Setting Info: Factions of Coriolis

The Third Horizon is not dominated by a single power, but instead a wide range of groups struggle to claim the title – these are the factions. These monolithic organizations are divided into two groups, fighting economic, cultural, and military wars among each other to further their individual agendas.

The Horizon is full of large corporations, institutions and orders, but only a few – those with strong enough ancestry and political power – are called factions. Despite some disagreement on the issue, the general consensus is that there are ten active factions in the Horizon today, divided into two groups: Firstcome and Zenithian. The dividing line between the early colonists and the late-come Zenithians is the Third Horizon’s most prominent cultural conflict, taken to its extreme in the power play of the factions. The Firstcome share a strong belief in the Icons, while the Zenithians base their ideology on the austere pragmatism introduced by the arrival of their arkship, Zenith. There are some exceptions: the Church of the Icons is a young faction, but counts as Firstcome thanks to their strong religious foundation. The Legion on their hand have a Firstcome history, having fought together with the Order of the Pariah at Odacon, but counts as Zenithian because of their current alliance with the Consortium.


ZENITHIAN FACTIONS

◆ The Consortium
◆ The Legion
◆ The Zenithian Hegemony
◆ The Free League
◆ The Syndicate

The Zenithian factions, headed by the Consortium, all promote the pragmatic Zenithian culture and focus on function and effectiveness. They acknowledge the Icon faith, and many Zenithians have adopted the Icons as their gods, but view religion as something separate from politics and refuse to let the Icons influence their ideology. Their common goal is to consolidate their power in the Horizon and act as guardians and shepherds for the Zenithian peoples as they believe this to be the way into a new golden age.

The Zenithian factions have a natural leader in the Consortium, who through their myriad subsidiaries and trade networks have gathered riches and resources second to none. Thanks to their alliance with the Legion they also possess considerable military strength, dominating Coriolis and controlling large territories throughout the Horizon. Not all Zenithians are happy with their leadership, however – the proud Zenithian Hegemony regards themselves as the true rulers of the Zenithians and they are steadily growing stronger. The smallest factions, the Free League and the Syndicate, have less direct power on the political scene, but work with precision in the shadows, often together. They are also the most ideologically flexible of the Zenithian factions, open to negotiations and compromises for mutual benefit with the Firstcome factions.


FIRSTCOME FACTIONS

◆ The Church of the Icons
◆ The Draconites
◆ Ahlam’s Temple
◆ The Order of the Pariah
◆ The Nomad Federation

Unlike their Zenithian counterparts, the Firstcome factions place great belief in religious and mystical ideas about destiny and morality – in the legendary words of Icon Mother Saresha: "Without the Icons, the suns would go out. Without prayer, the Horizon would stop." Faith and morality can be discussed just as intensely before drafting a new trade agreement as when debating whether or not humanites have souls. The Firstcome factions are known for their inability to agree with each other, often leaving it to the Zenithians to mediate between them. Only on one occasion have the Firstcome factions joined forces to achieve a common goal: when they crushed the Nazareem’s Sacrifice.

There is no obvious leader among the Firstcome factions, but as far as wealth and size goes, the Church of the Icons and the Order of the Pariah are the strongest. With the Order’s recent seclusion and the Church of the Icons lack of any real military strength, the Firstcome factions are more divided than ever.

"Expansion is life."

The Consortium and the Coriolis station are one – so closely tied together that most people in the Horizon can’t tell them apart. Coriolis was constructed using materials from the dismantling of the Zenith, on the orders of the Yriedes family, the seconds-in-command. The Yriedeses had a vision that became the Consortium’s motto: "Sell everything to everyone". The Yriedes clan, together with the families Parr, Nestera and Evgeni founded the core group of companies that now, some sixty years later, have grown into one huge faction. The Consortium of today consists of about twenty larger companies, all owning installations and factories throughout the Horizon. Most production facilities are located on Kua or in the larger systems, but new colonies are established all the time. The larger corporations have representatives on the board of directors, the faction’s governing body, and the three largest ones – the Bulletin, the Foundation and the Colonial Agency – each have their own seat at the Council of Factions.

The current faction director and council member is Tiera Yriedes, closely associated with the military industrial trinity Parr-Nestera, Tilides and Xoar, and a personal friend of Legion general Ekaterina Hierida. The new, aggressive policies promoted by Tiera have begun to escalate conflicts across the Horizon. A storm is coming.

"The best must die so the rest can live."

The Legion is the youngest of the Firstcome factions – so young that it is usually considered Zenithian, albeit this is mainly due to their close ties to the Consortium. Some say that they might as well just join the Consortium, but this would not be in the corporations’ best interest – it would mean one less Zenithian vote on the Council.

The two flagships Shahrazad and Dunyazad and their escort, the only survivors from Shadussar’s 2nd Fleet after the Portal Wars, founded the Legion. When the fleets from the First Horizon were about to attack Mira, some of Shadussar’s forces were diverted to set up an ambush there, but as the enemies took the Odacon route – and were destroyed there, along with the rest of Shadussar’s fleets – they survived. During the chaotic years that followed the end of the war, the survivors traveled the Horizon as warlords and corsairs. Many of the horrors perpetrated during those years can be traced back to the Legion – something they refuse to acknowledge today, of course.

When the Zenith arrived and the Consortium was founded, this new and powerful employer suddenly meant new possibilities. The Legion of today was born. They were originally hired by the Consortium to wipe out the fleets of the Zenithian Hegemony, but suffered terrible losses and retreated, instead being tasked with hunting corsairs, greedy nobles or any other who would threaten the Consortium’s interests.

"As it once was, so shall it be."

Members of the captain’s family and other high-ranking officers of the crew of the Zenith founded the Hegemony after the schism onboard. Captain Abarren Quassar together with the Cabinet of Thousands from the Monolith officially rules the faction, but a divide has been growing within the organization. De facto, there are two factions within the Hegemony: the Hegemonists and the neo-Zenithians, the former led by the Quassar family and the latter by Arianites. Both groups share the view that the Hegemony is the rightful ruler of the Third Horizon and destined to lead its peoples to greatness, but they disagree on how to get there. The Hegemonists are elitist and unforgiving, while the neo-Zenithians prefer cooperation, mainly with the Consortium, but also with other factions. Both groups act as patrons for middle class Zenithians through scholarships, as mentors for entrepreneurs, and invest heavily in Zenithian projects, industrial as well as research.

The two groups both control a few key institutions within the faction each. The Hegemonists control the infamous secret police, the Astûrban, while the neo-Zenithians founded the Judicators and dominate the mighty fleet. The two police forces aside, the different families keep house guards of their own.

"Unity is strength."

The League, as it is commonly called, was originally created as a counterweight to the Consortium, but had no way of competing in the beginning. They tried to perform the same functions as the Consortium, but have over time changed their attitude towards nurturing a more symbiotic relationship instead. The fact of the matter is that without the League’s deckhands, pilots and engineers, all of the Consortium’s ships and haulers would wait in dock, their cargo unloaded, and without the free traders, Consortium commerce wouldn’t reach as far out on the star arms as it does.

In the shadows, both parties are still trying to out-maneuver the other, however. When it comes to free traders and markets outside of the core systems, the League is practically in a monopoly position. The risks compared to the calculated profit are too great for any of the major Consortium companies to get involved. The League runs several auction houses and souks in the outer systems, as wellas a few on both Kua and Coriolis.

The current goal for the League is to keep its control of the outer markets, and to improve the living conditions of its members. No other faction is as open about its membership as the League – counting official members, the Free League is the Horizon’s largest faction.

"They have what you need - we have what you want."

The Syndicate was founded at the same time as Coriolis, and is viewed by many as the illegal shadow of the Consortium. The faction is made up of a group of wealthy families from the crew of the Zenith who joined forces with Firstcome criminal groups on Algol, Sadaal and Zalos. Together, they took control over the street gangs that had started to form on Coriolis.

The Syndicate wants their operations to run smoothly, and this requires a certain level of law and order. They cooperate with the Guard to combat petty crime because it disturbs their more lucrative forms of business: protection rackets, gambling, pimping, drugs and smuggling. In the first decades after its birth, the Syndicate grew to own almost the entire Guard through threats and bribery.

The courts and the governor needed a drastic change, and asked the Zenithian Hegemony for help. The Hegemony created the Judicators. This new tool of law enforcement decimated the Syndicate’s lower levels, especially the street gangs. Soon, however, the crime families learned to adapt, and balance returned once again. Today, the Judicators are less involved with the Syndicate and focus their resources on other forms of crime.

The basis of the Syndicate is the gangs that run the different plazas on Coriolis. Things get violent from time to time, as the gangs’ methods include a certain level of territorial disputes and revenge. Outside of the station, the middle layers of the organization, the so-called charpurs, run the operations. They operate above the gangs, organizing things like smuggling and drug production. The only areas the Syndicate stays away from are slave trading and the smuggling of faction tech. Unfortunately, other players are less scrupulous.

"There is only one salvation, and only nine ways that will lead you there."

The exact origin of the Icon faith has been lost to time, but everyone knows that it was introduced to the Third Horizon by cultists and believers from the First Horizon. All but one of these cults, the Circle of Seekers, are dead today but their religious practices have been all but abandoned by the general population. Instead, the Church of the Icons has become the dominant religious faction. They have grown strong through collecting, canonizing and institutionalizing the wide, sprawling faith that has existed in the Horizon for centuries. During a live Bulletin broadcast in CC 49, the nine sacred rites were put in writing in the Icon City on Mira, where the Church originally grew into a faction to begin with, during the darkness of the Long Night after the end of the war. A ruling matriarch and patriarch, assisted by an assembly of clergy, head the new faction. Today, the Seekers, whose presence was also strong on Mira, have been marginalized, looked upon as wise ascetics and prophets rather than actual figures of power within the faction.

The key difference between the Church’s doctrine and the Iconic folklore is that the faction denies the duality of the Icons’ temperaments and vengefulness. Instead, the Church preaches that evil exists within humans themselves, and that it is released when the Dark between the Stars enters someone’s life.

"Through conflict, the truth."

Few factions have such an air of mystery as that which surrounds the Draconite order. They are renowned for their fearlessness in both combat and diplomacy, and are said to make no distinction between the two. The faction originated in the part of the crew of the Zenith that valued resolve and willpower above all else. They viewed the commanding Quassar and Yriedes families as too entrenched in the discussions about what to do with the colonists in stasis, and instead went ahead and woke them up on their own. They were among the first to leave the Zenith after the awakening, disappearing into the dark. Whatever it was that they found out there among the debris and ruins on abandoned worlds no one knows, but they quickly became the stuff of legends, ghosts seldom seen but intensely discussed.

The stories claim that their travels in the Dark between the Stars turned them into something cold and purely egotistical. When they reentered the light of civilization, they did it as a disciplined faction of warrior philosophers, possessing secret truths the other factions could only dream of.

"Every human is a world of its own."

Like the seekers, Ahlam’s Temple is an old cult, but instead of the religious traditions of the Seekers or the Church, the Temple’s foundation is the eternal importance of the present. To the Temple, the Icons represent the human soul’s different positions, both spiritual and physical. Just like the Church of the Icons, the Temple seeks to spread their philosophies. The knowledge of the purity of the present will help the people of the Horizon lead better lives. The teachings of Ahlam are applied to everything from dance and art, to judiciary theory and politics. The Judicators’ interrogation methods, which don’t use torture, are based on an Ahlamite theory. The origins of the teachings stem from Miran temple dances and poems from before the Portal Wars. Esteemed philosophers like Haraman Hassam and poets like Jasmine Sidat developed the heritage into the Temple of Ahlam of today.

The Temple is mainly famous for the courtesan academies they run on Coriolis and Mira. The education there is completely focused on the eight arts of pleasure. Apart from the courtesans, many influential rhetoricians, prophets, entertainers and officers have attended the academies. Both the Zenithian Hegemony and the Bulletin regularly send employees and aristocrats to the academies to be taught the mysteries of subjectivity and sensory input.

True courtesans are only taught in the academies, and begin their education at an early age. Only the best students complete the program and get their titles. On Coriolis and in other metropolises, true courtesans are in high demand. In some places it would be unthinkable to enter the political arena without a courtesan by one’s side. Wealthy families and recently even the big corporations employ a personal aesthete to show off their status. A part of the Temple less spoken of is the Black Lotuses, courtesans who have been trained in the ninth art – the pleasure of death. These assassins played a crucial role in the destruction of the Nazareem’s Sacrifice, but how active they really are today is uncertain to outsiders.

"The end is near."

On Coriolis, the Order is known as the Samaritans. They run a hospital, a sanatorium for the hyper sick, a poor house, several soup kitchens and a renowned medical school. The medical students become neophytes of the Order and their education is heavily influenced by the faction’s religious views, but all the students are offered generous scholarships for the duration of their training. When they graduate, they are often offered employment by groups who are otherwise less than friendly towards the Order, a good indication of the quality of the school. The Samaritans appear the perfect believers, helping their fellow human beings out of the kindness of their hearts. This reputation is kept intact on Coriolis thanks to the Samaritan part of their work – the memories of the Order’s involvement in the atrocities of the Portal Wars are not something the station’s mainly Zenithian population keeps alive.

Outside of Coriolis, the name Samaritans is frowned upon. Here, the Order is known as the Martyrs and have an entirely different reputation. Their symbol, the martyr’s crown, stirs feelings of unease in almost everyone. Stories from the Portal Wars speak of the Order as fanatic Martyr worshippers, merciless in combat and without any concern for their own lives. Their enormous monastery cruisers are said to have carried both crusaders and flagellants into battle, a rumor that is still prevalent.

"We know the secrets of the void."

The Federation is a jumble of different families, clans, bloodlines, alliances and tribes all claiming nomad heritage. Most nomads in the Federation are from the Quadrant of the Pillar, the Rimward Reach or Nharmada, but the Kyhber swarm from Algol, the salvage nomads from Odacon and the Jebel and Chambi clans from Melik are also represented here. The prime goal of the faction is to strengthen the nomads against the other factions whose claims in the Horizon have grown considerably, especially since the founding of Coriolis.

What kind of issues the faction would address at the Council is uncertain, but it is likely that they would demand that the nomad culture be treated as equal to that of other peoples, and act as political opposition to the Zenithian factions – after all, it is they, not the nomads, who are the newcomers in the Horizon. In the popular assembly on Coriolis, the nomads have argued that the Zenithians must start respecting old laws and decrees, but up until recently, the Zenithian factions have responded to the demands without interest – something they are now beginning to regret. Suddenly a powerful force in the popular assembly, the nomads have demanded a seat on the Council of Factions – or else. Their threats include the disruption of Consortium trade in the Quadrant of the Pillar and Free League activities in the Nharmada system, and a collective strike against the prospectors in the Rimward Reach. Thanks to the impressive armada the nomads could scramble if they wanted to, the threats are taken very seriously.