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Mercury

Posted by: The Well of the Ocean is Water Aflame

Sol's swiftest island is Mercury. It orbits in less than ninety days, but turns so slowly that a face may be exposed to the sun for nearly sixty of those days. The lack of atmosphere provides no blanket against Sol's light, and temperatures range over 620 degrees between day and night. The sun's daylight gaze overhead is fierce enough to melt metal, but at night the surface is as frigid as space. The terminator line moves slowly enough that a transhuman on foot could keep ahead of it at a steady pace.

Sol attracts many stray travelers of rock and asteroid, and Mercury takes the blows as they cross its path, leaving the surface of the planet covered in pockmarks and craters. Alternating heat and cold further breaks the rock, covering the surface in dust.

Mercurials​

The residents of Mercury must be hardy to live in extremes of light and dark and dust. But there is little loyalty to Mercury as a home. Exposed heavy metals lie near the surfaces and are easily mined. Corporations mine Mercury's bones and harvest the sunlight of Sol to profit elsewhere. Solar cells coat every crafted surface to best capture Sol's gift, powering equipment. Hypercorps such as Tolstoj Mining Concern, the Vyasa Workers Cooperative, Jaehon Offworld, and Noonday Mining turn the efforts of their miners into profit. The isolation and difficulty of escape leads hypercorps to enlist prisoners who serve out their sentences -- well-earned or falsely framed -- working in the mining camps.

Those who are not with a corporation survive in the shadow. These sifters live nomadically, following the night cycle of the planet to avoid the temperature spikes of the day. The sifters are independent people and know the secrets of Mercury should they be asked, but they will not share without payment.

Mercury is tiny and isolated, so the production of antimatter is safest here and the intense light provides enough energy for the work. Antimatter powers spacecraft drivers for voyaging and the most dangerous of weapons, making the research worth the risk for groups such as Omnicor, Gammax, Direct Action, and Fa Jing.

Al-Hamadhanj​

  • Habitat Type: Tin Can/Subsurface
  • Allegiance: Sifter

The modules of this sifter capital are tucked under the sand and into the edges of a crater for safety in the extreme temperatures. This city is a gathering site for sifters, a place to rest, trade, and seek out news and services. Information and gear may be had and discretion sought for the more clandestine project.

Cannon​

  • Habitat Type: Dome
  • Allegiance: Jaehon Offworld

Cannon is the largest habitat on Mercury. It is also mobile, crawling on massive tracks. Ten-thousand individuals loyal to the hypercorp Jaehon reside here. This city-sized mass driver pauses at each mine to launch giant ingots of heavy metals into space for delivery to ships overhead. Cannon travels the edge of the Caloris basin and the northern hemisphere in its journey between camps.

The Egg​

Mercury holds mysteries as close as Sol does, and the Egg is one of them. From a distance it does not appear to be a weapon. A pale gray ovoid of unknown material, the Egg orbits above the surface of Mercury. Left by the Factors in AF8, the Planetary Consortium declared the Egg off limits, overruling those who thought it safer destroyed. The Factors offer no explanation, they only ask us to leave it be. So far we have, though not without question or protest. Some speculate it watches over Caloris 18, site of a TITAN outbreak on Mercury during the Fall. Others believe its purpose is to monitor the Vulcanoid Gate from afar.

Lumina​

  • Habitat Type: Dome
  • Allegiance: Independent (Hypercorp)

Near the northern pole lies Lumina. Here energy is captured by solar panel fields lit at all times by the sun. This powers nuclear, radiochemical, and particle physics research, including manufacturing isotopes and the extraction of fissionables. Many hypercorps hold interests here, making it a shared resource as well as a resting place for the hyperelites who come to enjoy the spas and private meeting facilities.