An interview of a native of The City..((read this first))

--Taken from “A discussion over drinks.”
By- Sweet Hune the Historian.
 
An interview of Tharnie the Viking in Earth Orbital station AD6, after the Sun.


Well chummer, you wanted me to let you know my view of the world, from so I hope you have some free time. It wouldn’t hurt to keep the rounds comin’ as well. Inebriation tends to sharpen my recollection abilities some.
 
Some might tell you that these days are the brightest mankind has had, what with all the tech advances we’s had over the last bazillion years. I am here to tell ya though, this world has gone to Hell in a few hand-baskets.
Sure we’s got most of livin’ till were almost 200 unless we get shot, ‘cuted, fall out of the city, or just give up. And everyone has food, well let’s not call it food, everyone has things to eat. For the most part, we even got one government. I use the term government loosely but over the history of the earth man has always tried to unite in one way or another. The governments didn’t do it though, it was the corporations. Orgatek has had the monopoly on Earth for now over 200 years.
They aint all that bad, at least that what the ganda says. They make sure everyone has what will keep them alive so everyone can buy something the next day, whether its solar power, meds, water, air, or whatever, Orgatek has it all. They even manage to keep the other Corporation poor enough that they can’t compete for management rights over the city.
We call the entire earth, the City now. Aint more’n a few small stretches of water open up to the sky and if you go looking for a piece of land that can grow without rented light, I wish ya the best.  Ya see, not only is most of the world under the cover of artificial structures built from deep in the ocean to high enough that if ya open a window you will lose all yer oxygen, but as of last year  no one can even see the sun no more. Orgatek launched some rockets and they released nanites thay formed a shield to block the sun out. It’s more like they put a pair of sunglasses on the earth, light still passes through but none of the radiation that’s been killing us can get through. Sad though; a lotta people have had night mares so bad now that they croaked. O-tek says it’s a psychological effect and gave out pills for us to take to help us sleep better.
We take pills for everything now since we don’t got the sun to feed us what we need. I aint never known we fed off the sun anyhow. I never once looked for a good sit in the sun over a nice juicy steak, but I aint no scientist either.
 
Talkin’ ‘bout employment, ha ha!  No one really earns credit from working. You work for the corporations and they erase life-debt offa you and yer familys record. They also give ya lights and semi-pure water and all the protein stew you can eat. The only way to get any luxuries or things you just have an itch for is to go underground and start up yer own biz. Sure there are those that work for the corp’s off-book and some legit Biz owners, but there aint no room for that no more. Most people are simply satisfied with mild disgust at their miserable lifes got no drive to do more than wait to die painlessly at old age.
Crime is Life. Everyone lives in districts called a Canopy and their all numbered based on their value to the corporations. Lower numbers are better and are the most well taken care of because that Canopy might have Astrominers or some other skilled labor. Yeah I said Astrominers. We are mining every rock in space clear out to Jupiter to support the infrastructure of the City. Most of it is done by drones but even them has to be done remotely by pilots from orbit.
Anyhow, I got sidetracked. Every Canopy  feeds off of other Canopys. C-1209 might need clothes from C-1476, and C-45 might want Blondes from C-21. The Canopy in need will ‘recruit’ people to be couriers to go get said needs. Couriers are paid well, but the life is short. If you’re lucky, you might be born from a family that has fallin’ off the network and you don’t have any Life debt and you just live and die in the shadows. But that means you have to steal everything you own, and the local Canopys don’t take nicely to unregisterds stealing from them. Local Law is worse n’ Corp law but you can usually count on not serving time if you get caught locally.
Anyways, I digress and it’s time for me to head to the clinic; sposed to be a shot from some new pharmacy group that’ll let me fly. I am dying to see the top of the City.