Beyond

At the dawn of the information age, humanity had thought itself ascendant. Having mastered the Earth, we eyed the worlds of our Solar System with machinations borne of curiosity, greed, wanderlust, and domination. But the Unraveling, the long cumulative collapse of the planet’s ecosystem and global organized society, brought humanity to its knees and nearly kept it there. It took over a century for the world to reorganize and rebuild, and again turn its eyes skywards, but this time with a renewed sense of wonder and appreciation.   Beyond is a post-capitalist hard science fiction set in the mid-2400's, in a future where humanity has spread through the solar system after having built back from global climate collapse. While the societies that emerged after the Unraveling are generally far more equitable and sustainable than information age nation-states, the world is not a utopia. Maintaining the ecological balance on Earth is a constant struggle with 11 billion people. Even with radical abundance, differences in ideology, religion, and even resources can still lead to conflict, and there are still regions where the wealthy and powerful hold outsized influence. In these places, the marginalized continue the struggle of liberation, using whatever technology and tactics they can to undermine the power of their enemies.   Average lifespan has nearly doubled for baseline humans, and augmented transhumans can have an effectively indefinite lifespan. For the first time, nearly all of humanity shares in the benefits of progress. Radical new technologies allow people to alter their bodies to better match their own identities. And although climate change ravaged the planet and civilization during the horrors of the Unraveling, the ecosphere is beginning to recover thanks in large part to focused renewal projects that are effectively re-wilding large swathes of Earth.