Geosynchron

49th Heaven collapses within a generation. It

  reemerges to prominence a hundred years later as a

  sybaritic resort.

  66 First fully functioning multi technology comes into

  existence. Sheldon Surina, though not the technology's inventor, makes vast engineering improvements. Within a decade, multi projections are ubiquitous among the wealthy.

  70s- Inspired by the apparent success of 49th Heaven, a

  90s rash of orbital colonies are funded and colonized.

  Space mania brings new funding and energy to

  ongoing efforts to colonize Mars.

  180 Birth of Prengal Surina.

  103 Major national and corporate interests join together

  with the vestiges of ancient nation-states to form the

  Prime Committee. The Committee is mainly seen as a

  bureaucratic organization whose task is to ensure

  public order and prevent another Autonomous Revolt.

  107 The Prime Committee establishes the Defense and

  Wellness Council as a military and intelligence force.

  Its first high executive, Tul Jabbor, surprises the

  Prime Committee's corporate founders by expanding

  the Council's authority and in some cases turning on

  its sponsors (particularly OCHRE).

  108 Creed Objectivv is founded by a reclusive mystic

  figure known as the Bodhisattva.

  111 The Prime Committee undergoes a major effort to

  fund the development of multi technology throughout the system.

  113 OCHRE becomes a target of the Prime Committee,

  which seeks to end the company's stranglehold on

  nanotechnology.

  115 Dr. Plugenpatch agrees to special oversight and cooperation with the Defense and Wellness Council in order

  to avoid the same fate as OCHRE. The corporation

  becomes a hybrid governmental/private sector industry

  that forms the basis of medical treatment worldwide.

  116 Death of Sheldon Surina. To honor his memory,

  Surina's successors build the compound at Andra

  Pradesh and found Creed Surina.

  117 Tul Jabbor is assassinated. His killers are never found,

  but many suspect OCHRE. After a protracted legal

  battle, Henry Osterman dies under mysterious circumstances (some claim suicide). OCHRE battles over

  his successor for several years to come, then finally dissolves in 132.

  122 Prengal Surina publishes his universal law of physics.

  130s Major advances in hive birthing bring the technology

  to the public for the first time. A small minority that

  resists these advances begins emigrating to the Pacific

  Islands and Indonesia, where Luddites encourage isolation from the outside world. The remainder of the

  system comes to know them as Islanders. The Islander

  emigration continues for the next fifty years.

  143 High Executive Toradicus begins a campaign to bring

  the L-PRACGs under Defense and Wellness Council

  control. He enlists Prengal Surina to lobby the LPRACGs to construct a joint governmental framework with the Prime Committee. The Congress of LPRACGs is founded.

  146 The Islander Tolerance Act creates the Dogmatic

  Opposition.

  150s Teams working under Prengal Surina make startling

  advances in the control of gravity using maxims from

  the universal law of physics. Key members of these

  teams (including Prengal Surina) become the first

  board members of GravCo.

  153 Par Padron is appointed high executive of the Defense

  and Wellness Council. He is nicknamed "the people's

  high executive" because of his actions to rein in the

  business community.

  160s The business of multi technology booms. By decade's

  end, most connectibles live within an hour of a multi

  facility.

  162 Union Baseball adopts radical new rules to keep up

  with the times and to even the playing field among

  bio/logically enhanced players.

  168 Death of the Bodhisattva of Creed Objectivv.

  177 A coalition of business interests forms the Meme

  Cooperative to stave off the harsh populist reforms of

  Par Padron.

  185 Death of Prengal Surina.

  196 Libertarian rebels, funded and organized by the bio/

  logics industry titans, storm a handful of major cities

  in an attempt to overthrow the Prime Committee and

  the Defense and Wellness Council. Par Padron initiates martial law and puts down the disturbances.

  200 The bio/logics industry attempts to pack the Prime

  Committee with its appointees and paid lobbyists. Par

  Padron pushes through a resolution declaring that the

  people (via the Congress of L-PRACGs) will always

  hold the majority of seats on the Committee.

  209 Death of Par Padron.

  220s- A time of great economic and cultural stability world-

  230s wide, dubbed afterwards as the Golden Age. A resurgence in creedism results in the formation of the

  Creeds Coalition.

  247 Birth of Marcus Surina.

  250s Almost all infants outside of the Pharisee and Islander

  territories are born and raised in hives. Life expectancies rise dramatically.

  268 Creed Thassel is founded.

  270 The first fiefcorp is established, and rules governing its

  structure are encoded by the Meme Cooperative. Most

  people see fiefcorps as a boon to society, helping the

  underprivileged gain skills and putting them on a

  track to social empowerment.

  First successful tests of teleportation technology are

  conducted by a team that includes Marcus Surina. The

  IliT:';'"i

  present The Great Boom, a time of economic prosperity, is

  ushered in, fed by the new fiefcorp sector and the

  promise of teleportation technology.

  ment guide.

  Birth of Margaret Surina.

  Len Borda appointed high executive of the Defense

  and Wellness Council.

  Marcus Surina dies in a shuttle accident in the orbital

  **

  The Economic Plunge of the 3 1 Os, a time of economic

  stagnation. Len Borda keeps the system afloat largely

  through the use of Prime Committee ca[satal to fund

  research projects. Critics grumble about the return of

  the * and centralized authority.

  Rioting in Melbourne threatens the Prime Committee, but is put down by High Executive Borda.

  Creed Thassel is nearly disbanded after scandal caused

  by the drudge Sen Sivv Sor's expos6 on its membership

  practices.

  Birth of Natch.

  Warfare erupts between the Islanders and the Defense

  and Wellness Council. Although the official "war"

  lasts * a few years, unofficial skirmishes continue to

  present the

  339 Margaret Surina founds the Surina Perfection

  Memecorp, and the drudges begin to whisper about a

  mysterious "Phoenix Project."

  351 The world economy officially surpasses its previous

  peak, achieved in 313, before the death of Marcus

  Surina and the Economic Plunge.

  359 Natch demonstrates the power of MultiReal technology to the world in Andra Pradesh. The first infoquakes strike.

  360 Present Day.

  APPENDIX D

  ON THE

  ORBITAL COLONIES

  Ever since Neil Armstrong's first step on the moon in ancient times, humanity h
as sought to establish a permanent presence off the Earth. Despite the longevity of this dream, however, it's only in the past few hundred years that technological and economic factors have aligned to make it a reality. Yet even today, many observers doubt the offworld colonies' prospects for long-term survival in the face of a Terran global disaster.

  EARLY HISTORY OF THE ORBITAL COLONIES

  The first permanent human settlement in space, Yu, was commissioned and built by the Congressional China Assembly in years of antiquity. Named after the legendary founder of the first Chinese dynasty, Yu was seen by its contemporaries as a way to solve the pressing population problems of the day. The colony housed ten thousand people in a series of interlocking rings.

  Unfortunately, the colony's engineers made a crucial miscalculation by placing the reins of Yu in the hands of the thinking machines known as the Autonomous Minds. The sabotage and destruction of Yu by the Minds (and the colony's cataclysmic landing in the great ancient city of New York) triggered the Autonomous Revolt. The Revolt claimed billions of lives and put the prospect of offworld colonization on hold for many decades.

  Orbital colonization remained an unattainable dream until 61 YOR. It was in that year that Jesus Elijah Muhammad (the last of the fanatic religious prophets known as the Three Jesuses) commissioned the construction of 49th Heaven. The colony was intended to be a haven for the faithful seeking refuge from the extremism of the Pharisee Territories and the religious pogroms being executed by many of the remaining nation-states.

  Although 49th Heaven did not exactly succeed in the manner its founder had hoped (about which, see below), it proved that the construction of orbital colonies was technologically feasible and thus inspired a rash of other developers to follow suit. Over the next century, the prosperous colonies of Allowell, Patronell, and Nova Ceti were all established.

  LIFE IN AN ORBITAL COLONY

  Given all of the technologies that dominate modern life-teleportation, multi, SeeNaRee, OCHREs-life in most of the orbital colonies is not radically different from life on Earth, Luna, or Mars.

  The main differences have to do with the extremely high premium put on space and the reliance on the quasi-governmental agencies GravCo and OrbiCo. The science of gravity control is simply not mature enough to provide one hundred percent stability, resulting in the occasional fluctuation with comic (or disastrous) consequences. And OrbiCo interplanetary shipping, while a necessity, has long been called one of the most unreliable services in the history of humanity.

  MAJOR ORBITAL COLONIES

  The Prime Committee only officially recognizes orbital colonies that have been in continuous operation for ten years with a permanent population exceeding two hundred persons. By this standard, there are several dozen orbital colonies in the solar system, ranging from the prosperous city of Allowell to the small scientific outpost of Ducenzia out beyond Jupiter. The amount of small, unrecognized orbital colonies is thought to number in the thousands. While most of these colonies are clustered in orbit around Earth and Luna, there has been a rash of building lately in the asteroid belt.

  These are the major orbital colonies as of this writing:

  * 49th Heaven (founded 61 YOR) was built as a religious refuge by Jesus Elijah Muhammad. Muhammad's grand plan was eventually done in by the economics of the nascent hoverbird industry, which put the cost of travel out of the reach of religious pilgrims-but well within reach of the bio/logic scions looking to evade Terran law. By the mid 100s, 49th Heaven had become a sybaritic resort notorious for its gambling, sporting, and black coding cultures. Today the colony hosts approximately twenty thousand permanent residents and an uncountable number of tourists.

  * Allowell (founded 83) might have quickly descended into the same decay that awaited 49th Heaven if not for the leadership of military veteran Tul Jabbor (later the first high executive of the Defense and Wellness Council). Jabbor smoothed out Allowell's early engineering difficulties and set out a strict, conservative set of laws and regulations that has withstood the test of time. Today the colony boasts a quarter of a million inhabitants and a strong economy.

  * Furtoid (founded 293) was the first major orbital colony constructed in the asteroid belt beyond Mars. As such, the colony has been plagued with logistical, economical, and technological problems. Not helping matters is the fact that Furtoid is dependent on Terran supply shipments run by the everunreliable OrbiCo company. The colony, with its eight thousand permanent residents, is therefore a constant drain on governmental resources, and many politicians have won elected office by promising to shut it down. The colony's status as the most distant major human settlement has given rise to the phrase "from here to Furtoid."

  * Nova Ceti (founded 85), once the home of the great painter and sculptor Tope, has become a haven for artists (both real and selfproclaimed). Many a promising young painter or musician has packed up for Nova Ceti to make his fortune in the arts-and many have ended up living in lazy servitude to the wealthy patricians who run the colony. Nova Ceti is home to about 110,000 people.

  * Patronell (founded 147) orbits Luna and boasts around 130,000 citizens. While technologically stable, the colony has never been the most politically stable and has hosted a number of violent rebellions over the years. The current administrators of Patronell have been currying favor with the Defense and Wellness Council for half a century. As a result, the offices of the Meme Cooperative and several other minor central governmental organizations are located here.

  APPENDIX E

  ON THE ISLANDERS

  Founded by a group of dissidents known as the "Band of Twelve," the Islanders largely inhabit the archipelago once known as the Philippines and parts of the ancient nation-state of Indonesia. The nationstate called the Free Republic of the Pacific Islands maintains a skeptical position towards bio/logics and blocks many modern technologies that it considers dangerous or morally corrosive.

  HISTORY OF THE FREE REPUBLIC

  Though many unconnectible historians romanticized the achievements of the Band of Twelve in breaking away from the nascent centralized government, the reality was somewhat more prosaic.

  Of the dozen that made up the Band of Twelve, three were fugitives from what many considered to be politically motivated prison sentences for theft; five were wealthy tycoons who preferred to buy their own country rather than pay the exorbitant taxes their governments were charging them; and one was scheduled to go on trial for a brutal rape. While hiding out in the Pacific Islands, they combined their assets and bought out several of the impoverished local governments around Manila.

  But largely through the efforts of Tio Van Jarmack-a former political speechwriter who was the only one of the Band without any money of his own-the newly christened Free Republic became known as a bastion of independence and free thinking. Frightened and angered citizens around the world had been looking for a place to flee from the rapid change that bio/logics had wrought during the late first century YOR. Many fled into the already established Pharisee Territories or the newly minted orbital colonies, but the Islands attracted a largely Texan population of technological skeptics.

  The Free Republic of the Pacific Islands remained a haphazardly organized collection of independent estates and towns for nearly a generation. It was an ailing Van Jarmack who brought a sense of unity and purpose to the Islands in the early 140s, culminating in a treaty with High Executive Toradicus of the Defense and Wellness Council. Toradicus's Islander Tolerance Act of 146 created an official framework for enabling the Islanders' skepticism: the Dogmatic Opposition.

  From 146 to the present day, the Islanders have largely defined themselves as a Luddite culture opposed to the relentless advancement of bio/logic technology.

  THE DOGMATIC OPPOSITION

  The Islander Tolerance Act of 146 mandated that all bio/logic vendors and providers recognize and respect the Free Republic's right to ban their technologies. In the beginning, these so-called Dogmatic Oppositions were few in number and mostly revolved arou
nd broad technologies such as hive birthing. But by the mid 200s, the Islanders had developed an entire bureaucracy (the Technology Control Board) to study, test, and vote on technologies to be blocked. At the time of this writing, dozens of Dogmatic Oppositions are presented to the Prime Committee every day.

  Objections to bio/logic technology are required to be classified under one of three broad categories:

  * Moral Oppositions. Technologies that the Control Board opposes for primarily ethical reasons (example: hive gestation)

  * Practical Oppositions. Technologies that could cause undue harm to the Islanders because they are incapable of running them (example: multi technology, which the Islanders cannot run because they already do not run neural OCHREs)

  * Skeptical Oppositions. Technologies that the Control Board does not necessarily deem harmful, but require further study (example: telescopic programs)

  In many cases, it's not the technology itself but rather its implementation in the human body that's considered objectionable. For instance, the Islanders have no objection to the use of telescopic technology to allow superhuman sight; what they object to is the ability to run telescopic programs inside the eye such that people can easily be spied on without their knowledge.

  WARS WITH THE DEFENSE AND WELLNESS COUNCIL

  Enmity and distrust between the connectibles and the Islanders is by no means a new development, but such feelings rarely broke into violent conflict before the tenure of High Executive Len Borda.

  The Melbourne riots of 318 were a watershed moment for connectible-Islander relations. For the first time, the Free Republic took up arms against the centralized government in response to Borda's increasingly aggressive economic policies towards Manila. While the Islanders' role in the riots was minor compared to that of the libertarians, it opened a rift between the two cultures that has never fully healed.

  Relations between the two groups have since been characterized by increasing belligerence and a rapid acceleration of military spending. Border skirmishes have been constant, and for a few years in the mid- 330s the two parties even engaged in a full-scale war. High Executive Borda pushed through a measure requiring Islanders to wear the bulky and uncomfortable "connectible collars" that allow them to interact with the multi network when they are in connectible territory.