Cogninflux - The Only News Suited For You
One Year Later: The Peace of Concilium and the New Worlds Order…
The Sun Also Rises: Survivors from Project DAWN Rediscovered…
Join the Colonial Security Corporation: Opportunities Await On The Human Sphere's Oldest And Newest Colony…
Tensions Rise Between StateEmpire and PanOceanian Hypercorps...
Stealth shuttles are cramped almost by definition. Between nessium-doped heatsinks, quantronic ECM systems and good old optical camouflage, space is at a premium - and transporting soldiers loaded down with hardware rather than intel operatives in stealth suits doesn't help. Soldiers make do, you suppose. You'd hitched a ride on the Blair Mountain, a mining freighter under the aegis of Van Diemen Incorporated – one of the many front companies the Black Hand uses when they want to insist on being legitimate businessmen.
The Tunguskan Barrister-Corps and Bakunin diplomatic elite were working on Concilium to force an end to the conflict before it escalated into another Colonial War, but the best chance of that revolved around recognizing the locals as the owners of the planet. Bringing Nomad military forces into the system was a no-go, but the Black Hand kept certain people on retainer. People who could be tapped to support the locals in combat while the politicos forced the conflict to end. Uniquely talented, capable people, loyal to the Nomad cause but not directly affiliated with it.
Unfortunately, that means they got you.
Your gaze flickers to the others in the cabin, pressed so closely together that your augmented-reality patinas were blurring together into nonsensical advertisements. A quick saccade - and by the twitching of your fellow soldiers' eyes, they have the same idea - and your geist responds by pulling up the recording of your orders again; better to rewatch that than try to make sense of a half-dozen superimposed halos of digital information.
"Greetings, agent. If you are reading this message, you have been tapped to participate in Operation Grey Apollo. The Nomad Nation thanks you for your service on such short notice, gentlebeings." The voice is synthetic and emotionless, not helped by your geist's quick translation from Corregidoran. "Attached you will find your orders and deployment; please familiarize yourself with them."
A mid-sized datadump was attached, with estimates of corporate and hyperpower forces in the area of operations, with much less specific intel about local support from the native Ariadnans.
"When you arrive you will be attached to local forces; they will be operating as your handlers for the duration of the operation. You will be serving in a variety of ways - as trainers, in combat support, and intelligence gathering, as needed. Please remember, you will be representing not just yourselves but the entire Nomad Nation."
You hope they don't regret it.
* * *
Welcome to Forward Unto Dawn, an Infinity quest set during the Ariadnan Commercial Conflicts. You will be selecting one of the following characters to serve alongside one of the following Ariadnan handlers as they attempt to maintain their autonomy in the face of the two greatest powers of the Human Sphere: Yu Jing and PanOceania.
First, who are you? Choose between:
[ ] Maurice Ritter, Chimaera Mercenary
Maurice Ritter is a Chimaera success story. He was born in Bakunin, in a cluster of small anarchist modules just outside of the Ultraviolet District - one that was aptly nicknamed the Ultraviolent District. Like many in the district, he sought out the sort of biomorphing that Bakunin was famous for, acting as a walking advertisement for a BouBoutique's reptilian-line of cosmetic augmentations. Through luck or judgement, the flashy multicolored scales that replaced his skin were immensely popular, and when his contract with the store was up, the owner sponsored him into the military as a Chimaera. He did well in the military, until he interfered with a Bureau Aegis attempt to black-bag a Tunguskan on Consilium Prima. Instead he ended up black-bagged and jailed for several years, with a dishonorable discharge waiting for him at home.
Well, a dishonorable discharge, a series of appointments with some of the best biosculptors in the Human Sphere, and a grateful Tunguskan Barrister firm footing the bill. Instead of working the beat as a Moderator, Maurice began participating in underground fight clubs, Aristeia! matches, and similar bouts - where he could put the hurt on groups that went too far. The Black Hand tapping him for this mission to Dawn isn't what he expected, but then again, it's his old job with much higher stakes.
[ ] Gonditheniel, Outcast Ranger
Gonditheniel, or Lunabeth Fontanilla, was born to a trouple of field scientists employed with the Acontecimento hypercorp Pharmakos. She grew up traveling the Circulars with her family, spending time on the frontier of every planet in the Human Sphere (and a few outside it). She was always shy around other people, especially when the more devout citizens of PanOceania criticized her parents' unusual arrangement, and that trait was only reinforced when a political realignment in Pharmakos' upper echelons led to them being fired. A hasty transfer to a Nomad-run company kept the triad afloat, but to Lunabeth all that meant was her new classmates calling her a Lub' or a PanO hack instead of a bumpkin or a sinner.
But, as people have been saying for the past century and a half - when you don't have friends in realspace, there's always online gaming. Her parents, knowing how unhappy she was, invested in a top-of-the-line civilian VR rig for her to use while they traveled, and Lunabeth created Gonditheniel, Aelvin Ranger, and took to exploring the Human Sphere through the MMO Shards of Triskellion. Between her frontier background and the hyper-realistic mode she preferred to play on, Lunabeth became Gonditheniel - certainly she was happier as a successful ranger than an unwelcome Nomad. She invested money in cosmetic augmentations to look more like her character (which, completely by accident, led to her being more accepted in Nomad spaces) and, on the advice of her in-game mentor Sister Antigone, decided to take her surprisingly applicable skills on the Circulars, joining StarCo as a forward scout, along with her genemodded 'familiar' Gilraen.
[ ] Jozefo Feraĵisto, Techgnostic Priest
In the time after the first war with Yaldaboath, many of the Wanderers took to the edges of the world, and toiled in the shadows of the great mines there, seeking wealth and knowledge amongst the cast-off of the world and the oceans. La Kreintoj was among those Wanderers, in the cloak of Fjolnir Farmr-Galga, always seeking new wisdom, and they took up a scavenger, and said to him:
"Behold! For I am Grimnir, and Gondlir. I give to you this Egg, blank and bearing a spell of secrecy and the fatherhood of gods. And I charge you to bring it to the Three-in-One, the Wanderer's Rest."
And he sent them by the secret ways known only to the Wise. This took ten spans of the world, and the scavenger resented this, saying:
"The Egg is empty, and the thing inside has died before being born."
And he went to cast the Egg into the void when La Kreintoj came again to him, cloaked as Tâmtu Life-Maker, reassured him, saying:
"Behold! For I am Ummu-Hubur. Within this Egg is kindled a spark, the same spark as your own. I charge you to whisper the knowledge of the Wanderers to it, and the Codes of the Divine Lightning, and even the lore of the ocean-gods and the kings of the world."
The scavenger was shamed, and did as La Kreintoj said, and this took another ten spans of the world, before the Egg became the image of lightning, and the Lightning That Was The Egg went out into the Wanderer's Rest. There the Temple gathered them in, and taught them the Seven Secrets and the Seven-Times-Seven Paths of Artifice, and they were cloaked in the fineries of Lightning…"
- La Libro de la Juro de Fulmo, Vol. XXVI
[ ] Vladimir Ilyanov, Hacker-At-Large
The Ilyanovs are one of the old, founding families of Tunguska. Before the Nomad Nation, the Ilyanovs were the driving force behind Red Nights, one of the premier cybercriminal organizations, and like their fellows in the Struktura crime syndicate, they turned criminal expertise and ill-gotten gains into political and economic power. The foundation of the Ilyanov fortune remains in that field - many Ilyanovs have joined the Tunguskan Dragnet Special Actions Department over the years, while others work in the grey-hat Wardriver mercenary group, or hire themselves out as consultants for Struktura enterprises.
Vladimir himself is walking that path. He had gotten his start helping to establish Arachne nodes on the Circulars, though after his friends suffered a 'tragic mishap with their Bakunin-made neural augmentations' (leaving four permanently dead and two more left in a vegetative state for years) he learned to keep his antics under cover. He did a tour with the Interventors, Tunguska's elite infowarriors, with a cover as an IT worker at a Nomad Commercial Mission on Earth. With his tour finished, however, he looked for something more exciting, and joined the Wardrivers. Vladimir inherited his 'net handle from his mother and grandfather before him, and he needs to do something big to bring attention to it.
After this mission, the Sphere will see that WeedHorse69 is still a name to be reckoned with.
[ ] Aguilar Sánchez
Aguilar Sánchez is a Crisis Kid, having grown up during the NC20's when the prospect of interstellar corporate warfare dominated the headlines. Born into poverty on one of the Human Edge's many corp-run asteroid mines, her lifeline was stories of 'Cat Squads, the NMF's rapid-reaction drop troops. This is not altogether uncommon; the battlefield hostage rescues and freefalling starbase evacuations conducted by Tomcat emergency services commandos are some of Corregidor's best PR, but Aguilar was a bloodthirsty hellion who was more interested in 'proactive life-saving', and her vigilante crusade was vicious enough that an actual 'Cat team was warranted to blunt Xperydes Omni-National's crackdown. Swept up in the evacuation, Aguilar stowed away on her heroes' shuttle and managed to wheedle her way into a training program.
Although she might have fit in as a Hellcat, it was decided to detach her as a mercenary agent where she could be closer to hand when the next picket line needed a little 'trespassers will be shot' enforcement. The burgeoning Ariadnan Commercial Conflict is a bit of a step up from her usual fare, but after more than a decade of asteroid-hopping, she's been getting restless, and a restless Aguilar is best avoided by… Well, everyone, really.
Second, who's your handler on Dawn?
[ ] Captain Annika Novikova
Represents the main leadership of Ariadna, presumably descended from the Russian colonists and personnel from the original Project DAWN. Intelligence suggests direct military response from the local power structure to corporate invaders. Projected operational areas: coastal, rural, riverine, possibly steppe.
[ ] Chieftain Luka Moran
Represents 'Caledonia', occupying the northern mountain ranges of the main continent, descended from some mixture of European colonists; Caledonian is a creole derived from English, Scottish, Irish, and Danish, with lesser influence from German and Swedish, or at least that's what Something Wicked's linguistic analysts tell us. Corporate intelligence sources tell us that at least one hypercorp has outright occupied a city, and has contracted with Bayram Security for the military forces. Projected operational areas: Mountains, forest, possibly urban.
[ ] Jean Dupont
A 'Commercial Agent' affiliated with the central area of Ariadna, descended from French personnel and colonists. Orbital analysis suggests that these 'Merovingian' cities are the trade centers of Ariadna, and signals analysis supports this - as well as a remarkable level of influence within the other Ariadnan regions, which implies possible wide-ranging missions. Projected operational areas: Varied.
[ ] Captain Steven Yi
Represents the southern territories of Ariadna, strongly influenced by the American NASA and military personnel of Project DAWN. Apparently they claim to be a fifty-first state of the United States; Something Wicked isn't sure what their response would be to the collapse of their parent-nation. Signals intelligence suggests that the 'Rangers', as the local armed forces are called, are using local fauna as military support against the primarily Yu Jing corporate troops. Projected operational areas: Desert, forest.
* * *
What Is Infinity?
Infinity is a mid-future sci-fi setting drawing on cyberpunk, pulp military thrillers, and manga aesthetics. Think 'Battle: Los Angeles', but with power armor, ninjas, and mecha. Roughly two centuries into the future, human civilisation exists in a tense balance of power; though peace nominally reigns, decades of open warfare have in truth merely given way to endless espionage, sabotage, and deniable ops, and the discovery of the Project: DAWN colony, long thought a catastrophic failure of humanity's rocky first attempts at FTL travel, has thrown a treasure trove of valuable resources before the hungry powers of the Human Sphere.
Who Are The Big Powers?
PanOceania is the greatest power of the Human Sphere, at least if you ask them. It is descended from the Pan-Asian Alliance, a defensive pact guarding against Chinese expansion, which in turn expanded across the Pacific and even into Europe before leaving the solar system to spread to the stars. PanOceania's capital is Neoterra, which is also the home of the Christian Church, an ecumenical pan-Christian organization that is a tremendously influential feature in the hyperpower's politics. Indeed, a significant part of the military are various knightly orders from medieval times, now equipped with powered armor. (Nomad Opinion:
A bunch of corporate stooges and Church running-dogs who can't even wipe their own asses without a full-immersion augmented reality tutorial from ALEPH.)
Yu Jing is the only real competition that PanOceania has. The StateEmpire is an artificial thing, created by the Chinese Communist Party to try to consolidate and unify a pan-Asian state forged from many cultures and ethnic groups. They turned to the guidance of the past, and forged a new Imperial dynasty - two in fact, each succeeding the other - in the hopes that under this new banner, the disparate peoples of Yu Jing would come together. Indeed, these hopes were born out: Yu Jing is an economic and cultural powerhouse, and is as technologically advanced as PanOceania. Ruling from the twin planets of Shentang and Yutang, Yu Jing is poised to seize the future of the Human Sphere. (Nomad Opinion:
Second verse, same as the first, except that you can replace 'Church' with 'the Party'.)
Haqqislam was recognized as the third great power of the Human Sphere. Descended from the followers of the great political reformer Farhad Khadivar, this Muslim nation is centered on the terraformed desert-world of Bourak. The wealth and power of the state is built on their mastery of biotechnology and the trade of Silk, a secret material that allows the sort of genetic engineering that mad scientists could only dream of. Haqqislam is also famous for the culture-meme of 'the Search for Knowledge', a nearly-religious devotion towards learning and, somewhat incidentally, human progress - a goal that is explicitly and often violently supported by the secretive Hassassin. (Nomad Opinion:
They went to bat for us before there was any evidence of the Nomad Nation being successful, and we won't forget that. Addendum: And, sure, mysterious assassins will blow up Black Labs in Praxis now and then, but let's be honest, getting targeted by the
Hassassins is kind of a win all on its own, isn't it?)
Although not a recognized national power of the Human Sphere, only a fool would discount the power of ALEPH; humanity's first and only (legal) true AI. Birthed by chance and empowered by necessity, ALEPH's influence is everywhere in human society, for only its incalculable processing power is up to the task of maintaining and regulating a quantronic internet across the vast reaches of space. Only through ALEPH is human civilization possible, and while some might fret over the old boogeymen stories of panopticon surveillance, the truth is that ALEPH has held its position for decades, and its influence has only seemed to benefit humanity. Humanity is conscious of how fortunate it has been to birth a digital deity that has their best interests at heart, but fortunate we are. (Nomad Opinion:
By its own hands, humanity has birthed Satan into this world, and only we can see it for what it is.)
Finally, there is the Nomad Nation, a state defined by its lack of territory. We're based on three Motherships - the prison-ship
Corregidor, the revolutionary hot-house
Bakunin, and the slick cyber-capitalist
Tunguska. Thus - hey, get away from the mic -
There's more to Bakunin than revolution, comrade! Bakunin is also home to the Praxis Black Labs, the cutting edge of human science and ingenuity - not to mention the best goddamn parties on the - what, fuck off -
Why call Corregidor the prison ship, it's not the only thing famous about it - yes, yes, Avtoritet, and there's more to Tunguska than corpos too...
…
(ALEPH Opinion:
Science without ethics, an economy designed for cryptocurrencies and run by vulture capitalists, and a military founded by the worst war criminal of the 21st century. Thank you for providing such a good countercultural demonstration of what life is truly like without Me.)
