Futuristic Night Fall - Lore

[ERode]

 

[ERode]

• The Nightfall Era
• The Bright Night and Lunacy

• 
  
  
  
  For lightning storms, avoid open plains. For tsunamis, reach high ground. For earthquakes, go outside. For wildfires, seek the water.
  
  For Nightfall, what could you do?
  
  Two hundred and one years ago, the moon turned black and ended civilization, starting from the easternmost point of Eurasian and racing westwards from there, a cosmic conquest that swept through the planet within the span of 24 hours. In its wake, billions perished, taken unaware by the new rules that governed the world, possessed by the madness of the night that corroded them so completely that when it ended, they remained changed. There were few who were fortunate enough to react in time, but those few were very few. The Old World, Europe, is a black box now, humanity lacking the ability to safely traverse the seas. The New World, the Americas, have become an alien wasteland, unrecognizable after centuries of mutations. Furthest west is where the remnants of humanity survive now, pushed to the brink by the terrors of the sea and the hordes that roamed the lands. The thousands of satellites that once connected the world had turned to stardust, and the great monuments of mankind have been irreparably defaced by the creatures that now claim them as their own.
  
  But if it was hopeless, humanity could not have continued onwards.
  
  Two hundred and one years later, the inheritors of civilization continue to raise their strongholds, to toil for their tomorrows. They possess power enough to break the tides that threaten to swallow them whole, and they look northwards, southwards. For if there were to be survivors, they could only come from places less populated. Could expeditionary forces in the North and South Poles survived, sheltering under the frozen grottoes and the cracks of glaciers? The night is dark. But human lives continue to burn in order to chase that darkness away.
  
• 
  
  
  
  The days are dark. There is a gloom in the sky and the hearts of man, a recognition that living meant labor, meant battle, meant holding tightly upon the small scraps of happiness that you could obtain, meant devoting yourself to a cause that you may never receive a reward for.
  
  But those days are preferable to the nights.
  
  For the nights are Bright, a nauseating aurora overhead that serves to replace fabled starlight and moonlight with a sinister brilliance. It coats everything it touches, that energy called 'Lunacy', painting the world of science and rationality with a bewitching madness. Life evolves in uncommon directions, evolves with the explosiveness of a plague, as dark carapaces form as extensions of the natural form. Bulbous sensory organs bloom, while skeletal structures twist and churn, losing their sense of symmetry and balance in exchange for a physical lethality. Those dyed with Lunacy cannot return to what they once were, compelled by the Black Moon to seek the fulfillment of their desires in the worst possible way. For animals, they may grow more violent and virile, losing empathy and intelligence in exchange for having the power to pursue the most direct path to what they desire. For humans, however? They become shells of themselves, parodies consumed by their ego, their obsessions manifesting in obscene manners. And though a few of them may still possess a capacity for communication, they cannot be reasoned with. That is good, though.
  
  If they could be reasoned with, they could reason with each other. And if they could reason with each other? They would become a much greater threat as a unified force.
  
  Few animals remain in their natural forms. Those that do to this present day are most certainly creatures pre-disposed to dwelling in dark places, or creatures of such simple intellect that they do not possess a 'mind' for Lunacy to corrode to begin with. Insects, in particular, have avoided being wholly warped by the Bright Nights, and have consequently become both a valuable source of food, as well as a surprisingly popular choice for a pet.
  

 

[ERode]

• Moondrops and Rejection
• Lunatics and the Defining Scar
• Couriers and Commissions

• 
  
  
  
  In the early years of the Nightfall Era, humanity had not the resources nor the personnel to choose how they survived. It was losing battle after losing battle, fighting just so they can keep their part of the underground free from the monsters that crept down below, seeking untainted flesh. They had no choice, but in exchange, they had a unified will.
  
  To live on, no matter the cost. To protect what remains of their families, close or distant, found or fathered.
  
  Biologists studied behavior of their foe. Hunters bled and skinned the beasts. Chemists and pharmacists concocted what they could. The Bright Night could not be understood, but what of its symptoms? What of the carapace that clung to those that had drowned in Lunacy? What of their fluids, their flesh, their bones, their organs, their cartilage? It was the end of days. They were all mad, but they remained lucid. They understood that Lunacy drove one to fulfill their desires. They reasoned that if that was the case, then a positive desire could be fulfilled too. If it was a virus, perhaps they could induce it. If it was mutation, perhaps they could induce it.
  
  It was neither.
  
  It was simply a miracle that, after the agonizing deaths of so many of humanity's most zealous fighters, they got the formula right once.
  
  The first Lunatic, the Progenitor, fought for seven days and seven nights, securing a route to a government facility where more scientific equipment could be obtained, before her flesh bubbled and reformed into a mass of arms and legs, and she was executed before that transformation into something other was completed. They got the formula right once. They refined it further after. Produced more Lunatics, those who possessed powers shaped by their desires and traumas, yet those who had yet to fall whole-heartedly into self-gratification. They continued, on and on, successful generations lasting longer than the previous, but all meeting a grisly end, until they realized that it wasn't due to an exterior problem, but rather an interior one.
  
  The Rejection of a Lunatic's new state of being was theorized to be something similar to how a body's immune system would attack transplanted organs. In this case, however, it could be considered a mutation induced to more effectively realize a Lunatic's desire, if only in some entirely maddening ways. The Lunacy itself seeks to spread, and in response, it had to be kept at bay.
  
  Moondrops, the serum that transformed humans into Lunatics, had been perfected after 73 years of development and testing. Now, the only way side effects could occur would be due to the quality of the product itself, rather than the science behind its synthesis.
  
  The Rejection, however, remains an unsolvable conundrum, one that could be held at bay or perhaps even regressed, but one that every Lunatic has to handle, has to face.
  
• 
  
  
  
  By NF 281, Lunatics are generally considered dangerous freaks, possessing powers that they sought out of their own greed.
  
  That is true.
  
  For the ordinary person living within the strongholds of humanity, life has become peaceful enough that one could perhaps die due to old age. If one were satisfied with becoming a cog in the machine, if one could look themselves in the mirror and be happy with being normal, then it could be considered incomprehensible to decide to become a Lunatic, especially a Lunatic outside the bounds of the Foundation. After all, if they did not swear themselves to the Foundation, did that not mean that their driving desire, the ultimate fulfillment of their dream, rested not in the betterment of humanity, but rather something a touch more selfish? Did that not mean, in fact, that they were what should be feared most? A monster who possessed the powers granted by Lunacy, yet still head the scheming intellect of a human being?
  
  There were syndicate leaders who were Lunatics. There were backdoors doctors who were Lunatics. There were mere teenagers, with undeveloped minds and no sense of self-displine, who were Lunatics!
  
  For the ordinary, who could be cowed by the fear of change, they could never understand why one may flood their veins with Moondrop purchased off of black markets and other illicit channels. Indeed, the defining feature that all Lunatics possess is a 'scar'. Something that pains them. Something that reminds them. Something that leaves a mark that they can always see, that they can never wholly grow up from. Perhaps it is a trauma, an event that shook them so deeply they could never forget or forgive it. Perhaps it is a dream, something they would seek to achieve, no matter what it may cost, no matter if it's not even achievable. Perhaps it is something more indistinct, the specifics forgotten but the emotions, like a brand, searing into their mind until they are consumed by it wholly.
  
  Lunatics are made of such things. It is both their origin as well as their power. Though the Foundation may be so crude as to sum it up in the categorizations of Transformation or Creation, the ability that a Lunatic possesses is a far more precious thing. Just as monsters possess carapaces and mutations that serve to extend themselves, so too is a Lunatic's power an extension of their own being.
  
  An individual, an iron-willed commissioner, gaining the gift of summoning forth implements of imprisonment and restraint.
  
  An individual, a star-blind sycophant, gaining the gift of exhaling fumes that make the sharpest minds as pliable as clay.
  
  An individual, a lion in every way, gaining the gift to embody the form of a beast now extinct.
  
  It is a simple thing, one that can be summed up within a single line.
  
  It is a deep thing, one that cannot simply change with time.
  
  It is, after all, a Defining Scar.
  
• 
  
  
  
  It should come to little surprise that there are few places in civilization and polite society where Lunatics fit in. Though they maintain a degree of normality, they were still the ones who injected themselves with a drug that transformed them into something more than human, something that was a biological time bomb, something that meant a peaceful death was entirely an impossibility.
  
  Some Lunatics maintain a facade still. So long as they are registered by the Foundation, they are technically allowed to remain free and unfettered within the cities that cradle humanity. They can continue to show up at work if they are employed, or continue to offer their services if they are self-employed. But unless they possessed an exceptional talent, they will be fired. Unless they were remarkable contractors, they will see their client pool dry up. It is the cost, after all, of declaring to everyone else that what you currently are is not what you wish to be, that what you wish for is something you'd be willing to risk your own life, as well as the lives of many others, for.
  
  That you are dangerous, manic, irrational, sinister, deluded, a twisted cog that popped out of the machine and rolled off the edge into self-pleasure.
  
  There are exceptions, of course. Lunatics who used their powers to heal the injured, to produce wealth and resources to the have-nots, to protect the great walls that are their only shelter through the night. Those exceptions, though, only prove the rule. After all, such exceptions unilaterally end up being employed by the Foundation, becoming exemplars of what a Lunatic ought to be.
  
  For the rest, however? There is only one choice: become a Courier.
  
  You are a twisted cog, but a durable one. You can resist the Bright Night. You can fight off the Lunacy-dyed. You possess superhuman capabilities, even without expensive power armor and military-grade weaponry. And few will cry for you if you vanished and did not reappear. You are a twisted cog, fit for slotting into broken machines.
  
  The Foundation has a place for you. The corporations have a place for you. Even the syndicates have a place for you. There are always commissions to be done, things that no one but a Lunatic would be fit for doing. And so long as you do your job, so long as you fulfil your end of the bargain? You get to survive another day, just like any other ordinary member of society, no matter how unordinary, how irregular, your work is.
  

 

[ERode]

• The Foundation
• The Sector of Standard Security

• 
  
  
  
  They are the bedrock upon which civilization rests.
  
  The Foundation manifested from the original group of scientists and innovators who created the Moondrops that served as humankind's first true method of fighting back. Collaborating with the Lunatics that they themselves created, they raised the first stronghold and from there, gathered, trained, bred the brightest scholars that remained, in order to study the effects of Lunacy. If the scientists of the past would see them now, the Foundation would be mocked for being a collective of pseudoscientists. But the Lunacy itself was not something that could be entirely understood, no matter how many monsters they captured and dissected, no matter how many Lunatics they created and tested. It is by treading on the boundary line between the scientific and the ritualistic that the Foundation had managed to bring humanity so far.
  
  But paradoxically, with iterations on defenses came the discarding of the obsolete. One could not trust Lunatics as much as their fellow man. Why place one's fates in hands of the inhuman?
  
  Great cities rose. Radio towers enabled city-wide communications. Power suits and mechanized weaponry turned monsters to pulp. Anti-Lunacy Beacons counteracted the Bright Night. Power plants returned the conveniences from two centuries back. In all this, the Foundation had a hand, and now, they are intrinsically tied to every facet of human life and possess a political power that ensures that no city they built will stray from party line. Some may consider it a dystopia. Some may fear the puppetmaster behind the governors elected by the 'people'. Some may rally up, demanding the freedom of self-determination.
  
  They have the right to do so.
  
  Yet the majority remain unswayed. The machine is working. Humanity is prospering in a nightmare world. And though the Foundation understands the dissentors, though their shadows stretch far deeper than underground in which they were born, they will never willingly relinquish the power they hold over government and industry.
  
  After all, they are the bedrock upon which civilization rests.
  
• 
  
  
  
  They are the Hammer, to build the walls.
  
  They are the Nail, to pierce the dark.
  
  The Sector of Standard Security handles the maintenance and protection of the walls, as well as short-range expeditions outside the walls in order to exterminate clusters of the Lunacy-dyed. There is no modern city that is built without them; their powered armor allows them to not only fight with the might of a hundred men, but also do the work of a hundred men as well. The same tools they use to build the perimeter of a fledging city are the weapons they use to crush the skulls of Lunacy-Dyed and criminal Lunatics alike. For the ordinary individual, the Sector of Standard Security are hosted upon a pedestal as the true heroes of the Nightfall Era. If a child wished to fantasize, being a member of the SSS would be one of the more common daydreams.
  
  After all, the stories write themselves. Masked individuas who venture off to the unknown, reclaiming the twisted lands and making it livable for their kin. Doing work that ought to be praised in perpetuity, but choosing to remain anonymous for none are in it for fame or glory. They guard the gates and keep the populace safe. They handle everything that the regular police force cannot, while retaining their humanity. And though they may be unbending and unsympathetic to small tragedies, though they may appear to exist only to upkeep the walls, the populace can understand. It is a job, after all. It is a job in which the Foundation is your boss. Nothing but the utmost adherence to the rules ought to be expected.
  
  Mysterious but selfless. Strong but human. Bound by duty, yet empowered by brilliant ideals. It's not just the stories that write themselves, but the smut too.
  
  ...
  
  Couriers, of course, hate them.
  
  How many times have they been pushed away, after all, simply because their ID could not be verified at the entrance of a city?