User:NewOriginalSchwann/Sandbox

Located in the Jovian System, the Commonwealth of Callisto is one of the commercial centres of the Sol Alliance and the largest port in the Alliance itself. Callisto’s ideal location and relatively hospitable environment made it an ideal point of colonisation when humanity first went beyond the Sol System’s Asteroid Belt, and Callisto has been a critical port since its inception and is one of the most populous bodies in the Orion Spur, with almost all of its surface covered by highly-developed urban areas. Callisto and its highly-valuable port are the subject of intense protection by the Alliance’s navy, and the moon itself is completely protected by the Callistean Supra-Atmospheric Ring Shield Generation Facility, a massive shield system locally referred to as either “the Ring” or “the Dome,” with residents often debating which local name more accurately describes the shield. The residents of Callisto are referred to as Callisteans, or Callistean.

History

The first of the Jovian Moons to be colonized by humanity, Callisto has had human settlements since 18 June, 2107 -- when settlers from United Orbital Enterprise made landfall on the moon. The Sol Alliance eventually acquired the moon in 2140 following UOE’s liquidation and Callisto became a significant area of investment for Einstein Engines following the megacorporation’s founding in 2155. Callisto’s relatively hospitable surface conditions made it, in the eyes of both Einstein and the Alliance, the ideal point for the development of a major center of commerce and trade in the Sol System. In the late 2100s an effort to rapidly terraform Callisto to a level of habitability suitable for heavy urbanization began while the first practical warp gates were set up in the moon’s orbit. The terraforming project was more successful on Callisto than on Mars due to the moon’s smaller size and succeeded in granting the moon a breathable atmosphere by 2040. This, combined with Callisto’s network of (for the time) cutting-edge warp gates, led to a massive amount of investment and building on the moon, which rapidly became one of the most urbanized member states of the young Alliance.

While Callisto’s shine was slightly tarnished by the Second Great Depression, its status as the Alliance’s single largest port remained intact and investment continued to pour into the moon. However, its system of aging warp gates began to struggle to keep pace with the demands of interstellar traffic by the early 2300s, and it became clear to the Alliance that the moon’s gates would need to be retrofitted sooner rather than later. And who, of all the Alliance’s many megacorporations, was better for the job than the original designers: Einstein Engines? Thus Callisto became the first test of the Warp Gate Project, a massive infrastructure project that would ultimately leave Einstein Engines more powerful than it had ever been and the Alliance in deep debt to the megacorporation. Despite the Alliance’s woes Callisto profited, and found itself granted even more massive infrastructure projects with the completion of the Callistean Supra-Atmospheric Ring Shield Generation Facility in 2395.

Despite the immense troubles faced by the Alliance in the 2400s Callisto has remained a heavily-populated and immensely trafficked planet, with the majority of the Sol System’s trade flowing through it even before the destruction of the shipping ports of Mars during the Violet Dawn disaster. While many planets and colonies in the Orion Spur now find themselves on shaky ground following the Alliance’s partial collapse, Callisto and its massive ports seem to be experiencing nothing but smooth sailing. At least, for now.

Environment

Callisto before its terraforming was a cold, cratered, and utterly desolate moon only set apart from dozens of other objects in the orbit of Jupiter by its low radiation levels and thin atmosphere. It was this lack of radiation and thin atmosphere that made it, and not its sister moon Europa the ideal location for humanity to settle -- even if a massive terraforming project was required. The project took 43 years and lasted from 2197 to 2240, when the moon was finally declared fit for human life. The surface, over the course of these four decades, had been radically altered.

Callisto’s environment following the terraforming is relatively pleasant and warm, and gradually becomes cooler as one moves further from the equator. This climate has seen the planet develop a relatively successful tourism industry, though its tourism industry is nowhere near the scale of Silversun. The Callistean surface, despite massive terraforming efforts, remains relatively hilly due to the moon’s surface’s previous status as the most-cratered surface in the Sol System. While many of these craters were “smoothed out” and reduced during the terraforming process the hills that they left behind are almost universal across the Callistean surface, and the sprawling urban topography that Callisto has come to be most readily known for is built regardless of how hilly the surface can become. Callisto is home to three major seas that were previously massive multi-ringed impact craters on its surface. The seas, from largest to smallest, are the Valhallan Sea, Asgardian Sea, and Sea of Adlinda.

As Callisto had no native life beyond a cellular level on it all animals and plants on the moon are “transplants” from Earth, though centuries of life on Callisto has caused a variety of adaptations unique to the moon itself. The terrestrial animal life of Callisto is typically small and adapted to urban environments, with some of the most common animals being the Callistean pigeon and the ever-present domesticated house cat. Callistean flora is similarly adapted for urban life and primarily consists of small flowering plants and some mosses, many of which tend to grow up the sides of buildings instead of expanding horizontally. Most notable amongst Callisto’s flora is the Callistean fan palm: a relatively short and quite sturdy palm tree found along the coasts of the Callistean seas and throughout the planet’s cityscape with an easily-recognisable fan-shaped leaf.

Aside from its three seas the vast majority of Callisto’s surface is dominated by densely-populated urban sprawl and large facilities utilised interstellar trade and commerce. Green space is very rare on the Callistean surface, and the massive urban sprawl of the moon has allowed it to support a massive population of approximately twelve billion permanent residents. The two least-urbanised non-oceanic locations are the northern and southern spires of the Callistean Supra-Atmospheric Ring Shield Generation Facility, the massive shield that keeps Callisto protected from orbital attacks. The twin support spires of “the Ring” are both roughly two-hundred kilometers across at their base and stretch one-hundred-and-fifty kilometers into the air, at which point both are connected by a massive ring which is used to generate Callisto’s protective shield. Free floating “ring gates” can be found interspersed throughout the shield, and are the primary point of entry to Callisto for ships possessing the proper Sol Alliance-flagged credentials.

Culture and Daily Life

It's hella.