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Shadowrunner Scene (Shadowrun 1st Edition Core Rulebook)

The world as we know it today is called the Fifth World. What came before is described in the Fourth World (and covered by a separate game, Earthdawn). What came after - the Shadowrun game - is chronicled below.

The Beginning of an Interesting Century (1990s–2010)[]

  • 1999:
    • January 8: Members of the Teamsters Union reject a final government contract offer and go on strike. The resulting work stoppage leads to a severe food shortage in New York City.
    • Febuary 2: After years of simmering conflict and well after the completion of a profi table natural gas pipeline, the Dene tribe in Northwestern Canada is pushed off its land. They had submitted a land claim that had been sitting in Canadian government halls for a considerable amount of time, which the Dene took as tacit approval oftheir presence. The government removed that approval and the Dene were forced to leave their land, clearing the area for further business development. Though not an earth-shaking incident, the event is a good indicator of the general direction of world events in the years to come.
    • April 12: During the strike-caused food shortage in New York City, a Seretech medical research truck is mistaken for a food shipping vehicle and is attacked. In the ensuing combat and riots, twenty Seretech employees and two hundred rioters are killed
    • May 6: In the aftermath of the New York City riots, state and federal governments sue Seretech for criminal negligence tied to the actions of its security forces.
    • October 26: The United States Supreme Court issues the landmark The United States vs. Seretech Corporation decision, finding that corporations have the right to maintain a private army. Governments do not immediately cede power, but the writing is on the wall.
  • Unknown Dates
    • Timor-Leste secedes from the Indonesian Republic and becomes independent
  • 2000
    • May 26: Blame for the rapidly deteriorating Austrian economy falls on the government due to several central banking decisions. The Austrian president dissolves Parliament, handing its power over to the Stahlmänner, a small council led by Austria’s foremost corporate figures.
    • July 10: The United States Supreme Court allows the Shiawase Corporation to build their own nuclear power reactor with limited Nuclear Regulatory Commission oversight
    • Scientist are surprised to discover a distinct new species of ferret in North America. Dubbed the Century Ferret due to the time of discovery, it is later concluded to be a "Spike Baby", a premature awakening.
    • November 7: Martin Hunt is elected President of the United States after campaigning heavily on a theme of “Smaller Government, More Freedom.”
    • November 8: Shiawase’s nuclear plant goes online, freeing the corporation from the public utility power grid.
    • December 14: The Nuclear Regulatory Commission, undeterred by their previous courtroom defeat, initiates a new lawsuit against Shiawase after an assault by a TerraFirst! team penetrates the exterior security of Shiawase’s new nuclear power plant. The NRC insists that the attack demonstrates that Shiawase cannot adequately protect its plant. Shiawase responds that their defense was hindered by federal lawsm, placing limits on what private security forces can and cannot do.
  • 2001:
    • January 4-18: Tensions in the southern states of Mexico increase, and in a two-week period governors of three states (Chiapas, Campeche, and Quintana Roo) are assassinated. Two of the three assassins are eventually caught and judged to have been working alone.
    • February 14: Using the Seretech decision as precedent, the second Shiawase decision once again goes in favor of Shiawase. As far as United States law is concerned, corporations become equivalent to governments—a rationale that other nations soon adopt.
    • February 20: The French government refuses to recognize Shiawase’s extraterritoriality. While they hope to be at the forefront of the backlash against growing corporate power, they instead find themselves alone, fighting a hopelessly quixotic battle. This begins nine long years of corporate sanctions against France
    • March-May: Severe environmental contamination hits Europe. Germany’s eastern Länder are evacuated due to groundwater contamination, and the ecology of the Baltic Sea collapses due to chemical sludge. Hundreds of thousands of people are relocated as governments try to address these troubled areas.
    • July 20: During the G8 summit in Genoa, private security forces open fire on anti-corporate protestors, killing twelve. The pro-corp Italian media describes the shootings as a “defense against an act of terrorism,” and protestors are force to change their tactics in the light of the corporate crackdown.
    • August 15: The FDA approves P4MO, a synthetic blood replacement, for general use.
    • Aug-Oct: NASA Mars probes photograph pyramids and a skeleton on the surface of Mars. The information is given the highest classification (Top Secret:Veil).
  • 2002
    • January 21: The “Resource Rush” begins when the United States government seizes millions of acres of land from various Native American reservations and turns it over to a handful of corporations intent on squeezing every last bit of oil, natural gas, coal, iron, and anything else they can find out of the ground. The Rush continues for years, as President Hunt is willing to give corporations just about any piece of land they ask for.
    • April 5: No strangers to mistreatment from the United States government, the more radical elements of several Native American nations band together in Denver to form the Sovereign American Indian Movement (SAIM), with the goal of ridding themselves of foreign intrusion once and for all so that they can be free to rule themselves.
    • June 14: Nicholas Aurelius takes almost every single business asset he owns and condenses it into a single corporation, which he bases in Detroit and names Ares Industries. President Hunt quickly grants the corporation extraterritoriality, and Ares becomes one of the largest corporations on earth.
    • July 8: Ecologies in both the Baltic and North Seas collapse due to chemical sludge. Hundreds of thousands of people are relocated as governments try to address these troubled areas.
    • September 23: After the horrible ecological disasters that have hit Europe, the Bündnis 2000 party sweeps to power in Germany’s federal elections. The party promises ecological restoration, a reduction in pollution, and other measures aimed at preventing more disasters. Naturally, corporations are not overly enthusiastic about this turn of events.
    • New tech enables production of optical chips that are not affected by EMP.
  • 2003:
    • March 24: An already-shrinking world gets smaller with the introduction of the Ghost, a suborbital plane jointly developed by BAE Systems and the Japanese Aerospace Corporation. The Ghost can go from London to Boston in 76 minutes and from London to Tokyo in a few hours. Within weeks of its introduction, corporations have placed enough orders for the aircraft to make a several year waitlist.
    • May 13: Biotech comes to the pet store in the form of the GloFish. Originally bred to detect water pollutants, the fish glows red under blacklight, and it becomes a common sight in aquariums across the continent.
    • July 8: The United States government dissolves the municipal government of Washington, D.C., replacing it with federal control. Widespread corruption had left the city with escalating debts, crumbling infrastructure, and a climate where no one believed the government was watching out for the common good. While the citizens were disgusted with the municipal government, they are not inclined to see the federal government in any better light, especially since they have lacked meaningful federal representation for so long. Most residents see the move as nothing more than a naked federal power grab.
    • November 19: A flash flood in the North Sea regions of the country gives the new government its first real test. All nuclear plants in the nation are shut down after some on the coast approach meltdown.
  • 2004:
    • April 26: News outlets across the country report the revelation that United States President Martin Hunt has been making regular payments to Mexican President Miguel Ávila in exchange for letting certain corporations continue the Resource Rush south of the border. Hunt’s laissez-faire governing style had left him with a middling approval rating at best, and the ongoing stories about the payments, while never confirmed (and dismissed as agitprop in some quarters) push his approval ratings lower.
    • June: Germany’s rush to shut down all its nuclear plants creates a problem when an accident at Biblis releases radioactive gas into the air. Corporations point to this as evidence that the shutdown program either be slowed or canceled, but they are forced to mute their complaints somewhat when a disaster in Dungeness, England, shows what happens if nuclear power goes bad. A partial meltdown irradiates a section of Kent and kills 6,000 people, and for a time thereafter Europeans are somewhat more tolerant of pro-environmental restrictions
    • September 10: The 10 Minute War. After Libya attacks Israel with chemical weapons, Israel responds with enough three nuclear bombs dropped on major cities, beating Libya into submission. The seeds of Libya’s eventual collapse are planted.
    • October 12: France finally finds a partner in resisting corporate extraterritoriality. Switzerland revives the famous Rütli Schwur Oath, which vows common action in defense of freedom, and uses it to bolster their effort to resist the growing power of corporations.
    • Nov 2: : Philip Bester defeats Martin Hunt and is elected president of the United States.
  • 2005:
    • March 25: Though he pledged to reverse many of President Hunt’s policies, President Phillip Bester continues his predecessor’s corp-friendly policies by eliminating public funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The Public Broadcasting System breaks up shortly thereafter, and private broadcasters quickly consume its resources
    • Israel nukes Libya, destroying half its cities.
    • May 13: As has often been the case, increasing European tensions result in the invasion of Poland. This time Belarus does the honors, also moving against the Ukraine and some other Baltic states, and beginning the Border Wars.
    • August 12: An earthquake measuring 5.8 on the Richter scale hits Manhattan. While Californians might scoff at such a relatively low number, the quake is strong enough to severely damage a city that wasn’t built to withstand such an event. Most skyscrapers besides the Empire State Building collapse and more than 200,000 people are killed.
    • September 2: The assassination of South Korean President Dae-Jung Rhee leads to Commander of the Army General Kyung Han Yoon taking power. Yoon uses the fact that the assassin was a Communist to declare war against North Korea. Japan strongly supports Yoon’s actions, and the Second Korean War begins
    • September 19: After the tremendous damage of the Manhattan quake, the East Coast Stock Exchange moves to Boston, which helps turn Boston’s economy around.
    • United Nations moves to Geneva.
    • Conservative government in the United Kingdom establishes regional parliaments in Scotland and Wales.
  • 2006:
    • April 10: Japan makes a strong statement to the rest of the world by launching a series of solar-power-collecting satellites that beam power to Earth via microwaves.
    • May 12: Though not as impressive as the Ghost, Boeing’s High Speed Civil Transport completes a successful test flight. In six years, the craft will be the key to a profitable Seattle-to-Japan route.
    • July 27: The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Orginisation (CSIRO) announces the birth of a healthy Tasmanian tiger cloned from frozen DNA samples of one of the previously extinct beasts.
    • October 17: The struggling Texas Instruments Corporation essentially wagered its entire future on a patent violation lawsuit against Miroyama Electric, and after years of court proceedings, they finally receive a favorable verdict. The Japanese courts turn over all of Miroyama’s assets to Texas Instruments, revitalizing the corporation, and every single Miroyama executive commits seppuku.
    • November 17: AN attempted nuclear attack by North Korea on Japan backfi res when the crude warheads fail to detonate. The attacks spur Japan to greater involvement in the Second Korean War, North Korea eventually falls, and Japan goes on to switch to an imperial government.
    • Japanacorps push the ROK (Republic of Korea, aka. South Korea) into a war with the DPRK (Democratic Peoples' Republic of Korea, aka. Communist North Korea).
    • The provinces of Guangdong, Fujian, Jiangxi, Hunan and Zhejiang form the Greater Canton Economic Development Council, to deal with the increased foreign investment and economic boom caused by the Resource Rush.
    • Early 2006: DPRK launches nukes at Japan, but they do not reach their targets.
    • Late 2006: DPRK is overrun. Japan proclaims Japanese Imperial State.
  • 2007
    • Spring: Some of the seeds of what Africa will become are planted when two nations, Ghana and the Côte d’Ivoire, begin the two year process of removing themselves from the United Nations and step back from the international community. Given that the international community has not always been kind to African nations, the withdrawal is met with general approval by residents of both nations
    • August 14: Three major drug cartels take several steps designed to bring their enterprises more into the legitimate business world through the foundation of ORO Corporation.
    • November 2: President Philip Bester wins a Pyrrhic victory when the United States Supreme Court decides not to review the government’s decision to disband the municipal government of Washington, D.C. While Bester had opposed many of his predecessor’s policies, he supported the move in D.C. The general public, however, was growing increasingly disenchanted with the handling of the situation, and Bester’s approval ratings start a decline from which they never recover.
  • 2008
    • March 4: The ORO Corporation announces the discovery of large deposits of molybdenum several kilometers off the Panamanian coast. ORO not only had full exploitation rights to this metal, but the corporation had managed to create a monopoly on all local molybdenum extracting and processing industries. They had managed to accomplish this before the discovery of the metal was made.
    • April 18: In Texas, a new kind of militias is created, allowing governments to assemble armed groups of private citizens to fill gaps in law enforcement.
    • June: Several Central American countries pull out of international agreements regarding intellectual property and related matters. Piracy and other forms of copyright violations became legal in those countries, and the ORO Corporation positions itself at the head of the burgeoning technopiracy industry.
    • August 23: The coalition government collapses as the strain of the ongoing series of ecological disasters take their toll. The government weakness translates to ongoing social instability and violence in the streets
    • Nov 4: Jesse Garrety is elected President of the United States over incumbent Philip Bester.
  • 2009
    • March 4: The Cattenom-GAU nuclear reactor loses its primary and secondary cooling systems. The failure leads to an explosion and a huge cloud of radioactive gas expands through eastern France and western Germany. More than 35,000 die immediately; the eventual death toll is more than 135,000 individuals.
    • April 7: King Charles III ascends to the nation’s throne.
    • May 5—USA: United Oil Industries receives the oil rights to one-quarter of the remaining national parks and one-tenth of the remaining Native American reservations. The action directly leads to the Lone Eagle incident.
    • September 18: Nuclear holocaust becomes a very real possibility in the Lone Eagle incident. Responding to land grants to United Oil Industries, a SAIM strike team invades a missile silo and threatens to launch.
    • September 28: After a ten-day standoff, military forces break into the silo and kill the SAIM strike team, but not before they launched a single missile, targeted for Russia. President Jesse Garrety desperately tried to convince Russian President Nikolai Chelenko not to retaliate once the missile hit. Then the missile disappeared. No retaliation was needed. The cause of the disappearance remains unknown.
    • October 19: In response to the Lone Eagle incident, the Re-education and Relocation Act is passed in the United States, ordering all Natives with the remotest connection to SAIM to detention centers. In Canada, the Nepean Act is passed, legitimizing internment camps for Natives while dismantling the Inuit territory of Nunavut
  • 2010:
    • January 20: As the roundup of Native Americans continues under the Re-Education and Relocation Act, the government seizes all remaining Native American lands.
    • Virally Induced Toxic Allergy Syndrome (VITAS) kills off a quarter of the world's population.
    • February 10: A new disease is discovered, a virus that produces severe allergic reactions and kills most of its victims by inflaming their lungs to the point that they suffocate. The disease is named Kali’s Harvest in India and kills 450 million people. Worldwide, the disease is named the Virally Induced Toxic Allergy Syndrome (VITAS), and it eventually kills a quarter of the world’s population, including Pope John Paul III.
    • February: Within weeks of its discovery, VITAS is diagnosed in countries across the world. Developed areas use their medical resources to somewhat mitigate the effects of the disease, but poorer and rural areas are devastated. Death and destruction are rampant—funeral pyres become common sights in European cities, while in Mexico City offi cials burn entire neighborhoods in an attempt to contain the virus.
    • June 22: The French economy breaks under the VITAS-induced strain, ending their long years of resistance to the new corporate culture.
    • September 16: Michael Beloit restructures BMW, integrating it with Saeder Munitions and Krupp Manufacturing, starting the organization that will grow into the behemoth that is Saeder-Krupp.
    • October 28: Madagascar reports that ten and a half million of its fourteen million citizens have died from VITAS. The survivors soon leave the island, and it eventually becomes a pirate haven.
    • October 31: Quebec secedes from Canada.
  • Unknown Dates
      • The Yakuza of Seattle is given official recognition as the Dungeness Crabs of the 87th Prefecture by the oyabun of the Watada-rengo in Chiba, Japan. This approval of and support for their activities allows the Seattle Yakuza to grow rapidly and expand its operations.
      • Keruba and BMW start the first megacorporate war, decimating each other. This inspired other AAA's to invest in defenses, set a precedent of no-holds-barred fighting for corporate war, and taught the world that corporate war was bad for everyone's business. In conjunction with the chaotic repercussions of the Awakening inspired, this would lead to the formation of the ICC.

Rude Awakening (2011-2020)[]

  • 2011
    • January 13: The first children with the odd physical traits known as Unexplained Genetic Expression are born.
    • February 9: Hurricane-force winds push the noxious waters of the North Sea into surrounding bodies of water, affecting several nearby nations. This phenomenon, known as the Black Tide, poisoned so much water that 500,000 people eventually died.
    • February 20: The first Mana Storm on record appears.
    • March 14: Newsweek magazine becomes the first major media source to label children who have experienced Unexplained Genetic Expression as “elves” and “dwarfs.”
    • April 7: The Mexican government disintegrates, mainly due to sheer exhaustion.
    • May-end of the year and beyond: Some parents of UGE infants report their children missing, others give them up for adoption or just abandon them. Disappearances are especially pronounced in Haiti, and it happens for three more years.
    • August 15: The Indonesian government collapses, buckling under the stresses of volcanic eruptions following the devastation of VITAS.
    • September 3: The basalt columns of Giant’s Causeway rise on the coast of Northern Ireland, taller and more solid than they have ever been. Throughout the year, stone circles erupt from the ground across the United Kingdom.
    • October 31: The annual Samhain ritual in Salem, Massachusetts is attended by some new guests: A ghostly hunting group, later identifi ed as the Wild Hunt, appears out of the evening mist charges around the celebrants.
    • November 18: After a surge in the number of photographs purporting to show yeti in the mountains near Nepal, a tribe of yeti is conclusively identified.
    • December 24: In Japan, the great dragon Ryumyo emerges from Mt. Fuji and immediately flies to two of the most magically powerful sections of the nation. At the same moment, Daniel Coleman (later to be known as Daniel Howling Coyote) leads his SAIM followers out of an internment camp in Abilene. They simply walk out, and guards that fire bullets at Daniel see them bounce harmlessly off a glowing field surrounding him. Also on this date, a manned flight to Mars crashes, killing five of eight astronauts.
    • December 26: The great dragon Celedyr emerges in Caerleon, Wales.
    • England's Sizewell B nuclear power station suffers critical meltdown, resulting in a total death count of 17,000.
    • A nuclear power plant in Dounreay, Scotland suffers a meltdown, creating the Scottish Irradiated Zone.
    • Jul: Operation Discovery, an 8-man Mars Mission, makes planetfall and begins its survey.
    • Tibet withdraws from China and erects a large magical barrier isolating it from the rest of the world.
    • Dec 24:
      • 00:00:01 - Saeletra makes its one and only appearance.
    • Dec 26: Ley-lines and standing stones re-emerge all over Britain. First sighting of the Great Welsh Dragon, Celedyr, in Caerleon.
  • 2012:
    • January 1: In the traditional New Year’s Mass, Pope John Paul IV proclaims that all metahumans are abominations in the eyes of God. The era of anti-metahuman discrimination officially begins. The Pope’s words are later reiterated in a Papal Bull in March that also condemns all things magical
    • January 3: The great dragon Hualpa emerges.
    • January 12: On the first day of Diwali, the Ganges, Indus, and Jamuna rivers are purified and become mana lines, though it is some time before people realize just what that means.
    • January 12: Tibet gains its independence, thanks in large part to a magic barrier that protects and isolates the nation.
    • January 20: The French Catholic Church (FCC), which had been steadily growing in power in recent years, denounces the pope’s words on metahumans. This initiates an irrevocable split between the FCC and the Vatican.
    • January 27: The most gregarious of the great dragons, Dunkelzahn, appears at Cherry Creek Lake in Denver. Unlike his fellow dragons, the Big D quickly makes himself available to the media, sitting down with reporter Holly Brighton for a full twelve hours as he tries to help the world make sense of the Awakening. More great dragons emerge as the year goes along, including Rhonabwy in Wales, Aden in Turkey, Schwartzkopf in the Czech Republic, and Lofwyr, Feurschwinge, Nebelherr, and Kaltenstein in Germany.
    • March 31: The great dragon Lung awakens at Mt. Emei. He is later seen flying over the Great Wall of China.
    • April 8: A dramatic display of active spiritual manifestations forces the Israeli government to order the evacuation of Jerusalem’s Old City. Evacuations become fairly regular occurrences in the months and years to follow.
    • June 1: The Japanese Diet passes the Yamato act, greatly deregulating Japanese corporations while adapting protectionist policies against foreign corporations. The Act also makes the nuyen the offi cial currency of Japan, and it paves the way for future imperialist actions and anti-metahuman activities by the government.
    • August 12: On the purported anniversary of the sinking of Atlantis, Sheila Blatavska founds the Atlantean Foundation.
    • August 30: A coalition of local corporations agrees to take control of Dallas’s struggling welfare system—as long, of course, as it adheres to their rules. Public-private partnerships, with the private sector taking the lead, become increasingly common.
    • September 16: After a four-month-long destructive rampage, the dragon Feurschwinge is killed by the German military.
    • October 17: A hot war between BMW and Keruba (the first true corporate military clash) leads to a dramatic step. Seven of the largest corporations— BMW, Ares Industries, Shiawese, Mitsuhama, ORO, Keruba, and JRJ form the Inter-Corporate Council (ICC) to represent their combined interests and mediate disputes—to step in, in essence, where governments no longer could.
    • November 6: President Jesse Garrety becomes the fi rst U.S. president of the millennium to win election to a second term. Pundits speculate that the voting populace was too distracted by everything else going on in the world to learn anything about the opposition candidates.
  • 2013
    • January 1: The Awakened, snake-like creatures known as the naga emerge near Angkor Wat. Cambodian peasants connect these creatures to Cambodian mythology and worship them as rulers of river and rain. The basis for a Naga Kingdom is established.
    • April 2: The ICC fails its first significant test. ORO and Keruba International had been skirmishing over how much military activity Keruba was supporting in Central America, and the ICC stepped in to attempt to resolve the dispute. The ICC issued a series of rulings and recommendations on this date, but the limited power of the body means that essentially everything it has to say about the matter is ignored. The fighting winds down on its own later in the year.
    • May 23: Escalating IRA actions culminate in an elemental strike on the British town of Aldershot (known as the “Home of the British Army”). This leads to a referendum in Great Britain on the future of Ireland.
    • June 15: The Combat Biking League is founded in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
    • August 12: The Xinjiang province of China declares independence, renaming itself Uighurstan. Ethnic cleansing in the province follows the announcement.
    • September 13: Pope John Paul IV dies in his sleep. His successor, Pope John XXV, seems to promise a more moderate approach to many of the world’s pressing issues. Still, many ranking officials in the church are not assuaged, and a handful of Irish bishops go forward with their plans to split from the church.
    • First televised Combat Biker match (Baton Rouge, LA)
  • 2014:
    • All year: Government collapses keep coming. The Cuban government falls in the wake of Fidel Castro’s resignation due to poor health, the Caucasian-controlled South African government dissolves, Egypt absorbs Libya, and Indonesia falls.
    • April 15: The great dragon Masaru awakens during a full lunar eclipse.
    • March 15: Preferring the conservative views of Pope John Paul IV to his more reform-minded successor, the German Catholic Church splits from the Roman Catholic Church.
    • June 10: Daniel Howling Coyote returns to the public eye. Unseen since his dramatic escape from the Abilene internment camp, Howling Coyote reveals that he has spent his time building a coalition of Native American tribes called the Native American Nations. He claims the entirety of North America for the NAN, and demands that all people of European, Asian, and African ancestry leave the continent or face retribution. Most of the governments and people covered by his demand opt not to take it seriously.
    • June 23: After a series of IRA actions galvanize a public already weary from other disasters, British Parliament passes the Treaty of Galway, creating the United Free Republic of Ireland
    • July 12: The Redondo volcano erupts, burying the city of Los Alamos and the Los Alamos National Laboratory under volcanic ash. Daniel Howling Coyote appears on vid-casts shortly after the eruption, claiming credit for his actions in calling on the power of Mother Earth to cause the disaster. He promises that more such events are on the horizon. Federal troops are sent to capture the NAN leader, but a string of tornados hampers their advance, and by the time they reach the location of Howling Coyote’s broadcast, he and his followers are long gone. This signals the beginning of the Ghost Dance War between Amerindians and the governments of North America.
  • 2015:
    • March 18: Hong Kong secedes from China, establishing the Hong Kong Free Enterprise Zone.
    • April 27: Berlin becomes an exclusion zone, freeing it from most regulations of any kind. It is quickly surrounded by troops and walls in an effort to keep the anarchy contained
    • May 5: The Azatlán Party comes to power in Mexico in the first-ever Matrix-based election and renames the nation Aztlan. The election was run, conveniently enough, by ORO, which only solidified their ties to the new government.
    • May 15—USA: The Magic Hat opens in Minneapolis. It is the first private organization for practicing magicians (meaning, of course, those who use real magic as opposed to stage illusions).
    • May 5: Francisco Pavón of the Azatlán party becomes first directly elected president of Mexico.
    • May 18: After years of tension tied in part to refugee issues, the nation of Belgium dissolves when Wallonia splits from Flanders.
    • August 6: Salish warriors led by Thunder Tyee capture a submarine base near Bangor.
    • Summer: The Hungarian economy collapses when the newly-elected Green Party overreaches with their environmental programs, putting too great a strain on businesses and delivering a fatal blow to an economy that wasn’t in very good shape in the first place.
    • October 4: Thunder Tyee and his warriors remain on the move, taking over the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard.
    • Schism splits the Irish Republican Army (IRA) into two factions: the Provisional IRA (led by Liam O'Connor, a "spike baby" elf) and the Official IRA. The Provisional IRA is incorporated into the state security apparatus, where it counters Protestant paramilitaries. It would grow into the core of the Tir Republican Corps (TRC).
  • 2016:
    • Yearlong: Corporations begin to realize the economic value of the space industry, leading to a new space race as they compete to gain and exploit footholds in space.
    • March 12: Terrorist mages in the United Kingdom manipulate an oil spill, creating the Scottish Fringe Toxic Zone.
    • USA President Garrety assassinated by William Springer (never captured). Also assassinated: Russian President Nikolai Chelenko, Prime Minister Lena Rodale of the United Kingdom, Minister Chaim Schon of Israel.
    • VP William Jarman passes Executive Order 17-321, the extermination of the Native American tribes.
    • Ares buys NASA.
  • 2017:
    • February 2: Four tech companies merge to create Transys Neuronet.
    • April 13: An earthquake collapses the mountain covering China’s main nuclear stockpile. Several warheads detonate, and between the explosions and the vast amounts of rubble, the stockpiles are destroyed.
    • May 9: The Harris-3M corporation launches the first privately constructed space station, Halo.
    • July 22: Lone Star Security Services is born in Austin, the product of a merger of two previous corporations. Broad security needs from both the public and private sectors result in explosive growth for the company throughout the rest of the year and beyond.
    • August 17: With military troops moving to carry out President Jarman’s extermination order, Daniel Howling Coyote and his followers initiate the Great Ghost Dance. The most immediate effect is the simultaneous explosion of four volcanoes in the Pacific Northwest—Mount Hood, Mount Ranier, Mount St. Helens, and Mount Adams. Freak weather patterns follow and continue for the rest of the year, frustrating the government’s plans to apprehend or kill Howling Coyote.
    • September 25: British Imperial Chemical Industries merges with two Swiss pharmaceutical firms to form Zeta-Imperial Chemicals.
    • August 22: The newly crowned King Kamehameha IV declares Hawai’i’s independence.
    • October 18: A massive Triad war that included the active participation of the great dragon Lung finally ends when the headquarters of one of the involved parties, the Majestic Peacock Association, burns to the ground.
  • 2018:
    • March 17: With a large part of the government’s nuclear arsenal buried under earthquake rubble, provinces start to rebel against the Communist rulers, leading to the collapse of both the Communist party and the Chinese state. The Canton Development Council breaks off first and becomes the Canton Confederation, and Sichaun, Shaanxi, and Henan soon become independent as well. The remnants are named the Republic of China.
    • April 25: After three months of meetings, the Native American Nations, the United States, Canada and Aztlan sign the Treaty of Denver (Québec abstains). The NAN’s sovereignity is recognized, and it gets the vast majority of the western United States, with California and the Seattle metroplex as the most notable exceptions. Daniel Howling Coyote becomes the head of the Sovereign Tribal Council overseeing the various components of the NAN. The Treaty also divides Denver into separate districts for the United States, Aztlan, Sioux, Pueblo, and Ute nations.
    • July 12: Dr. Hosato Hikita of ESP Systems Inc. first demonstrates Artificial Sensory Induction System Technology (ASIST), and the roots of simsense programming and entertainment are put down in Chicago.
    • November 9: Fuchi Industrial Electronics completes its Seattle Industrial Compound. Fuchi’s project is one indicator of Seattle’s progress toward becoming a major international center, but it also leads to inevitable strife and growing pains as Seattle attempts to deal with an influx of new residents and refugees from nearby nations.
    • The spaceplane America disintegrates in orbit, crashing in Longreach, Australia and killing 200.
  • 2019:
    • Spring: More than 200,000 Anglo refugees flood into the Seattle area from NAN lands. The influx of people causes massive food and housing shortages throughout the area, sparking sporadic fi ghts and riots, and keeping the police force working overtime for several weeks.
    • March 8: In an overwhelming vote, the Washington districts of Bellevue, Renton, and Kent vote yes to become part of greater Seattle. By summer’s end, Seattle has also incorporated all of King County and most of neighboring Pierce and Snohomish Counties.
    • April 12: Amid a vigorous corporate space race, Ares unveils their Apollo space station.
    • Summer: During a government push to drive all non-natives out, anti-Anglo extremism explodes into violence. For the next two years Anglos are continually harassed and suffer the brunt of terrible violence. Some brave people stay, but are treated as second-class citizens.
    • August 13: Two telecommunications companies, Nokia and Ericsson, merge to form the Erika corporation.
    • August 23: Leonora Bartoli, a world famous violinist who lost her left hand in an accident, ushers in the cybernetic age when the Transys Corporation replaces her lost hand with a cybernetic replacement wired directly to her nervous system. Just over a year later she is once again performing before sold out concert halls.
    • September 6: Facing an exploding refugee population, food shortages, and an overextended infrastructure, Everett and Tacoma vote in favor of joining Seattle.
    • November 23: The leader of the Shiawase Corporation and its founding family, Emori Shiawase, dies of heart failure.
  • 2020: Aden destroys Tehran in response to the Ayatollah's declaration of jihad against the metahuman races.
    • Ares launches Apollo space program.

Brave New World (2021-2030)[]

  • 2021:
    • April 30: Without warning, one out of every ten human men, women, and children in every country around the world transforms into new genus types, typically called an “ork” or “troll.” This devastating change then occurs in utero or in children who suffer the change just after puberty. The Media calls this change “Goblinization.”
    • April 30: King George VII of Great Britain’s death is announced. Rumors spread indicating he goblinized and was ordered killed by the military and senior members of the British aristocracy.
    • April 30: The government extends full rights and citizenship to all Québécois UGE victims, but only if they are francophone.
    • April 30: Victims of UGE are greeted with compassion, setting a pro-metahuman tone in the country that persists to this day.
    • May 4: President Joaquim Delmonte opens the country up to all victims of Goblinization after he turns into an ork.
    • May 14: Sparking extreme xenophobia in the Germanic regions of the country, Swiss offi cials declare Goblinization to be an unidentified disease. Everyone affected by this disease is forced into quarantine camps.
    • May 25: In a response to the government collecting all native orks and trolls into camps, the Goblinization victims organize the Mutant’s Congress in Cologne and threaten to revolt.
    • May 28: When Japanese corporations call upon the Imperial Diet for support in the Philippines, Japanese forces seize control of the nation to combat the “Goblinization plague.” Metahumans are rounded up and are later incarcerated on Yomi Island.
    • June 9: Acting on the growing fear that Goblinization is contagious-as has been reported in other countries—Seattle Governor Lindstrom orders the Metroplex Guard to round up all goblinized victims—including their families—and place them in camps once used to hold Native Americans.
    • August 3: In New Orleans, Louisiana, noted journalist McBean comes out of seclusion to write an emotionally charged article about the experiences of his childhood friend suffering from Goblinization for Time Magazine.
    • August 23: Texas Governor Melissa Santiago-Ortega strong-arms the Welfare Board into giving funds to provide adequate shelter and sanitary facilities in her newly established metahuman detention centers.
    • Sheila Blatavska establishes the Atlantean Foundation.
  • 2022:
    • January 30: The Metahuman Segregation Law (MSL) is passed. This law strips metahumans of their citizenship and civil rights, as well as their right to live in Switzerland.
    • Spring: Tensions between victims of Goblinization and the rest of the populace continue to rise. Sporadic race riots break out in cities around the world.
    • March 25: An assassin with ties to a growing anti-metahuman organization kills Dunkelzahn’s interpreter, John Timmons. Unfortunately for the assassin, Dunkelzahn is present and reduces the gunman, “to his component atoms.”
    • April 18: In retaliation for the MSL, several Swiss-French cantons secede to form the Confederatión Suisse Francophone (CSF).
    • April 26: Construction begins on the Aztechnology Pyramid in Seattle.
    • May 5: As part of a dramatic rebranding effort, ORO Corporation renames itself Aztechnology in an attempt to shed the stigma of their drug cartel origins.
    • Summer: A new, violent game emerges among street gangs that will evolve into Urban Brawl. The game is used to solve gang related disputes.
    • August 12: Months after scientists prove that Goblinization is not contagious, Seattle Governor Lindstrom finally orders all metahumans released from quarantine.
    • August 18: The great dragon Schwartzkopf begins lecturing at the University of Prague after the school adds arcane studies to its curriculum.
    • August 19: Scandal erupts when Johns Hopkins Institute of Health is caught performing illegal experiments on metahumans. The U.S. government removes all funding from the institute. In response, Johns Hopkins becomes an independent for-profit corporation.
    • Autumn: Racial tensions and violence are temporarily set aside as a new strain of the VITAS virus kills another 10 percent of the world’s population.
    • September 15: The FCC is disbanded, ending any control over broadcasting standards or licenses. The Internetwork Transmission Control Council (ITCC) takes over as a “self-regulating oversight body for the responsible management of communications frequencies.”
    • October 15: To prevent additional islands in the Caribbean from being bought out by corporations, the Caribbean League is founded.
    • October 24: Australia and New Zealand form the Australia and New Zealand Allied Confederation (ANZAC).
    • November 19: An electronic news magazine, Data, first coins the term,
    • The chain of earthquakes that began in Augervene in 2011 causes a seaquake; the resulting tidal wave hits Lisbon, killing thousands, destorying large stretches of the city
    • Los Angeles is rocked by gang warfare, eventually suppressed by National Guardsmen. The city's worst slums are walled off, soon renamed "El Infierno" by local residents
  • 2023:
    • February 6: The Seattle Police Department, tired of taking the brunt of the anger expressed in the racial riots between humans and metahumans, goes on strike.
    • February 7: Seattle Governor Lindstrom, incensed at being left with a metroplex in turmoil, declares the Seattle Police strike illegal. He promptly fires every members of the SPD, even those not involved in the strike, and replaces them with officers from Lone Star Security Services.
    • March 31: The German Parliament offi cially departs the violence-plagued city of Berlin, completing the year-long move of the German capital to Hanover.
    • April 29: Berlin descends into anarchy. Riots break out across the city leaving 14 people dead, more than 2,000 injured, 14,000 arrested, and causing billions of Deutsche Marks in damages.
    • May 30: In Los Angeles, California, a massive riot breaks out in the Watts district when rumors surface that MLK-Drew Medical Center is hording VITAS serum. 23 soldiers, 89 police and 619 civilians are killed as Watts is nearly leveled.
    • June 2: After seeing its numbers reduced to about fifteen thousand—mostly orks and trolls—by VITAS, the troll King Kouame banishes the remaining humans, dwarfs, and elves to create a troll and ork-only nation.
    • June 21: An unearthly fog, dubbed “the Mist,” covers large rural areas of Brittany. Any humans and metahumans caught in the Mist experience overwhelming fear and become lost. The Mist disrupts magic and attracts paranatural animals. Thousands of people go missing, including the entire population of several towns.
    • July 16: Frances Daniels, a PhD in engineering and a fourth dan black belt in ki-akido, demonstrates a newly identified form of magic. Rather than casting spells, he is capable of enhancing his body’s physical abilities.
    • July 18: Senator Franklin Moss becomes so incensed during a debate over metahuman rights that he challenges his opponent, Senator Victor Sanchez—a known sharpshooter—to a duel. The following morning, Senator Moss’s death is widely televised and later sold on several video formats.
    • August 28: The Metahuman Bill of Rights is passed in Texas. This bill guarantees voting privileges, equality in housing, medical care, education, and fair employment for all metahumans.
    • September 1: In the Seattle Metroplex, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) creates the Fort Lewis Zoological Gardens. This project will be used to explore Goblinization and paranormal changes in animals
    • Humanis Policlub founded.
    • The ICC moves to the Freedom space habitat, renames itself the Corporate Court, and grants itself authority over all extraterritorial corporations.
    • In Fatima, Portugal, during a visit by Pope John XXV, a new apparition of the Virgin Mary appears before thousands of witnesses. This event reinforces the Pope's Imago Dei reversing the effects of the previous Pope's declaration against Metahumanity. (Shadows of Europe)
  • 2024:
    • February 14: In Texas, The opening of the multi-million dollar Metahuman Resource Center is celebrated in Dallas. Governor Santiago-Ortega presides over the day’s festivities, with Lone Star in charge of security.
    • July 12: In Atlanta, Georgia, renovations on the formerly unused Ted Turner stadium are completed. Georgia Tech undertook the work in order to turn the stadium into a research project. The coliseum is covered with an experimental biotech photosynthesis-capable membrane used to produce food and turn solar radiation into usable power.
    • November 5: President Jarman becomes the first three-term president since Franklin D. Roosevelt. The opposition claims fraud in the landslide vote, but no concrete evidence can be produced to support their accusation.
    • November 11: The Magic Regulation Bill is passed, limiting the use of magic almost exclusively to corporate and government forces.
    • November 15: After new elections are held the cantons of the CSF rejoin Switzerland, but the cantons of Fribourg, Geneva, Jura, Neuchâtel, and Vaud refuse to accept the MSL under Switzerland’s “Opting-Out Law.” These cantons become safe havens for metahumans in Switzerland.
    • November 14: Using ASIST technology, the first simsense entertainment unit (a kind of sensory video player) becomes available on the open market. The high price of the unit limits sales to research institutions, large corporations, and the ultra-wealthy
    • After a prolonged succession dispute, George Edward Richard Windsor-Hanover becomes King George VIII in England.
    • Pope John XXV issues the encyclical 'Imago Dei': Metahumans have souls and are capable of salvation. Magical abilities are not inherently evil. Spirits are manifestations of nature (gray area).
    • The U.S. presidential election is held across the Internet for the first time, using the experimental “remote-vote" system.
  • 2025
    • January 10: In Seattle, Shiawase fi les a lawsuit against Aztechnology for not being honest about the structural integrity of their Monolith building prior to its purchase by Shiawase. Further examinations reveal that the building is too damaged to repair, quoting any work would surpass the price paid for it. The building is closed down and scheduled for demolition.
    • March 11: In Chicago, Truman Technologies begins relocating residents of the city’s Southside as part of a massive revitalization project.
    • March 21: The United Kingdom Constitution Act is passed, formalizing the roles of Parliament and royalty. A new offi ce is created, the Office of the Lord Protector, with powers relating to administration of internal and national security.
    • March 24: Japan appoints Fukatsu Saru governor and he quickly turns the nation into a police state, controlling and censoring all media, except for those from Japan.
    • March 30: A flood of refugees from China and the Philippines begins and continues for the next fi ve years. The retreat from China and the Philippines is caused by conflicts between the two nations, threatening to overwhelm the city’s infrastructure.
    • April 1: The first cyber-modified player, linebacker Mario Sanchez of the Philadelphia Eagles enters the NFL. There have been concerns about these new athletes, citing their unfair advantages over unenhanced players. In order to quell a negative public response, this type of modification will be restricted to those who need reconstruction due to injury.
    • July 10: The New Druidic Movement in the UK gains a foothold in the government when Lord Marchment, one of their leading figures, is appointed Lord Protector of Great Britain.
    • UCLA establishes the first undergraduate program in occult studies.
    • Lone Star takes over law enforcement in Seattle.
  • 2026:
    • January 30: After the media blackout of 2025, Governor Fukatsu Saru passes laws banning the manufacture, sales, and ownership of firearms for all private individuals. Anyone caught with a firearm is subjected to the full authority of the Governor’s law. He follows this with laws against all manner of technology, including combustion engines, Matrix gear, and even medical supplies, citing their potential for use as weapons.
    • March 22: After a year of diligent work, a coalition government successfully liberalizes formally restrictive magical research laws. This also grants local political entities large administrative freedoms that will be under the watchful eye of a separate oversight committee as part of the research liberalization.
    • May 1: On the heels of the magical research freedoms granted in Germany, Oxford and Edinburgh universities establish Bachelor of Science degrees in occult studies. This decision is accompanied by a rash of arguments disputing the legitimacy of magic as a viable degree.
    • May 1: The Bureau of High Technology ruled today that only Sioux-based corporations and/or entities related to those corporations are eligible to license technology from the University of Cheyenne. This puts a halt to any negotiations with other corporations such as Aztechnology and Shiawase.
    • July 25: The first cyberterminal, a room-sized isolation chamber using multiple jackpoints and hookups, is tested for military intelligence applications. The system allows the operator to interface directly with the world data networks using their minds. Early attempts to use the system drive many volunteers mad.
    • November 2: In the Seattle Metroplex, Brian O’Malley from Milwaukee is named head of the Finnigan family and Don of the Seattle Mafia
    • Texas A&M and MIT both add occult studies, and rename themselves as Texas AM&M (Agriculture, Medicine, and Magic) and MIT&T (Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Thaumaturgy).
    • World Combat Cyclists League (WCCL) founded. Combat Biker becomes a major sport.
  • 2027:
    • February 28: In Paris, Dr. Etienne Dumas, Professor Emeritus of Occult Studies of Sorbonne University announces a breakthrough with his research group in magical studies; a method to test the magical abilities of humans and metahumans. Labeled the Dumas Test, it is quickly employed by several leading corporations, eager to test employees for magical talents.
    • March 8: In Los Angeles, California, the Los Angeles Power and Water Company begins the fi rst commercial use of cold fusion in its facilities. The process produces fresh water as a byproduct, and is the Governor’s hope for alleviating the city’s water shortage.
    • May 28: The Lord Protector’s office drafts the Magical Practitioners Registration Bill, which Parliament swiftly passes into law. This act is designed to strictly control the use of magic in Great Britain, and comes under heavy fire from both media and academic sources.
    • June 4: The court case of Manhattan Inc. vs. The State of New York, forces the boroughs of Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island, and the Bronx to separate from Manhattan, and allows Manhattan to retain the name New York City for itself.
    • August 7: The great dragon Ryumyo gains tremendous influence within the Yakuza when he aids Akira Watada in his rise to power.
    • November 8: In response to their abrupt ousting, Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island, and the Bronx become one entity called the Quad Counties. The attempt fails after just over a year, and the boroughs separate again.
    • November 17: The Revised Telecommunications Act of 2027 is passed. Under this Act, if the content of a sat-cast is legal in its country of origin, the ITCC will not challenge it in the U.S. regardless of the content. Retransmission of restricted content over domestic ground-based transmitters remains illegal
  • 2028
    • April 10: A massive earthquake hits Los Angeles, California, causing millions of dollars in damages and more than fi ve thousand deaths. LAX is completely destroyed, and the fusion reactors, recently set up to help alleviate the city’s water shortage, are critically damaged. The area around these reactors is declared off limits.
    • July 4: Dunkelzahn appoints neophyte reporter Terri Ann Riberio, who is barely out of journalism school, to be his new “voice.”
    • August 2: The University of Heidelberg establishes the first German professorship of magic.
    • August 14: The National Football League delays the start of the season by two months as fi elds and facilities are updated to support cybernetically enhanced players.
    • September 6: Cambridge University establishes a Bachelor of Science degree in Occult Studies.
    • September 11: The University of Chicago incorporates magical studies into their Philosophy department. These inclusions are sponsored by an anonymous donor, and include studies in metamagical theory, alchemy and spell design.
    • October 31: In Brittany, druids belonging to the Druidic Revival of Brittany are finally able to contain and dissipate the Mist. Unfortunately, the Mist returns in smaller patches throughout Brittany in unpredictable patterns.
    • November 3: The entire royal family of Monaco is killed during a massive earthquake that devastates southern France.
    • November 7: The United States elects Andrew McAlister as President.
    • November 10: Walter Bright Water gains a reputation based on his advocacy of segregation of humans and metahumans, claiming it is the only way to assure peace. Paradoxically, he is also a strong proponent of welcoming metahumans into Salish Council territory
    • Britain withdraws from the European Economic Community (EEC).
  • 2029:
    • January 1: Leading computer manufacturers, including Sony Cybersystems, Fuchi Industrial Electronics, and RCA, have each developed prototype cyberterminals. Funding for these projects comes primarily from military intelligence agencies.
    • February 8: Computer systems are attacked worldwide, apparently at random, by a virus program of unknown origin and unprecedented power. The program crashes systems, wipes software, and even burns out hardware around the globe. Within a few months, the virus collapses the entire world data network. The effects of “the Crash,” as it is later christened, topple governments, destroy corporations, and bring the world economy to the brink of collapse.
    • February 8: Using experimental cyberterminals, the top secret task force codenamed Echo Mirage is mobilized to combat the virus. Despite their training, the linear thinking team of military hackers is routed by the chaotic power of the Crash Virus.
    • February 8: Angry mobs of poverty-stricken citizens in Asturia use the chaos following the Crash as an opportunity to protest their plight, plundering rich enclaves in the region and forcing the wealthy residents to flee. The state of Euskal Herria uses the resulting unrest as an opportunity to secede. The state of Galicia, meanwhile, uses the threat of secession to extract liberal concessions from the government.
    • February 8: In Basle, a Genom Corporation facility experiences a disastrous computer failure due to the Crash Virus. An experimental mutagen is accidentally released into the city, killing thousands of people.
    • February 8: The Crash Virus permanently disables Harris- 3M’s Halo, Angel Station, and Nerva stations, while more than half of the other stations suffer fatal system failures. In the majority all of these cases, all onboard are killed.
    • February 12: The United Kingdom and Ireland close their borders in response to the Crash Virus, ceasing all traffic in and out of the islands.
    • March 1: After regrouping from the first attempt at combating the Crash Virus and studying the data from the operation, the directors of Echo Mirage begin recruiting a new team of erratic but brilliant data processing mavericks from industry and academia.
    • April 9: Despite major security measures, the computer virus infects the national air traffic-control network. The resulting chaos causes twenty-seven plane crashes within two hours, killing thousands. Among the dead is Keruba International CEO Kerpan Ubavie. His death severely destabilizes Keruba.
    • April 12: Corporate raider Inazo Aneki secures a massive loan from Global Financial Services and forms Renraku Holdings. He swiftly buys out the panicked Keruba shareholders. In the following years Aneki establishes Chiba, Japan as the corporation’s headquarters and begins building Renraku into a powerful corporate player.
    • May 1: In Tenochtitlan, much of the older architecture in the city—including the Metropolitan Cathedral—is destroyed when a major earthquake strikes. The amount of destruction is devastating and more than five thousand are confirmed dead, with several thousand more missing.
    • June 27: The French nobility, seeking a return to political power, stir up rumors that the government is using the Crash to cover-up the plundering of the national coffers by government officials. All across the country, angry citizens take to the streets.
    • July 10: In the Seattle Metroplex, the economy of the Redmond district, a community dependent on the computer industry, collapses in the aftermath of the Crash Virus. Crime escalates so quickly that that local law enforcement sets up barriers around the district. The district never recovers and is eventually known as the Redmond Barrens.
    • July 14: Amid social chaos and economic disaster, the Fifth Republic falls in a military coup.
    • July 30: The Crash Virus destroys the Mafia’s worldwide financial network. With their assets gone—and still under attack by the more aggressive and ruthless Vory—the Mafia is forced to return to its roots in other more basic criminal enterprises, delving back into neighborhood protection, drug dealing, and smuggling.
    • August 10: Powerless in the face of the Crash with its member states collapsing around it, the European Union is officially dissolved.
    • August 20: Thanks to paranoid financial protocols set in place before the Crash—Switzerland’s banks recover relatively quickly from the Crash Virus.
    • August 30: Armed with improved cyberterminals, the new Echo Mirage team enters the worldwide data network to battle the Crash Virus. Eighteen minutes after entry, four members are dead from lethal biofeedback. Their sacrifice isn’t wasted as scientists analyze the data taken from their cyberterminals and learn how to combat the biofeedback generated by the Crash Virus. Also, it is noted with horror by corporate observers that no computer security protocol in existence can slow down a cyberterminal user. Funds flow into corporate research programs searching for ways to prevent intrusion by hackers using cyberterminals.
    • November 10: First generation UGE elves from a variety of tribes move to the Mount Rainier area and form a new tribe called the Sinsearach. Dwarves, orks, and trolls move to the area as well, but in smaller numbers.
    • November 28: The new Echo Mirage team slowly learns techniques that allow them to isolate and contain the virus. Equipped with the new combat programs and beefed-up, slimmed-down cyberterminals, they begin a two-year process of purging the Crash Virus from global computer systems.
  • 2030
    • February 4: In Detroit, Michigan, Ares Macrotechnology CEO Nicholas Aurelius retires.
    • February 22: In Big Sur Coast, California, pesticides and chemical fertilizers used by agrobusinesses in the northern region pollute the area so badly it is no longer able to sustain life. Instead of offering to clean up the area, the agrobusinesses abandon it.
    • March 11: A small IT corporation called Aegis Cognito makes a name for itself recovering and reconstructing data lost in the Crash. From these roots, Aegis becomes one of the largest private intelligence contractors in the world.
    • April 8: In Chicago, Illinois, simsense gets an added boost in design and concept when Dan Truman of Truman Technologies founds a colony of writers, painters and other artistic experts to work on the chips. The area grows as other corporations follow Truman’s model to branch into simsense technology.
    • April 30: In the Seattle Metroplex, Campana & Carrindum Technical Industries accuses Aztechnology of engineering the Crash Virus and launches a series of assaults on Aztechnology facilities. Aztechnology defends itself and completely wipes out C&C. To prevent any such “misunderstandings” in the future, Seattle’s most powerful corporations form the United Corporate Council (UCC).
    • May 16: Brittany, still plagued by the Mist, is designated an autonomous region. Under the charismatic leadership of High Druid Gwendal Le Pellec, the High Council of Brittany is established to rule the region.
    • October 15: President MacAlister and Canadian Prime Minister Harold Frazier sign a treaty to merge the remaining states of America with what is left of Canada. This includes Canada’s major industrial center and even more importantly, her remaining natural resources.
    • June 1: Thousands of ghouls gather in Northern Ghana along the Black Volta River. Under the leadership of Thema Laula the ghouls found their own nation, naming it Asamando after the Asante land of the dead.
    • November 29: A study of the infamous Bermuda Triangle by the University of Chicago Magical Studies Department finds no magical anomalies strong enough to affect large physical objects such as planes or ships. The only hint of magical activity is a low background count that gives astral space in the area a “fuzzy” appearance.
    • Winter: As if from nowhere, three previously unknown elves start a swift rise to power in the southern region. These members are Aithne Oakforest, Sean Laverty, and Lugh Surehand. Around the same time, the a soft spoken author known only as Ehran the Scribe appears in Portland
    • Ghoul nation of Asamando founded in Africa.
    • Awakened forces in Russia seize Siberia.
    • Brian O'Malley is shot and killed in his home by Yakuza assassins. A retaliatory hit the next day kills the Yakuza oyabun responsible, along with his lieutenants. Losses on both sides of the Mafia/Yakuza conflict result in a truce. Patrick Finnigan becomes Capo of his family and the Don of Seattle.

A New World Order (2031-2040)[]

  • 2031
    • January 17: Beginning with Poland, Russia invades Eastern Europe touching off the beginning of the Euro Wars.
    • March 12: After experiencing an emanation of the god Jagganath at the Holi Festival, India interprets this as a sign to begin a massive post-Crash rebuilding effort, including urban, rail, road, and Matrix networks.
    • April 3: Poland surrenders to Russia.
    • April 7: Russian forces invade Eastern Germany.
    • April 17: A new constitution is submitted to the UCAS Provisional Congress. Within six months, two-thirds of the new country’s states have ratified it. Before the year is out, the Constitution is passed and U.S. President MacAlister is installed as the Provisional President of the UCAS.
    • May 23: After a three year civil war, Leopold von Hapsburg leads a traditionalist faction in an overthrow of the Austrian government. Shortly after, he declares himself Emperor.
    • July 6: Russian forces invade the Czech Republic. Emperor Leopold of Austria mobilizes his military forces to aid Czech troops. Other European militaries soon follow.
    • September 9: Taking advantage of lingering post-Crash chaos in Russia, a cabal of Siberian shamans and sentient Awakened creatures declare northeastern Russia an independent nation called Yakut. The move more than halves Russia’s territory.
    • October 21: In the face of military threats from Russia and to aid in economic recovery from the Crash, Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden unite as the Scandinavian Union
    • November 3: The Echo Mirage team wipes out the last of the Crash Virus code. Only seven members of the original thirty-two still live. Four of these survivors move into the private sector, taking with them the secrets of cyberterminal technology.
    • November 30: Major David Gavilan of Echo Mirage disappears leaving no trace.
    • December 16: Father Julian Estrellas’s car is struck by an oncoming car when the driver of that car goblinizes and loses control. Cardinal Estrellas loses an arm, and his mother is killed in the accident. The accident incites Estrellas to fanatical anti-metahumanism, a stance he maintains even when he is named cardinal two decades later.
    • December 25: Second generation cyberterminals are reduced to a desk-sized cocoon. With more affordable manufacturing costs, retail prices make it feasible for them to be released to as consumer grade electronics
    • James O'Malley, capo of Milwaukee and Brian's older brother, becomes obsessed with revenge against the Yakuza. He neglects his city's operations so dramatically that the Commissione strips him of his position and forces him to retire.
  • 2032:
    • January 12: In Alpena, Michigan, after being checked in for a routine flu treatment, doctors discover Owen Whiting’s cells contain neither A nor B proteins, making them completely non-allergenic for use in transplants. With his permission, the cells are cultivated and modified for use in clonal research and transplantation.
    • February 10: Maritech Enterprises of Vancouver submits a proposal to the Ute Nation Council to turn the Sevier Bridge Reservoir into the world’s largest freshwater fish farm. After some deliberation, the proposal is approved.
    • March 1: The merging of the United States and Canada is nearly derailed when senators from Alabama and Georgia instigate a major walk-out of southern bloc legislators. Representatives from fourteen states later meet in Atlanta to discuss secession from the UCAS.
    • May 14: The AMA, ever stalwart in its duty to protect the medical association from malpractice lawsuits, develops strict rules and guidelines concerning the licensing of magic practitioners for medical purposes. Not only are magical medical practitioners required to have magical training, they’re also required to have a medical degree, nursing degree, midwife certification, or medical technician certificate.
    • August 19: When fully immersive VR-based technologies make their way into the market, the Corporate Court spearheads an effort to rebuild the virus-shattered grid, replacing it with these technologies. The resultant grid becomes known as the Matrix.
    • September 28: After buying out seven corporations in two months, Lone Star is granted extraterritoriality.
    • October 30: In Seattle Metroplex, several megacorporations are robbed of a fortune in nuyen—in the same week. The money is never recovered and the thieves escape. It is rumored later the theft was committed by a group of shadowrunners.
    • November 2: Andrew McAlister is elected the first president of the UCAS.
    • November 15: The Corporate Court initiates a hostile takeover of Global Financial Services. The attempt is successful, making the bank’s primary creditors its new owners.
    • Great Britain deploys troops in Netherlands and Flanders.
    • Olympic Games are cancelled.
    • Michel Beloit, head of BMW, dies. His widow Wilhelmina Graff-Beloit becomes Chairman of the Board.
    • A dozen large Filipino and Japanese companies merge to form Yamatetsu.
    • UCAS government grants Lone Star Security Services a contract to privatize the Drug Enforcement Agency duties.
    • Creation of the Technocratic Party in the UCAS.
    • 2 November - UCAS President Andrew McAlister is re-elected in the first election held since the creation of the UCAS.
    • Baseball becomes the first major league sport to allow cyberware
  • 2033
    • January 23: Swedish airspace monitors detect several flights of what appear to be British Aerospace FA-38 Nightwraith fighter-bombers flying across northern Europe. The aircraft obliterate key communications and command centers belonging to all sides involved in the Euro Wars. Britain denies any responsibility.
    • January 24: Crippled by the Nightwraith strike, the major combatants in the Euro Wars declare a cease fire and an armistice is signed. Smaller battles continue to plague Eastern Europe, leaving the continent to slide deeper into economic recession.
    • January 24: Using an expertly programmed set of computers located in Stockholm, the previously unknown financier Damien Knight executes a hostile takeover of Ares Macrotechnology on the Boston Stock Exchange in just over a minute. It is a precedent setting event and leads to safeguards to prevent the similar computer aided buyouts in the future.
    • March 15: The Corporate Court relocates Global Financial Services to its headquarters on the Zurich-Orbital Habitat and renames GFS the Zurich-Orbital Gemeinschaft Bank.
    • June 7: After the research project at Turner Stadium in Atlanta, Georgia is abandoned, homeless people move into the abandoned structure. As the numbers increase, those inside build their own micro-society by using simple rules such as “might makes right.”
    • August 5: In Tulsa, Oklahoma, the Tulsa School Board refuses to admit a troll into school. To add insult to injury, the board then tries to fine the parents for violating the state’s compulsory education law. The Grumman family files a suit against the board but loses.
    • September 4: The United Islamic Conference breaks down completely in Damascus. As a result, the Alliance for Allah is created out of extremist groups and right-wing governments, an organization founded by al-Qaeda spiritual leader Mullah Sayid Jazrir.
    • November 14: In Boston, Massachusetts, former members of the Echo Mirage team, Ken Roper and Michael Eld, demonstrate a prototype cyberdeck to a group of potential investors in their company, Matrix Systems of Boston.
    • To rebuild gumis nearly crippled in the conflicts with the Mafia, the Japanese Yakuza send a new upper echelon of Koreans to Seattle. These Korean leaders begin aggressively reclaiming lost territory.
  • 2034
    • February 28: Shiawase research and development teams successfully develop the first type “O” genetically engineered organs. The corporation is quickly granted a patent on the process by the Corporate Court.
    • March 31: In Chicago, Illinois, in a joint effort, the University of Chicago and the Atlantean Foundation create a research complex on Lake Michigan to study the high number of unfettered air and water spirits in the area. The facility is called Elemental Hall.
    • May 1: In Boston, Massachusetts, Matrix Systems of Boston, the company created by Ken Roper and Michael Eld, former members of Echo Mirage, release the first “gray-market” cyberterminal, named the Portal.
    • June 12: Exactly six weeks after the release of the Portal by Matrix Systems of Boston, founders, Ken Roper and Michael Eld are each killed in what are determined to be freak accidents. The next morning, all data regarding the technology for the cyberterminal and the Portal are lost when Matrix Systems’ main computer crashes. All prototypes of their cyberterminal also disappear.
    • July 4: Primrose Hill and the surrounding buildings are given to the New Druidic Movement by the government. This new location serves as the group’s headquarters.
    • August 7: Richard Villiers, who invested heavily in Matrix Systems, turns up at Fuchi Industrial Electronics with the specs, code, and prototypes of the Portal. Villiers trades these, all of his North American holdings, and even a Corporate Court seat for one third ownership of Fuchi.
    • August 28: Three great dragons (two identified as Hualpa and Sirrug) lead a force of Awakened beings and metahumans to seize control of the city of Manaus, located in the Amazon basin. The Awakened forces continue to seize additional territory, working their way outward from the heart of the Amazon.
    • October 14: The Alliance for Allah launches the Great Jihad with attacks on Israel, Russia, India, the Balkans, and the Iberian Peninsula.
    • November 2: The city of Brasilia falls to the Awakened forces, and the Brazilian government is forced to surrender. Shortly after, the great dragon Hualpa declares the creation of the new nation of Amazonia.
    • November 10: The southern states that sent representatives to Atlanta in 2032 secede from the UCAS and form the Confederation of American States. Although fears of a second civil war run high, the split is handled relatively orderly.
    • December 11: President McCarthy requests that Liam O’Connor impose a state of emergency in Ireland while the legislature enacts future constitutional changes.
    • December 19: Representatives from the CAS and the UCAS sign the Treaty of Richmond, formally recognizing the CAS as a sovereign nation.
    • December 25: Politician Seamus O’Kennedy, an associate of Liam O’Connor, goes before the nation to announce further governmental changes and the creation of a new nation: Tír na nÓg. In response, many remaining humans join a mass exodus.
    • December 31: South Florida breaks from CAS and joins the Caribbean League.
    • Aztlan withdraws from the STC and the NAN.
    • The Human-Metahuman Vampiric Virus is isolated.
  • 2035
    • January 10: The NAN sector splits into three separate sectors; the Pueblo Corporate Council, the Sioux Nation, and the Ute Nation.
    • April 16: Atlanta, Georgia is chosen to be the permanent capital of the nation, triumphing over New Orleans, Louisiana.
    • May 1: After years of organizing a nation in everything but name within the borders of the Salish-Shidhe Council, Lugh Surehand officially announces the formation of Tír Tairngire, the Land of Promise.
    • May 2: The Salish-Shidhe Council refuses to acknowledge Tír Tairngire’s independence. They immediately launch attacks against Tír Tairngire but are repelled by an unexpectedly well armed Tír military. After several days of attacks Salish forces stand down, defeated.
    • May 9: Admiring the strength displayed by Tír Tairngire during their defense against invading Salish-Shidhe troops, all members of the NAN except the Salish-Shidhe Council recognize Tír Tairngire as a sovereign state.
    • May 17: With CAS distracted by economic and political growing pains, Aztlan forces invade southern Texas. Aztlan forces stop at Austin, which becomes a divided city, and the Texas capital is moved to Dallas—Fort Worth.
    • July 9: Satellite imagery reveals that the natural landscape of Africa is undergoing a major transformation. Later research suggests Africa went through a form of continental Awakening.
    • September 10: Frustrated by the unwillingness of the CAS to help Texas regain her lost territory, Texas secedes from the CAS and forms the Republic of Texas. Texas immediately starts their own campaign against Aztlan.
    • November 20: The United Nations faces dissolution after years of dwindling membership, economic troubles, and a complete failure to prevent the Euro Wars. At the last moment, the Corporate Court steps in to rescue and revitalize the organization.
    • December 22: The Yarrow nuclear reactor suffers a catastrophic meltdown, creating what is later dubbed the Northern Irradiated Zone
    • Mar: Liam O'Connor becomes State President of Tir na nOg.
    • The Ceneste branch of the Sinsearach elves establish the elven nation of Tir Tairngire (TT).
    • Lugh Surehand appointed High Prince of TT.
    • Tsimshian secedes from the NAN.
  • 2036
    • January 11: After failing to retake its lost territory from Aztlan, Texas rejoins the CAS.
    • April 19: In Scotland, druidic magic transforms acres of pine forests into deciduous forests, creating what is now known as the Scottish Wild Lands.
    • March 21: California threatens to secede from the UCAS if not granted heavy economic and political concessions. The UCAS calls their bluff and votes to dissolve California’s bond to the UCAS. Seeing an opportunity, Aztlan moves north to claim San Diego and Tír Tairngire moves south to occupy Northern California.
    • May 1: The Council holds its first Rite of Progression tests. These tests, comprised of a series of mental and physical evaluations, determine an individual’s social rank within Tír Tairngire.
    • June 23: in New Visions, Ohio, a church filled with mostly metahumans is firebombed with napalm. Twenty people, most of them metahumans, are killed. Two hours later, a previously unknown anti-metahuman terrorist group, Alamos 20,000, claims responsibility in a rambling announcement riddled with spelling errors.
    • August 2: The world’s currency shifts to the nuyen as the government of Japan grants policy control of their nation’s currency to the Zurich-Orbital Gemeinschaft Bank. It is soon established as the world accepted reserve currency.
    • August 21: The great dragon Lofwyr takes control of the BMW/Krupp corporate empire after revealing he has acquired a 63 percent share in the company.
    • September 4: The government ratifies a modification to the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, establishing the System Identification Number (SIN). This new clause in the amendment requires that all peoples of the UCAS register to receive a SIN.
    • September 9: Fuchi introduces the CDT-1000 third generation cyberterminal. Unlike its bulky predecessors, this unit is acompact, desktop box.
    • September 18: Portland is officially recognized as the trade hub between Tír Tairngire and the rest of the world. , Tír Tairngire begins construction on a massive wall around the city to keep international traders isolated from the Tír Tairngire. During this same period, the capital of Tír Tairngire is moved to Royal Hill just west of Portland.
    • November 4: Martin Vincenzo is elected president of the UCAS.
    • November 4: Sean Timbs is elected president of the CAS.
    • Aztlan invades north to San Diego.
    • Japan takes control of San Francisco.
    • SIN established through the 14th Amendment to the UCAS Constitution
    • Akiko Kano and Arthur White-Eagle earn the Nobel Prize for the "Kano-White Eagle Theory of Metaphysical Phenomena"
    • Open war in Italy is only avoided when Pope John XXV negotiates a settlement between the corporations and the sindaci (mayors). The cities of Genoa, Milan and Turin are written off as a catastrophe zone and renamed the Special Administrative Zone of Genoa-Milan-Turin (GeMiTo). (Shadows of Europe)
  • 2037
    • February 7: After California appeals to Japan for aid in defending its remaining territory, two Japanese Imperial Marine light divisions arrive by air simultaneously at San Francisco’s International Airport and the Alameda Naval Air Station. They take control of San Francisco and declare martial law, claiming a need to “protect Japanese lives and corporate assets.”
    • February 27: An underground computer clearing house for illegal and bootleg information called the Denver Data Haven goes online. In the years that follow, it becomes a force to be reckoned with inside the Matrix shadow community.
    • March 2: The wall around Portland is completed.
    • March 4: Tír Tairngire’s army is forced to retreat to Yreka after the Northern California populace wages guerrilla warfare. An unofficial stalemate is reached, with both nations claiming control over the lands between Yreka and Redding.
    • May 18: Lofwyr moves the Saeder-Krupp headquarters to Essen. The move turns Essen, effectively, into the great dragon’s personal kingdom.
    • June 12: In Atlanta, Georgia, promising to better provide emergency on-site medical care by increasing response calls faster than any other private paramedical service, the DocWagon organization is founded.
    • July 14: The military relinquishes control of the French government to Euro Wars hero Antoine d’Orléans, who founds the Sixth Republic of France.
    • August 22: Fuchi Industrial Electronics announces the release of RealSense technology, which introduces emotive signal processing into commercial simsense
    • DocWagon founded.
    • First North American Urban Brawl championship, "Super Brawl".
  • 2038
    • March 30: A navigational error is blamed when the airship Lothar Späth flies into the path of a dragon over the Black Forest. When the dragon retaliates with fire, the hydrogen ignites and the Lothar Späth explodes, killing all forty passengers and crew.
    • April 12: In Berlin, Ozgur al Houssari, a Turkish-Palestinian hobgoblin, and Louise Derrida, establish the Anarchist Black Crescent organization. It is an anarchist paramedic service dedicated to aiding those the traditional medical services can’t, or more often won’t, help.
    • April 20: In Texas, computer genius Steven Z. Ridgemont creates FTL Technologies. Ridgemont’s persona code is standard on Fuchi cyberdecks for years.
    • May 12: After years of disagreements, often over metahuman rights, Germany’s conservative southern states secede to form the Southern German League.
    • June 10: A London television station reveals that, for the past fifteen years, the Adams-Hoffmann Corporation was conducting genetic experiments on the poverty stricken populace on the Lambeth neighborhoods.
    • June 25: Dissatisfied with the government response to the Adams-Hoffmann scandal, the people of Lambeth begin to riot. The first riot ends on the Tower Bridge, when UK troops open fire on rioters, killing nineteen. The event gives birth to the terrorist organization, the Lambeth Martyrs.
    • August 3: Unable to restore order in Lambeth, the government uses the military to seal it off, creating the Lambeth Containment Zone.
    • September 1: Because they allowed cybernetically-enhanced employees into Tír na nÓg territory, Ares Macrotechnology is expelled from the country.
    • September 9: The Chrysler corporation and the Nissan corporation become embroiled in a hostile takeover war. At first it appears Nissan will take control of Chrysler, until negotiations result in a merger, creating the new corporation of Chrysler-Nissan.
  • 2039
    • February 7: After years of ongoing discrimination against metahumans, often escalating into violence, an undetermined cultural spark ignites riots around the globe. Around the world, metahumans take to the streets, sometimes peacefully, sometimes not, to protest their treatment as second class citizens. The event becomes known as the Night of Rage.
    • February 7: In Seattle, Governor Alleson’s reaction to the Night of Rage is to round up metahumans and herd them into warehouses on the Tacoma waterfront. When anti-metahuman terrorist set fire to the warehouses, hundreds die and riots, both pro- and anti- metahuman, engulf the city.
    • February 10: The terrorist organization Alamos 20,000 uses magic and explosives to send the Sears Tower crashing down into the streets of Chicago. Between the attack and the fires that nearly engulf the loop afterwards, more than 26,000 people are killed. Alamos makes the attack look like the work of metahumans leading the Chicago authorities to seal metahumans out of their neighborhoods and move them to projects outside the city.
    • March 17: The human Irish-American organization called the Knights of the Red Branch, angry with the elves of Tír na nÓg for what they view as the unlawful occupation of their homeland, set off a bomb at a popular elven restaurant in Boston along the St. Patrick’s Day Parade route. The attack triggers a riot. Twenty-four are killed and hundreds are injured in what the media dubs “Bloody Thursday.”
    • June 1: In Tokyo, Fuchi Incorporated hosts the Universal Matrix Specifications Conference. Taking the lead in Matrix development, more than 7,000 humans and metahumans meet for nearly three months to determine a set of standards for Matrix programming.
    • July 5: In Charleston, South Carolina, the first ever case solved with the help of one of the criminal victim’s ghosts is closed by Julius Wren, a magician with degrees in both criminology and thaumaturgy. The serial killer is captured after Wren studies the ghost’s actions, which revealed evidence that led to the murderer’s arrest and conviction.
    • August 6: The eco-terrorist group Pan-Europa releases a paraviral agent on London, resulting in the destruction of the biofabric weather control dome covering the city.
    • August 13: An accord is reached by the nations of the Cape Republic, Zulu Nation, Oranje-Vrysraar, and the Trans-Swazi Federation, creating the Azanian Confederation.
    • September 10: Senate hearings begin on charges of racial prejudice against metahumans and their families. The hearings publically reveal shocking reports of conditions that amount to slavery in most states. In response, the NAN impose sanctions on the CAS to encourage reform.
    • September 16: After meeting her in Paris, the great dragon Dunkelzahn selects the mysterious and beautiful Nadja Daviar to serve as his new “voice.”
    • November 15: Monarchists execute a successful coup and restructure the government as a parliamentary monarchy. Michelle Chou is crowned Queen of Shaanxi
    • Feb 7: Thousands of metas, friends & family, and wannabes die in global riots. New York City: 836 dead. Seattle: "Hands of Five" terrorist group firebombs the metahuman detention center on the Tacoma docks.
    • Feb 10: Alamos 20k destroys the Sears Tower in Chicago.
    • St. Patrick's Day: Boston, Knights of the Red Branch bomb an elven restaurant on the parade route, killing 24 and inciting a race riot that claimed hundreds more.
    • Nadja Daviar becomes the Big D's third interpreter.
    • Charleston, SC: Serial killer caught and convicted on evidence obtained from a ghost.
    • Fuchi sponsors the Universal Matrix Specifications (UMS) conference, Tokyo.
    • A massive chemical spill kills 70,000 people in Teesside, England.
  • 2040
    • April 7: The council designates sasquatches as a sapient species, according them the same inalienable rights as metahumans. They are one of the fi rst nations in the world to do so.
    • Spring: The University of Prague refocuses their magical training into on cross-traditional approaches, garnering worldwide recognition.
    • July 18: War breaks out between Iran and Iraq, which quickly embroils much of the Middle East. Badr al—Din Ibn Eisa resolves the conflict in conjunction with his Islamic Unity Movement.
    • July 20: Noted mage Martin de Vris strikes off on a series of one-man vampire hunts.
    • September 10: In the Seattle Metroplex, construction begins on the Renraku Arcology.
    • Fall: BTL abuse climbs to record heights. Over the next ten years it is slowly contained through the efforts of socially conscious groups like the Church of Unification.
    • October 15: Evidence emerges that suggests that the Conservative government encouraged the Adams-Hoffmann Project 42-20, leading to the Conservative’s downfall in the following year.
    • November 6: Carl Preston is elected president of the UCAS.
    • November 6: Joseph Alexander is elected president of the CAS.
    • December 12: New Horizons corporation comes under investigation for its Superkids project, overseen by New Horizons CEO Paul Louberge, when one of them commits suicide. The program is shut down when discoveries of extensive genetic manipulation, in conjunction with physical and mental abuse are discovered.
    • December 14: Several metahumans are tapped for key cabinet posts by President Elect Alexander, which persuades the NAN to lift some of its sanctions.
    • December 25: In Connecticut, a casino on the former site of an Indian reservation is hit with a magical explosion that destroys part of the building, killing eighteen people and wounding dozens. A group calling itself Warpath claims responsibility.

Corporate Mess (2041-2050)[]

  • 2041: EuroAir Flight 329 from London to Atlanta destroyed by Sirrurg
  • 2042
    • January 10: President Liam O’Connor stages his election as High Steward, making him the single most powerful person in the nation.
    • February 5: Automation of coffin motels becomes the standard.
    • February 24: Tsimshian military forces wipe out the HNF, imprisoning founder John George.
    • March 7: Yamatetsu achieves AAA status and is awarded a seat on the Corporate Council. On the same day, a previously unknown investor named Ms. Buttercup acquires an eleven percent stake in the corporation.
    • March 13: Business Recognition Accords establish the requirements for corporate extraterritoriality.
    • April 8: Ehran the Scribe puts his support behind Lester’s Gaia Hypothesis that contends that if the biosphere is a living organism, its Awakening will cause “ripple effects” in minerals, soil, and landscapes.
    • April 20: Masaru formally becomes a great dragon and builds a lair on Vancouver Island.
    • April 25: Sichuanese combat mage Liang Hong drives back Canton Confederation forces using magic.
    • May 31: The Eugenics Project is activated, with Metahumans rounded up and sent to camps.
    • June 1: Long dormant volcanoes in the Eifel region of the SGL erupt simultaneously.
    • June 2: The Eugenics Project is abandoned, but many metahumans still flee the region.
    • June 7: Ares Project Cydonia launches a probe to perform detailed scans of Mars.
    • July 7: The pro sports commissioners charter a joint committee to consider physical adepts in sports.
    • August 10: Limited citizenship is granted to non-metahuman sentient beings.
    • September 9: First episode of Wyrm Talk airs, starring the great dragon Dunkelzahn.
    • October 21: Istanbul declares independence and changes its name back to Constantinople.
    • October 25: Pope John XXV allows women into the Roman Catholic priesthood.
    • November 8: Lobatchevski Vory takes control of Ship City.
    • November 13: Sasquatch and hsing-sing are recognized as sentient species by the UN.
    • December 8: Veil agents intercept and destroy all data from the Cydonia Mars probes.
    • Akira Watada, oyabun of the Watada-rengo, issues an ultimatum to the Korean oyabuns of Seattle. They must pledge their loyalty to the Watada rengo or suffer the consequences.
    • Ares project: Cydonia discovers Operation Discovery crash, Veil agents engineer a hoax to cover it: The cheesy UFO photo made public 15 years later by Dunkelzahn's Will.
    • First biannual international Urban Brawl World Cup
    • Yamatetsu elbows its way into the Big Seven, becoming the Eighth major megacorp.
  • 2043: Seoulpa Rings
    • February 1: The Universal Brotherhood opens its first chapters in California.
    • February 19: The Black Forest Troll Kingdom is established.
    • March 19: Flanders and the Netherlands unite to form the United Netherlands.
    • April 7: The dwarf-ruled Grand Duchy of Westrhine-Luxembourg is founded.
    • May 2: President Liam O’Connor disappears.
    • May 21: Liam O’Connor’s widow, Lady Brane Deigh, names herself Queen of the Seelie Court.
    • June 2: Damien Knight reinstated as chairman of Ares.
    • June 14: Kurdish Autonomous Zone founded.
    • June 22: Powerful earthquakes rock Southern France.
    • June 29: Magical cheating at an Urban Brawl game in Bonn rocks the sports world.
    • July 8: Rhiannon Glendower becomes Countess of Snowdonia.
    • July 12: SGL forces attempt to retake the Black Forest and Westrhine-Luxembourg, sparking the Troll Wars.
    • July 13: Freepark, the new federal government complex in Atlanta, is completed.
    • July 22: DocWagon opens their first Seattle office.
    • July 31: Professional gladiator games debut.
    • August 10: Yakuza purges Koreans from its ranks. Survivors form the Seoulpa Rings.
    • August 22: Public executions are instituted.
    • August 30: Earthquakes shake the Upper Rhine region.
    • September 1: Vietnamese army withdraws from Cambodia.
    • September 9: The first commercially available skillsoft technology hits the market.
    • September 14: Prof. Markus Kochik presents the Unified Magical Theory.
    • September 17: Earthquake rattled independent city-states rejoin France.
    • October 5: The bulk of the Swiss governmental apparatus is moved to the Matrix.
    • November 10: Vladivostok reopened to commercial traffic.
    • November 25: Ehran the Scribe publishes Mankind Ascendant, where he first mentions his controversial “Sixth World” theory.
    • December 21: Don Franco Mueller of Atlanta appointed to the Alta Commissione
    • Jan: Watada-rengo assassins invade Seattle and kill the vast majority of the Seattle Yakuza's Korean leadership. The survivors are forced to pledge loyalty to the Japanese rengo or be executed. New Japanese managers are put in place, and within a few weeks the Japanese Yakuza once again control the Seattle Yakuza.
    • Former Korean Yakuza oyabun Park Jai Kyu begins organizing the Seoulpa Rings in Seattle with the help of his remaining contacts and followers. The concept catches fire and begins to spread through the metroplex and the rest of North America.
    • Gwynedd elves make major advances in Welsh regional parliament.
  • 2044: The oyabun
    • Hanzo Shotozumi is appointed the oyabun of the 87th Prefecture in Seattle. He re-institutes and enforces traditional Yakuza ways and values, and begins an aggressive campaign to expand Yakuza operations in the Pacific Northwest.
  • Olympic games are held again, the first time since 2032. Multinational teams backed by corporate interests are allowed to compete.
  • 2045: German Alliance founded.
    • Don Patrick Finnigan is failing to hold the line against Yakuza encroachment in the Seattle metroplex, and so the Commissione calls Don James O'Malley out of enforced retirement to resume control of Seattle operations. O'Malley is appointed Don of Seattle specifically to slow Yakuza growth in the metroplex. He, his wife, and his 15-year-old daughter Rowena move to Seattle.
    • The Seoulpa Rings start making a name for themselves in the Seattle underworld as their operations expand; they begin to encroach on the markets of the other syndicates.
    • 2045-2047: Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, El Salvador, and Nicaragua are accepted into the Aztlaner republic.
  • 2046
    • January 15: The Desert Wars™ are broadcast live, pulling in record- breaking ratings.
    • January 23: Earthquakes in southern Aztlan kill 14,000 and trigger a landslide that closes the Panama Canal to all but the smallest ships.
    • January 30: Don Lucio Feretti reorganizes the Mafia and creates the Alta Commissione.
    • February 2: The professional baseball team Portland Lords is accepted into the MLB.
    • February 12: The Panama Canal Zone is turned over to Aztlan.
    • April 18: Rapidly growing forests consume Asturias.
    • April 24: Dominican Republic’s government collapses. Pirate interests begin fighting over the country.
    • May 16: The simsense program Free Fall, starring Holly Brighton, breaks sim sales records and pushes simsense technology into the mass market.
    • May 19: Dr. Robert Kortmann elected president.
    • June 2: Massive mana warp forces the abandonment of Jerusalem.
    • June 4: Ares celebrates the 150th anniversary of the automobile in Detroit.
    • July 8: The fi rst bi-annual International Urban Brawl World Cup is held in Flint, Michigan.
    • July 23: The UN establishes an Ecumenical Council to rule Jerusalem.
    • July 29: Seattle band Shield Wall releases their first album.
    • August 2: The Bruckner-Langer HMHVV strain, which turns humans into nosferatu, is isolated.
    • August 14: The effect of HMHVV I on dwarves, transformation into a goblin, is documented for the first time.
    • August 23: The UN gains administrative control of the Suez Canal.
    • September 10: A team of shadowrunners called Magestone wipe out the results of the CFS gubernatorial election.
    • October 5: Researchers discover an awakened freshwater serpent living in Loch Ness.
    • October 31: Seattle rocker Jetblack bursts onto the music scene. His “angst-rock” style rockets him to megastar status.
    • November 16: Humanis Policlub is founded in Texas.
    • December 21: El Salvador and Nicaragua are both accepted into Aztlan as member states.
  • 2047
    • February 21: Maria Mercurial plays her first concert at Underworld 93 in Seattle.
    • March 6: The Sons of the Alamo policlub is established in Texas.
    • March 15: A massive BTL crackdown is launched following the death of Senator James Wheeler’s daughter from BTL use.
    • April 18: Blut und Ehre policlub launches a string of chopper raids in the DeeCee sprawl.
    • April 23: A gorgon attacks the island of Skopelos.
    • June 18: The North American Basketball Association approves cybertech for players.
    • June 19: London Bridge station in London is bombed by terrorists.
    • June 22: An assassination attempt is made against High Prince Lugh Surehand.
    • July 11: 120,000 die after toxic shamans with links to the druidic Inner Circles unleash a paraVITAS virus in Tynesprawl.
    • July 19: Sichuan annexes most of Guizhou and parts of Yunnan.
    • August 4: The Pattani Islamic Republic gains independence.
    • August 22: Malopolska is declared a Free City.
    • September 10: Hedwig Gabler is elected Mayoress of Karlsruhe. She begins building an army to attack the Black Forest Troll Kingdom.
    • September 26: The Aleppo citadel madrassa graduates their first class of magicians and adepts.
    • October 4: Don Jim “Tools” O’Toole takes over as head of the Chicago mob.
    • November 15: Most of the Everett Beacon Mall in the Seattle Metroplex is destroyed by a terrorist bomb. 180 are killed.
    • November 23: A second bomb goes off at Sea-Tac Mall in Seattle, killing five.
    • November 26: Edna Wallace wins the presidential election.
    • November 28: Keiji Hiroshige takes over Yakuza operations in Chicago.
  • 2048
    • January 9: Proteus AG begins secret construction of its future headquarters in Helgoland using a shell company.
    • January 10: President Edna Wallace is inaugurated.
    • February 13: Aztechnology opens the Spindle Orbital Platform.
    • February 20: Food shortages in Toronto lead to city-wide riots.
    • March 26: Corporate Court member corporations launch a military strike called Operation RECIPROCITY against Aztlan and Aztechnology for nationalizing corporate assets.
    • March 29: Aztlan and Aztechnology bow to pan-corporate demands by agreeing to the Veracruz Settlement. Reparations are paid and the other megacorporations are allowed to indirectly operate in Aztlan.
    • April 23: Government forces take over Karlsruhe, narrowly averting an attack on the Black Forest Troll Kingdom.
    • May 1: Panama joins Aztlan after its government collapses.
    • May 14: A powerful earthquake rocks San Francisco.
    • June 1: Humanis Policlub begins a four-year period of attacks and riots in Chinatown.
    • June 6: Erika achieves AA status.
    • June 24: United Oil Corporation hires the dragon Haesslich as their Seattle Head of Security.
    • July 8: Maria Mercurial’s first single, “Who Weeps for the Children?” hits number one on the charts.
    • July 28: Fashion designer Zoë makes a name designing one-of-a- kind clothing for exclusive clients.
    • August 4: Sasquatch musician Frumious joins the Seattle rock band, Shield Wall.
    • September 23: The IUC takes control of the Indian government and India rejoins the UN.
    • October 10: Rock megastar Jetblack is killed on his way home from a concert in Seattle.
    • November 3: Alan Adams is elected president of the UCAS.
    • November 3: Edna Wallace is elected president of the CAS.
    • December 8: Humanis Policlub assassinates Seattle mayor Daniel Feddersen.
    • December 18: Queen Euphoria’s first simsense, “Shotgun Blue,” is released.
    • December 29: A massive earthquake levels Izmir.
    • Panama admitted into Aztlan.
    • Panama canal becomes a Pan-Corporate Zone under the Corporate Court.
  • 2049
    • January 1: Proteus AG is officially chartered and revealed to the world.
    • January 3: Proteus AG offi cially begins the construction of their headquarters in Helgoland.
    • January 20: President Alan Adams is inaugurated.
    • February 17: Major Aztechnology shareholder Thomas Roxborough undergoes experimental gene therapy that leaves him unable to survive outside a specially designed vat.
    • February 18: The “street mercenary” style gains popularity among fashion leaders.
    • March 4: Leonard Aurelius ousts Damien Knight as chairman of the Ares board.
    • March 26: The great feathered serpent Arleesh awakens.
    • April 11: Eco-terrorist organization Deep Green kills thirty-one aristocratic hunters in Dartmoor.
    • May 14: Maria Mercurial’s second album, Puta, is released.
    • May 28: Border control is turned over to Aztechnology Corporate Security.
    • June 12: Metahumans calling themselves the Wasatch Awakened petition for tribal status in the Ute Nation.
    • June 17: Aztlan establishes an embassy in Dallas.
    • July 13: Amazonia annexes Venezuela and half of Columbia.
    • July 29: Arkady Krolenko becomes General Secretary of the Russian Republic.
    • August 20: Concrete Dreams guitarist Warren Cartwright hosts an acoustic jam session at Club Penumbra in Seattle. Maria Mercurial sits in.
    • September 2: The recording of rock star Axe Slayer being killed by his exploding codpiece sells hundreds of thousands of copies on its fi rst day of release.
    • September 18: Renraku develops the first semi-autonomous knowbots.
    • October 4: Saeder-Krupp led consortium completes the New Silk Road railway between St. Petersburg and Qingdao.
    • November 2: Texas lifts trade sanctions on Aztlan.
    • December 10: A team of mages from AGS and the Czech Republic are awarded the first Nobel Prize for Magic.
    • December 13: The Establishment Act establishes the Church of Ireland as the official church
  • 2050
    • January 3: Sales of the blockbuster sim Free Fall hit fifty million.
    • February 17: Faux armored clothing gains popularity among the fashion elite.
    • March 19: Aztechnology Corporate Security kills hundreds of unarmed protesters in Campeche.
    • April 7: Corruption scandals lead to massive government reform.
    • May 6: A Kraken sinks a ferry bound for Vancouver, killing all on board.
    • May 22: Government forces seize a portion of Venezuela from Amazonia.
    • May 30: Thousands of metahumans march on Atlanta, calling for increased awareness of the metahuman plight.
    • June 5: Tong syndicate lord Kung Soo refocuses his syndicate’s activity on the Matrix rather than local business owners.
    • June 30: Revenants policlub bombs a Werner-Voss corporate shuttle en route for London, killing 175.
    • July 16: Seattle urban brawl star Carter “Mauler” Tate is fired for refusing to take steroids.
    • August 10: Keyboard-sized cyberdecks hit the market.
    • August 28: After the catastrophic failure of genetically engineered crops, Aztechnology is brought in to assist in the recovery.
    • September 13: The first closed-circuit simsense systems allow security deckers to rig an entire building.
    • September 22: The independent portion of Columbia petitions for, and is awarded, full Aztlan membership.
    • September 26: Morituri te salutant debuted as a game show focused on gladiatorial-style death matches. It scores the highest ratings for a trid debut in the history of Aztlanar broadcasting.
    • October 4: Corsica is granted independence from France.
    • November 9: Yamatetsu board member Ms. Buttercup reveals she is a free spirit.
    • November 24: Proteus AG wins bids to build offshore arcologies in Japan.
    • December 14: The Trans-Polar Aleut government withdraws from active participation in the NAN

Welcome To Our World (2051-2060)[]

  • 2052
    • January 2: The war with Yucatán rebels continues to escalate.
    • January 6: 2XS, a BTL far more potent than a standard BTL, hits the black market.
    • March 14: Cross Applied Technologies achieves A status.
    • May 3: Insurance costs force University of Seattle to remove fire elemental summoning from its practical exam.
    • May 18: A group of militant homeless take up residence in the struts of the Manhattan Bridge.
    • June 24: The first footage of gorgons using their petrification power is captured.
    • July 2: International Olympic Committee awards the 2056 Olympics to Tokyo. Japanese officials announce that metahumans will not be allowed to participate.
    • July 19: UCAS Data Systems pulls funding from Dr. Ronald Halberstam after they discover he is trying to isolate children’s’ brains from their bodies to raise them completely in the Matrix.
    • July 21: The body of Derek Highsun is found behind his barn.
    • September 13: The street mercenary style loses favor among fashion moguls.
    • September 23: Willamette Compustat is contracted to handle all government data backups.
    • October 4: Sol Media Group gains a foothold in the Aztlan media market.
    • November 5: Alan Adams is re-elected president.
    • November 5: Edna Wallace is re-elected president.
    • November 11: Arthur Vogel founds the One World Association to address environmental issues.
    • December 5: Bioware is released to the public market, gaining instant popularity.
    • December 13: The Chiba Virtual Stock Exchange crashes in the midst of a Fuchi takeover attempt by the Yamana family.
    • Seattle-Tir Tairngire trade agreement, by which Seattle becomes Tir Tairngire's major port.
    • UCAS Pres Adams died after re-election, VP Thomas Steele takes the Big Chair.
  • 2053:
    • January 20: President Adams inaugurated.
    • January 21: President Adams dies of a massive stroke. Vice President Thomas Steele assumes the presidency.
    • February 20: Flavia de la Rosa elected president.
    • March 12: Proteus AG completes the Okinawa offshore arcology.
    • April 24: The Essence-Integrity theory is published, explaining the mechanism behind the loss of magical potency from cyberware and implants.
    • May 6: A United Oil tanker dumps millions of gallons of petrochemicals into Boston Harbor.
    • May 28: Hestaby awakens and blocks Tír Tairngire’s attempt to take Shasta Dam. She settles on Mount Shasta and claims the region as her own.
    • May 30: UCAStrak bullet train derailment kills 157. UCAStrak stock plummets.
    • June 25: The redwood forest near Mount Shasta begins spreading at an unnatural rate.
    • June 28: Cross Applied Technologies is granted extraterritorial status.
    • July 16: University of Michigan researchers publish magical theorems describing spell anchoring.
    • August 13: Proteus AG completes the Osaka offshore arcology in Japan.
    • August 24: For the first time, borders are opened to megacorporations.
    • September 10: Hurricane Ethelbert hits the New York and DeeCee areas, causing extensive damage.
    • September 18: Credstick readers get new anti-tamper technology, and additional Matrix protection is added to the associated nodes.
    • October 20: Strikes and riots against the Russian occupation leave the economy in ruins.
    • October 23: The Socialist Worker’s Party is destroyed by an embezzlement scandal.
    • November 10: Police pull out of Cape Town when violence reaches unmanageable levels.
    • November 11: The Cabrini Refugee Act establishes the Cabrini Green Housing Development in Chicago as a ghoul haven.
    • December 4: Humanis Policlub attacks Cabrini Green, killing at least 100.
    • December 6: Authority over the SOX is handed over to a joint corporate administrative council
    • Hestaby takes possession of Shasta Dam and surrounding territory in Northern California, repelling a Tir Tairngire attack.
    • Publication of Anchoring theorems.
  • 2054
    • January 3: Knight Errant abandons their contract to protect Cabrini Green.
    • February 16: The AGS chancellor is assassinated at O’Hare Airport in Chicago.
    • May 2: The military seals off Crater Lake.
    • May 8: A Sioux military scout is shot down after passing too close to Crater Lake.
    • May 11: HKB takes control of the Transys Neuronet board.
    • May 12: Yucatán rebels bomb an oil refinery, killing 127 workers.
    • May 17: The Seventh Church of the Guiding Hand is founded.
    • May 24: A semi-ballistic flight to Tokyo crashes just short of the runway, killing 119.
    • June 4: In Seattle, the ork activist named Preacher encourages a crowd of seven thousand orks and trolls to fi ght back against racism.
    • June 10: Scholars from MIT&T, funded by the Atlantean Foundation, uncover a cache of artifacts at a site near Crete.
    • June 24: Proteus AG completes the Emden arkoblock.
    • July 1: The shadowrunners known as the D-Team, with D standing for Dunkelzahn, make their first appearance.
    • August 30: The fi rst rumors emerge of Black Hammer, a Matrix utility that mimics the deadly effects of Black IC.
    • September 7: Congress passes the Endangered Species Act and includes a number of awakened creatures.
    • October 26: Sol Media Group acquires numerous Latin American media and telecomm companies.
    • December 16: An unknown scientist proposes that elven cells resist aging. He calls the phenomenon the Stopwatch Complex
    • tentative discovery of Atlantis (Thera) 150 miles off Crete.
  • 2055: The UB (Universal Brotherhood)
    • Acting on 'tips' from Ares, the UCAS FBI discovers that insect spirits control the UB and shut it down, but without making the reasons public. Cover story of financial corruption. Other nations take similar steps, and the UB is completely shut down by '56. Ares assists in destructive raids against local hives, which are reported as widespread incidents of "unmotivated terrorist violence" against the Universal Brotherhood.
    • Aug 22: A Knight Errant Firewatch team attack what may be the largest insect hive in North America. It does not have the anticipated effect. A swarm of bug spirits spills out of the hive to infest the city of Chicago.
    • Aug 23: The UCAS government sets up the Chicago Containment Zone, isolating most of the population of Chicago behind UCAS Army barricades. Those trapped include the Chicago Mafia, as well as the Chicago branches of the other major syndicates. The Mafia loses contact with the Don of Chicago and the Commissione believes him dead. It transfers control of Chicago operations to Don Leo McCaskill of Milwaukee, a former lieutenant of James O'Malley.
    • Chicago Containment Zone is explained to the public as securing against a virulent outbreak of VITAS.
    • Early October: The remains of the Knight Errant Firewatch team inside the Chicago Containment Zone detonate a subtactical thermonuclear warhead inside the new core hive. The blast and radiation effects are much lower than expected, but knock virtually all the insect spirits in Chicago into torpor.
  • 2056
    • January 12: The Aleph Society is founded by Dr. Michael Nickson, who claims that an ancient Atlantean book he possesses reveals that every person has magical potential.
    • April 28: Hostilities between Proteus AG and AG Chemie erupt into all out war at Proteus’ Helgoland facility. The conflict climaxes when the great dragon Nachtmeister sides with Proteus, leading to their victory.
    • May 5: Proteus AG closes its Helgoland facility for reconstruction.
    • June 8: Insect spirit hives are uncovered in several large cities.
    • June 22: Dunkelzahn is awarded citizenship and moves his home from Lake Louise to Prince Edward Island.
    • July 3: Truman Technologies relocate their headquarters from Chicago to Los Angeles.
    • July 5: Yucatán rebels accidentally destroy a ferry carrying more than 200 passengers.
    • July 9: The revelation that the neo-communist movement is led by insect spirits leads to wide spread panic and riots.
    • July 19: Ares forces and Kurdish mercenaries destroy an insect spirit hive.
    • July 24: Renraku launches Locus Elementum, an interdisciplinary magical organization.
    • August 9: 60% of invited nations boycott the Olympics due to Japan’s ban on metahumans. The IOC responds by cancelling the 2060 Olympics.
    • September 13: A previously unknown group called Winternight is caught by federal agents while attempting to smuggle nuclear warheads into the UCAS.
    • October 25: A bomb goes off at the Liberation Day parade in San Francisco, killing fi fteen.
    • October 28: A strange aurora appears over Crater Lake. Unusual magical events across the country follow.
    • November 7: Thomas Steele is reelected president.
    • November 7: Oliver Jackson is elected president.
    • December 17: Proteus AG announces plans for a fully submerged arkoblock near Rømø Island.
    • Late December 2055-January 2056: The truth about the Chicago Containment Zone is disseminated to the public at large via Shadowland, the Denver Data Haven, etc. via the Bug City download. The UCAS government can no longer sustain its coverup of the Zone, and the world knows that insect spirits and totems are, indeed, real.
    • The UCAS Congress formally recognizes the great dragon Dunkelzahn as a legal citizen of the UCAS. Famous "handshake" between Dunkelzahn and President Thomas Steele sends the Technocrat ticket to the top of the polls.
    • Dec-Jan: UCAS Election results of 2056 are found to be rigged; House Speaker Betty Jo Pritchard declares the election null and void and announces new elections. Congress approves short campaign season of under eight months, with Election Day re-scheduled to Tuesday, 7 Aug 2057.
  • 2057
    • January 19: President Thomas Steele is accused of rigging the 2056 election.
    • January 26: President Steele and Vice President Booth are impeached. By default, Speaker of the House Betty Jo Pritchard becomes the first female president of the UCAS.
    • January 29: Congress announces a new election on August 7.
    • February 1: Kenneth Brackhaven, a Seattle businessman with ties to the Humanis Policlub, announces his candidacy for president.
    • March 15: The great dragon Dunkelzahn announces he will run for president.
    • April 10: Using a secret technique, the Doge of Venice purifies the canals.
    • May 21: Sichuan readies forces for an attack on the Canton Confederation.
    • July 10: Presidential candidate Franklin Yeats is killed by an insect spirit.
    • July 18: Franklin Yeats’ running mate, Anne Penchyk, declares her intention to run for president in Yeats’ place.
    • July 23: Parliament establishes the Northern Habitable Zone.
    • August 7: Dunkelzahn is elected president.
    • August 9: President Dunkelzahn and Vice President Kyle Haeffner are sworn into office. At 10:23 PM, President Dunkelzahn is assassinated by an unknown assailant outside the Watergate hotel. An astral rift appears above the site of Dunkelzahn’s death. Witnesses report seeing President Dunkelzahn’s astral form entering the rift.
    • August 10: Vice President Kyle Haeffner is sworn in as president. His first act is the formation of the Scott Commission to investigate President Dunkelzahn’s assassination. Riots break out across the nation, but military and corporate security move quickly to avoid a second Night of Rage.
    • August 11: A funeral is held for President Dunkelzahn at Lake Louise
    • August 12: President Haeffner nominates President Dunkelzahn’s ex-spokesperson, Nadja Daviar, as his Vice President.
    • August 13: The cordon around Crater Lake is re-established.
    • August 15: Dunkelzahn’s will is read. Contrary to dragon custom, Dunkelzahn distributes his wealth to an extensive list of individuals. Copies of Dunkelzahn’s will hit the Matrix seconds after the reading is complete. The will includes instructions for the formation of the Draco Foundation, with Nadja Daviar appointed as its Chairperson. With the stock he received in the will, Miles Lanier leaves Fuchi to join the Renraku board.
    • August 18: President Haeffner submits his complete list of names for cabinet appointments. Many metahumans and magically active individuals are included.
    • August 19: The Atlantean Foundation begins negotiations to pursue an underwater dig in the Bermuda Triangle.
    • August 20: Arthur Vogel is appointed chairman of Sierra Incorporated.
    • August 25: The Scott Commission is convened.
    • September 3: The Draco Foundation begins operations at its headquarters in DeeCee.
    • September 5: The Scott Commission begins hearings.
    • September 12: Wuxing, Inc. announces major expansion plans.
    • September 18: Proteus AG performs its first space launch from Devil’s Island.
    • October 12: A change to the 14th Amendment allows non-metahuman sentients and probationary citizens to obtain SINs.
    • October 19: A new national flag is adopted.
    • November 8: The Scott Commission clears President Haeffner of involvement in former President Dunkelzahn’s assassination.
    • November 11: The Draco Foundation moves to a monthly schedule for the distribution of the items in Dunkelzahn’s Will.
    • November 14: Congress begins the approval process for President Haeffner’s cabinet.
    • November 20: David Emerson announces the foundation of the Children of the Dragon, a cult that worships Dunkelzahn.
    • December 3: Renraku cuts a deal with the decker Leonardo to purchase cutting-edge technology from him.
    • December 18: Jurgen Meiers and Princess Caroline divorce
    • July 19: Republican candidate General Franklin Yeats found murdered in his hotel room (Shadows of the Underworld)
    • Apr 20: All eight megacorporations suffer security breaches and system shutdowns at midnight, followed by extortion demands by a unidentified decker who leaves behind an enigmatic negative portrait of the Mona Lisa. The decker is later dubbed "Leonardo" and is rumored to be an elven genius of enormous intellect. (ras.25, Novel: Black Madonna)
    • Aug 7: The great dragon Dunkelzahn is declared the winner of the 2057 Presidential Election by a narrow margin
    • Aug 15: Miles Lanier (Fuchi chief of security) leaves Fuchi to join the board of directors of Renraku Computer Systems.
    • Aug 20: Arthur Vogel becomes president of Sierra, Inc.
    • Aug 22: Nadja Daviar grants Damien Knight voting control over Gavilan Ventures (Ares stock portfolio) for 2 years
    • Aug 31, 02:55:23 EST: The Players (of the Awakened World) is uploaded to the Shadowland BBS by system administrator Captain Chaos.
    • Oct: The dons of the Bigio and Ciarniello families in Seattle begin meeting covertly with Sergei Malenkin, a representative of a group of super-killers known as Chimera.
  • 2058
    • Jan 1: Don James O'Malley is shot and killed by a Chimera assassin at his home in Seattle.
    • Jan 4: O'Malley's funeral is held in Seattle, with all the major Mafia figures of the metroplex in attendance. Hanzo Shotozumi appears with a Yakuza honor guard to pay his respects to his fallen rival and inform the remaining Mafia bosses of Seattle that the Yakuza is not responsible for O'Malley's death. He also delivers a veiled threat implying that the Yakuza plans to retake all the territory it has lost to the Mafia to date.
    • Jan 4: Following her father's funeral, Rowena O'Malley informs the Finnigan family's leaders and advisors that she intends to claim leadership of the Family and of the Seattle Mafia as her father's sole heir. The announcement creates a considerable stir among the Mafiosi gathered at the meeting, but Rowena quickly gains the support of the Finnigan family with the help of her father's consiglieri, Al Cavalieri.
    • Jan 5: Inspired by Don O'Malley's death and the brewing potential for Mob War in Seattle, the first of the Underworld collection of files is posted on Shadowland. Shadowrunners begin to take notice of the Seattle syndicates.
    • Jan 5: Rowena O'Malley delivers word of her intentions to become capa of Seattle to the heads of the other Seattle Families as well as to Don McCaskill and the Commissione. The Inner Circle of the Commissione places responsibility for the Seattle situation in McCaskill's hands.
    • Jan 5: Word goes out among Seattle's gangs that the Yakuza is recruiting gangers as soldiers in its aggressive expansion plan. Some gangs join up; others are wary of the offer.
    • Jan 7: Yakuza soldiers start muscling in on Mafia-run gambling operations and businesses in the metroplex. Sporadic fights break out between the Yaks and Mafia enforcers.
    • Jan 8: An assassination attempt against Rowena O'Malley is narrowly averted. The attempt only strengthens her determination to gain control over the Seattle Mafia and put an end to the conflict.
    • Feb 22: Ares implements "Operation Extermination," a large-scale physical and magical assault on the insect spirits infesting the Chicago Containment Zone. The Chicago quarantine is officially lifted in President Haeffner's State of the Union address. ° Ares uses FAB Strain III, an astrally active bacteria, to target Bug Spirits in the Zone. Unfortunately, Strain III does not restrict its depredation to insect spirits—it affects all astral objects and beings. Chicago's ghoul community is devastated.
  • 2059
    • January 6: The tanker Go Jo is sunk near Cancun, resulting in a massive spill of radioactive waste after a battle between pirates, CAS SEALs, and Aztlan Jaguar guards.
    • January 15: The great dragon Masaru posts a manifesto calling for Philippine independence to Shadowland. Days later, Governor Saru calls for open elections in February 2059.
    • February 22: Tadamako Shibanokuji dies in a Yamatetsu hospital. Yuri Shibanokuji, his ork son, gains controlling interest in Yamatetsu.
    • March 3: Ares Macrotechnology purchases a controlling majority of stock in General Motors. This creates a monopoly on the industrial production facilities around Detroit.
    • May 5: Fleeing what it labeled “an active attack” of fines and sanctions by the Japanese government due to the ascension of an ork chairman, Yamatetsu relocates its corporate headquarters to Vladivostok, Russia.
    • July 8: Yamatetsu and Wuxing rally a collection of Asian corporations to form the Pacific Prosperity Group (PPG) as a regional response to the Japanacorps economic strength.
    • August 14: Lofwyr purchases all mining rights to several sites in the Eifel Mountains. AGS geological surveys conclude that the mountains have been fully mined of any valuable ore.
    • August 15: Wuxing representative Li Feng is given the Corporate Council seat left vacant after the death of Fuchi’s representative.
    • September 29: White Monday. The Tokyo Stock Market faces the largest single-day drop in 70 years as traders sell off massive amounts of Fuchi and Fuchi-related stock.
    • October 6: Richard Villiers announces the formation of Novatech. The new company is the result of consolidating pieces of Fuchi Industrial Electronics with Villiers International, Cambridge Holdings, and other interests.
    • October 20: Leonard Aurelius sells all of his stock in Ares Macrotechnology to Arthur Vogel. Vogel, an eco-activist, resigns as President of Sierra, Inc and takes a seat on the Ares board. A week later, Aurelius uses his earnings to buy a seat on the board of Cross Applied Technologies.
    • December 19: A security malfunction at the Renraku Arcology allows the AI Deus to assume control. Shortly afterward, the Matrix connection to the Seattle is severed. The Arcology remains shut down for several weeks, with nearly a hundred thousand people trapped inside. The Metroplex guard is called in to protect the rest of the city from the automated security systems.
    • ??: The Commissione has made its decision, and the big winner is Maurice "the Butcher" Bigio as the new Don of Seattle, chosen over Rowena O'Malley. Page 12 The Mafia bigwigs were forced to step in and make the choice before the newly united Yakuza clans ate up what holdings the mafioso had left. But the yaks have worries of their own now, having claimed independence from the oyabun in Japan...
    • May 16: Dosan Aburakoji, one of Mitsuhama's Corporate Court representatives, commits suicide in his Kyoto home.
    • Jun 6: Fuchi brings suit against Renraku in the Corporate Court, accusing them of using Miles Lanier's inside knowledge to steal Fuchi trade secrets. Within 24 hours, the charges are dropped. Lanier leaves Renraku, selling his four million shares of Renraku stock to the Zurich-Orbital Gemeinschaftsbank.
    • Jun 16: Navroz Chandaria of Renraku is named to the Corporate Court seat left vacant by Aburakoji's death.
    • Jul 19: David Hague, one of Fuchi's Corporate Court representatives, is found dead in Redmond, Seattle.
    • Aug 15: Li Feng of Wuxing, Inc. is named to the Corporate Court seat left vacant by Hague's death.
    • Aug 22: Nadja Daviar regains control of the Ares stock owned by Gavilan Ventures.
    • Sep 29: "White Monday" The Tokyo Stock Exchange suffers its largest single- day drop in 70 years.
    • Oct 6: Richard Villiers of Fuchi announces the formation of Novatech, Inc., which continues Villiers' strategy of acquiring large portions of Fuchi. Miles Lanier is appointed Novatech's director of security
    • Oct 27: Leonard Aurelius joins the board of directors of Cross Applied Technologies.
    • Dec 15: Anna Villalobos replaces Domingo Chavez as Aztechnology's representative on the Corporate Court.
  • 2060
    • January 3: The UCAS Army erects a quarantine zone around the SCIRE.
    • February 10: Shadowland posts a file claiming the Renraku Arcology has been taken over by an AI. Claims that people are being brutally experimented on are further fuel for the shadow community’s belief that the arcology has become a war zone.
    • March 17: Representatives of the corporate and anarchist zones of Berlin sign a peace treaty allowing both areas to co-exist.
    • April 30: Resolution 3031 is passed by the UN with the explicit purpose of “regulating the influence of economic powers in questions that should be answered by politics.” The Commission on Megacorporate Affairs makes regular use of Resolution 3031 while policing corporate activities.
    • June 2: Professor John Maniha publishes the best-selling book Dumpshock: A Brief History of the Awakened World.
    • July 28: After a prolonged period of economic hardship, Fuchi Industrial Electronics is officially dissolved.
    • August 12: The Pacific Prosperity Group acquires the islands Pulau Batam and Pulau Bintan from the Sumatran Alliance in exchange for economic cooperation in order to build the Pelawangan Space Port.
    • October 3: Dunkelzahn’s Island appears. Roughly 300 kilometers off the coast of Petrolia, CFS, an island erupts from the Pacific Ocean. Though it was bequeathed to Federated Boeing in Dunkelzahn’s Will, the company investigates the island. Support personnel left to monitor the island are killed in a brief skirmish with pirates and are not replaced.
    • October 20: Yamatetsu is awarded the Draco Foundation prize for creating the first fully self-sustaining underwater habitat.
    • November 7: President Kyle Haeffner and Vice President Nadja Daviar are overwhelmingly re-elected to offi ce.
    • November 8: Decorated veteran of the Aztlan Invasion of Texas, Cheryl Cundiff is elected President. She is joined by Vice President Brad Williams, a trial lawyer with extensive experience in domestic policy.
    • November 10: In San Francisco, noted civil rights activist Robert Page announces he has fi nished translating the ancient book left to him in Dunkelzahn’s will. He titles the book the Or’zet Codex, claiming it contains proof that orks have a unique language.
    • December 31: Justin Rochefort declared the Voice of Ogoun, earning Dunkelzahn’s talon clippings.
    • Mar 19: A virus of unknown origin attacks Seattle's Matrix RTG. People accessing the RTG suffer memory loss, psychotic episodes or brain death. The attack lasts for eleven minutes, then ends with no explanation or after effects.
    • Mar 26: Navroz Chandaria, one of Renraku's Corporate Court reps, dies in a terrorist bombing in New Delhi.
    • Apr 5: Shikei Nakatomi of Fuchi purchases four million shares of stock in Renraku from the Zurich-Orbital Gemeinschaft Bank. Renraku begins acquiring large portions of Fuchi.
    • Apr 15: Yves Aquillon of Cross Applied Technologies gains the Corporate Court seat left vacant by Chandaria's death.
    • Jun 7: Korin Yamana of Fuchi announces his marriage to Mitsuko Shiawase of Shiawase Envirotech.
    • Jun 14: Shiawase Corporation purchases all remaining assets of Fuchi Industrial Electronics. Korin Yamana accepts a position on Shiawase's board of directors.
    • Jun 15: Neil Benson replaces Francesco Napoli as Renraku's rep on the Corporate Court.
    • Jul 28: Fuchi Industrial Electronics is officially dissolved.

A New Spin (2061-2064)[]

  • 2061
    • January 1: The UN commemorates the arrival of Halley’s Comet and declares 2061 as the “Year of the Comet.” Several megacorporations vow to send probes out to meet the comet and gather what data they can.
    • March 21: The Corporate Court founds the Grid Overwatch Division (GOD). Tasked with cross-jurisdictional matrix law enforcement, GOD hackers are drawn from security divisions of all Corporate Court member corporations.
    • April 5: General Saito begins to crackdown on the teaching of Or’zet within the Protectorate.
    • May 11: With the help of a second AI called Magaera, Renraku believes it has destroyed Deus, the AI in control of the Renraku Arcology in Seattle. In fact, it has escaped by secretly uploading itself into a system of a thousand unwitting human and metahuman vessels called the Network. Unbeknownst to Deus, Maegara was transferred to the Network as well.
    • May 13: Renraku announces that they have resolved the arcology issue in Seattle, although most of the arcology remains under the control of Deus’ drones.
    • June 20: At dawn, during the Summer Solstice festival Stonehenge is restored to its original condition. With the stone circle reformed, the power site begins strengthening the ley line beneath it.
    • July 21: King Berthold I of the Black Forest Troll Kingdom goes missing. Investigations do not reveal any sign of assassination or abduction. Chancellor Hugo von Hasslach serves as interim regent.
    • August 1: Magaera and Deus begin to struggle for control of the Network, causing division within the ranks.
    • August 15: The Aleph Society makes global headlines with its promise to restore magical ability to any awakened individual who has burned out. Dr. Michael Nickson, the founder, states the fundamental mission of the Aleph Society is to raise the innate magical potential inherent in every person.
    • September 4: Ibn Eisa, leader of the Islamic Unity Movement, is assassinated. He returns from the dead five days later and declares a New Islamic Jihad.
    • September 5: Halley’s Comet becomes visible to the naked eye. Mana storms become more common and powerful as they scour the globe. Early reports come in as roughly one thousand cases of Sudden Recessive Genetic Expression (SURGE) are discovered worldwide. SURGE is compared to UGE and Goblinization due to massive physical changes effected on a genetic level.
    • September 5: A stable astral shallow forms around Wuxing Skytower on Aberdeen Island. All astral space for one kilometer becomes visible to mundane individuals.
    • September 12: Fueled by fear of the SURGE phenomenon, riots and civil unrest spread across the world from megaplexes to small towns. Only a small number of cities and nations are untouched by the violence.
    • September 12: Matthias Hesse and Nationale Aktion release an airborne strain of VITAS-1 in Munich’s ruined Olympiapark Stadium. Nearly ten thousand homeless metahumans and aid workers are killed in the attack.
    • September 23: Hundreds of saddhus bathing in the holy waters of the Ganges River at Haridwar are transformed during an astral flood. Manifestations of Hindu SURGE are seen with individuals taking on elephant and monkey features or blue and golden skin tones.
    • October 17: Novatech announces that they have begun construction of the Olympia Lunar Base.
    • October 27: The Ring of Fire erupts. Across the Pacific Rim, volcanoes erupt and earthquakes wreak havoc with massive damage in Japan, the Philippines. The death toll is estimated in the hundreds of thousands including the Japanese Emperor and most of the Royal Family.
    • October 29: In the face of the eruption of the Ring of Fire, the Imperial Diet orders the withdrawal of Imperial Marines from San Francisco.
    • November 4: General Saito refuses the Diet’s withdrawal order and stages a military coup in San Francisco, supported by loyal troops and the Japanese megacorps. They advance into the Central Valley, conquering Sacramento and other key sites.
    • November 10: The Auvergne volcanoes erupt astrally. Though there is no physical evidence of the eruptions, the astral space is flooded with magma. While the event is harmless to most, thirteen individuals were killed due to damage sustained on their astral forms.
    • November 27: The Dunkelzahn Institute of Magical Research announces the discovery of naturally occurring orichalcum. The discovery sparks an Orichalcum Rush and forces parageologists to reexamine several core beliefs about alchemical compounds. Around the world, natural occurrences are discovered and mined including on Dunkelzahn’s Island and the Eifel mountains.
    • December 2: A massive earthquake strikes Los Angeles, destroying the walls that contained the El Infierno slums. The denizens swarm out and begin to loot the city. Fires spread throughout Los Angeles as looters burn everything in their path.
    • December 8: Pueblo military forces enter Los Angeles to subdue the rioters and claim Los Angeles and southern California as part of the PCC.
    • December 17: Spirits of unknown origin break free from the central stupa at the Borobodur temple complex. Members of the Astral Space Preservation Society and Javanese military work together to identify and recapture the spirits though many escape. They are later defined as non-shedim and classified as a strong threat to metahumanity due to their ability to possess metahumans against their will.
    • December 24: Ghostwalker is fi rst seen when he emerges from the Watergate Rift in Washington, D.C. Later that day, the Great Dragon rampages through Denver. In the fi rst day, he destroys the Aztlan teocalli. His attacks continue for several weeks, focusing on the Aztlan Sector.
    • December 24: In the wake of Ghostwalker’s emergence, a swarm of spirits is seen leaving the Watergate Rift. These spirits are later identified as shedim
    • Jan-Sep: The first leg of the "Probe Race", as the space megacorps compete to be the first to send a probe to the comet. One by one, each probe falls victims to accident or sabotage.
    • Mar 19: A citywide power failure cripples the Seattle RTG for a short period, forcing many users and hosts offline and impeding other Matrix functions.
    • May 7: Inazo Aneki returns from his convalescence in Tibet.
    • May: Cooperating with an otaku alliance called Overwatch, Aneki enters the Renraku Arcology and uses hard-wired "kill codes" to disable the rogue artificial intelligence that has kept the arcology locked down for the past sixteen months. Deus is apparently destroyed. Aneki commits suicide. Public credit for ending the shutdown goes to Sherman Huang, despite the crucial role played by anonymous shadowrunners.
    • Late May: Inazo Aneki's death is announced publicly. Details are vague. Hot contenders for the now-vacant position of Renraku CEO are Sherman Huang and current acting CEO Haruhiko Nakada.
    • Aug: Typhoons batter the Philippines.
    • Sep: Halley's Comet becomes visible to the naked eye.
    • Sep 4: The first reported cases of SURGE express.
    • Sep 4: Ibn Eisa, leader of the Islamic Unity Movement, is assassinated.
    • Sep 9: Ibn Eisa rises from the dead, proclaims a New Islamic Jihad.
    • Sep 10: SURGE sweeps the globe, continues at a regular pace.
    • Sep 12: Paranoia about SURGE sparks riots, attacks and urban unrest.
    • Oct: SURGE backlash continues in full swing, with riots and attacks on metahumans
    • Nov: Halley's Comet temporarily disappears from view.
    • Nov 1: Ancestor spirits warn of the "return of the dead."
    • Dec 2: An earthquake demolishes the free city of Los Angeles; walls go down, riots and looting sweeps the city.
    • Dec 8: The Pueblo Corporate Council moves in troops, seizing Los Angeles and the outlying areas. The PCC makes all Los Angeles residents probationary citizens.
    • Dec 24: The astral form of Ghostwalker breaks through the Dunkelzahn Rift, followed by a wave of spirits; Ghostwalker appears in Denver, destroying the Aztlan teocalli and rampaging through the city; the dragon wages a guerilla warfare campaign against the city in the weeks that follow.
    • Dec 25: Ghostwalker secretly meets with Aina Dupree and Nadja Daviar of the Draco Foundation, as well as SilveryK (the Nexus) and Ryan Mercury (Assets, Inc.)
    • The CCMA creates a new Matrix policing agency in response to the arcology situation and grid shutdowns, called the Grid Overwatch Division (GOD).
  • 2062
    • January 3: 14-year-old Yasuhito, the only survivor of the Imperial Family after the eruption of Unzen volcano, is named Emperor of Japan.
    • January 27: Council of Denver formally cedes control of the city to Ghostwalker. Aztlan territory of the city is given to CAS; Aztlan personnel and businesses are ordered to leave the city immediately.
    • February 1: Emperor Yasuhito rescinds the Yomi Island Decree, which mandated the deportation of Japanese metahumans. Yomi Island prisoners are free to return to Japan.
    • March 15: Earthquakes, tidal waves, and spirits batter the Yucatán territory, forcing Aztlan to halt their military action in the area. Yucatán rebels and Aztlan military alike die in the natural disasters.
    • April 1: Halley’s Comet disappears from view. All recently discovered natural orichalcum deposits run out. New SURGE cases decrease.
    • May: After comet fever dies down around the world, it is discovered that the magical nature of Tír na nÓg has been affected permanently. The Veil works erratically, mana flares and ebbs near cairns and monoliths and astral constructs fade in and out of the material world on a regular if unpredictable basis, shaking many Tír citizens.
    • July 19: An astral volcanic eruption in Auvergne spills over into the mundane world as physical eruptions.
    • October 31: Lyonesse emerges from the English Channel at the termination point of the Stalker and Stonehenge Great Ley lines. No seismic activity is recorded during the event.
    • Jan: The CAS offers a bounty for magicians who reanimate corpses.
    • Jan: Aztlan moves military troops into their sector in Denver in direct violation of the Treaty of Denver; the other sectors also reinforce their borders with troops.
    • Jan 27: The Council of Denver meets with Ghostwalker; Ghostwalker is given control of the city; Aztlan is kicked out of Denver; CAS troops invade and take control of the Aztlan sector.
    • Feb 5: Aztlan/Aztechnology military forces start a slash and burn of the Yucatan.
    • March–April: Ares lands a probe on the 2nd pass of Halley's Comet, which sends back telemetry, establishing Ares as the winner of the Probe race.
    • April: Halley's Comet disappears from view. All known natural orichalcum deposits run dry; no new deposits are located. New SURGE cases decrease to a trickle.
    • May 2–5: Armed combat erupts on the Salish-Shidhe/Tsimshian border resulting in thousands dead from an apparent biological weapon. Ceasefire agreed to on the 5th, but would be broken by SSC militias in July.
    • June: Lofwyr and Aithne Oakforest retire from the Tir Tairngire Council of Princes.
    • July: The Republic of Québec begins a trial period allowing English to be used in business transactions.
    • July: Great Dragon Hestaby, who had guarded northern California Free State from Tir Tairngire, joins the Tir High Council of Princes, replacing departing Lofwyr.
  • 2063
    • January 15: Noted ork rocker CrimeTime releases Djoto, the first album primarily in Or’zet, and overnight the orxploitation musical genre is born.
    • May 1: NEEC is officially inaugurated.
    • May 5: King Felipe VI dies. In a national scandal, it is revealed that Alfonso de Alba, an ogre, is the true firstborn son of the deceased king. The heir-apparent’s, Prince Juan Carlos, claim is superceded by Alfonso, and the nation is divided as the church comes out against a metahuman as king.
    • May 15: The long-postponed Rite of Progression is halted by the Rinelle ke’Tesrae rebel group; millions gather to boycott the tests and show support for the anti-government faction.
    • June 4: In spite of Renraku’s 2061 announcement, the UCAS military officially designates the Renraku Arcology liberated, when they take control of the arcology.
    • July 12: Pax, a dissonant technomancer and one-time servant of Deus, has a vision about transforming the Matrix, and begins working on a virus that will bring it to life.
    • August 15: High-level media and industry officials establish the Horizon Group, and former sim-star Gary Cline is appointed CEO.
    • September 16: The crew of the Valentina Tereshkova, the first manned mission to Mars, sends back live footage of the planet.
    • December 19: Pax meets with a Winternight doomsday terrorist cult cell and proposes an alliance. An underworld war begins between otaku and dissonant otaku, resulting in the deaths of thousands of children. Winternight steals the Surtr biological weapon prototype from Zeta-ImpChem and begins manufacturing it

Matrix Crash 2.0 (2064)[]

  • 2064
    • January 8: Sioux Office of Military Intelligence (OMI) intercepts a heavily thamaturgically-modified nuclear warhead outside of Butte. Research links it to the doomsday terrorist cult Winternight.
    • March 14: Admiral Ryoichi Kuroda is appointed the new governor of the Philippines by the Diet after the assassination of the previous governor. He is given a contingent of Imperial Marines to handle the crisis. He immediately orders the public execution of all Filipino dissidents.
    • March 17: Novatech announces they will be offering twenty percent of their shares for public sale at an IPO scheduled for November 2.
    • April 1: The East Coast Stock Exchange (ECSE), in Boston, begins upgrading their systems for the Novatech IPO, anticipating the largest Matrix transaction in history.
    • April 2: Emperor Yasuhito weds Hitomi Shiawase.
    • April 18: Pax’s virus, Jormungand, is lab-tested. The covert deployment of Jormungand code eggs and Surtr weapons begins.
    • June 5: Aztlan signs the Yucatán Peace Treaty. Aztechnology CEO Juan Atzcapotzalco is killed during the ceremonies by a bomb. The treaty is still signed, and the Yucatán becomes autonomous. Dzitbalchén is found guilty of the attack and later publicly executed by Aztlan.
    • August–November: Winternight uses magic to usher in exceptionally early and harsh winter conditions around the globe. The east coast of North America is hit especially hard.
    • September 27: Zeta-ImpChem reports to the Corporate Court that Winternight is behind the theft of the Surtr prototype. Around the globe, counter-terrorist watch groups and government agencies go on high alert.
    • October 9: Covert intelligence agencies and shadowrunner teams begin a 16-day strike against Winternight cells. A few members are captured alive but are resistant to interrogation.
    • October 24: Mitsuhama announces it will be pulling all operations out of Tsimshian. The Mitsuhama-supported government teeters on collapse as Haida-led forces prepare to overtake the country.
    • October 31: The escaped AI Deus compiles itself into the ECSE host, planning on using the heavy Matrix traffic of Novatech’s IPO to transform himself.
    • November 1: The Corporate Court coordinates strikes against Winternight, capturing leaders and destroying training camps. With the cult supposedly destroyed, they believe the crisis is over and stand down. It is not until the early morning of November 2 that a lead cult member finally breaks under interrogation, and they learn the true plans; too late, they attempt to intercept the numerous bombs.
    • November 2: The Novatech IPO triggers the Crash 2.0. The IPO starts at 8:30 am and at 9:16 AM, the AI Deus, escaped from the Renraku arcology, takes over the East Coast Stock Exchange host and raises it to ultraviolet levels. As he forces open connections to other supercomputer hosts around the globe, otaku hidden in the ECSE, who are working against Deus, create a resonance well and two other AIs are awakened: Megaera and Mirage. While the three AIs battle, the Winternight terrorists unleash their plan to cripple the world. First, Jormungand, a dissonant otaku-created virus, is unleashed at 9:31 AM, and corrupts hosts around the globe, killing deckers who attempt to stop it. People in the ECSE and other hosts under attack are trapped, unable to log off, and many are killed. The second prong of the Winternight attack includes setting off EMP bombs in major cities and nukes on fault-lines around the globe, which they hope will lead to a holocaust winter. Boston is hit by the first EMP at 9:44 AM. Other EMP bombs destroy the backbone of the worldwide Matrix. Luckily, the fault line nuclear bombs that do go off appear to be oddly constrained; instead of global destruction, the fallout is very localized and far less severe than expected.
    • November 3: Taking advantage of the chaos of the Crash 2.0, the rebel group New Revolution stages a coup. UCAS President Kyle Haeffner is kidnapped from the White House and killed. Vice President Nadja Daviar survives an assassination attempt; Secretary of Defense William Stratta does not. Across North America, New Revolution troops—subverted from the UCAS military itself—attempt to seize control of sprawls. Acting President Daviar announces a state of martial law. By the end of the day, Brigadier General Angela Colloton announces the UCAS coup has been contained and that the leader—Senator Jonathan S. Braddock, backed by Alamos 20,000—has been killed. However, the New Revolution actions have fallout in multiple North American nations.
    • November 4, CAS: Elections are postponed.
    • November 26: Ibn Eisa, the power behind the New Islamic Jihad, is revealed as a shedim.
    • December 1: The Haida National Front overthrows the government. Civil war ensues, and is ended after Sioux-led STC forces overtake the nation. Tsimshian is made a protectorate of the Salish-Shidhe government.
    • December 1: Teetering on collapse from the combined crises of the Matrix Crash and the New Revolution coups, the Council of Princes announces it will disband and the nation will elect a representative government.
    • Fall: The hostile AI Deus, who had escaped his destruction in the Renraku Arcology, attempts to use Novatech's Initial Public Offering (which had potential to be the biggest Matrix event on record) to upgrade itself to Matrix godhood. Efforts by an opposing AI (Megaera, who was to an extent Deus' mother/prototype) and a former acolyte who had allied with the radical terrorist organization, Winternight (who sought to bring Ragnarok) disrupt this, and as an after effect, crash nearly the entire Matrix, with major hardware damage. In addition to the damage to the Matrix, a large number of people are trapped within the Matrix for some time. A number of those who survived, as well as those who were otaku prior to the Crash begin to note that they now have a deeper connection to the Matrix that no longer fades with age - the first technomancers are born.
    • Fall: Transys Neuronet and Erika, who had been designing and hoping to implement a new wireless Matrix interface, step forward and become the leading elements in the rebuilding of the Matrix.
    • Fall: Lucian Cross, CEO of Cross Applied Technologies, dies in a plane crash. Damien Knight, and thus Ares, quickly moves to seize as much of his greatest rival as possible.

The Wireless World (2065-Present Day)[]

  • 2065
    • January 1: The fi rst general elections are held in the nation, signaling the start of a democratically-elected government. The newly elected High Prince is Larry Zincan.
    • January 5: Tsimshian is accepted into the Native American Nations, and the Haida National Defense Force, with support from the Sioux and Salish- Shidhe, form a tribal police force. Elections are held to form a new tribal council.
    • January 27: Shiawase is shaken by an internal reorganization that ends with Empress Hitomi as Chairwoman of the Board.
    • February 10: Aaron Franklin of the New Nationalist Party is re-elected president.
    • February 12: Second Universal Matrix Conference begins at Transys-Erika’s Silicon Glen corporate facilities. The newly merged Transys Neuronet and Erika lead the conference in their readiness to complete the Wireless Matrix Initiative, which they had begun to implement in the fall of 2064. The decision is made to focus on building the Wireless Matrix rather than rebuilding the heavily damaged wired system. Protocols, frequencies, and interfaces are all standardized to those presented by Transys-Erika.
    • March 2: Cross Applied Technologies’ status as an AAA megacorp is revoked and it loses its seat on the Corporate Court. The remains of the corporation are given an A rating by the Corporate Court.
    • June 22: Novatech and Transys-Erika announce their merger. The new corporation is named NeoNET and retains its AAA status. Richard Villiers remains CEO. The great dragon Celedyr is announced as the head of R&D.
    • August 21: The Corporate Court gives Horizon its AAA rating and a seat on the Corporate Court.
    • October 12: DeBeers Omnitech announces a merger with Universal Omnitech under the Universal Omnitech name.
    • December 1: Global fi nance experts announce that the global economy is experiencing a major upswing and that consumer confi dence is higher than pre-Crash 2.0 levels.
    • Mitsuhama Computer Technologies pulls out of the plundered NAN of Tsimshian. The Salish-Shidhe Council quickly moved in and declared the nation a protectorate. This has lead to some unease within the Native American Nations as a whole.
  • 2066
    • January 6: First generation commlinks—palm-sized cyberterminals—are commercially released.
    • February 18: Metaphysicists discover that a modified electrical current run through an orichalcum-laced fi lament creates dual-natured light.
    • May 3: The French government sets the Brocéliande Forest as a self-governing territory, under control of the Korrigan, a coalition of sapient non-metahumans including pixies and spirits.
    • June 15: The two year Yakuza war begins between the Mita-gumi and the Watada-gumi.
    • July 5: Glitterworld, an immersive interactive sim park, opens its doors.
    • July 8: A super-typhoon hits the city, but the loss of life and property is a fraction of previous storms. Hong Kong officials attribute the city’s survival to the newly launched Wireless Matrix warning system, which came online only days prior to the storm.
    • September 8: Salish-owned Gaeatronics’ Geothermal Power Plant Network of five power plants comes online, eight months past the anticipated activation date. The power plants are hailed as the next generation in environmentally sound engineering. The power, marketed as Green Energy, is sufficient to meet the entire Sioux Nation’s needs, as well as the needs of other Native American Nations. The Sioux, Salish-Shidhe, and PCC begin to decommission corporate-run energy plants in their nations. Corporate protests ensue.
    • October 31: Student riots at Cambridge are violently put down by the Lord Protector’s Office. The riots are attributed to the Pendragon, who subsequently vanishes. The violent police response ends with the deaths of eighty-one students, with hundreds more injured. Over two hundred students are arrested, and a dozen disappear after their arrests, sparking further riots and protests against the LPO.
  • 2067
    • February 8: The Ute Nation, which never recovered after Crash 2.0, is officially absorbed by the Pueblo Corporate Council. The government announces that it will disband and all government functions, including economic and welfare support, will be administered by the PCC. The change is met with widespread resistance among the Ute population.
    • April 28: Yamatetsu goes through a massive corporate restructuring, renaming itself Evo Corporation and naming Anatoly Kirilenko as the new CEO. The megacorp retains its AAA status. It announces a new focus on projects meant to advance metahumanity to the next stage of evolution. Internally, a new corporate charter sets the Terms of Unity, designed to end racial discrimination within the corporation.
    • July 15: Orxploitation music experiences a major surge in global popularity, and ork culture gains new prominence. Music industry analysts attribute this to the release of AR-enabled delivery systems patented by Horizon.
    • October 13: Forensic thaumaturgy gains international recognition when a murder is solved after a thaumaturgic expert follows the ghost of a deceased young woman to the site where her body was buried. Evidence gathered at the scene is used to convict her boyfriend for her murder. It sets a precedent for using ghosts and summoned spirits in forensic thaumaturgy, although many nations continue to exclude testimony from spirits in trials.
    • November 4: Manadyne purchases its brother-corp, the Magnadyne software corporation, rescuing it from bankruptcy. The resultant corp is granted an AA rating and extraterritoriality by the Corporate Court. It focuses on merging magic and technology.
  • 2068
    • January 24: Riots erupt at the 100-year anniversary of the African Cup of Nations, when the team from Asamando attempts to gain admittance to the games. The entire team and their coaches are killed in the violence.
    • January 31: Struggling Wind River Corporation goes up for sale; the Horizon Group beats out Aztechnology, Shiawase, and the PCC’s offers when the corp agrees to donate ten percent of the agricultural yield to NAN food banks. Later in the year, the corp opens the five long-delayed underground agricultural hydroponic farms. Covering over 20,000 kilometers each, with multiple underground levels, the farms make Horizon the largest corporate agricultural producer in North America.
    • March 15: The Seven Kings war ends when the Yoruba government strikes a deal with Global Sandstorm for military support. The oil pipeline becomes fully operational, bringing huge profits to Global Sandstorm and participating Nigerian Kingdoms. Piracy and corporate infighting rise to an all-time high.
    • May 18: An astral shallow appears for a short time on the Splendid Dragon Path overlaying the astral image of an actual dragon on the skyway. A shrine is built where the dragon’s head appeared.
    • July 2: Virtual marriages are approved as legal by the Corporate Court and in multiple nations around the globe, including UCAS.
    • September 9: The anti-corporate group 9x9 makes its firstappearance in a terrorist strike against corporate holdings in Hong Kong.
    • October 31: Archeological sites in Egypt, while being excavated by the Apep Consortium, come under assault by a group of Beetle magicians calling themselves the Hem’netjer. Multiple sites are shut down until they can be secured. When excavation continues, Egyptian officials announce that new tunnels have been discovered, and unknown artifacts removed.
    • November 6: General Angela Colloton, famous for her command of the Renraku Arcology situation and defending against the 2064 coup, is elected President.
    • November 6: Aaron Franklin is re-elected president
  • 2069
    • March 8: Two major earthquakes, centered in Los Angeles, rock the West Coast; the quakes are powerful enough that people in Africa report seeing well water moving. Mount Rainier, near Seattle, erupts; in the following years, it repeatedly showers Seattle with ash falls. A tsunami floods parts of Los Angeles; later it is discovered that the topography of the area has significantly changed, with a vast network of astral constructs in the form of underground tunnels and lagoon-sized sinkholes appearing. This unnatural phenomenon is named the Deep Lacuna and stretches from CalFree north of Los Angeles south into Aztlan. Between the earthquakes, flooding, and appearance of the Deep Lacuna, much of LA is a disaster zone; the entire NAN pitches in for rescue and recovery operations.
    • March 8: Manadyne CEO Dr. Carolyn Winters disappears in Boston. Despite massive efforts, no trace of her is ever found.
    • April 15: Symbionts reach the mass market.
    • May 2: In the former area of Namibia, Angolan troops occupy two contested diamond fields. Universal Omnitech sends mercenary troops in, leading to a militarized conflict zone.
    • May 5: King George VIII passes away. Princess Caroline is coroneted as Queen five days later.
    • July 1: Saeder-Krupp reveals the fi rst large buildings produced solely by nanotechnology in Portland. The office complex is considered a major breakthrough in nanite-built structures. S-K announces plans to construct their fi rst ever Seattle offices using the same technology.
    • November 15: MIT&T publishes “The Virtuakinetic Phenomenon,” regarding an individual apparently able to manipulate the Matrix by thought alone. Shortly afterwards, Patient “V” disappears, the apparent victim of an unwilling extraction.
    • December 24: The Kobíkela, an organization of tribal shaman and Awakened sapient non-metahumans, takes over the Kinshasa-Brazzaville sprawl. Corporate interests in the city are informed that it is now the capital of the Congo Tribal Lands and all residents are now under the jurisdiction of the Kobíkela.
    • General Saito is removed from California.
  • 2070
    • April 11: The great dragon Rhonabwy signs a contract with Evo’s MetaMatrix branch to produce a daily music review blog called Soothing the Savage Beast.
    • June 28: Queen Elizabeth Hospital explodes. MCT announces the explosion was caused by technomancers, a dangerous group of people who can manipulate the Matrix with their minds alone. With events of Crash 2.0 still fresh in everyone’s minds, the announcement sparks citywide riots; news coverage generates widespread fear and hysteria in sprawls across the globe. Governments and corporations around the world meet for emergency sessions, and response varies from “wait and see” to round-ups, arrests, and even executions.
    • July 5: The United Nations holds an emergency session to discuss the technomancer threat.
    • August 18: The rogue AI Sojourner takes over Aztechnology’s Tlaloc orbital research station. It threatens to attack earth cities biowarfare weapons being produced on the research station unless all experimentation on captive AIs is ceased and all captive AIs are set free. Another AI, Pulsar, allied with Horizon, negotiates a peaceful ending.
    • September 18: A recording is released by reporter Jane McCrory, showing gruesome images of inhumane corporate experimentation on technomancers, including children, most of whom were kidnapped from their families. Public outcry is immense.
    • November 2: Kenneth Brackhaven wins the Seattle gubernatorial election.
    • November 10: Horizon releases Persona 2.0, an exclusive multimedia personal blogging, communication, and social rating system in Los Angeles.
    • December 1: The technomancer registration bill is passed into law.
    • December 1: The Coptic Pope issues a proclamation offering sanctuary to any technomancers who are “People of the Book.” Alexandria and Cairo become havens for technomancers and hackers as underground railroads from across Asia and Europe bring them into Egypt.
    • December 5: The Diet passes a bill requiring mandatory testing of children for technomancer abilities. At the same time, Empress Hitomi establishes a government school for young and latent technomancers.
    • December 25: French military units launch a multi-prong attack againstcorporate facilities in the SOX area.
  • 2071
    • January 5: The NEEC passes legislation requiring mandatory testing and registration of technomancers.
    • January 15: The Corporate Court votes against the Artificial Intelligence Accords, stating that the question of AI sapience and rights must be determined on a case-by-case basis.
    • February 2: The Pueblo Corporate Council begins offering SINs to AIs, according them rights as Pueblo citizens. Horizon and Evo follow suit within days.
    • February 12: A new drug, called tempo or flipside, hits the streets around the world. Inventories quickly skyrocket, as does demand, sparking an underworld war and rushed legislation as governments attempt to control the drug-related crime sprees fueled by the underworld unrest.
    • April 20: The NEEC institutes severe economic sanctions against France for their attack on SOX corporate facilities. France continues to remain silent on the reasons behind the attack.
    • June 23: A march on London’s inner city led by the Pendragon results in the peaceful dissolution of the Office of the Lord Protector.
    • July 1: The United Nations Initiative on Awakened Issues releases a 4,600-page “Sapience Report” in preparation for a vote on sapient non-metahuman rights.
    • November 20: Interpol and affiliated agencies, with Corporate Court blessings and backed by Aztechnology military, execute strikes on drug cartel assets in South America, in several nations including Amazonia, and in the free cities of Bogotá and Caracas. In the attacks, the Olaya Cartel is all but destroyed, and Graciela Riveros’s—the mastermind behind the creation of tempo—laboratories and residences are destroyed. A body later discovered in a lab is identifi ed as Riveros. Aztechnology’s global popularity soars after their decisive action against the cartels.
    • December 2: Empress Hitomi gives birth to the Crown Prince of Japan, Asaka Nashihito. The boy is the first child for the Imperial couple. The dateis declared a national holiday.
    • 5 January 2071: New European Economic Community follows the lead of other nations in mandating testing and registration for Technomancers.
    • February 2071: Pueblo Corporate Council, Horizon and Evo begin issuing SINs for AIs.
    • February 2071: "Tempo" or "Flipside" hits the streets, sparking crime wars and rushes from governments to pass new legislation to control them.
    • April 2071: Following continued silence from France regarding its attacks in the SOX, the NECC sanctions them for their attacks.
    • 23 June 2071: Following a march in London lead by the Pendragon, the office of Lord Protector is officially dissolved in the U
  • 2072
    • January 1: The citizens of the previous Ute nation have their Pueblo Corporate Council Conditional Shares mature, switching to Residential Shares. This gives them voting rights. A large voting block immediately puts a motion on the next shareholder’s agenda to reinstate Aztechnology’s business license in the PCC. The motion is also popular with much of Los Angeles’s population.
    • February 5: The 2072 Winter Olympics are held in Denver; Aztlan athletes are prohibited from competing or even entering the city by ZDF forces.
    • March 15: Seattle makes national news when the government chooses not to reinstate Lone Star’s Metroplex Law Enforcement contract, offi cially citing poor performance during the tempo crisis of 2071. After a bidding process, Knight Errant is chosen to provide public security services for the sprawl.
    • May 9: Ares unveils a line of new nanotechnology focused on space travel applications, paving the way for a new era in space exploration, colonization, and habitation.
    • May 10: In a closed-door session, the UN Security Council overturns the Sapient Non-Metahuman Rights Accord. Protests from several Awakened nations, including Amazonia, both Tírs, and Yakut are vehement.
    • June 1: The Aztechnology vote is deferred at the shareholders’ meeting, leading to widespread protests by the citizen shareholders. In the previous Ute territory, a movement starts calling for a vote of no confidence against the corporate board of directors.
    • November 8: Incumbant Angela Colloton (R) is elected president.
    • November 8: Ramsay McMalkin of the Technocrat party wins the CAS presidential election.
    • November 10: The Corporate Court publicly announces that construction is underway on a space elevator. The key components of the elevator are scheduled to be online by 2074, with a space-side habitat ready for general occupation by 2076. Immediately following the announcement, a petition was placed before the Corporate Court to decommission the Mt. Kilimanjaro mass driver upon completion of the space elevator

References[]

Article forked from the wikipedia Shadowrun timeline article

See also[]

  • Meta:Overview Timelines

External links[]

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