“We're leaving again. Sun's got too far over the horizon, so we're heading East to get into the next citadel. Helen says that there looks to be some scratching on some of the original Gasbag designs in the old city ruins. So, if you get back here before we do I've attached maps for how to find them. Best of luck to you both, and wish Julio fortune on their implanting tests.”

— From Leane, Briarean archivist before the War.

• Briareos is a single blasted planet, even from before the War, that turns slowly on its axis. Nothing else in the system is inhabited, barring small stations.
• The people get by using bio-technology adapted to the toxic environment, and constantly move along the line between night and day.
• Most Briareons live on giant, floating farms known as gasbags. Young people are expected to complete a form of national service, reclaiming the planet’s barren surface.

Briareos is not stranger to war. Conflict against enemies internal and external destroyed vast swathes of the planet and slowed its rotation to a crawl, leaving the surface harsh and barren. The long days and nights, approaching the length of years of more reasonable planets, and the vast pollution left by the war, meant that agriculture became mostly unfeasible. Still, Briareos was able to rebuild, using bio-technology to provided much-needed stability. The most obvious example is the floating farm known colloquially as the Gasbag. By using reverse engineered plant matter, the people of Briareos could pilot a portable farm to areas of promising environment, while the very method of transport was growing and ripening. When ripe it can be eaten, or used as a framework for growing more meat-like calorie-dense foods. This quickly became the staple of Briarean diet and employment, and most inhabitants had worked as a farmer at one point in their lives. People also moved along the dusk-lines, between certain safe cities to prevent drying out in the day, or freezing at night.

Politically, Briareos had been a strict gerontocracy¹⁾ for as long as anyone could remember. The logistics involving itinerant populations, and the intricacies of a vast range of supporting biological machines, required a lot of experience and left no room for error. Thus it was necessary to follow those who had had the longest time to prepare. That was the official line, at least. At the time of the Ananke Conference, it was clear that generational tensions had grown more than anyone could have expected. The passing of the previous gerontocrat, Oscar Letts, in his sleep was seen as an opportunity to foster meaningful change in Briareos.

A rough proposal for political reform was hammered out at the Ananke conference. The presence of some of the generation’s most politically active young people, along with many of the planet’s oldest, meant that the discussion stuck once the delegates returned home, resulting in the creation of a series of small local authorities, run by gerontocrats but where the young were also able to have a say.

While many were initially not thrilled with the compromise, the message of unity managed to sink home for most people. Over time, a more settled compromise was worked out, helped by swathes of new and advanced land reclaim technology which worked to make the surface of the planet - the old farms and cities - habitable again. While the older generations were generally left in charge of the gasbags and the newly reclaimed cities - old strongholds of Briareon civilisation - young people have been able to find more freedom in participating in missions to reclaim the land below.

After many centuries, the surface of Briareos is slowly becoming more habitable thanks to both a number of successful technological developments and the efforts of the planet’s younger generations to develop the surface. What was once a blasted wasteland now harbours large, carefully regulated plant beds growing varieties of hardly plant life, even as the gasbags still fly above. Genetically modified crops work in sync with swarms of robotic bees, a strange sight to those unused to them but one which seems to be helping with the terraforming efforts.

The political situation on Briareos has improved over the past couple of decades to settle in a place most people are happy with. Of course, no-one will ever be entirely happy and some gasbags and surface areas have declared independence, such as the so-called Independent Cities controlled by Maribelle John and jealously guarded with heavy weaponry and zealous guards. For the most part though, the older members of society remain firmly in charge, as has been tradition. The planet is no longer ruled by the very oldest members, but a general culture of respect towards one’s elders remains.

The main innovation in the lives of most Briareons is the creation of the Expeditionary League, a group sponsored by the planet as a means to repopulate the surface. Most young people will join the League for a few years, in part to do their bit for Briareos and in part because the commune-based structure of the League offers them more freedom than the traditional gasbag life. The League has done good work over the decade and a half since its inception, covering the planet in a thin layer of green that looks set to become ever more firmly lodged.

One of the political effects of recent years is that the planet has become far more inward-looking. While they conduct trade with other planets, their foreign policy is drifting slowly towards the isolationist end, ad Briareos seeks to look out for Briareos, and focus on their own planet’s restoration.

Even in this new age of relative safety and prosperity, all of Briareos remembers what it means to cling onto life in a hostile environment. This has fostered a culture of great respect for the elderly, meaning that most political decisions are made by the older generation. The expansion of arable land and improvements in food production capacity have given Briareons more time to relax in recent years, but the risk of hardship remains and Briareos is keen to instill in its youth a sense of Briareos as it was.

To this end, many young people participate in the Expeditionary League, travelling down to the surface to work on reclaiming the land. This has led to a slight disparity in talents between age groups, as young people who have been a part of the league tend to have better survival skills and a greater understanding of advanced technology and farming techniques. Meanwhile, the older generations have more experience with traditional farming methods and governance and leadership abilities. People, particularly the middle aged, can find this slightly disorientating, as all the people younger than them have gone off to do adventures, while all the people older than them have had very little change.

Probably the most notable bit of technology to come out of Briareos in recent years is the so-called foodless technology, allowing people to go without food for extended periods of time by attaching effectively plant matter to the person’s body, allowing them to grow their own sustenance and conduct limited photosynthesis. Initially adopted by the first Expeditionaries, this was later adopted more widely throughout society once it was found that the technology worked incredibly well to keep infection at bay.