2031 to 2037

The world

The future is being built, not feared. Here are the companies, machines and places that build it. Everything here is safe to read before Book One.

How we got here

The return to the Moon

Company
Aurora Systems
A UAE energy company. Partner to Nexus Prime.
Company
Avalanche
A Seattle fusion company building reactors small enough to change everything.
Company
Nexus Prime
The most powerful aerospace and AI company on Earth. Runs the intern program and much of the Moon base.
Company
Selene Commerce Initiative
Nexus Prime's commercial lunar program, and the intern track that feeds people to the Moon.

Technology
ATLAS, VEDA and Bower
The AIs of Remy, Priya and Eden.
Technology
Project HELIO
The first stage of a Dyson swarm: a cloud of solar collectors orbiting the Sun, built to power Earth.
Technology
Homekeeper
A six-wheeled home robot found in millions of kitchens. Roy's is named Bernard.
Technology
The mass driver
A 2.4 km electromagnetic rail on the crater rim that throws lunar material into orbit at 2.4 km per second.
Technology
Personal AI
A voice in your ear (or a bracelet or pendant) that has learned how you think for years. Everyone has one.

Place
The Junkyard
Rook's salvage station in lunar orbit, 110 km up, among dead landers, rovers and fuel tanks.
Place
Nansen Deep
A city being built inside a lava tube under the Moon's surface.
Place
The Shackleton Ring
The corporate base built around Shackleton crater at the lunar south pole.

Society
The Commons Accord
The international agreement that governs work in space.
Society
Cook night
The five's weekly tradition, started in Book One. Each cooks food from home.
Society
Open money vs company scrip
The Moon's quiet economic fight: Rook's free currency against the credits the company pays in.

Fourteen engineering plates, from the Irvine campus to the lunar farm.