Crash and Burn: Welcome to the Rim (ch. 1)

I mentioned that I was looking to experiment a little with my schedule and rotation. This is one such experiment. I'll be upfront that there's no real plan here -- this is me playing around to see how fitting a quest into my rotation could work. So, no solid update schedule. If you want to see more of it, then please let me know. I'm judging if this is working by the amount and kind of engagement that I get.

With that out of the way, onward to the chapter.

...

My eyes snapped open as my consciousness returned to me with the sharp hiss of compressed air, my cryosleep casket swinging open. It was a sound that I had heard before but all the prior times it wasn't accompanied by the painful sensation of pins and needles across my entire body. The synththread scrubs could do nothing to ward off the chill of cryosleep, a chill that I felt bone deep. That alone was a warning that this wasn't a normal awakening.

The sounds of gunfire just proved it. My body reacted on instincts that were ingrained into me back in the cloning vat that I grew up in. Despite the pins and needles, I threw myself out of my casket, grabbed hold of my bioencoded charge rifle, and used the casket as cover to examine the situation. Which could best be described as completely and utterly FUBAR. The most glaring issue was the fact that only the emergency lights were on, casting the cryosleep room into a shade of dark red that flashed every other second, making the dark shadows seem pitch black.

That told me that there was a system-wide error in the bunker.

Compared to that, the three men fighting against the megaspider were downright tame.

"The legs! The legs!" One of them shouted, firing a primitive weapon, the muzzle flashing in the darkness to illuminate the megaspider as the projectiles dug into its patterned gray and black exoskeleton, splashing fluorescent green blood into the wall. "Aim for the legs!" He shouted at the other two, taking a few steps back as the other two tried to do as they were told. Their weapons bucking in their hands, firing at the lone megaspider as it lunged at the closest one.

Megaspiders were as genetically engineered as I was, except they were engineered to kill vat-grown soldiers like me when we were in cataphract armor. A lone human with a primitive weapon never stood a chance. The spider was the size of a large man at seven feet tall, four pointed legs maintained its balance while an oversized pair of pincers lunged at the man, enveloping him in a grip that could sheer through plasteel armor and with a single bite, he was sheared in half with a spray of blood.

"FUCK this!" The other human shouted, turning on his heel and racing away from the scarab, and a horrid but familiar screech echoed through the room. A mistake, I thought to myself as I watched the scene unfold. Megaspiders could smell weakness. However, I had also seen enough. The megaspider was alone, meaning that they had either killed the others or in the much more likely case, the rest of the hive soldiers would be on their way.

"Get back here!" The second man shouted as I stood up from my cover, shouldering my charge rifle and leveling it at the megaspider, the heavy clicks it made as it scurried after its meal were loud enough to echo. " Get-"

I pulled the trigger, small green blast of ionized plasma slammed into the creature's front leg to much greater effect than the primitive projectile weapons, filling the room with the stench of burnt bug as the joint collapsed underneath the weight of the scarab. It skidded a few feet, nearly taking out the other human, but all the while I kept my barrel trained on it, maintaining trigger discipline as I fired shot after shot at it. Were it so easy to kill them, I thought with reluctance, seeing the scarab rise back up despite parts of its exoskeleton melting.

Every muscle in my body tensed as the other man looked at me -- he wasn't a face that I recognized even if I did recognize his style of armor. Combat armor colored a mat gray and black with an odd symbol etched into one pectoral. Meaning that he wasn't with the empire. I considered taking a shot at him, but it would turn out that I didn't need to. As our eyes met -- his face covered by a blood-red visor, the megaspider did something unexpected.

It spat acid. A glob of dark green bile was launched out of the scarab at the man, splashing over his chest and helmet and I heard him screaming as his armor sizzled underneath it.

"That's new," I muttered, ignoring the loss as I started to move from my current position, my legs felt as weak as a newborn deer, but I walked all the same as I fired shots. It turned its head to me, its maw filled with needle teeth expanding in preparation for another shot. It opened up a convenient target that I placed a few shots into before I dove to the side when it spat another glob of acid that splashed over a cryosleep casket that started to sizzle and pop. The acid glob was smaller. It wasn't something it could do forever.

Rolling to my feet, I looked up and my eyes widened when I made eye contact with someone else. A girl. Dark hair, golden amber eyes, painted lips with Asian features. Couldn't guess how old she was, but if I had to guess it would be late teens, but that could be a sculpted look. Her eyes hardened the moment that she saw me, telling me that she was no civilian. It was a risk but I chose to ignore her as the megaspider was back on its feet and it was racing toward me despite its injuries.

Close-quarters combat with megaspiders was never fun but it was survivable if you lived through the first three seconds. Taking in a sharp breath, I marched forward with my gun up and fired shots, focusing on the creature's eyes. It had a good dozen of them along the head ridge, giving it three-sixty vision. When it dove for me, lashing out with an arm that was little more than a blade on a pointed appendage that could and did tear through armor, I dove toward it. The best went over me, smashing into another casket and nearly crushing it, while I placed the barrel of my gun into the joint of its back leg and held down the trigger. The auto-fire didn't do much as tear through the leg but more burned through it.

The scarab cried out in pain, lashing out with another arm that I couldn't quite dodge out of the way. Instinct saved my arm when I used the charge rifle to divert the incoming swing, but I still suffered a deep gash to the inside of my firearm that probably nicked bone. No matter there. My blood was already clotting the wound and by the end of the day, it would be gone. Provided that I lived to the end of the day -- something that was very much in question as I faced down the injured megaspider, now weaponless.

A flash of heat and light was my only warning for what happened next. Blue fire washed over the megaspider, making it cry out in pain, a shrill shriek that made my ears want to bleed. Glancing over, I saw that it was the girl from before, a fist extended to the scarab. Her expression was one of intense concentration before lashing out with another fist and more blue fire erupted from it. A psionic ability? Useful.

In any case, the fire was as hot as my charge blasts and a whole lot bigger. By the third punch, the creature collapsed into a heap, the air filled with the sickly stench of cooking big, while the carcass served as a convenient light source. And it was only then that I realized that the cryoroom was in a complete state of disrepair. The familiar blackish-gray kitchen that the scarabs preferred was creeping over the walls. That didn't bold well. Not at all. It meant that this wasn't an invading force. The vault was part of the scarab hive and it had been for some time.

How long have I been asleep?

"You there -- I demand that you answer my questions. What was that thing? Where are we?!" She demanded, leveling a fist directly at me. Her black hair drifted into her eyes, telling me that she wasn't a grown soldier. I honestly didn't think I could even grow long hair. However, her tone was one that I recognized easily enough. It wasn't wholly uncommon for the son or daughter of nobility to earn a feather in their cap by 'fighting' on the frontline of an insane war that was destroying the world.

"A megaspider, ma'am," I informed her, checking my arm to see that it had already stopped bleeding. Wiggling my fingers, however, proved a little difficult. That too should heal soon enough, but for now, it was just very annoying to deal with. "As for where we are, we're in a vault, ma'am." I could see that the words didn't register with her, which was a little confusing. However, I busied myself with checking the caskets. If she and I woke up then that could mean that there were others.

"A vault? For what?" She demanded, following me every step of the way. She did lower her fist, but her posture remained guarded, watching me through slits for any sign of ill intent.

"For us, ma'am," I answered her, a veritable fount of patience. It was my first time interacting with a noble directly, but I knew the golden rule -- be polite. If you didn't, they tended to fry your brain or have you executed. After all, they could just grow another soldier. I opened a casket manually to see that it was occupied, but the inhabitant wasn't alive.

"Your twin?" The girl questioned, catching me off guard. I looked down at the man in the casket -- short black hair, high cheekbones, strong jaw with a stubborn chin. A perfectly symmetrical face that was artificially sculpted. Underneath his eyelids, I knew there would be cool blue eyes that weren't quite natural. I knew because it was my face.

"He was in the same vat batch as me," I told her, a note of sadness in my voice. Not all the vat grown soldiers fighting on the front lines looked alike, but all in the same batch did. Genetically we were completely identical. Because of that I could reach into the casket and take his service weapon -- another charge rifle -- and the biometric lock turned off. Closing the casket, I bumped a fist on it for the fallen soldier before turning to the girl to see that she was looking at me with carefully guarded incomprehension.

Her gaze flickered to the casket, then at the others, then finally to the one that she had gotten out of. "Explain this to me -- why are we here? Who put me here? Whoever they may be, they will suffer the full wrath of touching a princess of the Fire Nation. I will personally raze their homes to the ground," she snapped, her tone testy. I froze at the word princess.

Oh fuck. Oh shit. Oh, fucking fuck. Royalty? I might as well have let the scarab eat me. It would have been less painful.

I kicked my lips, feeling nervous for the first time since I woke up. Then the rest of the statement clicked with me. "Fire Nation?" I echoed, my own guard going up and my confusion increasing. "You… aren't a princess of the Rublous Empire?" I asked, torn between hoping that she was and fearing that she wasn't. Because if she was a princess of the Empire, then it would at least make sense why she was here in the vault. An Empire-controlled vault.

"I have no idea where your petty empire is, much less am I a princess of it," she stated with a sneer. I worked my jaw, considering killing her for the briefest of seconds. If she wasn't a part of the Empire, then it meant that she was a dissenter. The Emperor's standing order was that all dissenters were to be put to death, regardless of age or social standing. An order that had seen hundreds of millions killed in my years of life. Even as she said the words, I saw doubt in her eyes. She was posturing.

That convinced me not to act more than anything else. An enemy of my enemy was not my friend, but she genuinely seemed to have no idea what she just confessed to. She wasn't part of the Empire, yet she wasn't a rebel.

"I've never heard of the Fire Nation either," I told her outright. It didn't matter if she was a princess now. The Emperor's mandate was that there was no nobility outside of the Empire, thus her title was not recognized. To that, her expression twisted into an ugly snarl, and for a split second, I thought she was going to shoot a blast of fire at me. "I can fill you in on what I know, but we'll need to move fast. Scarabs managed to breach the vault and set up a hive here -- that won't be the last of them."

"That is… acceptable," She decided. "I am Princess Azula of the Fire Nation," she decided to introduce herself, pride shining in her voice as she did so.

"A-833-T523-L864-A133-S360," I returned and there was a small pause as she just stared at me, her eyebrows quirking up. It was my vat designation number. The first three were my batch number and the rest were my number within that batch. "My comrades called me Atlas," I offered, and that earned a slow nod.

With introductions out of the way, I focused on the task at hand -- getting out and connecting with the empire. But, before I did that, I needed information. The rest of the caskets were either empty or they were filled with a corpse. Dying in cryo was rare, but it did happen. Just never in these numbers -- there were a dozen caskets in the room. Four were empty, four were dead, and the last two were me and Azula. Cryodeath happened to one in a thousand, maybe. Four in ten? That was something else.

It was nothing short of a testament to glittertech that despite the encroaching lichen that everything still seemed to be in working order. I heard Azula gasp softly when she saw the screen light up and that told me that she was from a primitive line. When it did, I saw that the forced opening button had been pushed, which is why Azula and I were up in the first place. Clearing that screen, however, my knees nearly buckled when I saw the data. I sagged against the table, a pit forming in my gut. "Five thousand years," I breathed, looking at how long I had been in cryo for.

"What?" Azula questioned, not quite understanding what I just said. What it meant.

"We've been in cryosleep for five thousand years," I told her, lowering my head and letting the revelation wash over me. The estimation that I had been given was a thousand years tops. Five thousand years… that was longer than I was in cryo when I had been shipped out to this planet. A full two thousand years of space travel from a core glittertech world.

"That's not possible," Azula voiced, but there was an edge of fear and alarm in her words as she saw it in my face that it was. "That's impossible," she repeated, trying to will the words into being true. It was possible. Sleeping for vice thousand years, growing perfect soldiers by the millions, and shipping them out to every corner of the galaxy was honestly one of the more mundane abilities of glitter technology. The only thing it hadn't figured out was faster than light travel, which was the root of the problem. "Why would I be here, asleep, for thousands of years?" She demanded hotly.

I wasn't surprised at her anger. It wasn't an easy thing to learn unless they were immortal or in cryo that everyone you ever knew was long dead. "I'm not sure why you're here specifically," I told her, and I could very much see that was not the correct answer to her question. "But the vault is for the War. Things… got out of hand, I guess you could say, on this planet. By the time we arrived, the rebels had already developed into a powerful force capable of producing glittertech of their own. We fought to take the world, they fought to keep it, and in that fight, we caused so much damage to the planet that it became unlivable."

It truly was insanity of the highest order. Across the galaxy, war had raged for… tens of thousands of years simply because it was impossible to stop. The Empire suffered a civil war thousands of years ago with a number of planets wanting to split off, so they told the Emperor that they were breaking from the Empire. That message took nearly three hundred years to reach the Emperor. It took eight hundred for his armies to arrive on the Dissident planets, and by that time, the men that sent the message were either long since dead or emperors in their own right.

Which is how the war had progressed for thousands of years. We would be shipped to a planet to either find it was wildly more advanced than it had been, it had collapsed entirely, it was under new management by another rival empire, or it had already been reconquered by the Empire. It also certainly didn't help things when core worlds would send planet-busting weapons, and over the course of three thousand years, the planet rejoined the Empire, only to get blown up because, in the thousands of years, the source access code had been changed enough that the planet couldn't communicate with the weapon.

It was pure insanity that would never end.

"We were put down here to wait for the biosphere to regenerate and rebuild the planet in the name of the Empire," I continued, and I could see even that was overwhelming for her. She held it in, but I could see the panic growing in her eyes. "There were hundreds scattered across the planet, buried deep. They would have everything that we would need to rebuild," I continued. Mass fabricators, fleets of robotic drones… and me -- soldiers to fight because I doubted the Dissenters wouldn't have made preparations of their own. I fully expected the war to resume when the planet was capable of supporting life again. I also fully expected it to have been waged by mechanoids while it wasn't.

"I have no interest in fighting in your war," Azula stated, her tone certain of it. I nodded.

"Which is why I'm not sure why you're here," I admitted to her. "The vault is for the Empire… if you're not a part of it, then you shouldn't be here." I continued, making her look away. There was panic and confusion in her eyes, but overshadowing it was anger.

"I see," she returned, her tone clipped and curt. "Loathe that I am to admit it, I find myself… out of place here and I do believe that you have nothing to do with my capture. Together we shall escape this place," She informed me and that told me that there was a very real chance of her leaving me behind if I hadn't proved amicable. Which really sold that she was nobility regardless of wherever she was from.

"Let's," I agreed, shouldering my charge rifle just as the flames died down from the scarab, basking the room in dull red darkness once again. Azula sprung a blue flame in the palm of her hand, washing us in light and I saw the smirk on her lips. It was a useful ability, I decided. Psionics and magic were mainstays in combat, but it was a finite resource. I didn't really understand it, but it has been explained to me that the more mages there were on a planet, the less magic there was for everyone. Divide an ocean in two, you have two oceans. Divide a gallon, and you have two half gallons.

I found that Azula was confident because she walked alongside me instead of letting me take point. The door to the room had recently opened, I noticed because of the dark leshen on the ground. The hallway was far worse, I saw with even a precursory glance, seeing the long hallway that had been metallic gray and silver with doors spotted on the walls was transformed into an uneven dark tunnel that had no light. The only source was the odd spot that an emergency light hadn't been covered up by the damp concrete-like material.

"I trust that you have a plan?" Azula questioned, making no effort to lower her voice and glared back at me when I shot her a look. "I don't intend to wander aimlessly until I find an exit."

My jaw clenched -- I wanted to find the main system to see what happened. Right now I was completely in the dark about what happened. What was the error? Not to mention the mainframe would know if there were others still alive in cryosleep like I was. However, it was extremely optimistic to think I could make my way there. Cleaning out a hive, at least, took a good half dozen squads. No. It wasn't practical. Better to get out now, regroup, gather information and prepare, then return. If they managed to make it five thousand years like I did, then they could wait another week.

"There's a central elevator that we can use that'll take us to the surface. It's connected to the emergency power supply, so it should still be operational," I returned in a low whisper, giving Azula a sharp look. Haughty she might be, she did seem capable of taking a hint. With that, we traveled in silence, the layout still in my memory, so I knew exactly where to go.

As we walked, the light pushing back the darkness with almost physical force, I couldn't help but notice how quiet it was. I had cleared out hives before to secure a position and perhaps it was because we kicked the door down, but hives were generally loud. Depending on how big they were, hives could have hundreds of megaspiders and insects. Hearing nothing was more alarming that reassuring.

It was as we walked that I got the first hints why it was so quiet. We turned a corner and the barrel of my gun snapped up when I caught the first glimpse of something in the dark, only to see that it was a corpse. It was a type of insect that I didn’t recognize -- low to the ground, almost like a scorpion, but its tail seemed to shoot some kind of projectile. Possibly fire based on the scorch marks on the corpses that were beyond it. There were more insects -- dozens of them. Some of them were grouped up and others were picked off -- A fair number of them were megaspiders but there was an alarming amount of species that I didn’t recognize.

Combining that with how doors were uncovered, a picture became pretty clear. “They’re waking us up,” I voiced, glancing into a room to see that it was filled with empty caskets. And they were clearing out the hive to do it. The question was why? Altruism? Recruitment? Everyone down here was essential personnel. Out of the millions that had been waging war, we were the ones that were handpicked to resume it when the planet recovered. Everyone else?

They fought until they either died in battle or the atmosphere was so poisonous their lungs rotted away.

“How many people were down here?” Azula questioned, whispering as she inspected each creature that we passed. She sounded thoughtful. And calm. I was glad for it. The very last thing we needed was for her to panic.

“A hundred thousand, give or take,” I answered. The vault was ten levels in a spiral around the central elevator. “If our room was anything to go by, then there could be up to five thousand people left here. Maybe more, maybe less.” The deeper levels could be untouched by the hive and the error, so maybe all of them were fine. I harbored doubts, though. If that was the case, then we all would have woken up a long time ago.

“And all of them are like you?” Azula questioned as we continued on. She was getting her bearings.

“I thought so,” I admitted. You needed meat soldiers in case the mechanoids got hacked, even if it was bloody business. “But if you’re here, then I don’t know. Do you remember anything?” I asked her, glancing at her out of the corner of my eye to see that she was frowning.

“Yes,” Azula answered. “I was placed in charge of leading the Fire Nation while my father went out to conquer what was left of the Earth Kingdom. I went into my room, went to sleep, then I awoke in that coffin.” She explained, and that sounded like a story. So, she was nobility in a time of war. At least she could take care of herself. That was more than I could say for most.

I opened my mouth to respond, only to be cut off by the sound of shouting that sounded close. “No! No, you can’t do this to me!” I heard someone shout, and I placed the voice. It was the one that ran. The coward. “Just give me a little more time. I just need a little more time!” There was despair in his voice that I recognized. I knew what I would see even before we turned the corner towards the elevator. It was the despair of a dying man that knew he was dead.

I saw him at the opening to the elevator to see that there was some kind of jury rigged lift instead of the wide saucer elevator that I had seen before. He was in the middle of it, clawing at the base of his skull with enough force that I saw blood on his fingernails. He looked filthy, I thought now that I got a good look at him, Scraggly beard, dirty blond hair that was so greasy that you could wring it, and his skin was smudged with soot and filth. His clothes were little better as they were more fit to being rags than clothing.

“Tell Lady Dimitrescu that- that- that I have two slaves for her! I just- I just need to find them! Just give me enough time to find them!” The man begged, desperation in his voice. I didn’t see a communicator. Telepathy? The light gave us away, I realized because his gaze snapped in our direction. “They’re right there! I see them! I see-” He started, going to level his primitive gun at us, and just before I could pull the trigger to drop him where he stood, something happened. His head jerked, a small spurt of blood escaping the back of his skull where he was tearing at. Then he simply collapsed to the ground face first.

“That was certainly odd,” Azula remarked, her voice as dry as a desert as we approached. I filed the name he mentioned for later. Lady Dimitrescu. It wasn’t a familiar one. “And inconvenient. He could have told us something,” Azula voiced my thoughts. Practical. I was starting to like her already. “What happened to him?”

“Remote explosive in the back of his skull,” I told her, approaching the lift to see that it was made out of wood and rope. Hardly secure. But, looking up, far above, I saw a distant light that had to be the surface. Given that I could breathe without a mask, the atmosphere had certainly cleaned up. I picked up his weapon to find that it was ballistic-based. No biolock either. The man didn’t have anything else on him, not even spare ammunition. “Seems like he was a slave soldier sent down here to fight the insects for more slaves. The bomb in the head was to ensure compliance.”

“An interesting way to ensure loyalty,” Azula remarked, sounding like she approved. Glancing up, I saw a slight smirk on her lips as something intense shone in her eyes. “In any case, I believe it would be best to avoid this Lady Dimitrescu for now. At least until we know more,” Azula voiced, earning a nod from me. Slavery wasn’t uncommon within the Empire, and this didn’t seem wholly unfamiliar to me. We should be fine in theory, but best to make sure.

“First, lets get out of here,” I said, stepping onto the lift to see that it did hold. I spotted a lever as Azula stepped on, proving that despite its looks, it could support both of us. Pulling it, the lift began to rise, but every creak of the rope made me twitch, my instincts telling me not to trust a bunch of coiled plant fiber.

However, despite all my doubts, after several minutes, we managed to raise to the top and for the first time in five thousand years, I saw sunlight. Holding up a hand to shield my eyes, I stepped out of the vault entrance to see a rough-looking encampment at the opening. I ignored it in favor of looking out at my surroundings. It had been years since I saw a spec of green on the planet, but now it was lush with it. Grass, plants, trees… we sat at a high elevation, a cliffside at the base of a mountain. The terrain was very different from what I remembered.

Off to the left, I saw the ruins of a city. Skyscrapers that had long since collapsed and rotted into a shell of what they were, but even in the shadow of their former glory, they still stood over the tall trees. I saw banners hanging off the ruined buildings, a symbol that I recognized. That belonged to Lady Dimitrescu, I think. Or she had a presence there. Too early too tell. Beyond the city was blue. An ocean, or a very large lake. Could be interesting.

It was disheartening to see, but in the five thousand years that had elapsed since I went to sleep, while others had woken up before me, they hadn’t restored the world. I didn’t imagine I would be seeing any glittertech. So, it was a question of what kind of scarcity that we would be dealing with -- had society completely collapsed? Was there an industry? Did the Empire have a presence on this planet or had it fallen completely to the Dissenters?

“What… is that?” Azula breathed from behind me, her gaze not fixed on the skyscrapers or the ocean. Her gaze was drawn to something far more terrifying in nature.

It was almost bright enough to be the sun, I thought, looking over at a massive pillar of light that was pounding down at the planet many miles away. I could see where the laser had impacted the terrain -- how it was lifted and dried up in comparison to the lush forest we were surrounded by. Beyond that, however, I couldn’t tell specifics from where I stood.

“It’s an orbital laser,” I answered, looking up at the clear blue sky to see where the laser was coming down from. “Seems like it's been at it for a while,” I added, seeing more of a rise off in the distance. A little lip -- which was probably several hundred feet high -- marked where the laser had passed before. “That’s not good. If it’s been at it for the past five thousand years, then it’s effectively cut the planet in half.” It was sustaining the burn, and the markings on the terrain couldn’t come from a single pass over.

No. The orbital beam had a stable orbit and a solar furnace as a power source and for who knew how long, it had been carving a line into the planet. As big as the lip was, I’m bettering that there was a deeper trench that it was passing through, punching a little deeper each time it did so.

“It’s cut the planet in half?!” Azula exclaimed, looking at me with wide eyes and an openly shocked expression.

I chuckled and shook my head, “Not literally. If it managed that, then the two halves would just slam back into each other. What I mean is that getting to that side of the planet is going to be difficult. However… if the planet has regressed to a primitive era, then there’s a good chance that they would mistake that beam of light for something divine. There’s a good chance that we could find people if we go towards it,” I voiced, having seen that same thing before. There were builder mechs that had operated after a planet had collapsed and the tribals that came after the technological collapse saw them as gods.

Big beam of light slowly cutting the planet in half? There was a good chance that it was of religious significance if there were tribals.

I gazed out at our options. What would it be?

The City? The Ocean? Or the Orbital Beam?

...

Welcome to my second attempt to write a Rimworld story. The first one was nearly five years ago and petered out after a few chapters because it was all 'oh, cool idea' and then went nowhere because I realized that I would have to completely build the world up and at that point, I might as well write original fiction. This time, I'm filling the world up with a metric shit ton of waifus and other neat things in addition to the normal Rimworld shenanigans. However, more on that below.

Also, on a general note -- in terms of direction, I can go pretty much everywhere. However... well, if you aren't running an organ harvesting operation or mindbreaking psionic slaves with drugs to keep your colonist happy, are you really even playing Rimworld?

That first choice will determine what faction you will be meeting first. So, what will it be?

...

Premise: Welcome to the Rimworld, where everything that sees the light of day and anything within the shadows wants to kill you dead, preferably as painfully as possible. The nameless planet is home to a wide variety of life. Some familiar, some not. Your quest is of your own making -- Do you GTFO off the rock? Dominate it and rule over it as a living god? Or will you fall like so many others that have come before?

Assemble your colony of talented individuals, expand and grow. Topple your rivals and defeat your enemies. However, be warned -- kindness is an expensive luxury on the Rim. Suspect anyone that offers it freely, and be frugal with your own or you will find yourself with nothing.

General information: This is a fairly sizable multi cross that borrows on an idea that I had some time ago -- a waifu battle royale. The idea has been modified rather heavily, but the gist of it is more or less the same. The factions that populate the Rim are led by various waifus in fiction. The first chapter name-dropped one already -- Countess Alcina Dimitrescu. She will have a number of characters underneath her that she leads in her own way, just as every faction leader will.

These roughly fall under a handful of classifications: Power User, Combatant, Mage, Sleuth, Support, and Crafter. Naturally, it would hardly be considered a colony with only seven people, but those roles are generally going to be the head and shoulders of a faction. Each in the role will be a character from a piece of media. Some will be loyal to their leader, others will have their loyalty enforced -- so keep an eye out for opportunities for recruitment.

I used the WC interactive as a tool to build these teams -- with some tweaks. The cost of a waifu doesn’t matter, so long as she is below the listed tier of the leader of the faction. That's mostly to prevent a T8 from being led by a T2. Each colony will have its own flavor -- some will be well-intentioned and heroically inclined. Others will be authoritarian states, some will be slaver colonies, and a few will be hedonistic despots determined to get as much pleasure in as possible before the world inevitably kills them. However, what they all have in common is a fight for resources -- minerals, land, magic, and security.

In the background, I will be doing rolls for each of the faction that I have created, and of which you know about. These rolls determine how well a faction does in general, to conflict between them -- disastrous results could end with the destruction of the colony, so don’t assume that you can just come back without seeing any changes to a colony. If there is a colony left at all. Likewise, these rolls could offer unexpected opportunities.

As for the world itself -- Rimworld has a long list of disasters to work with. I will be using all of the in-game ones in addition to a number of modded disasters and threats. In general, just assume that the planet wants to kill you. Because it probably does.

Lastly, as a taste, here is a list of some faction leaders. Some of which you could be meeting very soon: Lady Alcina Dimitrescu, Miss Fortune, Yennefer, Oliver Mira Armstrong, Hestia, Yoruichi, Emma Frost, Makima, Artoria Pendragon, Wonder Woman.

And I think thats it. This could be updated further if a question gets asked enough.