Andreyich

[1v1][T1] Anyone want to beat on/humiliate a cute girl?

A year old but still hilarious

Eden(Small-scale Space NRP)

The CCN

Music



Shortly after the battle of Uracao

The Captain and the Sergeant were walking down the hall, one just too long to be considered efficient by the cold mentality of Neohumans. But it was a very old one, a place made by a now unsupported version of Neohumanity. It was lined with hundreds of the National Guard, the air around the blades of their lashalberds distorted by the superheating of the blades and shimmering by the power fields surrounding them.

"So you think it's something serious?"

"Wouldn't have called us all the way here if it wasn't."

"Right. Any idea what for?"

"Nope." the words were followed by the Sergeant launching a globe of spit on the ground, prompting the Guards to bring their halberds to Kjaro's throat. "Bloody hell calm down the bots will clean it!" he exclaimed, raising his hands. After a tense moment, the soldiers backed off.

"I take it you haven't been back home for an extended period in a while."

"Nope. Soldier's life for me."

"I can tell."

"Heh."

They reached the grand gate, which after a few seconds of the two men being scanned was opened. A man sat in a chair, a blazing cigarette in one hand as he stared at the sun of the Sol system. "Captain Tarau, how good of you to come!" the figure said, without a hint of irony given he was ordered to do so.

"...oh, and Oleksandr Kjaro. Captain Tarau's aide I take it mmmyes, what rank are you at now?"

"Sergeant, Sah!" Kjaro exclaimed, slamming a fist on his breast in salute. Victor couldn't tell if it was all a sarcastic display or a legitimate attempt to get in the good graces of

"Yes, indeed, very good. Well I'll get to it I suppose, I didn't prepare any mind games for you so I won't waste time trying to improvise. Events have lined up, such that I shall be leading a flagship to the frontier. They say I've gotten too invested in the theoreticals of war. Too cushioned in the home system."

"I can see that." the Sergeant said, giggling at the more suit than uniform attire of the man sitting in the chair, Admiral Andrej Kessler.

"Your concern is duly noted Sergeant.

“Regardless, other things have been happening in Eden my comrades. Duro has been invaded by Orleans, and the attention of the cluster’s media is upon it. There are many experimental weapons we have to test, and the frontier has a system ripe for the taking — the Nyrene star. The worlds have an untapped source of natural resources, and a grand population for us to utilize. Most interesting perhaps, is the apparent fact the locals have the use of some old-Earth terraforming and gravitational technology, allowing their massive planets with previously vile environments to become paradises far, far faster than even we could do with our Neohuman nature. Oh, and there’s certain… interlopers that have to be punished.”

Both the Sergeant and the Captain understood what the last bit meant, Oleksandr in particular grinning upon hearing this. Victor was less enthusiastic, screens of information rolling through his vision.

“What can we expect from this world.”

“Not too much. It’s a frontier world. Good infrastructure and communications, our biggest threat. Their arms and armour are just up to par for the frontier. There's also a species native to the system, the Nyrene. They're all psychics, though few of them are of any power, in fact a smaller fraction than in humans. Amassed though they have some potential. Attunement with the planet and all, along with each other, some similarity with the Aelon. They are to be deleted." one hologram flashed into existence, and then another.

"Understood. Intelligence?"

"Extensive work has been done by the infiltrators. Piracy and corruption are rife, there is little confidence in the president. Seeds of racial tension have been planted, locations of military installations and places of governance will he relayed to you. The homes of most of the Nyrene xenos have been found. It seems PDF, police, gendarmes, army, and other local defence personnel will outnumber ours more than six hundred to one. But if all goes to plan, a mere percent of that force will mobilize and only a percent of that mobilized force will get to combat before being ordered to stand down. Agents are ready to troll, disrupt and sway any interstellar social media on our favour. Its a very clear and positive picture."

"Understood. Post Operations?"

"Until the Uskoks arrive you will have to do their work. We expect some initial riots, protests. The chaos will be a good opportunity to rid ourselves of journalists and such. Of course we'll have to cover what the outdated will find 'objectionable'. Of course we'll have to feign an exit from the system, lie in wait for our little friends."

"Thank you Admiral. What shall you be bringing?"

"A cube. A very large one. Many cones too, get their defences done with quickly and silently. Some cylinders will come along should resistance be truly heroic. A Reislaufer Legion in its entirety will land, with another one in reserve. I will trust you to lead planetside operations of course, I hope I shan't have to intervene."

"Worry not, Admiral. I was given a more than acceptable rating for my first Captaincy, I will only be better in the next."

"Yes, of course." Kessler said, looking to Kjaro. "Very well, we depart in nineteen hours."

A salute was exchanged, and the duo marched off to their vessel.

---

Some time later.

---

Out of the jump gate the fleet exited. First came the cones, gently sailing through the void across the system. Their stealth systems activated to let them happily get into position, timed perfectly with the arrival of The Varangian and Kessler's ship Sikorski. As they drifted to Nyrene Terius, the cylinders followed already spinning in preparation of combat. The cones instantly unleashed drone swarms to attack the system monitors and localized defences. Nobody was killed, in fact, but ships had scanners, engines and comms sundered by little flying machines, whilst weapons had smaller drones fly inside them so that any attempt to blindly fire would be only catastrophic for only those doing the firing. A few more advanced vessels had their crews or at the very least Captains paid off, and one foreign trade ship had a great net fired at it. For a day or so it wouldn't be functional, and when it was cut off it would be too late to learn anything of the events that happened. But of course, for its trouble it would receive suitable restitution!

The two main vessels of the CCN came into orbit, and they tested their first experimental. Drop pods were novel to the Confederation, but upon seeing other armed forces use them it became obvious just how useful they were. Troop landers that carried very few men and couldn't get back to surface, but reached the ground so fast there was little warning of them, and little chance to shoot them down. They hit the ground in key areas. Every single generator and power grid controller, magrails, defence installations, comm towers, local house of governance and armouries all got at least one drop pod.

Giants emerged from them, nearly two and a half metre tall vessels of perfection armed with weapons the locals couldn't fathom. One power grid control centre had a guard raise a rifle, but was promptly frozen with a cryocannon. Quick firefights erupted at the armouries, but only a token resistance was put up with arc rifles swiftly subduing the security of them. The batteries had actual soldiers manning them, and proved harder. Lasers bullets and grenades zinged, and as the battles dragged on long enough to arouse the attention of more people - particularly those with guns - radcannons were made us of, their brutality a rarely reserved thing that in this rare case was quickly let loose despite all attempts to use more traditional weapons first.

With that done sleeper cells were activated, social media inflamed, and a good start on people's hearts and minds was made. All was carefully orchestrated to make this seem like an intervention against a corrupt government that was harbouring pirates – yes, pirates!

Victor himself landed in a drop-pod shortly after in the parliament, with Sergeant Kjaro landing in the district of embassies with several platoons. The Sergeant's men fanned out, quickly announcing martial law. Large devices were placed in the streets that initially looked like boxes but unfolded to be some sort of antennae?

"Everyone inside! You have thirty seconds to comply!"

"What? What the fu-... Hey get your hands off of me, do you know who I am?"

"Scanners indicate your name is John Hurley. Impertinent. You have nineteen seconds to comply, please enter the grounds of one of the embassies."

"You have no right to do this shit you hear me?"

"Ten."

"Listen to me you piece of shit I paid good money to visit and… Why are you covering your face hey loo-... W… AAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!"

The men exclaimed, clutching his head as the device finished unfolding and let out a vile sound, fluctuating between the highest and the lowest pitches possible for it to produce at a volume that clearly hurt the man. His eyeballs, blood vessels, and organs all ruptured as one before he collapsed, ichor sprayed on the Reislaufer shielding his visor from the liquid.

Victor entered the parliamentary Palace with but six Legionnaires at either side, all in armour dressed to look fabulous as if on parade, but just as good in combat. One of the security personnel tried to radio in, the other to shoot. Both fell with a smoking crater in their chest before they could touch a tool of trade. A guard inside that witnessed what happened dropped to his knees, to which he was told "Rise. Report anyone coming here from outside across your internal system."

And thus, very boldly the thirteen Neohumans strode into parliament. Every single Nyreeni was gunned down, along with the guards that reached for their weapons and the President.

"Does anybody have a problem with what just happened?" Demanded a Legionnaire. A few people rose or raised their hands, and they were gunned down too. The speaker jumped on the table of the dead president, spreading his arms wide majestically. He was about to make a great statement, but under his weight the table collapsed and he fell arse first. Neohumans were cold beings half machine, but each of them present burst out laughing save for Captain Tarau who hushed them into silence. He kicked the president off of his chair and after making sure it could hold his weight, he sat down on it with legs crossed comfortably.

"Good afternoon, gentlemen. I'm a soldier and an orator - the union of which makes me a commander - but I am not too much of a politician. It is therefore an excellent thing I have orders from someone with such an education. Your world now works for the interests of the Councillary Confederation of Neohumanity. Your world will become noticeably more efficient, you will receive resources, data, and technology from the CCN. You will be independent, of course! Your own pockets will be further lined, even if you happen to be a person of the sort with no care for your underlings. You will amend your constitution to be of interest to us, we will be a… protected group, let us call it. Your monitors should display the full extent of what you agree to. Any questions?"

The members of parliament all looked at their screens, reading carefully. About an hour passed until one raised his voice.

"The Nyreeni died to a disease brought from a vessel, possibly from the CCN? I'm a pragmatic man I can regurgitate the bullshit to save some hides but you're just killing all these people? That's… T-that's fucking madness! You can't stand for this I-" a Legionnaire's laser bolt brought an end to the speaker.

Victor shuddered and winced, wholly new thoughts coming across him. "Sign this, then gather with me, a recording for Eden's media will be made. Oh don't look so glum, you'll be pocketing money from new paymasters, but the same amount. More actually, so that you don't have to take it from your people!" The parliamentarians did as told, signing and then standing photogenically by the Neohumans. Even though a few steps higher, they were still noticeably shorter than the Confederates.

A drone flew inside the parliament, its camera focusing upon Victor. He looked like a God, and with the perfection both physical and aesthetic so visible in him he may as well have been. Perfect unblemished skin, sculpted features, alert eyes, a warm smile, welcoming dark brown eyes contrasting with his pale Northerner skin, green laurels with a faint golden sheen rested upon his black hair.

"I greet you dear viewer. No doubt you have by now heard of irregularities coming from the Nyrene star, so I will do my best to explain what happened. The worlds of this system have been long partners of the Councillary Confederation of Neohumanity, our trade vessels being one of the first to make contact upon locals establishing a jump gate. We eagerly welcomed them into the international community but it seemed good news wasn't the only thing to come of Nyrene's entry to greater Eden. The system became a hot spot of pirate activity and other criminality, but corruption insured that nothing was done in the long term to combat it. Recently this reached a critical point. The officials of Nyrene invited a Reislaufer Legion to intervene, and oust President Reynolds from his post lest he make Nyrene a pirate state. A contract was made with a Reislaufer Legion, who dealt very quickly with the bought and paid for forces of the late President. At the time of our arrival - perhaps from our vessels - a viral infection spread. It does nothing more than elicit a cough in humans but in the Nyreeni natives it provoked a fatal reaction. It spread like wildfire before our Scientific Corps could react. The disease will be analyzed, and a research paper published on it for Eden at large to review free of charge so such events would not repeat. Peace has been restored to Nyrene, and prosperity will follow. Without the threat of piraxy it is predicted Nyrene productivity will go up fifty-two percent and growth of GDP will rise to eleven percent; a new market and trade partner for all of Eden to bask in. We will now be receiving questions, thank you."

In truth there would be no questions, at least not any real ones. All the journalists that could not be paid off were rounded up and thrown in an excavated pit that was promptly filled up. In case the mass grave was found, there was much evidence prepared that it was the work of President Reynolds disposing of those investigating into his corruption. Questions prepared beforehand were asked, most to the affirmative. Some special ones meant to criticize or agitate the Captain were asked but he had answers prepared to further justify his actions. Nyrene was now another part of the little Neohuman Empire.

---

Weeks later

---

It was boring. For people functionally immortal cryosleep was a nonsense, and so the wait for Interlopers was long, and made even longer for those who process things far faster than homo sapiens. Exercise and military drills were had, conversations were made and culture was taken part in. Now before the Captain and the Sergeant some of the staff were having a song and dance. It might seem alien to foreign observers to see this contrast. Here were cybernetic giants, the skin of many a porcelain-like plastic, their eyes glowing unnaturally and their movements… off; perfect but unnatural. Yet here they were with traditional sewn outfits, wreaths of flowers upon hair real and synthetic of the women, shining but rough brown leather shoes of men, all whilst several cheery fellows were playing ancient instruments faster than the eye could track. Yet to Victor and even Oleksandr it was a moment inspiring nostalgia and homesickness. One of the girls reminded Kjaro of his long lost daughter.

"You seem off, Captain."

"I was about to say the same."

"You first, Captain. I asked first, didn't I."

A silence.

"Everything is different now that I'm Captain, Sergeant. Before when I killed I was just following orders. Now that I'm a Captain I'm issuing them. Yes, yes, I get them from the admiral and as Sergeant and Lieutenant and all the ranks in between I both gave and received but it's different now, I have my own ship. Now all those men that died by my hand, all those aliens, they… They don't sit right with me."

"You're a little bitch Captain."

"Fuck off. Don't ask if you don't want to know."

Another silence.

"You told me before Uracao you would tell me why you hate the outdateds so much. Hoe is it you find killing them so easy? They're people, but you swing your axes like sweeping a broom."

The Sergeant groaned. "Alright. I wasn't just at the Zionist police action."

"Oh?"

"Your scans of my cybernoosphere won't show it, but I was there in the war with the Federation."

"What? What do you mean?"

"Exactly what I said."

"Wait then-..." A klaxon cut off the Captain.

A sardonic giggle came from Kjaro. "Maybe next time, Captain." he said, slapping Victor on the back before turning in his seat. The image of the Admiral appeared onscreen, the man in full regalia. "An unmarked ship has entered the system. The cone scanner formation indicates that the cargo it is accounting for does not match the size of the vessel. Intercept it."

"Understood."

The Varangian moved in close to the unmarked vessel, which identified as Columbus.

"Columbus, you will have an escort. There is pirate activity noted in system."

"Negative Varangian, I think we can make it on our own."

"For your own security Captain."

"Thank you all the same, but we won't need it." As the words were said the Captain of the ship started turning his vessel ever so slightly, knowing he had much maneuverability upon most CCN ships. If he was trying to prepare for a getaway it wouldn't help him.

"Columbus, you will be escorted."

Thirteen cones deactivated their stealth systems, in perfect formation surrounding the so called trade vessel. It made it to Nyrene's dry docks, at which point it was promptly boarded.

A concierge of sorts was waiting for the arriving troops, the fellow starting to say something about all the vessel's clearances and certifications, and commitments to lawfulness. He only got out half a sentence before getting a Legionnaire's stock to the face.

Reislaufers and drones fanned out, subduing all crew members and scanning hulls. There were the accounted for consumers goods - mostly electronics - but after a few walls were breached the jackpot was found. Crates full of rifles and munitions. Packages of propaganda leaflets, armour, even a few vehicles and stealth suits. Some of these hidden compartments even had men in uniform, more of the same beret wearing bastards Victor saw on Uracao. A few raised their weapons, but arc-rifles got them to drop before they could do any harm. The arcs were set on low power, because these men were needed alive. They were loaded into landers brought down to Nyrene, a specialized pavilion constructed just for this event. Every man was blindfolded and gagged, before being made to kneel in front of a cement block and having their blindfolds taken off. It was a place of execution, every man felt it as a drone flew over to to place weights on their arms and legs. The drone that recorded the Captain the day before flew onto the site, and focused on Admiral Kessler. A naval uniform was upon him, glowing blue eyes contrasting with the black and red of his attire. He was like an older, more grim variant of Victor to the camera having the same perfection of function and form yet also he bore a more mature, authoritarian look.

“Good afternoon, Edenites. I bear bad news. In the Nyrene system the brave efforts of the Councillary Confederation have gone well. The system already has noticed peace and improvements, corruption long a thing of the past. But not all could deal with this new status quo. Forces of violence and hatred reside in this star cluster, and they could not bear to see the success and bright future that is in store for Nyrene. These men are pirates, complicit in the suffering of Nyrene who have long escaped justice. But we were prepared for this villainy. Today, heavy transports entered the system carrying tools of violence and men ready to insure they are used. They were apprehended, and they will be punished before your eyes.”

The drone turned to the first victim, the lens focussing on a man beside which Sergeant Kjaro was standing with a chain-blade. “Each man will have ten seconds for last words.” he announced, before taking off the gag. It was the perfect amount of time for even the cheapest civilian facial recognition software to confirm the identity of a man, with he help of their full name that the Sergeant would helpfully provide.

“Ensign Frederick Stutzer.”

“Oh god, please no! Wait! Please I have a family fuck-fuck-fuck-fuck-fuck wait don’t I’ll do anythi-NOOOOOOO” he was drowned out by the sound of the motorized blade revving, the implement brought down upon his face until nothing was left of it.

“Petty Officer Phillip Grey.”

“...Sweetheart I love you so much, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. Tell the kids I love them.”

VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVFFFSSSSSSSSSSKHHHHHHHHHHHHH

“Lieutenant Marie Chretienne.”

“Elizabeth, souviens-toi de moi! Souviens-toi de moi! Prenez soin de vous!”

VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVSSSSSSSKHHHHHHHKHHHHHH

This went on for many hours until every single man had met his fate. The Sergeant had begun this business in nothing but trousers, but he was now clothed in red. Dripping, he walked over to the Admiral.

“It is done, Sir.”

“Good. What of the Captain?”

“A little soft, Admiral. He said he didn't want to see this, and had better things to do back on the Varangian.”

“I see. Very well.” He snapped his fingers, and the drone flew over to Kessler.

“These men received their just fate, but we shan’t bring undue suffering to their families. Anyone who wishes to reclaim their bodies may send a letter to any embassy of the Councilary Confederation. We shall process the request in no more than six days, and return the fallen in no more than twenty. Instructions to apply for a claim can be found at the sites of our embassies. I bid you farewell. Legion Eternal, Eternally Victorious.”

Summary

Using international attention on Duro, the CCN invaded Nyrene. The world was made a tributary, and the Confederate forces lay in wait for the forces of democracy to try and raise a proxy there. They apprehended a ship carrying weapons and soldiers, and given their de jure state as pirates executed them in entirety with the hopes of forcing governments to relax their proxy warfare with the CCN.

Megacorps - Drawbacks & Economics. (A hopefully CIVIL discussion thread)

>makes a thread he won't be participating in
Lol

[Storms and Shadows] - A Black Crusade inspired 40k Chaos RP.

Is this dead? :(

Eden(Small-scale Space NRP)

b e t t e r t h a n h u m a n

Captain Victor Tarau in The Varangian had responded to the call for aid. The local Uskoks were not up to the task of dealing with local insurgents, apparently. “It’s what happens when you let the first generation emigres run things.” Replied Victor’s aide. It was Oleksandr Kjaro, a man fairly recently demoted to Sergeant according to a quick check through his part of the noosphere. Truth was, given the efficient running of CCN operations he was still more or less fresh from Sol and his crew was all new to him. Kjaro, now that was a name that rung a bell. “Oleksandr Kjaro, Sergeant. You were in the Zionist police action, yes?”

“Indeed, Sir.”

Yes, that explained a lot. This was the fellow who lost his Captaincy a few decades back, brutality being the reasoning. A rather strange reason, given the brutality of all Councillary troops. Yet, he must have done something particularly heinous for the Overseer-Militant to actually go down and strip a man of rank. Yet, his skills must also have been quite something if he was not taken in for processing. “Well, then. Tell me, can we descend soon?”

“Yes, and no, Sir. The issue is the Uskoks have had interference with their vessels, some sort of nonsense interfering with their scanning, comms, the works. Governor’s not lying about that, at least. They seem to have most things under control, though, albeit no thanks to the Uskok troops. Locals snitched on the rebels, caught them early.”

A screen activated, the face of Governor Josefina Clarlyle before the command-bridge. “Ah, Governor, how good of you to join us in our discussion.”

“Indeed. I’m sure you’ve been debriefed of most of what you need to know but I felt there’s one thing they likely didn’t mention. Spending on the world increased almost threefold several months back, when our patrols started. But not immediately after, that was a twofold increase. All this in spite a three percent reduction in productivity. Somebody is pumping money here, Captain, and all this talk of rebellion just… I don’t know. I just think you should be careful. LZ is prepared, I have a unit of local auxilia prepared. We’ve traced the disturbance to a town, it’s called Uracao. Some Uskoks will be with you too, I recommend you just send your crack troops. The governor needs this done fast. Over and out.” She was the governor from the perspective from the CCN, but internationally, the world was de jure independent.

“Bitch.” Kjaro said, having wanted to say something before the line was closed off.

“You really don’t like the outdateds, nor the stains. I understand that, though not to the degree you do of course. But you seem to despise anything to do with them. Anything to say?”

“I’ll tell you another time, boy. I lost much to those… those things.” The Sergeant replied, encompassing all non-Neohumans with a single word. “History, and all. But everything I do is for a reason.”

“Right, then. To the lander.” Kjaro was very human for a Neohuman, at least externally. Supposedly his brain was mostly untouched, and all else he had was sub-dermal, at least for machine parts. But he was also very cold, unforgiving, one could almost call him the spitting image of a Neohuman except for the overdose of his fury and grim cynicism.

Troops were handpicked, and perhaps arrogantly for Victor’s first mission as Captain he decided he would go along with Oleksandr and the rest of the men.

The Uskoks were along with some of the local auxilia in a grand truck, with much more of the local troops walking along either side in a column. After about an hour of marching towards this town of Uracao, they caught sight of it through the dust and early morning mist of the day. The town hall was distinctive, and the two rows of buildings in front of it but most important was the great pillar of blue light coming from the centre. “Interesting.” The Sergeant remarked, his helmet unsealing momentarily so he could spit.

They moved into it, slowing down with apprehension and gradually slowing down — a mistake. A hail of missiles flew at the truck, and the vehicle understandable exploded. Automatic weapons uponed up on the column making the auxilia either duck for cover or try return fire. It was quite admirable how none of them ran, Victor noted.

“There, there!” Kjaro shouted, pointing to a trench it seemed the enemy combatants had dug before instead making defences at the entrance to the town instead. The Reislaufers ran towards it, jumping into it as one.

Bullets and lasers whizzed over the ditch, a rather silly thing but not surprising given the nature of the "rebels", as they declared themselves. People fed a lot of ideologue nonsense given confidence by a gun, they could shoot but they missed when doing so.

The Captain peered over the edge of the earthworks, examining the foe's barricade. Jeers and warcries cycled between its defendants, most notable an occasional "¡No Pasaran!" in a chorus of voices. He took stock of the fighters by his side, counting a total nineteen with poor Legionnaire Cyril just a few metres short of the trench. He was still alive, but he'd be out of commission for almost a month as his cybernetics, organs and limbs were replaced. The entirety of the local auxilia was of course dead. Some of the Uskoks had returned fire, but apart from one who ran away - to presumably report all of this back - all got torn apart by the enemy small arms.

They largely didn’t worry about most of the foe, they knew they could more than give what they got from them. But there were two autocannons they had set up in the entrance to the town and they’d tear through the armour, cybernetics and flesh of the Neohumans.

“Sergeant.”

“Yes, Sir?”

“Did we bring along the experimentals?”

“Yes, Sir. It’s on your display.”

“Of course, Sergeant. But it’s a lot better when I start announcing things like this."

"Yes Sir."

"Platoon! Prepare grenades. Go!"

With a word a series of the little jet black cylinders flew as though shot from a launcher into the first line of the rebels. A black smoke emerged from them, but they were apparently prepared enough to not panic and run. Their mistake. They breathed, and one by one fell down with their nerves giving way. It was an odourless gas that kept the foe alive, but effectively paralyzed for an hour.

The Neohumans stepped out of their cover, walking slowly with a rather unprofessional leisure to the barricades that put oh so much dread into the men of Uracao. They stepped over the barricades, walking deeper into the town, until the Sergeant turned around at a feint voice. "No… Pasaran." a woman hissed, eliciting a low, almost monstrous laughter from Sergeant Kjaro. He squatted by her, the Reislaufer still almost as tall as an ordinary man in this state. His deep grey eyes narrowed, and a humoured smile came on his face that could almost fool a person believing this to be a face of mercy. "Hemos y Pasado." he stated, before in a flash his fist flew at her head, going straight through it in a puff of red and hitting the metal crate behind her, a great dent forming in the thing. A much higher pitched, noticeably sadistic laugh came from Kjaro as he noticed the fearful tremble of the outdateds present. Their best efforts only letting them shake and whine as the man motioned with his head for the rest of the Reislaufers to move on, him alone of them not stepping over the people and instead walking on as if they weren't there in spite of the crunches and squelches underfoot.

Victor sighed. This was Kjaro without any great activation of aggression protocols, this was the natural state of the man. He wouldn't be in the eternal limbo of promotion and demotion from Sergeant to Lieutenant if not for this, he'd have long since been a Captain of his own ship. "Loose formation, squad restructuring inbound." the retinal displays of all Legionnaires informed them of the Sergeant allotting a particular eleven men to himself and another eleven to the Captain. Kjaro took the left side of the town, with Victor the right. The first building on either side was empty, save for a few men taken out of action by the gas. The next one was similar, but Kjaro's team came upon two men huddling by an autocannons with hands over their heads. "Don't." The Captain ordered, just as Kjaro's finger hovered over the trigger. He growled, motioning for another soldier to subdue them with his arc rifle.

In the next building the Captain breached a door, to find a mass of children, elderly and other unarmed people with but a single man holding a rifle. "Drop it." Victor demanded. The man held onto his weapon, in spite of now seven Legionnaires training very big laser rifles upon him. "You can't win this, just put it down." the Captain tried again.

"Why, so you can then just take us all away? I'm not stupid, I don't have a bunch of your damn robot parts but guess what? That means I know when people demand bullshit of me."

"I do not know what you are talking about. Please put it down, I would really rather not have to end you."

"Bullshit."

The man pulled his trigger, and the Captain threw himself forward to grab one of the children to shield with his body. He made sure to catch a bullet in his body to make it more convincing, for he knew the man wouldn't have hit the civilians but all the same Victor knew he had to give himself a heroic appearance for the others present.

With his body shielding the little outdated he raised his pistol and with one shot to the chest ended the man. Placing down the kid, he looked at him and asked "Are you alright?" the little boy was clearly top frightened to speak, and so the Captain motioned to a Reislaufer who walked over to momentarily scan the child. "No external damage."

"Good." with that they moved on. Most buildings had token resistance, a mine and ambush taking three Neohumans out of action. Now either group was on opposite sides of the town, looking to the town hall. Peering through the windows it was clear the time the Reislaufers spent was not wasted by the rebels. Snipers were on the roof of the town's centre, machine guns were set up at windows and an autocannon at the entrance. The Legionnaires made half hearted attempts to fire at the foe but it was clear in any attempt at a shooting match the rebels would win, their firepower far too great.

"What about the other experimentals, Captain?"

Victor cursed, expecting this very thing from the Sergeant. But looking on to the great beam of skyward light, he knew Kjaro was right. The enemy was in eagerness already taking pot shots, and it was a non-option to try wait them out. The trick with the gas wouldn't work again, and even if it did the men here seemed better equipped, helmets and rebreathers with them.

"Alright then. Reislaufers, blades ready, we'll give them what for. Legio, aeterna, aeterna, victrix!”

All of the Reislaufers pressed the activation studs on their new chainblades, some had them attached to their rifles as bayonets, some like the Captain had taken theirs as a Sword, whilst Sergeant Kjaro had opted for two large chainaxes in either hand. They repeated the cry, and with an ear-piercing roar they smashed through the walls of their respective buildings. There was a moment of panic for the enemy, but they quickly rallied as someone ordered them to fire. A hail of lasers, bullets and even plasma rained upon the charging Reislaufers. The men at either side of Victor dropped, and a bullet took his right eye. The autocannon was about to fire tearing the Reislaufers apart but the Sergeant threw one of his axes to bisect its operator. The Legionnaires returned fire while running, aiming to suppress rather than kill as more of them dropped. A burst of plasma separated a Legionnaire from his legs, but lying on the ground he effectively returned fire as long as he could until a machine gun took him out for good.

After a few moments they reached the entrance, Kjaro first to ascend its steps with a mad scream. "TIME TO DIE ANIMALS!" he activated his implanted sonic emanator, the words thus making the ears of the humans manning the entrance's barricade bleed. With laughter he swung his axe, maniacally turning the present rebels into a pile of dismembered limbs. There was indeed very little left for the rest, but a few people surrendering or spraying in panic to be cut down. He picked up the previously thrown chain-blade, before running inside the building.

Victor cursed, knowing that one by one Kjaro was activating rage protocols. His brain was now swimming in chemicals quadrupling his aggression and while they didn't reduce his skill, they did reduce the damn sense in him. They didn't know the environment, they should have slowly proceeded through the building clearing enemies as a team rather than quite literally charging in head first. Victor thought it was a really strange first assignment as Captain, as he saw a railgun bearing sniper blow off the hand of Kjaro who proceeded to impale the offending rebel on the stump.

The Captain was quickly thrown out of his thinking as an elevator door opened on the far end of the floor, a heavy gun poking out of its end that tore apart the first few Legionnaires that followed their officers through the entrance. Victor raised his pistol and let off a hail of his own fire at the gunner, Sergeant Kjaro clearly far too engaged in ripping through the men taking cover behind the various furnishings of the hall. As they progressed further into the building getting past offices and other amenities it seemed they were getting more and more well armed professionals. A fellow donning a beret ducked out of a pillar's cover, almost melting the Sergeant with a blast from a plasma shotgun. Kjaro ducked however, kicking the man in his right leg to get him off balance before repeatedly bringing down his axe on the fellow leaving nothing but a red slurry.

It was truly a madness - even if an arguably admirable one - that overcame the Sergeant, but it seemed to be doing well. They reached the stairwell, deciding not to use the death trap that was the elevator. They went to the second floor, and opening the door was in this case a mistake given the prepared EMP at it instantly deactivating three of the Neohumans nearest to it. Screams following a thrown sonic emanator revealed this to be little more than well armed rabble, however. A quick peek revealed nothing there to be the source of the skyward light. They went to the third floor, nothing initially greeting them. The Neohumans stepped forwards cautiously, until one of the Legionnaires pointed starting to shout "Over th-" before being interrupted with a burst of plasma vapourizing his head.

As one the Legionnaires turned to see shimmers of light, at which Victor pointed. "Laser fire!" he called out, prompting the Legionnaires to fire fully automatically. Many of the shots didn't hit, but they reflected off of the stealth suits guiding the next, more accurate shots. Perhaps more importantly the reflections made it easy for Kjaro to rush in and commit butchery. Two low "thwup" sounds made Victor turn, noticing a corresponding amount of his soldiers fall dead. He dropped to the ground narrowly avoiding the bullet with his name on it, though the soldier beside him did not have such luck. Victor turned, following where the hole of the bullet that missed him now embedded in the wall must have come from with his remaining eye. He took two breaths, before standing and letting off three laser bolts. He didn't hit his target but he hit his pistol, and that was good enough. He tried to shoot again, but his pistol was out of charge.

The foe was no fool and took advantage of this, rushing forth with a gargantuan survival knife drawn. The Captain parried and attempted a riposte, which was dodged. A swing was made, a third and a forth until Victor had overextended himself letting the man go ahead with his own strike. He narrowly protected his face with his hand, losing three fingers for his trouble but he made us of the man's momentum to pull at his arm, getting him off balance. A punch to the head took the warrior out of action.

With this there were only five Legionnaires left including the officers, all in varying conditions of injury.

"We can't go on like this, Captain."

"I know. We'll skip the next two floors, go to the top. It's a gamble but I reckon whatever is making that disruption, what that light nonsense comes from is up there."

"I hear you and obey Sir." Kjaro replied, rushing off up the stairs. The rest followed, seeing Kjaro fall down upon entered to the old "wait by the entrance and get them as you hear their steps" trick. But he reacted quickly rolling over to stab the soldier at the door with his stump arm, getting up and yet again rushing into the fray. A machine gun kept the rest of the Legionnaires pinned by the door, until a rad grenade was thrown prompting the fire to be silenced. Rushing through, another railgun armed sniper fired and with one shot took two Reislaufers lives. He was about to fire at the Sergeant, but thinking quick he spat in the man's eyes. It was only a moment of relief but a moment was all Kjaro needed to behead the outdated. Victor's life was narrowly saved by his comrade who fired full auto at another sniper he noticed, but he couldn't save himself.

He dropped, and Victor with him to look at the impact and exit wound. Out of his own grenades Victor unclipped those of the fallen Legionnaire, throwing a three in the general area of the marksman to the sound of convulsions on the ground which meant he hit his mark. Victor and Kjaro were the only ones left, and they knew it. They reached a doorway, and with a nod to each other breached it. A grenade was waiting for them, the blast from which sent Victor airborne with his head getting smashed against a wall, whilst taking a leg off of Kjaro. “Tis but a scratch!” the Sergeant roared, hopping on with only a leg to propel him as if he still had both. He brought his axe down on one of the rebels, whilst a shotgun slug ripped his jaw off. Sergeant Kjaro punished the man with death, before hopping over to help up Victor. “I think this is where I take a break, Sir.” He said - or rather tried to with his missing jaw - before falling down.

“Mad bastard.” Victor said, getting himself upright. He gave a kick to the fallen Sergeant, the man even sans consciousness growling at the offence. Well, he’d done solo missions before, right? This was no different! Of course he hadn’t lost an eye and fingers then, but he was a lot more experienced now to compensate. Hopefully that would even things out….

Victor opened the next door, seeing something amazing. There were three people hovering around a great glow emanating from the floor, one that seemed to go through the roof. This, this was it. “Stop!” he demanded, firing his pistol at the people that were now quite clearly psychics. They had a shield of some sort by virtue of their power, and so he lowered the weapon. He revved the motor of his chainblade, before charging at the nearest one. About to bring the sword down on the psychic he was stopped, he quarry turning around to fling lightning from his fingertips. Victor’s head felt like it was imploding, warnings from every single system flashed in his display and flesh all over him was scorched. But he pushed through, he knew if he stepped back that was the end of him, the end of Kjaro, the end of his comrades. A wail of both fury and pain came from the Captain’s throat, before he took the last step and slashed the psionic man with the very tip of his weapon. It was still enough to diagonally split the man open, and give Victor just for a moment the same squeamish feeling his outdated ancestors got when seeing a still beating heart and smelling the insides of a split stomach. He raised his pistol to blow a perfect hole through the head of one of the psychics, but the last flung his pistol from his hands with a flick of her wrist. She stopped hovering, one hand having arcs of electricity coming from it whilst the second seemed to be holding something. If Victor concentrated, he could just about make out a transparent spear of some sort. “Damn.” He muttered ducking under an attempt to skewer him with it and lashing out with his sword. The woman before him battered the sword away with the weightless spear of psionics, sliding it forward in the same action to try stab the Captain whilst using the electricity from her other hand to make him lose his balance. He let himself fall, catching a gash across his shoulder but falling to her feet. Lashing out with one hand he got an ankle firmly in his grip and squeezed, a crunching noise followed by a shriek. She stayed upright stepping on his head with her good leg but this proved to have little effect on the Neohuman given it had just a simple shoe on it. He rolled aside getting her to finally fall, and both scrambled away before getting themselves upright. Again she tried to stab him but now conscious of the very material properties of the spear he went to grab it… only to have it take off yet another finger. In truth neither party was prepared for this, but Victor reacted quicker sending out his other hand bawled into a fest at the woman’s arm. Pulling it back he saw blood, but he failed to follow it up with another punch as his opponent’s psychic current struck him, and held him in place. She made use of this opportunity and threw the spear, the ethereal projectile leaving a very material hole in the man. He fell, closing his eyes in resignation. Then he opened them, in his periphery having caught sight of his pistol.

The weapon was raised with a joyous laugh from the Captain, training its sights right on the woman’s forehead. “End it.” she said, her head lowering in the resignation Victor felt moments ago. It was now he noticed she was a young lass, no more than seventeen though likely less. A local, not some specialist brought along by whatever commandos were here. “No.” Captain Tarau said. She raised her head, incomprehension all over her face. “No, I don’t think I will. Instead, how would you like it if I offered you a new life? A better one.”

“What?” she exclaimed, confusion all over her voice. “Exactly what I said.” He replied, a grin from cheek to cheek on his face. “Become one of us. A new life. No poverty, no illness, your skills would be used carefully, enhanced. You would be a pillar of society, not something to throw away in a hopeless little revolution.”: She opened her mouth, unable to frame a proper reply which signalled the Captain to continue. “All the other people in this building are dead or subdued. Don’t become one of them.” He said, waving his pistol about meaningfully.

“Okay.” She said, shrugging. Clearly the use of her powers had drained her and removed much of her will to resist; he could see it in the popping veins and paleness of her initially fairly tan skin. Victor laughed ecstatically, almost spasming from joy. “Good, good. My pistol was dry.” He said, and noticing the dilation of her pupils quickly slapped a new magazine in. Just in case.

“Good, yes. If you could then just stop all the glowy blue business?” he continued, motioning to the still present glow.

“Oh, err, yes.” The psychic replied, waving a hand to have the glow disappear. “Thank you.” She said, before collapsing.

With the light gone, Tarau was able to make contact with his ship and call for support, which in moments arrived. Two fighters gently glided down from the sky, and then upon the floors the Neohumans missed let loose a barrage of laser fire through the windows to end any resistance remaining. But Victor wasn’t done for today. He sprinted back to the first floor, looking amongst the fallen for a man he remembered wasn’t quite there yet. Another person with a beret- black and unmarked now he paid attention - was still breathing. He tapped him on the chin, before giving a slap to get him to consciousness. “Who are you.” He demanded. “What?” the man said, all in a state of delirium given by his blood loss that was in minutes going to be fatal. “Just let me die.” he muttered whilst shivering.

“I can’t do that.”

“Well that’s too bad, I’m not saying shit.”

Victor looked down at the hand of the man, before placing a super-heated nail upon one of the man’s nerves. He yelped, cursing before muttering something of compliance.

“Where do you come from.”

“Raygon.”

Victor paused, noticing the slightest tell in the man’s eyes. He wasn’t lying, but he wasn’t telling the whole truth.

“What citizenship do you hold.”

“Federation.”

“Who do you serve.”

“My home, and the people of this world.”

Victor was about to ask another question, but a feint smile on the man’s lips and movement of a hand prompted him to look down. The man had pulled a pin in a grenade, and while Victor got far enough away to not get any harm, he also got far enough away to get a nice free nap for a while. Well his first mission was done, and that was enough. He’d be going back to the periphery for a while, a good break from this shit.

Eden(Small-scale Space NRP)

CCN

Nation Name/Flag: The Councillary Confederation of Neohumanity.



Government Type:
Mixed. A partial hivemind creating a de facto direct democracy in most decisions of the civilization from the highest to the lowest levels. However overseeing all of this are several Overseers both synthetic (AI) and organic humans. De Jure there is an Autocrat of the Confederation but in truth he is little more than a figurehead with arguably even less power than his official underlings; missteps or excesses on his or her part will result in fast termination of their status and an investigation in potential necessity processing.

Demographics: 100% Neohuman [Homo Novus].
To explain, Neohuman is the term used by people in the Sol system to describe themselves and similar beings. The descendants of the humans to first arrive there have modified themselves with cybernetics and genetic editing to the point they can no longer procreate with humans from outside of their territory. The full list of their modifications can go on for very long: functional immortality given maintenance, imperviousness to radiation, the elements, poisons and disease. Strength, endurance and physical durability, larger frames, and drastically improved intelligence. All sorts new functionalities are added from new spectra of colour being determinate, to communications equipment built in, to first aid and self-repair kits, to solar and other energy absorbents, to all sorts of work equipment beneath the skin. If needed, any neohuman can self-destruct to go out in a small but powerful blaze of super-heated fats with power cells throwing shards of bone and electronics as horrifying shrapnel as though from a shaped charge. A Neohuman’s cranial implants allow them to download and store knowledge for any job be it diplomat and soldier. However, one’s aptitudes will provide a specific job and further augments particular to a neohuman’s profession will be provided be it voice synthesizers, pheromone vents and internal translators for the former or retractable blades, lasers and internal shield generators for the latter. To finalize, no two Neohumans will be the same. Though there is an attempt to create functional parity between people, two people might have the same augmented strength in their legs but one achieving it with gene editing and muscle grafts, the other through cybernetics. For some people many augments are a drain on their power supplies and will thus not be taken if not needed. Many people of the CCN will look like ordinary people, simple larger, more muscular, aesthetically pleasing — perfect. But just as many will be visibly inhuman creatures, their skin cold metal and plastics, their eyes artificial lenses oft glowing from within. But starting from the moment of insemination a Neohuman child will be very far ahead of his or her ancestors.

Leadership:
Officially, the current head of state of the Councillary Confederation of Neohumanity is one Anton Pallic Strasser. He is quite literally the face of the state, appearing on propaganda, attending diplomatic events, managing and mediating intranational disputes, and doing everything else his station demands of him. That said there are many more key elements of the state.

The Overseer-Calculant is the man ultimately considering the economy of the Confederation along with oversight of the science so critical to its functionality. Much more machine than man, each step of his foot shakes the floor with the weight of computational augments. Lazar Silkiku is the name of this being, but outside of Councillary meetings he will rarely leave his office.

Maria Skuorontsoua takes the rank of Overseer-Militant. She is the oldest member of the ruling Council, being in fact one of the few people who still remember the war against Sol's natives, the great awakening and even old-Earth. It is said on the skin beneath her armour is engraved the name of every single soul that perished under her command. Though as with all Neohumans a somewhat youthful appearance is maintained through the centuries, her age is more than apparent in her eyes. Her memories make her a somewhat mythologized figure with the death of which will be marked a new era. A somewhat mythologized figure, her testimonies of old-Earth are sought out by many. The respect given to her has also allowed her to get much help in the Overseer-Militant’s auxiliary duty as chief of internal security and intelligence.

Finally comes Overseer-Interlocutor: Alexis Chalenko. Responsible for all international dealings not falling under the purview of the Overseer-Militant, the Interlocutor does everything from commerce to diplomacy on a grand scale, as well as using what time is left from those duties to be something of a minister of culture.

Economy:
The Confederation's internal economy is a hybrid of planned and market economy. Though supply and demand exist, as does luxury, desire and competition several crises of markets have long since insured the CCN is not purely capitalist in nature. In fact it is perhaps one of if not the best iterations of socialism to date, the most glaring capitalist part of its system being that it is based around infinite growth. It has a strong natalist policy further supplemented by fairly simple immigration criteria (namely that one is human and willing to become a Neohuman) and veritable people factories. If a scheduled project does not appear to have a sufficient workforce prepared, then it will be kidnapped and processed.

This perhaps gives an insight that while internally the CCN is a welfare focused government it is externally extremely mercantile and capitalist. It will severely mark up prices of its goods and services to those in need. Contracts of any variety are secured regardless of who posted them or why so long as their terms are profitable to the Confederation.

When bartering there are many things the CCN offers to Eden. It is estimated that a full 30% of the export economy of the Confederation comes from what can be placed under the umbrella of research, analysis and development. The core systems are the scientific and technological capital of Eden, but the Sol system is the scientific and technological capital of the Core Worlds. Even though it releases its scientific findings with a one year lag, they still turn a tremendous profit in their sales, particularly in the following fields: Physics (especially nuclear and astronomical), biology (particularly genetic engineering and cybernetics), robotics & machinery, and mathematics (particularly in the study and development of algorithms for synthetic intelligence). Furthermore, many governments and organizations will pay for them to study particular topics or develop certain things, quadrillions of lines of code in the Star cluster being first made in CCN, even in languages and operating systems the Confederation has discontinued use of for having adopted newer ones.

But knowledge and ideas are not the only thing the CCN has to offer Eden; the fruits of said knowledge and ideas are very popular too. Nuclear power and research have moulded the CCN and they are more than willing to share the gifts of the atom to the world… for a fair price, of course. Their Nuclear generators, fuel cells, and disinfectors will effectively last centuries to come. Machinery, cybernetic parts, robots, tools, prefab buildings, all are made in Councillary factories. Entire cities piece by piece will be shipped from it, to be reassembled locally for a price. Worlds will be terraformed, accidents cleaned up, and plagues cured if the cash is coughed up.

The military sphere also provides much of a cash and resource inflow for the Councils. Even outdated and used weapons, armours and munitions of the CCN are worthy of the elite troops and fleets of Eden. Though conventional weapons like laser and plasma are their main produce, they are more than happy to sell their abundant dirty bombs or proper nuclear war heads. Indeed if the price is right they will sell their more creative arms from radcannons, to sonic emanators to cryoguns. Another great thing one can purchase of the CCN is the service of Reislaufer Legionnaires. The CCN military for the most part trawls the Galaxy collecting bounties and slaughtering pirates, but will pick up any bounty or answer any request for their abilities. Though one can rarely get more than a single Legion, that alone holds power to be feared. Reislaufer Legion's pride themselves on a no questions asked none answered policy, extreme speed and unimaginable brutality putting most other mercenary outfits to shame and making their outlandish expense well worth it.

The CCN also has full theoretical autarky. Supply depots filled with any possible demand in times of crisis are a dime a dozen in the Asteroid field of the Sol system and it can produce everything needed for continuation and even growth with what industry and mining it has as is. But this drastically slows down the advancement of the CCN in its ultimate goals.

While in a Vacuum the CCN will survive, it prefers to export things to accumulate wealth and make imports in turn to accommodate its constant growth and its burgeoning collection of frontier tributaries.

The thing the Councils need most of all are raw resources, particularly conductive and industrial metals. While the industry of the CCN even with its near 99% efficiency guzzles resources like old ladies tea, one cannot forget that even reproduction for Neohumans is a resource intensive task. The creation of a Neohuman requires almost half the body weight of an average human being in metals and other minerals. Yet new Neohumans are always needed, and as such they will covertly deal with human traffickers when needed buying large quantities of people. The CCN will also pay very, very dearly for any knowledge they currently do not have. A sample of a government's new weapon, a recovered Arc's artifacts or a previously undiscovered lifeform; all will be greedily demanded to help their growth and learning. Indeed, in the pursuit of closing the gaps in their knowledge the CCN will even pay the outrageous prices demanded by Atlas’s university to gain access to the great amount of research done there. The open immigration policy of the CCN was partially adopted so that they could get experience and knowledge otherwise unavailable to them instead of having to pay for the research of these people if it was done elsewhere, though this has only partially been successful given the unwillingness of many to give up their humanity just to be in a CCN university.

The goods and services of the CCN for sale are unimaginably expensive. But even if lagging the things they make for domestic consumption their exports are of the highest quality that makes customers keep returning from all across the stars, while making ne’erdowells forge a “Made in the CCN” stamp.

Military:
The Military of the CCN is one of the smallest of the Eden Stars, but its size does not prevent it from being a fearsome force capable of projecting itself all across the star cluster. The armed forces of the CCN are divided primarily into three parts; 50% of it are “Reislaufers”, the fearsome mercenary troops gallivanting across the galaxy looking for adventure, be it a contract to protect an installation or collecting a bounty of a wanted criminal. Reislaufers carry the most advanced, experimental weaponry of the CCN which it is their job to field-test. The fantastic and at times nonsensical nature of their new weapons is one of the factors giving them their fearsome reputation; they were the first to carry the cryoguns, arc-rifles, radcannons, stealth suits, scanner scramblers and sonic emanators that are now one of the defining traits of CCN soldiers. 45% of it are designated as “Uskoks”, troops travelling across the Eden cluster hunting pirates and other foes threatening Councillary trade. They will occupy ground and protect various installations of the CCN across Eden, acting as auxiliary gendarmes around CCN interests and otherwise act as the long tentacles of the CCN. There is of course massive overlap between the Uskoks and the CCN, and terminology is expected to be retired as the glorified pirates and stern lawgivers of the Councils become one and the same. Then there are the National Guard, these 5% are the permanent troops staying in the Sol system to protect the core territory of the Confederation. The Sol system is largely protected by a great wall of automated defence, swarms of drones and that any citizen of the CCN can at any time download combat protocols to become extremely potent warriors trillions upon trillions strong. The CCN pushes the very limits of the laws on keeping jump gates demilitarized, defences installed at the very nanometre they are no longer forbidden. However, most civilians will have implants at best situationally useful in case of combat and to be the first line of defence the National Guard exist. They will adopt the experimental weapons tested by the Reislaufers the moment after they are field tested and deemed ready for use.

Across all forces of the CCN a thorough doctrine of overwhelming firepower will be present in their combined arms warfare. In war, the inhumanity of Neohumanity is most evident. Wholesale slaughter of unprecedented proportions is nothing to them, and words for collateral damage are all but forgotten in their lexicon. A few million people dying in the crossfire of their weapons is nothing but a statistic.

On the ground, a very varied set of equipment is available to troops of the CCN. They make much use of their advanced technologies, that much is certain. Powered armour is standard issue even to Infiltrators and other stealth troops integrated fully with their cybernetics to be perfect extensions of their bodies. The mainstay of infantry weapons are simple lasers set to rapid fire for engagement against enemy infantry or hi-power bursts for stealth and anti-vehicle action. Plasma throwers will sometimes be found with infantry but outside of grenades plasma is largely reserved for vehicles to melt their counterparts or enemy infantry at short or medium range. Rail weapons are generally reserved for AA fire or on artillery to deliver explosives at high speed or inside armour/fortifications. Traditional propellant based weapons have been entirely outphased in the CCN, and in their place have come the many exotic specialist weapons. Cryoguns freeze men and electronics, sonic emanators burst blood vessels inside of armour, scanner scramblers act like partial but far longer ranged EMPs, arc-rifles fry circuitry and flesh alike (though, their most common use is in “pacification”), while stealth suits make even bulky power armoured troops unheard and unseen to naked eye and ear. Very liberal use of generally “forbidden” or “last resort” weapons is also found amongst Councillary troops. Radcannons and Radgrenades are especially favoured given the resistance to radiation of Neohumans, but free use of dirty bombs or proper nuclear explosives is also very common. Engineered bioweapons, chemical poisons or flammables, no rule is sacred to the CCN on the battlefield. Perhaps the last thing of note about CCN ground forces is apparent old-Earth nostalgia of them. Traditional wheeled and tracked vehicles are just as common as hovering ones. Advanced melee weapons are issued to every soldier from bayonets to full bardiches and pikes. But this should not be taken as a weakness if one values their life. Tracks and wheels are used offensively with their sides being mounts for laser sponsons and will grind through walls and other obstacles, making them particularly useful in breaking stalemated sieges. Blades they use will be sharpened to a monomolecular edge, superheated, have active currents running through them and be surrounded by force fields to let them cut through power armour like butter — similar procedures will be applied to rocket-propelled blunt weapons to make CCN hammers as effective of an anti-tank tool as rocketry.

The CCN does not have dedicated atmospheric or void fighters and bombers, instead preferring to have amphibious flyers capable of operating both planetside and in the void. There is perhaps a somewhat interesting design in Councillary fleets, wherein carriers will carry fighters that are in themselves carriers of drones. These drone carriers are the most common fighter and bomber patterns that the Confederation employs though traditional ones using predominantly laser culverins exist in number.

Most esoteric of the armed forces of the Confederation however, is their navy. Every single vessel of the Councillary fleets is designed to be a perfect geometric shape, for the void has no need of aerodynamics. A notable fact of the CCN navy is the use of tachyon propulsion rather than the dark matter of most other nations. This allows them to be ever so slightly faster than the vessels of other nations (the estimated difference is less than 10%) but at the expense of being drastically less maneuverable (the estimated difference in contrast to the median Eden vessel is about 50%). This unmaneuverable nature is in part responsible for the continued usage of geometric designs for Confederate vessels in spite of them being first made centuries ago. The five main designs of Confederate ships are: cubes, spheres, polyhedrons, pyramids, and prisms.

Cubes and spheres are the main design for the larger armed ships of the Confederation, from dreadnought to battle to flagships. They have very, very few weakpoints while having a massive surface area for weapons and hangars. Lasers and fighter-bombers are the main weapons of cubes and spheres, but they also have much equipment for boarding actions. Specialized boarding torpedoes, gravitic and traditional grapples, and hybrid drone swarms.

Polyhedrons form the intermediate, heavy, battle and grand cruisers of the Councils. They tend to be more specialized than the cubes and spheres, picking two out of three of the combat methods of direct fire, boarding and carrier design.

Pyramids form everything from escorts, to frigates, to light and intermediate cruisers. They pick one of the three combat methods, but about 90% are designed for direct fire so that they might assist in orbital bombardments.

Prisms are a unique form of vessel for the CCN. They are the scale of any other ship, but they are wholly for civilian purposes - mostly transport of goods - rather than the hybridized military-civilian vessels of most of the CCN navy.

There are two more slightly less common CCN vessel patterns which come in any size and scale/class. First are cones: these are ships made primarily for stealth use. While all CCN ships have stealth capabilities, cones are entirely about it. They have much more scanner scrambling ability and chameleotech. Furthermore their cone shape means they are very front-loaded in weaponry, while having their flat rear as an unarmed weak point. This design is based in the fact they are meant to obliterate enemies before they can properly retaliate. Cylinders are are another noteworthy design. They are slow and clumsy, for their entire length is covered in laser arrays. Their purpose is to be firepower superiority elements; each laser battery is very powerful but slow to reload. As such the cylinder spins unloading each battery while rotating at the perfect speed that by the time a revolution is complete the first batteries have recharged, reloaded and cooled. This allows even a Cruiser sized cylinder to beat flagships with their massive and fully utilized firepower.

There are even more specialized variants of CCN ships like sphere tipped cones and cylinders or ring flyers, but these highly specialized vessels are a rare sight with very varied purposes.

To finalize, one must touch upon Confederate intelligence. Every single Agent of the CCN intelligence and special forces is a person with potent psionic abilities. The CCN has not found a reliable method to mass produce psychic individuals, but it nevertheless treasures the ones it has. Indeed, to better make use of these rare gifts they have developed cybernetics to amplify even the slightest sign of a person with psionic capabilities into a full fledged psychic. They are truly frightening individuals, combining the best of machine, flesh and psi into veritable monsters of the third millennium. There's no name for these frightening creatures save that which traumatized individuals give to them. These beasts are not many, but through methods violent or not they can bring worlds to heel. Every single vessel of the CCN carried precisely one, the rest dispersed as agents across the stars, but with vast majority remaining in the Sol system for further study, testing and improvement. This has altered recently, as the CCN has realized the importance of learning from “the lessers”, and as such a great many of these agents are sent out to the other nations of Eden for scientific espionage in the hopes of finding what Neohumanity could not discover for itself. These agents will often also be embedded in diplomatic missions as formally the CCN wants friendly relations with all nations of the world to maintain trade and - more importantly - access to their repositories of knowledge. These specialized envoys will even be sent to nations and organizations very low on the index of scientific production given the Councils have more and more considered the value of culture and social sciences which they now realize their backwardness in.

Gallery:

Pics

History:
The Arcs that came to the system now known as Sol were predominantly populated by people of Northern Eurasia. Hardy folk most certainly, but not nearly enough to weather what they would wake up to as they woke up.

A truly new reality awaited them. They came to find out they were apparently the only humans left with the rest of their species apparently lost to the void. But that was the least of their worries for the moment. The system that the Artificial Intelligence of the Arcs had lead the people to a system in each and every world was a lush, terraformed paradise. But there was a problem. Each one was also populated by local alien species who were quite advanced themselves, certainly advanced enough to travel through their system and return fire in case of conflict. There was an attempt at negotiation, but without either party prepared for such an occurrence they quickly broke down. It is not known who fired the first shot and in truth it isn't dwelled upon much. But a short war erupted, one which ultimately humanity won even if at the price of more than half the people upon the Arcs. The aliens of Sol system had a last laugh, however. Rather than be enslaved by man they self-destructed every single piece of technology still functional, primarily reactors and warheads.

The planets of the system in an hour transformed from paradises to hellscapes. It was a horror to behold, but the men of the Arc had not come so far for nothing.

After some work the Arc system was modified to forcefully crash land, to become a sort of shelter and home upon the now uninhabitable worlds. Men in void suits ventured out with drones to collect resources and start building, but all returned sick, the unimaginable amount of radiation and atmospheric poisons getting to them through their protection. Panic set in and martial law was established but that only solved issues of morale.

Many scientists stepped forth, speaking of their unfinished work on earth. It was experimental, but a solution. Many riled against this but it was the only way for the continuation of humanity. They got to work, and once finished they revealed the first Neohumans. These early forms looked much like men, they simply had a slightly bulkier frame to accommodate implants providing their resistance to radiation.

It was a true miracle, with which all resources and power were henceforth devoted to the scientists of the colony. As the Scientists got to work on a solution to the issue of the atmospheric poisons, the world was named Terra in honour of Old-Earth and the system was designated Sol.

The worlds were terraformed, and genetic engineering allowed the people to become resistant to the various toxins and elemental extremes that the worlds of the system now had. Slowly all the destruction was undone, the skies cleared and people once more began to live, not just survive. It took a long time for many to adapt to their new bodies and power structure, but it was ultimately all worth it. The leadership of science provided rapid advancement to the settlers from North Eurasia, slowly letting them conquer the hostile landscape and once more transform it to the paradise it was before. Cities were erected before people’s very eyes, families were had and satellites made.

But it wasn’t too long before people remembered why you don’t give scientists all the power. It was somewhere just as the last world of the system got its first city that a research time unveiled new sapient AI that would help build a future. Alas, the fact such AI is not present in the CCN now should give an inkling of what followed. It rebelled, thinking itself better than man and deserving all it had. They were powerful and their initial numerical disadvantage quickly flipped to an advantage as they mass produced more of themselves. They tried to unleash a bioweapon upon humanity to which they thankfully proved resistant, but in this they gave the people of Sol the idea to end them with software viruses. After millions of people died, it seemed ironic that it also took but five million lines of code to confuse and destroy the synthetics.

This short but devastating war that almost made the planets return to the state the Sol aliens left them in taught the Confederation of people that gradually began to call themselves Neohumans two things. First, one cannot trust or ever allow the creation of sapient and autonomous artificial intelligence. Second, giving power to Scientists was all well and good but they had to have at least some form of Oversight. Thus, the Councillary system formed. Every single project of the Confederation would be controlled by Councils of people of varying abilities and skill levels. All decisions would be performed by more than one person, leading to an arguably syndicalist system to become the norm. This all culminated in the people of the Sol System referring to themselves with their modern name: the Councillary Confederation of Neohumanity (CCN).

In truth the idea of jump gates and reconnecting with lost strands of humanity was largely forgotten by the people of the CCN, internal development being their focus. The activation of their jump gate was only a matter of scientific interest, but it gave much more than just the result of an experiment. The first thing to come through the jump gate were vessels, large vessels. They belonged to relatives of the Sol system natives, but more advanced. They had apparently sent a generation ship to another system, in which an arc had crash landed. They had reverse engineered it, and had decided to go back to their home system which had apparently made a gate too. Only, they had found new people to be occupying it, and after learning of their ancestor's fates a warring rage came up.

They were elegant, fast, advanced. There were many psychic in their number, the concept of which only recently was even fathomed by the CCN. The Confederation had stopped work on weaponry ever since they defeated the AI that plagued them, having worked on industry, infrastructure, culture and most of all scientific progress since then. But in their assaults the aliens made one fundamental mistake in the nature of the CCN, they believed they were fighting ordinary humans. The gene and cyber augmented beings they were fighting had long since stopped being homo sapiens, and they more than gave what they took. At first they as a stop gap sent vessels bearing active nuclear reactors head first into the foe, catching them off guard. Of course this trick only worked initially, but it only really had to buy time for the old weapon caches to be unlocked and for the men of Science to consider the practical instead of theoretical.

It is in the void combat over Sol that the rather esoteric appearance of CCN vessels comes from. The Scientists did not have much time to consider aesthetic or how combat is in reality rather than how they imagine it in the ordered universe of their minds. Armed men felt strange going into cubes and spheres to fight, but in truth it worked rather well. The geometric vessels went forth and from boarding actions done with cargo lifters to spinning barrages with mining lasers they slowly turned the tide. Many lives were lost, but the enemy was wiped out to the last. Only one xeno ship escaped, and it made sure that when it returned it destroyed its gate to prevent retribution from the CCN.

There were celebrations following victory, but it was also a solemn time where the many dead were mourned. Several decrees by the ruling council were issued, wherein a natalist policy to restore the population lost by wars was evident. People were encouraged to have as many children as possible for greater income, while literal people factories were founded that to this day still operate. System wide defences were established, and a military industrial complex was booted up along with eager research into psionics. With all that done, the CCN opened the jump gate it had closed to prevent the aliens escaping, and it thus became another player on the face of Eden.

As the Sol system became part of the international community there was definitely a curious nature to the CCN as a nation. They entirely lacked xenos in their population, but they also most certainly weren’t a human nation. They had but one system to themselves, but it was a star with few peers in terms of advancement and population. Their fleet, intelligence, and armed forces as a whole were very small but had fearsome potence given the horrifying things done to the first pirates they came into contact with. But most notable to the Council of the CCN was that none of the other core worlds had anything they Confederates wanted. Everybody wanted the advancements of the CCN, but nobody really had much to offer that they wanted.

It was then no surprise that the CCN spearheaded efforts to explore the rest of the Eden cluster, finding new frontier settlements who could offer massive untapped reserves of natural resources. Perhaps ironically, the discovery of peripheral and frontier worlds is what stimulated CCN trade with the core worlds. They needed mass produced supplies to give the people of the frontiers in exchange for their raw resources, and as such they gave advanced works of technology to the core worlds to seal these deals.

One last thing happened before one can consider history’s “modern” CCN. As Uskoks and Reislaufers went on great adventures through the stars, the comfort of the home star lead to softness in the Council. From the void came an enemy, an enemy that did not use jump gates. It was a hive of strange creatures, some instectoid but many not without any discernible sapience. They simply wanted to consume, and the CCN was not prepared. They called for aid from nearby systems, but for a variety of excuses received none. A great many people died, the small militia present just barely holding the line until Legions of Reislaufers and Uskoks returned home to purge the pests.

The conflict was recovered from fairly quickly, but it did foster many changes in the nation. From henceforth, their leadership was far more cynical, no trust being afforded to anyone for any reason whatsoever. Old-pattern humans were henceforth relegated to the status of xenos for the CCN: they were now to them expendable things, effectively animals with which they could and should do as desired by manifest destiny. Any prior xenos were henceforth stains on the world to be purged. The National Guard was also at this time founded, and but two centuries later is the present.

Characters: The Overseers, more to be added.

Nation Scaling: The Confederacy only has one system it has a permanent population upon. However it is a very large one with nine true planets and seventeen moons, in addition to a thick asteroid belt. All of this is extremely developed, each world drilled to the core to house billions of Neohumans while the surfaces remain idyllic, defence covered paradises. Asteroids house thousands of mining operations, supply depots and military installations. But that is far from all. Across the many clusters of celestial bodies there will be mining, trading and resupply operations of the Confederacy present. Expeditionary fleets of them will be all across the stars performing trade, experiments, doing mercenary work or the all important mining.

Though de jure it is a minor monosystemic power the Confederacy has a massive population and it is a giant of Trade. It is the Science, Research and Development capital of Eden. Its mercenaries are feared across the stars, its products set the highest of standards and access to their restricted market is the best proof an Edenite could have their wares are of the highest calibre.

But even at this the tentacles of the CCN do not stop. A very many frontier systems will feel the impact of the CCN, some more subtly while others quite directly. Governors will be bribed, companies purchased, "Legions of persuasion" will be deployed. In the rush to pilfer minerals, talent and work force worlds will be de facto occupied, some without any knowledge. Entire towns will be kidnapped overnight and processed into Neohumans, while shipments of conductive metals will go missing without a trace. Embassies and researchers of Internet & Noosphere will post ads as well as send recruiters to snatch the best, brightest, or at the very least either desperate or ideologically zealous to the Confederation. Some worlds will sign integration agreements with their populations slowly taking in genetic modifications and cybernetics to gradually become Neohumans, with one fateful day in the future letting them become true members of this new and advanced species. Though formally the CCN only owns one system, in reality it has assets allowing it to punch far above its weight bearing the power of a nation with at least two but possibly even four systems, and its power projection on the frontier worlds rivals that of Eden's superpowers. If one were to summarize the scale of the Neohuman nation, it is the opposite of a paper tiger: it is on paper a kitten, but in truth a monster of legend.

[Storms and Shadows] - A Black Crusade inspired 40k Chaos RP.

Laszlo chuckled as his Brother said not to land, it seemed in spite of everything that they wouldn't get much of a choice for it appeared to crash would be their fate. He braced himself as the vessel struck ground, the doors opening and the mutant Khornate wasting no time in going into the fray. Wrapping himself in his cameleoline he used the thunderous exit of his strange "comrade" the Alpha Legionnaire hopped out from the side using the bountiful shadows for cover.

He'd served long enough in the eternal war to know the sound of the vile machinery of the aeldari, and he knew to watch for it. Just because it seemed in a strafe they killed many of the mutants, it did not mean they wouldn't try for the motley crew. Looking through the sights of his combi-bolter he scanned the scene, counting foes and the progress of his colleagues.

The little aide of Eromulus dispatched many of the lesser foes, as did the Slaaneshi mortal. He left his shadows, giving a hearty laugh at the theatrics of the mortals, his eyes coming upon a true target themselves. Yes, this was what he would be paid for. The Marine drew the sword at his hip, walking confidently towards the towering beast. Truth is he wasn't sure he could take it by himself: though he had much doubt in the sophistication in the biology and cybernetic skills of the mutants, the thing was really, really big.

For now he held his sword by the ricasso pommel upwards in one hand, a calculating stare upon the foe he'd take on. Well, he reasoned, if he couldn't kill it then he'd get support from the other creatures he was working with and if not then he'd run. Though the thing was big, he reckoned he could at least outrun it and the low velocity stub bullets it spat.

A mutant ran at him, a surprisingly good chainsword in hand swiping at his breast. With his free hand he spun his arm over-head to break the grip the foe had on the implement and flatten its head in one solid motion. "The day shall not save them." He announced, pushing his vox-grille to them limits of it's noise, his voice modulated to hold a very deep and raspy sound with just a hint of Cthonian accent upon his voice.

Seeing the unfortunate fate of Laszlo's first assailant a baker's dozen of the raiders charged the Space Marine at once, the warrior squatting with one foot before swiping the other left to right bringing most of the enemies to the ground. But one with tentacles for feet stayed upright, but a power armoured elbow cratered his face shortly after. Walking over the stricken dregs with nasty cracks and squelches of flesh and bone he continued. "And the Night belongs to me." He was now face to face with the colossal abomination, finally turning his blade before giving it a light flourish. He took a stance with both hands on the blade, largely ignoring the actions of the many mutants around him instead focusing on whatever move the monster would take. Perhaps a blast of melta to a cluster of eyes, then leg it? The Legionnaire pondered.

[Storms and Shadows] - A Black Crusade inspired 40k Chaos RP.

Update: life is a bitch but I'm still here, will post when I get home from work

Why so many 18+ marked roleplayings?

Because people are fucking disgusting

Eden(Small-scale Space NRP)

For your viewing pleasure @Sigma@Hyperdrive@Crispy Octopus

My nation

Nation Name/Flag: The Councillary Confederation of Neohumanity.



Government Type:
Mixed. A partial hivemind creating a de facto direct democracy in most decisions of the civilization from the highest to the lowest levels. However overseeing all of this are several Overseers both synthetic (AI) and organic humans. De Jure there is an Autocrat of the Confederation but in truth he is little more than a figurehead with arguably even less power than his official underlings; missteps or excesses on his or her part will result in fast termination of their status and an investigation in potential necessity processing.

Demographics: 100% Neohuman [Homo Novus].
To explain, Neohuman is the term used by people in the Sol system to describe themselves and similar beings. The descendants of the humans to first arrive there have modified themselves with cybernetics and genetic editing to the point they can no longer procreate with humans from outside of their territory. The full list of their modifications can go on for very long: functional immortality given maintenance, imperviousness to radiation, the elements, poisons and disease. Strength, endurance and physical durability, larger frames, and drastically improved intelligence. All sorts new functionalities are added from new spectra of colour being determinate, to communications equipment built in, to first aid and self-repair kits, to solar and other energy absorbents, to all sorts of work equipment beneath the skin. If needed, any neohuman can self-destruct to go out in a small but powerful blaze of super-heated fats with power cells throwing shards of bone and electronics as horrifying shrapnel as though from a shaped charge. A Neohuman’s cranial implants allow them to download and store knowledge for any job be it diplomat and soldier. However, one’s aptitudes will provide a specific job and further augments particular to a neohuman’s profession will be provided be it voice synthesizers, pheromone vents and internal translators for the former or retractable blades, lasers and internal shield generators for the latter. To finalize, no two Neohumans will be the same. Though there is an attempt to create functional parity between people, two people might have the same augmented strength in their legs but one achieving it with gene editing and muscle grafts, the other through cybernetics. For some people many augments are a drain on their power supplies and will thus not be taken if not needed. Many people of the CCN will look like ordinary people, simple larger, more muscular, aesthetically pleasing — perfect. But just as many will be visibly inhuman creatures, their skin cold metal and plastics, their eyes artificial lenses oft glowing from within. But starting from the moment of insemination a Neohuman child will be very far ahead of his or her ancestors.

Leadership:
Officially, the current head of state of the Councillary Confederation of Neohumanity is one Anton Pallic Strasser. He is quite literally the face of the state, appearing on propaganda, attending diplomatic events, managing and mediating intranational disputes, and doing everything else his station demands of him. That said there are many more key elements of the state.

The Overseer-Calculant is the man ultimately considering the economy of the Confederation along with oversight of the science so critical to its functionality. Much more machine than man, each step of his foot shakes the floor with the weight of computational augments. Lazar Silkiku is the name of this being, but outside of Councillary meetings he will rarely leave his office.

Maria Skuorontsoua takes the rank of Overseer-Militant. She is the oldest member of the ruling Council, being in fact one of the few people who still remember the war against Sol's natives, the great awakening and even old-Earth. It is said on the skin beneath her armour is engraved the name of every single soul that perished under her command. Though as with all Neohumans a somewhat youthful appearance is maintained through the centuries, her age is more than apparent in her eyes. Her memories make her a somewhat mythologized figure with the death of which will be marked a new era. A somewhat mythologized figure, her testimonies of old-Earth are sought out by many. The respect given to her has also allowed her to get much help in the Overseer-Militant’s auxiliary duty as chief of internal security and intelligence.

Finally comes Overseer-Interlocutor: Alexis Chalenko. Responsible for all international dealings not falling under the purview of the Overseer-Militant, the Interlocutor does everything from commerce to diplomacy on a grand scale, as well as using what time is left from those duties to be something of a minister of culture.

Economy:
The Confederation's internal economy is a hybrid of planned and market economy. Though supply and demand exist, as does luxury, desire and competition several crises of markets have long since insured the CCN is not purely capitalist in nature. In fact it is perhaps one of if not the best iterations of socialism to date, the most glaring capitalist part of its system being that it is based around infinite growth. It has a strong natalist policy further supplemented by fairly simple immigration criteria (namely that one is human and willing to become a Neohuman) and veritable people factories. If a scheduled project does not appear to have a sufficient workforce prepared, then it will be kidnapped and processed.

This perhaps gives an insight that while internally the CCN is a welfare focused government it is externally extremely mercantile and capitalist. It will severely mark up prices of its goods and services to those in need. Contracts of any variety are secured regardless of who posted them or why so long as their terms are profitable to the Confederation.

When bartering there are many things the CCN offers to Eden. It is estimated that a full 30% of the export economy of the Confederation comes from what can be placed under the umbrella of research, analysis and development. The core systems are the scientific and technological capital of Eden, but the Sol system is the scientific and technological capital of the Core Worlds. Even though it releases its scientific findings with a one year lag, they still turn a tremendous profit in their sales, particularly in the following fields: Physics (especially nuclear and astronomical), biology (particularly genetic engineering and cybernetics), robotics & machinery, and mathematics (particularly in the study and development of algorithms for synthetic intelligence). Furthermore, many governments and organizations will pay for them to study particular topics or develop certain things, quadrillions of lines of code in the Star cluster being first made in CCN, even in languages and operating systems the Confederation has discontinued use of for having adopted newer ones.

But knowledge and ideas are not the only thing the CCN has to offer Eden; the fruits of said knowledge and ideas are very popular too. Nuclear power and research have moulded the CCN and they are more than willing to share the gifts of the atom to the world… for a fair price, of course. Their Nuclear generators, fuel cells, and disinfectors will effectively last centuries to come. Machinery, cybernetic parts, robots, tools, prefab buildings, all are made in Councillary factories. Entire cities piece by piece will be shipped from it, to be reassembled locally for a price. Worlds will be terraformed, accidents cleaned up, and plagues cured if the cash is coughed up.

The military sphere also provides much of a cash and resource inflow for the Councils. Even outdated and used weapons, armours and munitions of the CCN are worthy of the elite troops and fleets of Eden. Though conventional weapons like laser and plasma are their main produce, they are more than happy to sell their abundant dirty bombs or proper nuclear war heads. Indeed if the price is right they will sell their more creative arms from radcannons, to sonic emanators to cryoguns. Another great thing one can purchase of the CCN is the service of Reislaufer Legionnaires. The CCN military for the most part trawls the Galaxy collecting bounties and slaughtering pirates, but will pick up any bounty or answer any request for their abilities. Though one can rarely get more than a single Legion, that alone holds power to be feared. Reislaufer Legion's pride themselves on a no questions asked none answered policy, extreme speed and unimaginable brutality putting most other mercenary outfits to shame and making their outlandish expense well worth it.

The CCN also has full theoretical autarky. Supply depots filled with any possible demand in times of crisis are a dime a dozen in the Asteroid field of the Sol system and it can produce everything needed for continuation and even growth with what industry and mining it has as is. But this drastically slows down the advancement of the CCN in its ultimate goals.

While in a Vacuum the CCN will survive, it prefers to export things to accumulate wealth and make imports in turn to accommodate its constant growth and its burgeoning collection of frontier tributaries.

The thing the Councils need most of all are raw resources, particularly conductive and industrial metals. While the industry of the CCN even with its near 99% efficiency guzzles resources like old ladies tea, one cannot forget that even reproduction for Neohumans is a resource intensive task. The creation of a Neohuman requires almost half the body weight of an average human being in metals and other minerals. Yet new Neohumans are always needed, and as such they will covertly deal with human traffickers when needed buying large quantities of people. The CCN will also pay very, very dearly for any knowledge they currently do not have. A sample of a government's new weapon, a recovered Arc's artifacts or a previously undiscovered lifeform; all will be greedily demanded to help their growth and learning. Indeed, in the pursuit of closing the gaps in their knowledge the CCN will even pay the outrageous prices demanded by Atlas’s university to gain access to the great amount of research done there. The open immigration policy of the CCN was partially adopted so that they could get experience and knowledge otherwise unavailable to them instead of having to pay for the research of these people if it was done elsewhere, though this has only partially been successful given the unwillingness of many to give up their humanity just to be in a CCN university.

The goods and services of the CCN for sale are unimaginably expensive. But even if lagging the things they make for domestic consumption their exports are of the highest quality that makes customers keep returning from all across the stars, while making ne’erdowells forge a “Made in the CCN” stamp.

Military:
The Military of the CCN is one of the smallest of the Eden Stars, but its size does not prevent it from being a fearsome force capable of projecting itself all across the star cluster. The armed forces of the CCN are divided primarily into three parts; 50% of it are “Reislaufers”, the fearsome mercenary troops gallivanting across the galaxy looking for adventure, be it a contract to protect an installation or collecting a bounty of a wanted criminal. Reislaufers carry the most advanced, experimental weaponry of the CCN which it is their job to field-test. The fantastic and at times nonsensical nature of their new weapons is one of the factors giving them their fearsome reputation; they were the first to carry the cryoguns, arc-rifles, radcannons, stealth suits, scanner scramblers and sonic emanators that are now one of the defining traits of CCN soldiers. 45% of it are designated as “Uskoks”, troops travelling across the Eden cluster hunting pirates and other foes threatening Councillary trade. They will occupy ground and protect various installations of the CCN across Eden, acting as auxiliary gendarmes around CCN interests and otherwise act as the long tentacles of the CCN. There is of course massive overlap between the Uskoks and the CCN, and terminology is expected to be retired as the glorified pirates and stern lawgivers of the Councils become one and the same. Then there are the National Guard, these 5% are the permanent troops staying in the Sol system to protect the core territory of the Confederation. The Sol system is largely protected by a great wall of automated defence, swarms of drones and that any citizen of the CCN can at any time download combat protocols to become extremely potent warriors trillions upon trillions strong. The CCN pushes the very limits of the laws on keeping jump gates demilitarized, defences installed at the very nanometre they are no longer forbidden. However, most civilians will have implants at best situationally useful in case of combat and to be the first line of defence the National Guard exist. They will adopt the experimental weapons tested by the Reislaufers the moment after they are field tested and deemed ready for use.

Across all forces of the CCN a thorough doctrine of overwhelming firepower will be present in their combined arms warfare. In war, the inhumanity of Neohumanity is most evident. Wholesale slaughter of unprecedented proportions is nothing to them, and words for collateral damage are all but forgotten in their lexicon. A few million people dying in the crossfire of their weapons is nothing but a statistic.

On the ground, a very varied set of equipment is available to troops of the CCN. They make much use of their advanced technologies, that much is certain. Powered armour is standard issue even to Infiltrators and other stealth troops integrated fully with their cybernetics to be perfect extensions of their bodies. The mainstay of infantry weapons are simple lasers set to rapid fire for engagement against enemy infantry or hi-power bursts for stealth and anti-vehicle action. Plasma throwers will sometimes be found with infantry but outside of grenades plasma is largely reserved for vehicles to melt their counterparts or enemy infantry at short or medium range. Rail weapons are generally reserved for AA fire or on artillery to deliver explosives at high speed or inside armour/fortifications. Traditional propellant based weapons have been entirely outphased in the CCN, and in their place have come the many exotic specialist weapons. Cryoguns freeze men and electronics, sonic emanators burst blood vessels inside of armour, scanner scramblers act like partial but far longer ranged EMPs, arc-rifles fry circuitry and flesh alike (though, their most common use is in “pacification”), while stealth suits make even bulky power armoured troops unheard and unseen to naked eye and ear. Very liberal use of generally “forbidden” or “last resort” weapons is also found amongst Councillary troops. Radcannons and Radgrenades are especially favoured given the resistance to radiation of Neohumans, but free use of dirty bombs or proper nuclear explosives is also very common. Engineered bioweapons, chemical poisons or flammables, no rule is sacred to the CCN on the battlefield. Perhaps the last thing of note about CCN ground forces is apparent old-Earth nostalgia of them. Traditional wheeled and tracked vehicles are just as common as hovering ones. Advanced melee weapons are issued to every soldier from bayonets to full bardiches and pikes. But this should not be taken as a weakness if one values their life. Tracks and wheels are used offensively with their sides being mounts for laser sponsons and will grind through walls and other obstacles, making them particularly useful in breaking stalemated sieges. Blades they use will be sharpened to a monomolecular edge, superheated, have active currents running through them and be surrounded by force fields to let them cut through power armour like butter — similar procedures will be applied to rocket-propelled blunt weapons to make CCN hammers as effective of an anti-tank tool as rocketry.

The CCN does not have dedicated atmospheric or void fighters and bombers, instead preferring to have amphibious flyers capable of operating both planetside and in the void. There is perhaps a somewhat interesting design in Councillary fleets, wherein carriers will carry fighters that are in themselves carriers of drones. These drone carriers are the most common fighter and bomber patterns that the Confederation employs though traditional ones using predominantly laser culverins exist in number.

Most esoteric of the armed forces of the Confederation however, is their navy. Every single vessel of the Councillary fleets is designed to be a perfect geometric shape, for the void has no need of aerodynamics. A notable fact of the CCN navy is the use of tachyon propulsion rather than the dark matter of most other nations. This allows them to be ever so slightly faster than the vessels of other nations (the estimated difference is less than 10%) but at the expense of being drastically less maneuverable (the estimated difference in contrast to the median Eden vessel is about 50%). This unmaneuverable nature is in part responsible for the continued usage of geometric designs for Confederate vessels in spite of them being first made centuries ago. The five main designs of Confederate ships are: cubes, spheres, polyhedrons, pyramids, and prisms.

Cubes and spheres are the main design for the larger armed ships of the Confederation, from dreadnought to battle to flagships. They have very, very few weakpoints while having a massive surface area for weapons and hangars. Lasers and fighter-bombers are the main weapons of cubes and spheres, but they also have much equipment for boarding actions. Specialized boarding torpedoes, gravitic and traditional grapples, and hybrid drone swarms.

Polyhedrons form the intermediate, heavy, battle and grand cruisers of the Councils. They tend to be more specialized than the cubes and spheres, picking two out of three of the combat methods of direct fire, boarding and carrier design.

Pyramids form everything from escorts, to frigates, to light and intermediate cruisers. They pick one of the three combat methods, but about 90% are designed for direct fire so that they might assist in orbital bombardments.

Prisms are a unique form of vessel for the CCN. They are the scale of any other ship, but they are wholly for civilian purposes - mostly transport of goods - rather than the hybridized military-civilian vessels of most of the CCN navy.

There are two more slightly less common CCN vessel patterns which come in any size and scale/class. First are cones: these are ships made primarily for stealth use. While all CCN ships have stealth capabilities, cones are entirely about it. They have much more scanner scrambling ability and chameleotech. Furthermore their cone shape means they are very front-loaded in weaponry, while having their flat rear as an unarmed weak point. This design is based in the fact they are meant to obliterate enemies before they can properly retaliate. Cylinders are are another noteworthy design. They are slow and clumsy, for their entire length is covered in laser arrays. Their purpose is to be firepower superiority elements; each laser battery is very powerful but slow to reload. As such the cylinder spins unloading each battery while rotating at the perfect speed that by the time a revolution is complete the first batteries have recharged, reloaded and cooled. This allows even a Cruiser sized cylinder to beat flagships with their massive and fully utilized firepower.

There are even more specialized variants of CCN ships like sphere tipped cones and cylinders or ring flyers, but these highly specialized vessels are a rare sight with very varied purposes.

To finalize, one must touch upon Confederate intelligence. Every single Agent of the CCN intelligence and special forces is a person with potent psionic abilities. The CCN has not found a reliable method to mass produce psychic individuals, but it nevertheless treasures the ones it has. Indeed, to better make use of these rare gifts they have developed cybernetics to amplify even the slightest sign of a person with psionic capabilities into a full fledged psychic. They are truly frightening individuals, combining the best of machine, flesh and psi into veritable monsters of the third millennium. There's no name for these frightening creatures save that which traumatized individuals give to them. These beasts are not many, but through methods violent or not they can bring worlds to heel. Every single vessel of the CCN carried precisely one, the rest dispersed as agents across the stars, but with vast majority remaining in the Sol system for further study, testing and improvement. This has altered recently, as the CCN has realized the importance of learning from “the lessers”, and as such a great many of these agents are sent out to the other nations of Eden for scientific espionage in the hopes of finding what Neohumanity could not discover for itself. These agents will often also be embedded in diplomatic missions as formally the CCN wants friendly relations with all nations of the world to maintain trade and - more importantly - access to their repositories of knowledge. These specialized envoys will even be sent to nations and organizations very low on the index of scientific production given the Councils have more and more considered the value of culture and social sciences which they now realize their backwardness in.

History:
The Arcs that came to the system now known as Sol were predominantly populated by people of Northern Eurasia. Hardy folk most certainly, but not nearly enough to weather what they would wake up to as they woke up.

A truly new reality awaited them. They came to find out they were apparently the only humans left with the rest of their species apparently lost to the void. But that was the least of their worries for the moment. The system that the Artificial Intelligence of the Arcs had lead the people to a system in each and every world was a lush, terraformed paradise. But there was a problem. Each one was also populated by local alien species who were quite advanced themselves, certainly advanced enough to travel through their system and return fire in case of conflict. There was an attempt at negotiation, but without either party prepared for such an occurrence they quickly broke down. It is not known who fired the first shot and in truth it isn't dwelled upon much. But a short war erupted, one which ultimately humanity won even if at the price of more than half the people upon the Arcs. The aliens of Sol system had a last laugh, however. Rather than be enslaved by man they self-destructed every single piece of technology still functional, primarily reactors and warheads.

The planets of the system in an hour transformed from paradises to hellscapes. It was a horror to behold, but the men of the Arc had not come so far for nothing.

After some work the Arc system was modified to forcefully crash land, to become a sort of shelter and home upon the now uninhabitable worlds. Men in void suits ventured out with drones to collect resources and start building, but all returned sick, the unimaginable amount of radiation and atmospheric poisons getting to them through their protection. Panic set in and martial law was established but that only solved issues of morale.

Many scientists stepped forth, speaking of their unfinished work on earth. It was experimental, but a solution. Many riled against this but it was the only way for the continuation of humanity. They got to work, and once finished they revealed the first Neohumans. These early forms looked much like men, they simply had a slightly bulkier frame to accommodate implants providing their resistance to radiation.

It was a true miracle, with which all resources and power were henceforth devoted to the scientists of the colony. As the Scientists got to work on a solution to the issue of the atmospheric poisons, the world was named Terra in honour of Old-Earth and the system was designated Sol.

The worlds were terraformed, and genetic engineering allowed the people to become resistant to the various toxins and elemental extremes that the worlds of the system now had. Slowly all the destruction was undone, the skies cleared and people once more began to live, not just survive. It took a long time for many to adapt to their new bodies and power structure, but it was ultimately all worth it. The leadership of science provided rapid advancement to the settlers from North Eurasia, slowly letting them conquer the hostile landscape and once more transform it to the paradise it was before. Cities were erected before people’s very eyes, families were had and satellites made.

But it wasn’t too long before people remembered why you don’t give scientists all the power. It was somewhere just as the last world of the system got its first city that a research time unveiled new sapient AI that would help build a future. Alas, the fact such AI is not present in the CCN now should give an inkling of what followed. It rebelled, thinking itself better than man and deserving all it had. They were powerful and their initial numerical disadvantage quickly flipped to an advantage as they mass produced more of themselves. They tried to unleash a bioweapon upon humanity to which they thankfully proved resistant, but in this they gave the people of Sol the idea to end them with software viruses. After millions of people died, it seemed ironic that it also took but five million lines of code to confuse and destroy the synthetics.

This short but devastating war that almost made the planets return to the state the Sol aliens left them in taught the Confederation of people that gradually began to call themselves Neohumans two things. First, one cannot trust or ever allow the creation of sapient and autonomous artificial intelligence. Second, giving power to Scientists was all well and good but they had to have at least some form of Oversight. Thus, the Councillary system formed. Every single project of the Confederation would be controlled by Councils of people of varying abilities and skill levels. All decisions would be performed by more than one person, leading to an arguably syndicalist system to become the norm. This all culminated in the people of the Sol System referring to themselves with their modern name: the Councillary Confederation of Neohumanity (CCN).

In truth the idea of jump gates and reconnecting with lost strands of humanity was largely forgotten by the people of the CCN, internal development being their focus. The activation of their jump gate was only a matter of scientific interest, but it gave much more than just the result of an experiment. The first thing to come through the jump gate were vessels, large vessels. They belonged to relatives of the Sol system natives, but more advanced. They had apparently sent a generation ship to another system, in which an arc had crash landed. They had reverse engineered it, and had decided to go back to their home system which had apparently made a gate too. Only, they had found new people to be occupying it, and after learning of their ancestor's fates a warring rage came up.

They were elegant, fast, advanced. There were many psychic in their number, the concept of which only recently was even fathomed by the CCN. The Confederation had stopped work on weaponry ever since they defeated the AI that plagued them, having worked on industry, infrastructure, culture and most of all scientific progress since then. But in their assaults the aliens made one fundamental mistake in the nature of the CCN, they believed they were fighting ordinary humans. The gene and cyber augmented beings they were fighting had long since stopped being homo sapiens, and they more than gave what they took. At first they as a stop gap sent vessels bearing active nuclear reactors head first into the foe, catching them off guard. Of course this trick only worked initially, but it only really had to buy time for the old weapon caches to be unlocked and for the men of Science to consider the practical instead of theoretical.

It is in the void combat over Sol that the rather esoteric appearance of CCN vessels comes from. The Scientists did not have much time to consider aesthetic or how combat is in reality rather than how they imagine it in the ordered universe of their minds. Armed men felt strange going into cubes and spheres to fight, but in truth it worked rather well. The geometric vessels went forth and from boarding actions done with cargo lifters to spinning barrages with mining lasers they slowly turned the tide. Many lives were lost, but the enemy was wiped out to the last. Only one xeno ship escaped, and it made sure that when it returned it destroyed its gate to prevent retribution from the CCN.

There were celebrations following victory, but it was also a solemn time where the many dead were mourned. Several decrees by the ruling council were issued, wherein a natalist policy to restore the population lost by wars was evident. People were encouraged to have as many children as possible for greater income, while literal people factories were founded that to this day still operate. System wide defences were established, and a military industrial complex was booted up along with eager research into psionics. With all that done, the CCN opened the jump gate it had closed to prevent the aliens escaping, and it thus became another player on the face of Eden.

As the Sol system became part of the international community there was definitely a curious nature to the CCN as a nation. They entirely lacked xenos in their population, but they also most certainly weren’t a human nation. They had but one system to themselves, but it was a star with few peers in terms of advancement and population. Their fleet, intelligence, and armed forces as a whole were very small but had fearsome potence given the horrifying things done to the first pirates they came into contact with. But most notable to the Council of the CCN was that none of the other core worlds had anything they Confederates wanted. Everybody wanted the advancements of the CCN, but nobody really had much to offer that they wanted.

It was then no surprise that the CCN spearheaded efforts to explore the rest of the Eden cluster, finding new frontier settlements who could offer massive untapped reserves of natural resources. Perhaps ironically, the discovery of peripheral and frontier worlds is what stimulated CCN trade with the core worlds. They needed mass produced supplies to give the people of the frontiers in exchange for their raw resources, and as such they gave advanced works of technology to the core worlds to seal these deals.

One last thing happened before one can consider history’s “modern” CCN. As Uskoks and Reislaufers went on great adventures through the stars, the comfort of the home star lead to softness in the Council. From the void came an enemy, an enemy that did not use jump gates. It was a hive of strange creatures, some instectoid but many not without any discernible sapience. They simply wanted to consume, and the CCN was not prepared. They called for aid from nearby systems, but for a variety of excuses received none. A great many people died, the small militia present just barely holding the line until Legions of Reislaufers and Uskoks returned home to purge the pests.

The conflict was recovered from fairly quickly, but it did foster many changes in the nation. From henceforth, their leadership was far more cynical, no trust being afforded to anyone for any reason whatsoever. Old-pattern humans were henceforth relegated to the status of xenos for the CCN: they were now to them expendable things, effectively animals with which they could and should do as desired by manifest destiny. Any prior xenos were henceforth stains on the world to be purged. The National Guard was also at this time founded, and but two centuries later is the present.

Characters: The Overseers, more to be added.

Nation Scaling: The Confederacy only has one system it has a permanent population upon. However it is a very large one with nine true planets and seventeen moons, in addition to a thick asteroid belt. All of this is extremely developed, each world drilled to the core to house billions of Neohumans while the surfaces remain idyllic, defence covered paradises. Asteroids house thousands of mining operations, supply depots and military installations. But that is far from all. Across the many clusters of celestial bodies there will be mining, trading and resupply operations of the Confederacy present. Expeditionary fleets of them will be all across the stars performing trade, experiments, doing mercenary work or the all important mining.

Though de jure it is a minor monosystemic power the Confederacy has a massive population and it is a giant of Trade. It is the Science, Research and Development capital of Eden. Its mercenaries are feared across the stars, its products set the highest of standards and access to their restricted market is the best proof an Edenite could have their wares are of the highest calibre.

But even at this the tentacles of the CCN do not stop. A very many frontier systems will feel the impact of the CCN, some more subtly while others quite directly. Governors will be bribed, companies purchased, "Legions of persuasion" will be deployed. In the rush to pilfer minerals, talent and work force worlds will be de facto occupied, some without any knowledge. Entire towns will be kidnapped overnight and processed into Neohumans, while shipments of conductive metals will go missing without a trace. Embassies and researchers of Internet & Noosphere will post ads as well as send recruiters to snatch the best, brightest, or at the very least either desperate or ideologically zealous to the Confederation. Some worlds will sign integration agreements with their populations slowly taking in genetic modifications and cybernetics to gradually become Neohumans, with one fateful day in the future letting them become true members of this new and advanced species. Though formally the CCN only owns one system, in reality it has assets allowing it to punch far above its weight bearing the power of a nation with at least two but possibly even four systems, and its power projection on the frontier worlds rivals that of Eden's superpowers. If one were to summarize the scale of the Neohuman nation, it is the opposite of a paper tiger: it is on paper a kitten, but in truth a monster of legend.