"Fate does not come to us; Rather, we turn to meet our fate."

"Unto the third and fourth generation, General Motors, you have visited your greed on the children.
Unto the twentieth, AEC, you have twisted their limbs and closed their eyes. Unto the last dawn of
man you have cursed us, O Father. Our Father. Our Father Who Art in Washington, give us this day
our daily calcium propionate, sodium diacetate monoglyceride, potassium bromate, calcium phosphate,
monobasic chloramine T, aluminium potassium sulphate, sodium benzoate, butylated hydroxyanisole,
mono-iso-propyl citrate, axerophthol and calciferol. Include with it a little flour and salt. Amen."
- John Brunner, The Sheep Look Up

This timeline is a negative 'Downward Spiral' projection based upon current economic data and intentionally
pessimistic assessments of conditions in the Clash of Civilizations model described by professor Samuel Huntington.

2004

• Quebec separates from Canada, sparking a financial crisis and forcing the Canadian economy into recession.
  
• American Reform party captures 22% of the vote, signalling the creation of a new tri-party dynamic in Congress.
  
• European Union accepts Poland, Hungary, Slovenia, Norway and the Czech Republic.
  
• NATO deploys troops into the Visegrad Four, sparking demonstrations and military sabre-rattling in Russia.
  
• International Space Station is completed despite the withdrawal of Russian co-operation.
  
• Chinese and other East Asian economies begin decline after overheated 1990s euphoria subsides.
  
• Airbus Consortium combines with Arianespace and the ESA to form a global corporation called Eurospace.
• European Monetary Union in full effect despite some adverse economic affects. Most EU countries except the UK and Denmark are members. The new currency is known as the 'euro' {E}.

  
  
  

2005

• Central American Indians start uprisings across the region, demanding compensation and autonomy.
  
• American economy enters recession after a long period of expansion.
  
• Inequality in the US at record levels, with 20% of the population controlling nearly 70% of the wealth.
  
• China sends its embryonic navy to seize small islands in the South China Seas. ASEAN protests while America sends naval battle groups to the region.
  
• The Western European Union transforms into the European Legion, an autonomous part of NATO.
  
• European Union reforms its internal structures, government and farm policy amidst continuing economic hardship.
  
• Mercosur expands to include most of South America, and begins talks on a mutual defence treaty.
  
• China stops propping up North Korea. With its economy in tatters, the North Korean government collapses, and decides to take South Korea with it. Chemical-laden missiles hit Seoul, Pohang, and American bases in Okinawa. American airpower levels most of the North within two months. South Korean and American troops occupy the North despite objections from China. The brief war costs over 340,000 lives, including 46,000 American casualties, mostly from chemical weapons.
  
• DEA secretly releases dozens of tailored bioplagues to exterminate coca, opium and maurijana plantations; unintentional mutation side-effects devastate large tracts of farmland in Central and South America.
• Under a new Federal Weapons Statute, large corporations are 'temporarily' granted the right to arm their security personnel with heavy weapons.
• Genetics Control Acts establish agencies and limitations on genetic engineering, privacy and testing.
• Interbank now ranked sixth-largest in the world, and growing as fast as the Net.
• UN chooses Protocol (Anderson Worldwide) as its official legal representative.
• Computers now capable of speech and listening.
• Bipedal robots taught to walk and navigate difficult terrain at Berkeley Labs in California.
• First practical aerodynes developed by American military.
• Citizen cards with complete personal info implemented in the EU and America.
• Biometric scanners capable of identifying individuals within micro-seconds.
• Nearly 3,000 micro-satellites in orbit, with near-daily collisions being reported.
• Firestorms rage across American Mid-west after a super-hot summer.
• Chemical pollutants from communist era identified as main causes of crop failure in Eastern Europe.

2008

• After three years of economic hardship, Canadians vote to form 'an association' with the USA, in effect becoming American States. Free Quebec closes its borders to immigrants.
• Switzerland ascends to the European Union under special conditions.
• Afters years of mis-management from Moscow, the Russian Far East territories form the Republic of Sakha and secede from the Russian Federation.
• Islamic extremists topple the Algerian government and declare an Islamic Republic. All foreigners are expelled and the economy nosedives.
• Christian paramilitaries announce their presence by capturing several federal buildings in the mid-west - most are ruthlessly dispatched by Delta teams after negotiations fail.
• Nigeria and Congo annex weaker neighbours; their economies boom as new oil and mineral reserves are discovered. Cape Republic declares independence when South Africa changes its name to Azania and swallows Botswana & Zimbabwe.

2010

• NASA lands the first man on Mars after a decade of delays.
• Unknown terrorists detonate (possibly accidentally) a nuclear device in Los Angeles,  killing over 140,000 people and sinking downtown. The source and instigators of the explosion are never found/recovered. America vows revenge and launches air-strikes against Iran, whom it despises, and Algeria, whom it suspects. In order to increase national security, the FBI is granted unprecedented security powers, including unlimited wiretapping and encryption control.
• The NSA ('Apparatus') completes the North American Data Network Project NADAN (nicknamed 'The Wall').
• Defence Information Systems Agency, in co-operation with NSA and FinCEN, takes over continental North American network security. Rechristened NETSEC, it soon gains police powers and begins developing sophisticated 'softwar' programs for military purposes.
• US deploys troops to counter Chinese insurrectionaries in the Philippines.
• Mongolia absorbed by China after a lightning-fast attack.
• Iran tests first atomic bomb despite world outrage.
• Japan and America develop sophisticated ballistic defence systems - codenamed Athena/Medusa.
• Mercosur countries federate their armed forces and rename themselves the Amazonia Confederation.
• European Union now encompasses nearly every country on that continent West of the Ukraine.
• America and Amazonia resign from APEC, shattering trans-pacific co-operation amidst accusations of racism.
• Network 23 now controls 53% of all American media.
• First anti-cancer viral treatments in general use.
• Genetics Control Council established to regulate health and genegineering.
• Global financial markets fully computerised and integrated - arbitrage suffers.
• First optical-photonic computers developed by Intel-Formosa Semiconductor partnership.
• High-power electric hydrogen-fuel-cell cars introduced in Japan and the West.

2013

• Japan and Germany are granted permanent seats on the Security Council, but without veto powers.
• Palestinian State swamped by refugees fleeing Israeli retribution after a massive fire sweeps through West Jerusalem.
• Central Asian republics descend into civil war as rival factions fight for control of the lucrative oil fields. Russia claims sovereignty and bars UN peacekeepers from intervening.
• America completes the hugely-expensive orbital Athena/Medusa ballistic-missile defence system.
• Drought and famine strike in China once again as decades of breakneck industrialization take their toll in deforestation, desertification, salinization and pollution. The Gobi Desert swallows Inner Mongolia. Ecological breakdown lowers life expectancy all along the Gold Coast.

2015

• Financial crisis strikes East Asia, causing severe recession for the first time in nearly forty years. APEC members raise tarriff barriers in an effort to stimulate their economies, but these protectionist tactics backfire and deepen the economic misery.
• Newly-elected Japanese Social Harmony party cancels the defence treaty with America and implements a policy of military neutrality and political isolation while secretly stockpiling a nuclear arsenal.
• A chinese bioweapon escapes and devastates Szechuan province; China blames America and starts building up troops throughout its territories.
• Iran occupies and then annexes a weak Iraq.
• Kurdish nationalists finally manage to tear off a chunk of Turkey into a separate homeland. Russian backing is suspected.
• Continuing EU unemployment causes a calcification in politics and a resurgence of conservative Victorian values.
• America continues to fragment into ethnic factions - Uhuru movement sweeps through the middle-class black community, while the South China Group represents disparate (mostly Chinese) Asian communities.
• French biotechnology firm Rhone-Poulenc develops the first 'Clotis' [CLOnal TISsue] tank, a hybrid bio/machine genetic construction engine which allows the 'building/growing' of organs, tissues and small animals.

2016

• China gains the upper hand in APEC, which becomes the Asian-Pacific Economic Community, a de facto Chinese economic bloc which discriminates against non-Asian people and goods. The trade war accerbates the mild recessions in America and Europe, leading to hostile feelings on both sides.
• A prolonged war of attrition between Israel and the combined forces of Syria and Greater Iran results in a stalemate until America sends its legions to reclaim Lebanon and contain Iran.
• On the urging of Iran, Arab OPEC stops exporting oil to the West. In response, American and Israeli troops invade and occupy Saudi Arabia, which had remained neutral until now.
• Minutemen militias slaughter Muslims in St. Louis, Chicago and Denver. Despite military curfew, little is done to stop the violence.
• The largely theocratic countries of North Africa form the Maghreb Union, a free trade zone from Egypt to Morocco.
• Chinese troops deploy into Myanmar. Chinese navy begins exercises off the coast of India.
• American military build-up on Korean-Chinese borders continues despite Chinese threats.
• Russian troops impose order in Kazakhstan, but casualties are heavy and Amnesty Int'l reports widespread atrocities.
• Azania starts building African Peacekeeping Force to impose restraint on excessively brutal regimes.
• The global computer web now channels most human entertainment, communications, processing and trade.
• Small deep-ocean mining stations established in the Pacific and South Atlantic.
• China becomes the second-largest economy in the world.
• Japanese paranoia increases as the economy stagnates and investment withers.

2017 PACIFIC WAR Cut off from oil supplies in both the Middle-East and Central Asia, Great China makes a desperate gamble and invades oil-islands in the South China Seas, Kazakhstan and the Sakha Republic. Russia declares war to defend its former territories. China re-iterates its 'no-first-use' policy on nuclear weapons. Russian XXII Mechanized Brigade uses a tactical (5-megaton) nuclear weapon to stop a Chinese salient on the Baikal Railhead. Chinese troops ruthlessly destroy all Russian opposition and raze Vladivostok to the ground, taking no prisoners. The Sino-Russian conflict has become a race war. European Legion splits from NATO as European powers refuse to send troops to the Middle East. Atlantic Alliance considered 'practically dead' with the exception of Great Britain, which still backs the USA. China invades Taiwan in 'Grand Reunification' bid. America invokes mutual protection acts and declares a state of 'limited engagement'. Cynics note the comparison to a former appeasement strategy. Taiwan fights tenaciously until it is subdued by chemical weapons. In the 'Week of Comets', over 4,000 Chinese (and Asian) satellites are knocked out of orbit by American Medusa space platforms. Americans hope that no ground fighting will be necessary. Philippines captured by Chinese paratroops within three weeks. To the outraged shock of Americans, the Japanese Self-Defence Forces are told to refrain from action unless severely provoked. Indonesia declares for China and invades Australia. Under great pressure, Vietnam declares for China.

• In a stunning defeat for American forces and a blow for Chinese intelligence, an entire American carrier battle group is annihilated by sophisticated Chinese missiles.
• US President Merim faced with outrage and impeachment at home for having 'snatched defeat from the jaws of victory'. He resigns two days later and the Executive branch collapses, with a little secret help from the Apparatus. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General S. G. Haldeman becomes interim president on the urging of Congress and with huge popular support. His first action in office is to authorize massive air-strikes and orbital weapon attacks (Zeus-II and Medusa) against the Chinese mainland.
• United Nations dissolved on May 3, 2017 amidst threats of nuclear armaggedon.
• Americans begin massive conscription drive across the country.
• Russia uses the ensuing confusion to annex eastern Ukraine.
• Thailand declares neutrality and expels American military advisors.
• Border clashes between Indian and Chinese forces. Beijing quickly placates India with territorial concessions, as it cannot afford a three-front war.
• US employs experimental simsense pilotjacks in prototype robotic aircraft.
• Renegade Hindu-nationalist Generals in Kashmir and Punjab provoke a war with Pakistan. A brief nuclear exchange destroys the cohesion of both armies, and the resultant fallout devastates Central Asia and the Indus river valley.

2019

• War of attrition on Korean-Chinese border claims more than 120,000 lives in the first few months.
• Chinese troops invade and occupy Thailand, Laos and Cambodia.
• The Battle of Manila razes that city during its liberation by American troops.
• American softwar programs infiltrate and cripple Chinese command & control systems.
• Bioweapons used across Asia, Russia and Africa, resulting in millions of deaths. Americans quickly reject any blame, and distribute massive amounts of vaccines across SE Asia.
• International arbiters desperately patch together the strict Osaka Biosafety Protocols in a partially-succesful effort to limit civilian casualties.
• European Union sends 900,000 troops to Russia to defend the failing defences in the Siberian Region.
• Allied troops land in Taiwan, now a defoliated desert.
• Okinawa destroyed by vacuum (fuel-air) missiles in a final round of attacks from mainland China. After this point, PLA forces are fighting for survival.
• European Legion sent to reinforce American troops fighting in Turkey against Iranian/Arab offensive.
• A damaged Clotis generator in Perth creates a super-adaptive strain of green bacteria which spreads into the desert at an astounding rate, overwhelming native vegetation and creating a thick carpet of green sludge across Western Australia. It is immediately dubbed the 'kudzu-too' by smartass pundits.
• American government merges Chrysler, Lockheed, General Dynamics, and Nordyne Systems into Eagle Corporation, creating a military-industrial collossus for war production.

2020 Allied forces liberate Victoria and Shanghai. PLA and Indonesian troops battle on in Australia, destroying Adelaide and Perth in a scorched earth policy. First use of anti-plastic virus (Shenzhen, Battle of), chemically boosted soldiers (Hong Kong, Operation Pharma). General Sung Wuxen declares a ceasefire in Southern China despite contrary orders from Beijing. Protocol negotiators broker a landmark peace treaty between the newly-proclaimed Chinese Gold Coast Republic and the Allies. China fragments into the anarchic Western provinces, the totalitarian North, and the democratic corporate South.

June 21, 2021

• American softwar programs mutate and go haywire, destroying the global Internet within hours. Communications and economic transactions flatline, causing havoc across the globe, and bringin down most advanced economies.
• President Haldeman declares limited martial law to contain the chaos, and elite troops are recalled from Asia to enforce the Security Acts against Americans.
• Megacorporations hire mercenaries by the ten-thousand and establish safeholds and enclaves to protect their holdings and employees from looters, gangs and fanatical militias.
• Central government in Russia collapses, but within a year is replaced by a theocratic Orthodox/military/FSB triumvirate.
• Mitteleuropa chafes under German domination, and takes this opportunity to destroy the offices of hundreds of German corporations and agencies. European Legion troops kill thousands of rioters when commands become garbled because of the NetCrash.
• Increased global birth defects from radiation and new diseases encourage hundreds of millions of couples to adopt eugenic drugs and modifications. American GCC Birth Enhancement Acts passed to encourage selective reproduction.
• Chinese Triad clashes with Allied occupation forces in the Pacific. Having grown fat and strong from black marketeering during the war, the Triad(s) now declares its divine mission to rid China (meaning Asia) of foreign domination.

2022

• Guerrillas continue fighting against American occupation troops in Indonesia and South-East Asia.
• Joseph Ramirez discovers and patents a gerontological treatment based on subDNA fragments which can increase normal lifespan by almost twenty years. He locks-in the patent with Protocol for 30 years and then is never heard from again. Amalgamia Plc. markets the new treatment in trust. As of October 12, 2037, Amalgamia represents nearly 7% of the world's accumulated wealth, with no heir in sight.
• Privatized American Aeronautics (formerly NASA) corporation begins construction of massive Brightstar orbital habitat at LaGrange Stationary Point Five (L-5).
• The Mediterranean becomes massively polluted by radioactive fallout from the Middle-East.

2023

• Megacorps organize and finance the Reconstruction, managing to extort special privileges and extraterritoriality from governments.
• Across the globe, the middle-classes now trust corporations and clans (intercontinentals) 2-to-1 over governments.
• Protocol implements treaties establishing Freeholds, Franchises and Estates as legal jurisdictions.
• The American States of Washington, Oregon, Colorado, Nebraska, D&S Dakota, Nevada, Wyoming, and Idaho declare themselves freeholds and estate zones, becoming practically autonomous. Land is franchised or sold to thousands of corps and clans.
• The Medical Collegia are established to restrain diseases in most developed countries - those who refuse to join are cut off from international travel and are considered Embargoed Areas.
• Pentagon establishment is purged and many generals are convicted of war-crimes in Asia.
• European Union fractures into connurbation city-states such as Provence, Barcelona, Milan and Ruhr.
• Organ vats and illegal genegineering labs develop in free zones such as Pusan, Sicily and Seattle.
• New plastics and alloys allow for the development of simple cyber/bio-implants in people.
• Japanese forces utterly destroy a small Korean fleet which strays too close to its shores. Japan closes its borders to foreigners and retrenches into an isolationist paranoia.
• Most Japanese multinationals 'emigrate' to new homelands in Asia and America.
• An underground cipherpunk network called Cryptnet quickly transforms into the world's most secure illegal information channel, providing samizdata to subversive activists and criminal syndicates alike. Working in cell-structures, untraceable distributed networks, and state-of-the-art encryption, Cryptnet is impossible to infiltrate or eliminate.
• In America, the Apparatus helps President Haldeman squash congressional opposition. The Directory, a secret shadow cabinet of Haldeman's friends, begins to control several government departments. Congressional powers are slowly weakened as power accumulates with the Executive.

2025 President Haldeman elected by a massive (and suspicious) landslide on a tough Christian Manifest Destiny platform. Historical birth of Imperial America. US Government - now run by expansionists - begins to reassert control over its wayward and economically devastated states. In a bid to regain lost jurisdictions, it declares direct control over Federal Territories and sends heavy security forces from the FBI to maintain control. Corporations support secessionist Amerindian claims in the Western States in a secret bid to control Rocky Mountain natural resources. Eurospace begins construction of the Kilimanjaro mass driver. South China corporations begin similar work at Kalimantan. American Aeronautics starts a small lunar colony for research purposes; it is soon militarized. US deploys cybernetically enhanced soldiers to the Pacific Conflict Zone and parts of Central America. California defies draconian edicts from the Presidency, but after FBI Cointel groups shatter the dissidents' organization it goes underground and forms the Tea Party, dedicated to restoring real democracy to America. As 'punishment' California is partitioned into conservative Anglo NorCal and Latino SurCal amidst ethnic tension. Nigerian Confederation imposes peace on central-west Africa through bloody repression. Digital Union becomes the world's largest virtual reality collective.

WORLD PARTITION
• What remains of the United Nations is absorbed into Protocol, while the Security Board within Protocol now represents the interests of major governments and intercontinentals:
  USA, European Union, South China, Russia, Amazonia, Hindustan, Pacifica, Azania, Fuji, Digital Union, Eurospace, Rusgaz, Security Franchise, Interbank, Health Services, Amalgamia, , Orbital Dynamics, and Eagle Corporation.
• American forces continue to occupy Shanghai, Hong Kong, Philippines, Indonesia, and Taiwan. Rebel groups, Maoist guerrillas and Loyalist (pro-Beijing) forces continue to wage a low-intensity war against Allied occupation. The Pacific Conflict Zone is ignored as 'an American problem'.
• Russian Crusade against Central Asian and Iranian armies continues with incredible ferocity.
• European economies boom rebuilding Turkey, Eastern Russia and the Middle East.
• Allies accept an Iranian ceasefire in the Middle-East as Muslim forces reposition against Russian crusaders.
• American troops occupy Jerusalem, Lebanon, Damascus, Baghdad and Riyadh.
• Tibet declares itself a free republic.
• The world's largest security companies, now controlling vast private armies, form the global Security Franchise to increase coordination and bypass restrictive national laws on weaponry and jurisdiction. The Security Franchise guarantees protection to anyone who pays its exorbitant fees.
• Shortly after, a Security Franchise batallion defending gas-billionaire Yovy Promskov wipes out a Holy Russian Tax Audit Team outside of Novosibirsk. Protocol acknowledges the Franchise's extraterritorial powers and urges member governments to do the same.
• Indian federation collapse into Hindustan (North) and Rajastan (South), and the severe drought territories in the Northeast.

2026

• Famine strikes Northern China as desertification, drought, and mismanagement reduce the already-poisoned soils to dust.
• New advances in space technology allow hundreds of corporations to build orbital habitats.
• Global ecosphere begins to degenerate, causing anomalous weather, crop failure, congenital genetic disorders, and a poisoning of the food supply. Many species go extinct as the world forgets about environmentalism.
• Serb revolt put down by European Legion troopers.
• Pacific Conflict Zone quagmire costing hundreds of American lives every week.
• Haldeman granted four-term extension (16 years) after ferocious debate in Congress.
• Heartlands Collective, a conservative Mid-Western farmer's militia, accepts a government contract to legalize its operations in order to reduce crime, subversion and rioting in major cities. The Heartlands clan soon attracts the vast majority of white, middle-class conservative votes and patronage.
• Designer drugs help to alleviate massive stress amongst the world's peoples after the horrors of the War.
• International travel becomes expensive and dangerous as virii mutate and strange new diseases creep across the unprotected sections of the world.
• Puritan foods, a provider of super-pure foods and cosmetics, becomes one of the largest intercontinentals (megacorps).
• Amazonia grows rich helping to rebuild North America.
• US Government creates the new Departments of Governance and Uplift, and the Imperial Marines. Governance will have the responsibility of governing American protectorates, franchises and freeholds, while Uplift is charged with helping to develop the economies of these regions. The Marines are, of course, expected to maintain strict order. President Haldeman allegedly creates an elite Eagle Guard presidential unit to enforce discipline among Army generals.

2028

• Hydrogen fuel-cells now power most vehicles and homes, with European and American governments enforcing implementation on reluctant consumers. The importance of oil diminishes, forcing many Arab countries into poverty once again.
• Millions of Asian and American refugees emigrate to the ocean colonies, transforming them into cities and farms.
• Matrix expands beyond the control of its creators, leading some to speculate that its exponential growth will eventually transform it into a sentient entity.
• Amazonian Medical Collegium quarantines Peru after an outbreak of the 'cruzo' variant filo virus. Genentech corporation is expelled for failing to use extreme (lethal) measures to stop the biosafety breach.

2030 Development of underwater platforms allows deep-oceanic mining, drilling and warfare - many companies and people begin building underwater boom towns. Aquadelphi becomes the capital of the new Pacifica Confederation, which attracts the world's worst and best when it drops all migration restrictions. Newly-founded lunar colonies in Tycho Under, Novy Leny and Pan Lung serve as military bases and simple mining operations. The privatisation of most public services encourages the Vatican to set up a medical/health-care corporation called Holy Trinity. Within ten years it becomes the second-biggest such group and services most Latinos, Europeans and Asian Christians. NETSEC recognized as the official international matrix police agency. New developments in plasmotics finally allow the transmission of high-density energy over landtubes with incredible efficiency and low wastage. Russian Crusader forces accused of genocide against Muslims in Central Asia. Modified exotic skin colours and textures become the rage in Stormbeat throb halls.

2033

• Intercontinental clans now exert as much political and economic influence as megacorps, and soon receive membership rights on the Protocol Security Board.
  
  Major clans include : Heartlands (USA), Victoria (Anglo - UK, NZ, Au, Canada, East US), Latinate (Latino), South China Group (Chinese), Muslim Council (mainly Iranian), and Slavonika (Slavic-Orthodox).
  
  Minor clans include: Zulu, Afrikaner, Francophonie, Korean, Japanese, Sikh, Australian, CryptNet, Seventh International, Uhuru (American blacks), Jewish Diaspora.

• The Triad(s), Cosa Nuova, Pharma Cartel and Russian Syndicate control international organized crime.
• The new field of Selenics revolutionizes biochip design and nanostructure construction, creating self-modifying materials which can adapt to climatic/stress conditions. These new 'living alloys' are used to expand underwater and orbital stations.
• American Apparatus completes the Registry, a universal databank storing all citizen data profiles. Those who refuse to join ("joining is your choice") are effectively excluded from the legitimate economy, and become 'blanks' (black spaces in the database).
• Orbital Dynamics (formerly Boeing, American Aeronautics, and Sao Paulo Aviation) completes Brightstar habitat while competing fiercely with Eurospace.

2035

• An economic boom in Offworld and Deep-Ocean colonies fuels migration and spawns new cyber technologies.
• Vatican now advises US and European governments on internal policy matters.
• Left-wing protests in major US cities against GCC Population Freedom (read birth control) Acts, which impose mandatory genetic selection on all couples. People with genetic defects or a high probability of giving birth to disease-prone children are 'encouraged' to have only one child. Tax structures effectively prohibit these misfortunate people from having any children at all, while the very wealthy are effectively exempt.
• First Artificial Intelligence, [A]dam, is born at the MIT Media Lab; it immediately runs amok and eats the entire lab network before it is destroyed. Shortly thereafter, the process is repeated in Chongqing by the South China Intelligence Group, and worried politicians in Protocol quickly pass the Swiss Artificial Intelligence Acts of 2035.
• Government surveillance across the globe is at an all-time high; thousands of microsatellites (eyesats) monitor and analyze every aspect of daily life, while the Net channels most of human activity.
• General Synthetics formed from a merger of Exxon and Dutch/Shell Oil to avert bankruptcy and diversify into chemicals, hydrogen fuels, and plastics alloys.
• Triad 'Seven Incense Sticks' terrorist group assassinates Governor Jim Boswell and his entire ministry in Shanghai with a tailored bioweapon.
• The global population approaches 10 billion.

2037

• Protocol hires Security Franchise Peace Dragoons to travel to the Tycho Under lunar colony, breeding speculation of a revolt on the moon.
• The present. Shadowrunners and Edgerunners emerge as potent tools of 'diplomacy by other means'.