>>intercepting broadcast...
>>masking source...
>>executing cloak_proto_01...
>>running...
Welcome one and all to yet another pirated broadcast with the intent of teaching you, and showing you the things the corps don't want you to see, by telling you the stories that the corps would rather see buried. Folks, there is a lot to be learned from our own past and I am one of the few in the Sol System who is absolutely convinced that life overall would be better if we hadn't willingly given corps complete rule over our very own existences, and I will tell you one of those stories tonight. This is Doc Mitnik with The Transmission, and it's story time once again.
So folks, you know that sometime in the 2130's, there was a mass exodus from Earth, the world was done, the AI's were running wild and were out of control, and even our most effective weapons were turned against us. The official history will tell you that we heroically ran away from trouble and we found safety and shelter in the Floating Cities, Space Stations, and well, Luna Colony. Except that's not exactly how it happened at all. You see, we hear the term Space Station and we immediately think of a massive environment that houses tens of thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands of people, Floating Cities can host millions too, but at the end of the 2130's that wasn't exactly the case. There were millions of people fleeing from Earth. They were scared, desperate, and they had just lost everything they had, and they didn't even have an idea of what to do, or where to go, turns out that they should have worried whether they would be turned away like a diseased vagrant on the streets, or actually welcomed as family. Obviously, the politicians and their teams from both the CPN and the UN were the first to leave the planet and therefore, the first to secure a place for themselves. The problem with that is that most of the Floating Cities, Space Stations, and anything you can imagine that would normally host thousands of souls? Those things weren't as big, or capable, or technologically adequate as the structures we know today. The largest Floating City was only as large as a Sector from Cocoon Station, and if they housed a thousand people at any given time, they were huge. Not to mention, they weren't adequately equipped with life support systems and supplies, especially not for a sudden surge of millions of people roaming space. This was a dark time where entire fleets would be turned down and sent away, and in very drastic instances, some of these ships would be fired upon and destroyed. Knowing ahead of these issues, the survivors from the CPN and the UN wasted no time and made the longer trip to what was then known as Earth Observation Post And Supply Facility #17: Mare Nubium, and they started all kinds of works that would turn the rarely used facility into what would eventually become Luna Colony.
You see, back then, these people thought that neither the CPN nor the UN were done, that they could always rebuild and continue existing as they did before. But without Earth, or nations for that matter, how would one justify one organization or the other? And just like one twisted cliché from those action holovids, the survivors of both sides started to realize that they weren't so different from one another after all, and they decided that while the UN and the CPN were both dead and gone, there was no reason for them to work together to create something new, something bigger, better, something that would guide humanity on this brave new world of theirs, and they started by turning Facility #17 into the first of many planned capital cities in the Sol System, and considering that the facility was set in Mare Nubium, a region with room for expansion, it wouldn't be too long before they started to not only use all resources to expand the facility, but to broadcast its location as a beacon of hope for those who had been turned away from other locations, the Moon was now the ideal symbol to signal the rebirth of mankind.
By the 2150's, the Facility had been greatly expanded both vertically and horizontally, jobs were being advertised in a such a way that the first commercial routes between the Moon and the Floating Cities, as well as Space Stations were established. And as the Moon became more and more important, more eyes were set on it. Before the century ended, the Moon issued the first Citizenship in the Sol System, and it was then where the terms Luna and Lunite were coined for the first time. Lunites were working together towards a bright new future, and they would eventually look at electing a ruling body.
On one hand, humanity still had fresh wounds from the destruction of Earth which was responsibility of an outdated form of conflict: One council versus another council, so they decided that a Governor, a figure that would control a council or cabinet and put it to work most efficiently was the way to go. And why not? Luna was doing well, but they could always do better, and in 2204 the first Lunite Governor was elected: Rufus Armstrong, a man who had started as a supervisor on the loading docks of Facility #17, and the last Union Leader ever to exist, as the remnants of both the CPN and the UN were slowly consolidating themselves into New Geneva. Unions would soon be a thing of the past, the same can be said about laws that use to tell people that before they were corposlaves, they were humans. Rufus Armstrong started his six year administration with the best of intentions: Making life easier and better for those who had worked the most to make Luna Colony take off, and even made plans to welcome refugees who were still roaming the cosmos looking for a permanent home. But like almost anything that starts with good intentions, this was not meant to last.
Two years into his administration, Armstrong saw the full scope of his power as Governor, he could make organizations or break them, he could make lives better or ruin them completely, but most importantly, he could become obscenely rich if he gave certain interested parties some advantages over others, or better yet, if he put his influence up to the highest bidder. Suddenly, most of his cabinet and council were replaced by representatives of other interests, ready to throw money at him in exchange of favors. Soon, word of Luna Colony being open to capital investments spread throughout the Sol System, and the elites set course to Luna Colony. The colony changed too, and it soon reflected its status as the best place to invest in the system: Exclusive restaurants, platinum hotels, high end nightclubs, and despite the initial limitations he himself set on habitation units, massive palaces and apartments were built for the right families for the right price. There was just one problem for the Governor: The refugees, the displaced, and the homeless he had previously accepted into Luna Colony. They were a scar on the face of the Moon, and according to his cabinet, they had to go. Either willingly or by force. Rufus Armstrong was convinced that this was on behalf of progress and for the better. Luna Colony had changed, had become the capital city of the Sol System, and he had the interests of his citizens to watch over, even if he was about to do something unspeakable against the less discerning citizens of his bright capital city.
2207 was the darkest year in Luna Colony that corpos would love to have you forget, Governor Rufus Armstrong signed the "Solution To Homelessness" Act, in which he had the security forces of Luna Colony move against the homeless, the displaced, and refugees, had them all stripped of their Luna Citizenships, had what little possessions and resources they had seized, and had them all ejected from Luna Colony. Thousands of homeless would be removed (most of the times forcefully) from the colony, the Transport Terminals were full with people waiting to be deported elsewhere. However, the process was taking too long, and the saturation of the Transport Terminals by undesirables was unsightly, and so, his cabinet convinced him that as the people didn't have Citizenship anymore, they didn't have any rights, and if they didn't have any rights, they were no different from undesirable cargo that would get ejected into the cold space to make room in the warehouses, by January of 2208, Governor Armstrong signed the "New Life" Act, in which thousands of homeless, refugees, and displaced were forcefully ejected via spacing, making room for the elite that would elevate Luna to the most exclusive habitat in the history of the Sol System. To this day, people claim you can still find some of the spaced bodies floating around, forever roaming the cosmos looking for a new home, like they did a few centuries ago.
Luna Colony would continue to grow, New Geneva would eventually get enough resources through their business interests in Luna Colony to build their own facility, and they would move to the space station of the same name, exercising ultimate control over any and all corporate organizations in the Sol System, with every credit to be made eventually making a stop in Luna Colony.
And there you have it, folks, the pristine streets, the bright lights, the elite society, the ridiculously priced restaurants, and the extremely luxurious hotels. All that you see whenever you go to Luna Colony is built over thousands of bodies that were unceremoniously and mercilessly spaced to make room for progress, and greed. Truly people like Bancroft and now, Russell, are not the worst things ever to happen to Luna Colony, but believe me, they aren't the best either, and with this, I hope you have learned a bit more on what many corpos aspire to become. It is a very dark story, but it's the kind of story that we shouldn't forget, so we never forget just how far some people will go for money and power, or what they perceive as money and power. They say there's a wind of change blowing on Luna Colony these days, and it may be true, but it could also mean that things will get even worse moving forward, I suppose time will tell folks.
And that's my cue for leave for the night, hope you enjoyed the story, and I hope you get to hear one more story on the next iteration of The Transmission, this has been Doc Mitnik, and I'll leave you with tonight's musical selection.
(("The Transmission" is meant to be seen as both an OOC archive of the lore, with a spin on interpretation, and it's also meant to be seen as an intermittent IC intrusion of PublicNET devices, it overall serves the purpose of counter to ONN/Corporate points of view and information, players are more than welcome to use or reference "The Transmission" on any way that may complement their stories.))
