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Mal Oreille was a planet with a surface that was ninety-seven percent covered by water. These seas were of a distinctive yellow colour owing to the peculiar algae that inhabited them.
There was some debate over the origin of the planet's name. Some thought it should be translated from the French as "earache" while others thought it derived from "mal or" — "bad gold". The thinking behind the latter explanation was that early settlers expected to find those yellow seas rich with gold deposits and were grievously disappointed on learning the real reason for their colouration.
A boarding school for children of Earth's military services, including Spacefleet, was maintained on the planet during the early 26th century.
Diverse lifeforms native to the planet shared the unusual ability to cover their tracks by creating watered-down duplicates of whatever they had recently ingested. (PROSE: Biology Lesson on Mal Oreille)
Behind the scenes
- The name Mal Oreille is a play on Malory Towers, the boarding school setting of several children's novels by Enid Blyton. Following their "dilution" by the native life, the children at Mal Oreille's school assume the distinctive speech patterns of Blyton characters.
- Both proposed derivations for the name are incorrect. French for "earache" is mal à l'oreille, while "bad gold" would be or mauvais.