Quote:The bells are ringing again.I'm pleased to report the success of the MS-04 live test.
Everything started in 2060, with the first Corporate Territory Act. Seems the politicians thought they could attract businesses if they just gave them more power. It worked... for a time.
Businesses flocked there in droves, bringing with them wealth and jobs. Some called it an economic boom. Others called it a new Renaissance.
The smart ones called it the beginning of the end.
At the time, you couldn't really see it. Business was good. Science was better.
With the engine of commerce behind it, technology soared to heights only dreamed of before. The corporate think-tanks and research labs turned out innovation after innovation, year after year, each one greater and more impressive than the last. It was a time of optimism- a time of possibility.
...a time of endless ambition.
Under the CTA, the corporations had prospered- but the CTA had limits. The governments that passed them... the politicians that ran the governments... were hungry for more wealth, more power. The CEOs who lived under them wanted more land, more customers. They weren't so different, really.
Everybody has their theories on who fired the first shots. The megacorps will tell you that the politicians launched raids, trying to seize everything. Propaganda, if you ask me. If you can find a nationalist, they'll tell you the megacorps crossed the borders first... fired the first shots. Nobody really knows, anymore.
We all know what happened, though. Big Business beat Big Government. The corporations expanded, became megacorps- and the old nations diminished.
This wasn't the end- not yet, anyway. Still, you could see it from there.
The megacorps quickly found that Earth was too small for them. Resources were running low. Space- space to live... space to work... was at a premium. Something had to be done.
The first colony bunch at Side 1 was seen as a triumph- for the megacorp that constructed it, for the concept of space colonization, and for humanity as a whole. 'January 1st, 2101 was the day when Man freed itself from the shackles of Earth- the start of the First Universal Century', they all say. Gran heard the bells then.
The next sixty years lived up to the hype. Everybody- corporations, nations, even a few private investors- had their eyes on the stars. Sides began to pop up all across the Earth Sphere, as they called it, and the people followed. By 2160, Earth was down to two billion of us, and starting to recover. Will it last? Prop says yes. Most honest people say no.
Megacorps fight. Fact of life. Corporate war was a thing well before the "Liberation"; after it, it was literal... and bloody. Most of the time, the wars run cold- a little hacking here, a kidnapping there, and espionage everywhere. Sometimes they go warm.
People die. Things explode. If you're lucky, you're not one of them.
The vids talk about 'colonial defense forces', or 'corporate security', or 'private police organizations' all the time. They never call them what they are- private armies. Every 'corp has one- but they don't get used. Catch an Anaheim soldier in a Zimmad bunch? The whole Sphere'd go to war.
When businesses go to war, war becomes a business.
If the 'corps couldn't hit each other, they'd get somebody else to do it for them. So they hired mercs. Private soldiers, not tied to any one company. Deniable assets.
Top of the group are the shadowrunners. Some call them an urban legend. I know better. Sister saw a group of toughs break into a VersaLife embassy one night, when we were kids. Slipped through the security like it wasn't even there. In, out, and gone. Mom heard the bells that night.
For the right creds, 'runners will break into anyplace. Steal a prototype? Sure. Blow it up instead? Why not? Trash some files? Of course.
Change is coming. I can hear it, like flashes of ringing bells.
Sibs and I are going to Side 3. Johnson wants some data from a Zeonic testing grounds. Everybody but the testing team has the night off. Get in, get some blueprints, get out. Supposed to be an easy job.
Too easy, almost. If it's worth stealing, it's worth guarding. If it's worth guarding, it's worth guarding well. What are we after?
I get the feeling it's something big.
Intelligence is still going over the effects of the two surviving infiltrators. So far, we've only managed to decrypt this one file (attached, above). No news on the identity of this particular fixer (Codename: "Mr. Johnson"), but I'm sure we'll track him down soon.
Recommend Infiltrator 24601 be transferred to F. Inst., Lab NT-03MS for evaluation.
Your Obdt. Servant,Oberleutnant Roger Schmidt, Zeonic Intelligence
October 16, 2174
(Elaboration later. Reactions first. This is a side project, after all- it only gets so much mindwidth.)
My Unitarian Jihad Name is: Brother Atom Bomb of Courteous Debate. Get yours.
I've been writing a bit.