“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.
• Following a brief yet bloody civil war, Briareos was split into ‘Dusk’ and ‘Dawn’ factions.
• The two sides were forced to work together following an infestation of walking corpses.

Briareos is no stranger to war; even before the conflict that desolated the Seven Systems, the planet was a harsh and barren place to live. Previous civil conflicts destroyed vast swathes of the planet and slowed the rotation of the planet to a crawl. 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, followed by the explosion which took out both the old ruling class and the planet’s politically savvy young people, meant that a political explosion was inevitable.

The civil war started soon after the Ananke Conference when the gerontocratic faction, scared by the political awakening that seemed to be happening there, enacted a bloody and brutal crackdown on the younger generations. From there it soon escalated beyond all reasonable containment. The faction who stood for the old Gerontocratic rule became known as the Dawn Briareons, let by Oscar Letts’ daughter Coraline. The faction which stood for change became known at the Dusk Briareons, who eventually fell under the leadership of Maribelle Johns, who proved herself to be a shrewd and cunning leader.

Having the initial advantage, the Dawn Briareons were able to force the Ducks down to the planet’s surface out of the Gasbags. The Dusks went more easily than initially expected. It is speculated that the reason for this is linked to the mortuary agricultural units - otherwise known as corpse farms - that they created shortly afterward. This innovative method of using a human cadaver for farming meant that the Dusk Briareons were able to feed themselves on the ground, and it is suspected that they already had access to the technology before the war started. This technological edge enabled them to fight back against the Dawn Briareons more effectively.

However, the conflict ground to a halt when some of the cadavers within the corpse farms started moving, apparently powered to locomotion by the growths implanted within them. The plague, called the Bloom for the flowers growing out of the creatures, was highly infectious and spread quickly, decimating the Dusk forces before quickly moving on to the Dawn gasbags. This new threat served to band the two factions more effectively together to fight the Bloom, and the plantwalkers it created.

The Dawn Briareons, concerned for their own stability, were initially certain that offering any concessions to the younger generations, would lead to ruin. Their hardline position has been softened by the necessity of working together to resolve the plantwalker menace. Briareon civilisation is still a gerontocracy, though this no longer simply means the oldest member of the civilisation, but rather everyone over the age of 70 has a vote to elect a single septuagenarian, octogenarian or nonogenarian to lead for the next few years. As the most recently elected gerontocrat died recently, coincidentally just as Coraline Letts turned 70 herself, it is widely assumed that she will be next elected.

The constant threat of plantwalkers means that life on Briareos is hard. The infection is capable of spreading to any animal-based multicellular organism - which unfortunately, due to their molecular structure, includes some of the gasbags. Many gasbags have therefore had to me abandoned due to becoming immense vectors for the Bloom, floating through the sky.

However, life is no better on the ground, as the plantwalkers - human and animal - crawl over the surface. Some choose to live on the ground anyway, finding shelter where they can, freezing in the night or burning in the day, relying on underground algae farms fed by light tubes for survival. Many have fled to the cities, where old power keeps things ticking over and old skyscrapers provide an obstacle for the shambling, bloom-infected masses. While Dawn and Dusk may be working together to fight the Bloom, they are still wracked by division, and being under constant attack isn’t helping with reunification efforts.

While the cessation of hostilities means that there is more intermingling, the people who live on Briareos now can be split into groups roughly along the lines of the civil war: the Dawn Briareons live on gasbags, eke out a meagre existence on their great, damaged mobile farms. Meanwhile, the Dusk Briareons dwell on the surface, seeking shelter where they can. Regardless of their current state, however, this is a new state for most Briareans, and the memory of their previous lives means that they all still share some traits. Briareans tend to be knowledgeable about technology, as even the youngest have some knowledge of how to produce and maintain it.

Those who live aboard a Gasbag broadly have lives comparable to those of serfs under medieval feudalism. While rule is theoretically by the eldest, in practice some families have risen to prominence, and even the young have authority - notable among these is Coraline Letts’ oldest daughter, Thalia, whose managerial ability has allowed her to run several gasbags in he mother’s name. For most people under the age of 70, however, life is hard: while technically free to do whatever they want, so long as the food is grown, most Briareons dedicate all of their time to farming and survival. People from all stripes of the Briareos that was work on one of these, so the expected talents of even a single farm are hugely variant.

Those who live on the ground move around in tight-knit units, trying to avoid the many threats to them both natural and human-made. Out of necessity these people have taken to wearing an increasing number of bio-technological implants and enhancements; this allows them to bring the tools of survival anywhere, on their person. The most notable of these are a series of nodules that look like miniature Gasbags - these can be eaten as a steady food supply, but also leaves the bearer without the need to eat to survive. It does not, however, remove hunger.