Welcome to Kedalion. The Corporate Council invites you to visit the Grand Showcase, and see what services we are able to provide. Visitors are reminded that they are responsible for their own personal and data security while on planet, and no liability is accepted by the corporations for the unsanctioned actions of any person. I am an Opti configured to help guide you through your visit - in the event of a question requiring human intelligence, I will be able to pass you on to a human operator.
- Introductory recording for the Gamma standard visitor assistant, provided to visiting diplomats and businesspeople.

• The Kedalion system has one inhabited planet, with three (uninhabited) moons. The other planets in the system are unremarkable gas giants.
• Before the war, Kedalion was a centre of industry - with particular specialisms in manufacturing, automation, and cybernetics.
• The system was also infamous for a tangled culture of corporate espionage, both within Kedalian society and against foreign businesses.
• During the war, the manufacturing facilities spread with little thought to the quality of life for normal citizens.
• Now, Kedalion is scarred both from planetary bombardment and from the waste produced by those facilities.

From the start, Kedalion was pure business - settled close to both the resource-rich Achelia, and the (at the time) wealthy Eunomia, Myriad Manufacturing Corp and their partners aimed to create an industrial and engineering powerhouse. Free from excessive regulation. Free from the constraints of an already settled planet. Free from anyone else's taxes. With some generous trade deals set up in the early days (already accompanied by allegations of corruption and espionage), Kedalion grew quickly. The executives of the corporations made more and more money, the workers kept a good enough life that it wasn't worth leaving, and the corporate espionage operatives were kept busy acquiring or destroying secrets, technology, prototypes, and people.

By the time of The Ananke Conference, Kedalion was ruled over by a council formed of representatives from the various corporations with an interest there - their representation proportional to their contribution to the economy. The three big players were Myriad Manufacturing (the founders of the settlement, and still the largest corporate interest there), Opti Automation Solutions (a close second) and NewYou (a distant third, specialising in cybernetic enhancement). Much of the day to day running of operations was handled by “optis” (or “optimisation engines”), not true artificial intelligences, but programs which could optimise towards a preprogrammed set of goals and priorities, taking into account all the data available and any preset limits. The leap to a true AI - which could change its goals in response to a changing situation - was never made.

During the War, Kedalion produced weaponry for its allies, as well as having its own sizeable (mostly uncrewed) defence force. The corporate espionage operatives quickly found that their skills were equally applicable in sabotaging enemy production, or stealing plans, so long as they could get in system. Kedalion began the war allied with Eunomia, and later Achelia joined that side. This three-way alliance lasted until an incident in which Achelia appeared to turn on Kedalian ships. The wrath of both Eunomia and Kedalion was quickly turned on Achelia in retaliation, although many have argued that, as Achelia had no reason to turn on Kedalion at the time, the incident was more likely an accident than an act of aggression.

Factories cover huge swathes of the planet, some still pumping out drones and other autonomous fighters for the ongoing war, a scant few providing necessities for the remaining people, and most glitched out and filled with wildly flailing machines as a result of constant cyberattacks. Most of the remaining space is useless - either bare craters, or zones too filled with radiation, toxins, or other hazards for anyone to survive. While much of this is from planetary bombardments and other attacks by Kedalion's enemies, a large proportion is self inflicted, as the need to produce more and more weaponry outstripped minor concerns like environmental pollution, or careful testing of new designs.

The people live in one of two places. The executives hide away in well appointed bunkers, with access to private spaceports, desperately trying to maintain the illusion of still being in control while hoping that someone actually is. Everyone else is squashed into one of a few cities - cramped hovels stacked wall to wall and floor to ceiling, where supplies are scarce and crime is rampant. Rumours abound that the whole planet has been taken over by an Opti with one goal: win the war, no matter the cost; these are always squashed by the Executives, but often debated in hushed whispers even in their bunkers.

The general population of Kedalion lives in tightly cramped cities, and most eat the nutrient mush rations which are supplied from automated farms outside the cities, made from crops carefully engineered to be nutritionally complete. The joke is that these are enough for you to survive on, calculated down to the calorie, by some Opti which has been told to keep everyone alive at the lowest cost possible. Black market farms and food smuggling is rife, and just adds to the general background crime and gang warfare that rages through the city. Anyone who wants to venture out of their home has to either be tough and armed, or have useful skills they can trade for protection.

The Executives of the smaller corporations live in well appointed bunkers, with meals that at least taste better and provide a little more variety (though the more tech-savvy know that this is simply the same old mush, passed through an advanced 3d printer with flavour compounds added). Most of their time is spent reassuring the public at large that they are still in charge, and this is all for their own good in the long run. The Executives of the larger corporations have not been seen in some time, but it is assumed that they are the ones actually running things and setting the boundaries for the various Optis which control all the resources.