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PLAYER’S GUIDE · DRAFT

BOOK OF SHIPS

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3. Story setup — the CBU introduction

The reader's front door to the CATBLASTER Universe — the in-world voice of the 100:1 Shot crew briefing a just-extracted recruit (you). First-pass draft, authored by Alex; the canon lives in cb-cbu-introduction and is transcluded here.

There's no easy way to break this to you… The Earth you knew is gone… Has been for two thousand years. A rogue planet on a collision course just narrowly scraped into the atmosphere and made impact with the surface. To be honest it could have been a whole lot worse. The majority of predictions had your home planet liquifying on impact… Instead you got The Post-Earth Belt, a scattered archipelago of remnant Earth asteroids, and a space-faring civilization living on, in, and among them.

Humanity knew for nearly 100 years that the rogue planet was Earth-bound, but it took a long time for anyone to take it seriously. Of course, the only people who could do anything about it were the mega rich. The factions that made it into space only accounted for .4% of all of humanity. Today, those factions are broken into 9 Oligarch Houses that control all activity in the belt.

Leading up to the cataclysm, the forbearers of these Oligarch Houses bided their time and strategized about what resources they would need in space. They knew that only a tiny fraction of people would make it, so they planned accordingly.

House Bukhara, comprised of media, data, and surveillance oligarchs, devised a technology to back up the memories of all of humanity through a new social media platform. They poured all of their effort into making this platform the penultimate network of the 21st Century, and successfully digitized the memories of humanity.

House Pearson, comprised of healthcare, pharmaceutical, and genetics oligarchs, had the idea to create a sort of "seed bank" of DNA samples from every human being they could reach. They did so through a clever marketing ploy that allowed customers to access the cutting edge in longevity medicines by sharing a simple swab with Pearson Labs. It worked, and they were able to log the DNA of nearly every living soul on earth.

In the centuries after the Cataclysm, Pearson and Bukhara realized an opportunity to join forces, and harness their combined resources. Artificial Intelligence was the dominant technology of the 21st Century, but together, Pearson and Bukhara had the building blocks for something far more powerful: amalgamated species intelligence.

Together they built a virtual reality where the memories and DNA of Earth's denizens were reunited in a digital vault. The real human consciousnesses of 21st century humans were reconstituted in a simulation of the world they knew. To them, nothing was different, and each day was the same as it had always been on Earth.

This vault allowed House Pearson and House Bukhara to harness the combined cognitive capacity of humanity as one super computer… But it came with a great challenge. The capabilities of the computer were limited by the fidelity of the simulation. If the consciousnesses suffered any cognitive dissonance around the authenticity of their environment, the super computer lost efficiency.

Thus, the advent of the modern day Virtual Reality Architect. In order to optimize the simulation, VR Architects would need to make every sensory experience feel immersive and lifelike. If the digital consciousnesses could peacefully go about their routines in the simulation without any hiccups or sense of unease, the super computer would be unstoppable.

Of course, no one would want to grant these ethically untethered oligarch super powers such a tool. They would need a cover.

The Pearson-Bukhara Library was their solution. In the Oligarch District of the asteroid Colony Transient, they unveiled a modern-day Library of Alexandria, where visitors could meet with "AI Versions" of 21st Century humans, engage with them, and learn from them. All the skills and cultures that space faring civilization had thought long lost, were now resurrected and democratized.

No one would ever suspect the truth; these weren't AI versions at all. They were something new entirely, reconstituted from the memory and DNA of people who were very real.

But when you wield this super power, what could stand between you and the library archival of any soul?

House Pearson and House Bukhara know of no such obstacle.

But we got you out didn't we? Here you are in the flesh! Which… About that…

I guess first things first: we are the crew of the 100:1 Shot, a secret Orbital Station, and the home to the resistance.

We found your consciousness in the PBL Vault, and your stats were a match for the kind of operatives we need out here:

So we tracked your drives down, made you an offer you couldn't refuse, and re-meatsuited you back into base reality.

Right… Re-meatsuited…

If there's one rule out here, it's that space is dangerous. That's why we always back up our consciousnesses before we leave the 100:1 Shot. If anything should happen, we load our backup into a fresh meat suit. Bing Bang Boom! Good as new. You haven't had a meat suit in over 2000 years though! How does it feel?!

Here aboard the 100:1 Shot, you can always visit our Genetics Lab and dial in the specs of your meat suits. You're limited to whatever attributes you have access to, and of course the quantity and quality of meat suit goo you're harvesting…

That brings us to the next location: The Biome. Spacefaring Civilization is built on aquaponic lifecycle systems. We evolved out here thanks to closed-loop organic ecosystems that provide oxygen, process waste, feed us and more…

These tanks house a cornucopia of mutant aquatic flora and fauna, and those grow beds are lush with mutant vegetation. We've been harvesting and manipulating the DNA of earth species from the remnant earth bits out in the maw. These species you see here are dialed in to provide the ingredients for everything we need to thrive here in space.

You should know that the more horrifying a mutant predator in those tanks, the more robust a meat suit you can print from its blended up bits. The whole Post-Earth Belt runs on meat suit goo my friend!

What's the resistance you ask?

We just think there's a better way to live than the many being subjugated by the few. The oligarchs extract our skills, attention, energy, and resources to feed their bottomless desire for domination.

It's really hard to break free of that… But those of us here on the 100:1 Shot? We did it. And we think everyone should at least have the opportunity.

With 9 supremely powerful houses lording over everything, that's easier said than done though, so we pick our battles. Play the long game. Build resistance technology and infrastructure and focus on sustainability over growth.

The key is encoded communication. I don't need to explain that to you though. You're a music lover! You know all about the layers and layers of meaning encoded in songs.

At the core of this resistance is a mesh of artists laying down the message we broadcast to the belt. In your time, music was ubiquitous, but in ours it's contraband. These days the oligarchs know only the lore of its power, but it's enough for them to vanquish any hint of music.

It's a dangerous gig, but we know that stewarding the music is humanity's only shot at uniting the subjugated masses and slipping the suffocating grasp of these Oligarch Houses… and it's 100:1.

So here we are. The 100:1 Shot. The resistance. We have sleeper cells all over the post earth belt. Now that you're here, we could really use your help.

Linked canon: pearson-bukhara-library · the-100-1-shot · meatsuit-system-lore · cb-cataclysm-nine-perspectives · cb-oligarch-families · cb-opening-training-mission

‹ 2. Universe premise ✅CONTENTS4. Character roster ⚠️ ›