This cold, dark planetoid ends up being a strange world indeed. There is only a thin hydrogen atmosphere, almost vacuum, and the average temperature is some 30 K (-243 °C, -406 °F), where only hydrogen, helium, and neon are gaseous in state and nearly everything else is a solid. Yet on this icy, frozen world, life manages to thrive: the keracks, which are no bigger than a few centimeters in length resemble "large one-eyed prawns dressed in elaborate clothing". The keracks, despite their small size, have built rather small cities and developed a complex society on their planetoid which they dubbed "Ice". They have a collectivistic hive-like society with a rich culture suggesting that of England in the time of King Arthur.