Introduction
The Galaxy is vast, and the denizens who inhabit it are many. Simple truths which were once held to be self-evident are often challenged in the dark expanse of space. Legends abound of planets orbiting Black Holes, where a single second is days elsewhere, or of Dyson Spheres the size of systems, which may only be entered through hidden apertures. The Galactic Exclusion Zone is a popular setting for many outlandish tales and sightings. What rumors might be true, and what speculation is simply just that is not often easily divined. For, after all, the galaxy is vast, and the denizens and mysteries it contains are as numerous as the stars themselves.
Legends
The Dancing Bomber
According to pre-War records, Cuba was an Old Terra country that existed prior to the Final War. A tropical island nation, Cuba suffered greatly from rising water levels and atmospheric pollution as Humanity tottered along towards its inevitable tipping point. Due to its poverty and low political capital, Cuba was underrepresented amongst the Diaspora. As a result, this culture struggled to persist among the stars, relegated to insular pockets of tightly knit cultural and ethnic colonies. To this day, the Cuban identity is considered largely extinct. On the Frontier however, legends persist of a Cuban agent in the employ of the Syndicated Corporations. His status as a terrorist with a penchant for explosive devices and his bombastic personality have turned him into a cultural icon. The impression left behind by his bombing spree during the Phoron War is so indelible that even NanoTrasen itself acknowledges his existence - often by portraying him as a notable antagonist in video games and media products. Outside of NanoTrasen, the Dancing Bomber has attained folk hero status, and is considered an icon for radical anti-corporate action: Cuban Pete, the Dancing Bomber.
Mysteries
Space Madness
This ephemeral mental condition is a hotly disputed topic across the broader Galactic Medical Community. Allegedly commonplace on the Frontier, and in areas of Deep Space where haulers and military vessels are dispatched to patrol for inordinately long periods of time, Space Madness is a form of rapid-onset psychosis with no confirmed triggers and no known pathology.
Space Madness manifests itself most commonly as a form of self-destructive homicidal rage. The affected individual - or individuals - may appear to be fully coherent throughout the psychotic break. Footage and sensor data from several suspected episodes reveal that the afflicted crewmember is still fully in possession of their higher cognitive functions. They might plan, utilize tools and weaponry, and set up traps to enhance their lethality. Regardless of how sober and coherent the affected party may appear to be, their condition will be readily made apparent when they commence their wanton acts of violence. Some allegedly afflicted parties have continued to fight even after incurring grievous bodily injuries. At least twelve hundred incidents of self-immolation have been recorded in the Cygnus Spur alone.
Amongst those professionals who accept its existence, Space Madness is commonly believed to exist across species - although it appears to statistically affect Humans and Human subspecies more often. Currently there is no known correlation between the condition and a lack of intelligence, as Doctors, Security Officers, and sometimes even Command Staff will be overcome by this affliction. There is currently no known treatment for Space Madness. However, the affliction will typically manifest as a brief outburst or episode, and then recede - often never to be encountered again. Professionals often recommend that affected crewmembers are restrained and quarantined until they can be appraised, and safely returned to duty, or committed.
Vat-Born Specific Madness
Although it is (somewhat) widely accepted that Humans are more prone to The Madness than other species, even amongst human demographics one subspecies is overrepresented in statistics. This has lead to the further, narrower designation "Vat-Born Specific Madness". Unlike with generalized Madness, there is at least one broadly held theory as to why VBSM occurs.
| “Across the galaxy, Vat-Born clones - sometimes referred to as 'baldies', after the lack of hair cheap Vat-Born have due to budgetary constraints - will sometimes come out of their Vats cognitively impaired. Science does not yet fully understand what goes wrong during the fabrication process, but it is thought that improperly cloned brains result in a higher incidence of Vat-Born displaying violent and anti-social impulses. The result of this improper cloning is an individual that may be sociopathic, nearly incapable of social interaction, schizophrenic, and/or prone to murderous rampages. None of these flawed clones may demonstrate all or any of these symptoms at first, and often times these symptoms may spontaneously manifest with no apparent instigation. Notably, these flaws appear more rarely in specialized types of Vat-Born, leading some to theorize that the root of the problem may lie in the bulk cloners employed by many Megacorporations - Nanotrasen most prominent amongst them. As with general instances of The Madness, unfortunately, whatever is wrong with these malformed clones is impossible to detect until the symptoms manifest, which they do rapidly, without warning, and often with horrible consequences.
The lack of scientific consensus around these models' failing brains has lead some spiritual leaders to state that the problem is not with the flesh at all, but with the soul. They claim that some Vat-Born, due to whatever metaphysical forces govern the nature of the soul, emerge from their vats with either a flawed soul, or no soul at all. Some crazed radicals have even gone as far as to suggest that these clones have become possessed by otherworldly destructive entities that seek only to spread misery and pain for their own amusement. Such rhetoric is considered highly offensive. With no scientific evidence supporting it, and with Vat-Born serving in common workforces the galaxy over, such claims are seen are derisive and dehumanizing. Due to this, Internal Affairs departments consider this rhetoric hate speech worthy of mandatory sensitivity training or other discipline." |
Rumors
Lore
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| Corporations | NanoTrasen, Frontier Megacorporations, Minor Corporations, The Syndicate |
| NanoTrasen Specific | NDV Marksman, Paracausal Monitoring Division |
| Other Organizations | ITV Talon, System Defense Force, The Orion Confederation |
| Worldbuilding | Extradimensional Mechanics, FTL Travel, Galactic Landmarks, Legends, Mysteries, and Rumors, Metaphysics and Paracausality, Technology of the 2500's, The Timeline |
| Contribution Data | Lore Submission Templates, Roadmap for Lore Development |