Lore:The Drift

The Cosmatic Drift is a fairly large defined sector of space off in a secluded corner of the Milky Way galaxy. The sector's prime defining feature is the super massive uniquely anomalous Fissure in the center of it.

Composition

The sector is compromised of a handful of stars, the planets orbiting those stars, and the belt of asteroids and wreckage circling the Fissure. As well as the hundreds of space stations and planetary facilities set up in The Drift.

In the tightest orbit around the Fissure, under the debris belt, is an area that isn't inhabited due to high interference from the Fissure. However research ships and probes will usually travel here to collect data from the Fissure.

In the debris belt itself is a large fixation of mining and salvage facilities. Most will just be in an orbit alongside the debris, though some others are directly attached to debris that have been course corrected for a longer term orbit.

Just outside the debris belt is where most research facilities are found, still orbiting the Fissure and close enough for study, but far enough away where they won't have to worry about getting struck by bits of debris.

In the furthest orbits are habitation stations, far enough away where most of the Fissure's regular constant interference won't effect the occupants too much.

And beyond all that are the stars and planets. Most anything out here is reserved for habitation and mining, but some research outposts can still be found.

Government

During the early stages of colonization a sector government was formed to avoid a megacorporation taking complete control over the sector. It is mostly compromised of members from various research organizations in a council like structure. Their main goal is to keep everyone in the sector safe and updated on Fissure happenings while also providing and maintaining public infrastructure and services like most any other government. One of their other important jobs is to set safety standards for interacting directly with the Fissure and ensure that any research company can get their footing in the sector without being pushed out by competition.

In terms of control the local government has actually maintained their presence well and avoided extreme lobbying, however megacorporations like NanoTrasen are always looking for ways to circumvent them. In fact, some sections of the sector are directly owned and controlled by megacorporations, especially NanoTrasen, however the sector government still controls a majority of the space.

History

Originally The Drift was an undefined sector that simply went by it's scientific title, KT-338. The area was deemed undesirable, with uninhabitable planets and very few rare resources. The only humanoid colonization were some rogue planets that were home to a few mining settlements all run by small corporations and a couple space stations that served as habitation for the workers and transport relays for supplies every month.

This all changed with the abrupt appearance of The Fissure. When the Fissure appeared it consumed one of the planets and sent out a large scale interference wave that resulted in the frying of every electronic device in the sector. Life support on both the planetary facilities and space stations ceased and every staff member died within days of the incident. The mental state of the personnel was seemingly extremely damaged, many corpses were found with wounds inflicted by other humanoids or themselves. In some cases bodies were found in the middle of taking off their life support equipment. The damaged psychological state of the survivors is now theorized to have most likely been a direct effect of the interference wave.

Due to the electrical damage nearly all recorded data from the inhabitants was lost, the only history that was recovered was from written recordings that were occasionally kept by the staff. However nothing useful was found in these records.

It took two weeks for a ship to be sent out to investigate the radio silence from the colony. After that news of the Fissure quickly spread around the galaxy and many research focused organizations took an immediate interest and begun colonizing the sector to perform their work, and of course, NanoTrasen was one of the first to mobilize. With time many mining and salvaging corporations also took an interest after it was discovered the Fissure's produces asteroids containing rare minerals and all sorts of wreckage.