Peoples of the Ice World
L-EKTRIK CORPORATION
L-Ektrik Corporation is the name of the immense Rail Monopoly that controls the World of Ice. It is in fact divided into a myriad of subsidiaries, some quite powerful, others much more frail. They function much in the same way our companies function today. But their power never goes beyond the economic sphere, as they must submit to the ruthless Rail Law.
The Pointsmen always keep their subscribers moving, and thus permanently ill at ease. All other means of transportation other than the Rail Company train is totally illegal, even sacrilegious.
The Rail Company is strongly segregated: the financial elite lives in luxurious well-heated liners while the rest, the subscribers, workmen and miners eek out a meager existence.
THE POINTSMEN
Smartly dressed in their black and red uniforms, the Pointsmen are the Corporation guards. They police and manage the rail traffic, but more important, they are the unwavering guardians of the Rail Law.
Theirs is a powerful caste, arrogant and proud of their prerogatives. And they take advantage of it. They believe themselves sent forth on a divine mission, impose their moral code and shroud the world in a Dark Age.
Nobody dares to challenge their power. It is their technology that brought forth the Rail Society from the darkness. They founded it, or so they say. As they never directly intervene in the various concessions’ economic policy, people rarely quarrel with their rule.
They also control all sub-glacial policy. No relic from the past can circulate within the company without their direct authorization. It comes as no surprise that a very lucrative black market in relics has sprung up.
Damien is their immediate authority, whereas Palidor is the leader of the Corporation.
PEOPLE OF THE COLD
This peaceful race lives on the rims of the stations. They can withstand extreme cold without protection but consequently cannot stand heat. They have their own customs and beliefs. The Ice is their “mother”. It has always existed.
The people of Grand Star consider them primitive. Their contempt for the People of the Cold is boundless. They are only good for living off railway refuse and performing menial tasks, when they can be trusted. They can vanish overnight. Their total independence is probably what most exasperates the people of Grand Star, and why they despise them so.
It is easy to guess why the People of the Cold aren’t welcome in the Rail World. Would they want to be? Nobody has ever thought to ask. But to avoid this ever happening the Law of the Rail forbids the mixing of races.
But where they come from is a vital key in the mystery.
THE PEOPLE OF GRAND STAR (A.K.A. THE SUBSCRIBERS)
They are the descendants of the 2% of the world population which survived the beginning of the ice age. For the most part they are simple workmen, civil servants or technicians living in the trains and stations comprising the Corporation
They give CAL a hand whenever they can. Most of them also dream of a better life. But they live in fear: the Pointsmen can at any moment cut off their power or move them where they please.
Years of ignorance and propaganda have annihilated their will to resist.
THE SUN RENEWERS
Humans who yearn for the memory of the sun, dissidents of the Rail dictatorship, they are considered dangerous heretics and terrorists. They frighten everyone and are ruthlessly hunted down. Their goal is to bring the sun back to the world without considering the awful consequences.
Some are highly gifted scientists, with lasers and ultrasound canons; they manage to flocculate the dust particles surrounding the Earth. They thus create a breach in the atmosphere which allows the sun to appear for a few seconds. MA KER, their leader, has gone blind contemplating the coveted bright star.
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