Unified National Nominate

**Unified National Nominate (UNN)** is a supra-national political union of Earth's nations, originally founded to contain megacorporations through strict oversight, regulation, and where necessary, nationalization. In the 22nd century, it is the largest polity on Earth, maintaining strategic control over a fractured, divided planet. Although the UNN remains nominally in charge, the world remains split between heavily armed, rival regions with simmering tensions. Worse yet, the UNN has failed to win the hearts and minds of the lower classes.

## History

The events on Citadel station have led to a general unrest and rebellion against megacorporate government. The previously ineffectual governments of Earth’s nations began to band together and founded the Unified National Nominate (UNN) to stand up to the suddenly defensive corporations. Governmental controls over business were stepped up, and national governments instituted severe political controls, using newly built-up military forces and secret police to force control over society and business. Bureaucracy became the watchword of the day and technological development slowed to a crawl, as everything had to be signed and countersigned in triplicate. Attempts were made by the UNN and national governments to take over megacorporate holdings completely, but the corporations were not yet powerless and they made a stand. An ever-widening rift between the public and private sectors developed, as governmental attempts to shut down noncompliant factories were met by well-armed corporate soldiers and other mercenaries. A wary truce settled between governmental and megacorporate forces and things became stable for nearly four decades. By 2102, with technological advances considerably slowed, the world has devolved further into a group of heavily armed rival regions. The UNN maintained strategic control, but failed to win the hearts and minds of the lower classes. The unsteady truce between the public and private sectors held shakily in place.

A revolution came when UNN Nobel Laureate Marie Delacroix, working under a grant from the dwindling resources of the skeletal TriOptimum Corporation, published preliminary research findings of a Faster Than Light (FTL) mechanism. The device works by bending and warping space around the device. Once the rumours of the device leaked out, public enthusiasm exploded uncontrollably. Rather than quash the initiative, the UNN allowed TriOptimum to develop a prototype, which tested successfully. TriOptimum then began production of an FTL starship, the *Von Braun*. Citing various obscure regulations, the UNN delays the launching of the starship, unwilling to let a corporation control the only FTL-capable starship in existence.

However, by 2111 the UNN's hand is forced. The device performed as advertised (though the full extend of its power and capabilities remained unknown), catching the imagination of the public. With deteriorating conditions on Earth and the disappointing results of Solar System colonization efforts, the Nominate decided to seek new opportunities outside the Solar system. Months of debate, negotiation and threatmaking follow, as the UNN wrestled with the resurgent TriOp over the shape of the project, culminating in the mysterious death of one of the most vocally anti-TriOptimum UNN officials. Before the government/corporate split devolved into open war, however, a compromise was brokered by William Bedford Diego, a UNN Navy captain, husband of a TriOptimum board member and the son of the infamous Edward Diego.

The Von Braun would be allowed to make a maiden FTL voyage, but only with an accompanying UNN escort. The military heavy destroyer *Rickenbacker* is selected to accompany the *Von Braun*, attached to its dorsal side. A UNN Marine, Navy, and OSA contingent will be stationed on the destroyer to defend their civilian charges from potential alien attacks. UNN propaganda focuses on this angle, including fanciful simulations of a potential confrontation between alien warships and the heavily armed *Rickenbacker*. The excitement fueled talk of discovering extraterrestrial forms of life, a topic more or less forgotten since exploration of the solar system turned up only a series of barren, lifeless landscapes. Anatoly Korenchkin, TriOptimum CEO and principal shareholder, was chosen as the captain of the Von Braun, despite Captain Diego’s objections. There are strong and fairly substantiated suspicions that Korenchkin ordered the assassination of the UNN official some months earlier. Marie Delacroix was appointed the Von Braun’s chief engineer, tasked with keeping her nascent FTL drive functioning. Dr. Delacroix is vocal about preferring a longer period of testing for the FTL drive and goes on record as saying that the ship is not yet ready for the field. However, pressure to launch the mission is growing daily, and the Von Braun/Rickenbacker mission embarks in early 2114.

A few months into its historical journey, the situation slowly deteriorated. Tensions ran high between the civilian elements of the *Von Braun* and their military counterparts on the *Rickenbacker*. In addition, Delacroix’s predictions prove to be accurate, as the *Von Braun* is plagued with numerous malfunctions due to its premature launch. The coolant tubes on the engineering deck constantly leak, scrubbers in the air-recirculators on the hydroponics deck have a tendency to pump out pure carbon dioxide and the integration of the core computer system, XERXES, was buggy and inefficient. These events only exacerbated the tension between the military and civilian elements of the expedition (though there is limited fraternization between the crew of the *Von Braun* and that of the *Rickenbacker*) as a complex web of interpersonal relationships begins to form. Still, after four months in space, it became clear that something was going to come to a head.

And then, the remarkable happened. On June 10, 2114, the transceiver onboard the Von Braun began receiving fragments of a distress beacon emanating from the Tau Ceti system, billions of miles outside the borders of colonised space.

## Organization

The Nominate is a supranational confederation with its own standing army, laws, enforcement agencies, and other features of a state. UNN constituent countries continue to exist as distinct entities with their own military forces, but delegate foreign policy, administration, extraterrestrial colonization duties, and a broad range of other responsibilities to the UNN. Key among these is the containment of corporate military forces that continue to exist worldwide. Although attempts have been made to create a national identity for the confederacy, such as selecting a national product in a popular poll, these attempts produced limited results at best.

The legislative branch of the UNN is the Senate, operating through its assembly and various committees and sub-committees. UNN heavily regulates corporations and technological development as a matter of course. While it throttles research and development at times, the omnipresence of the UNN allows for swift adoption of revolutionary technologies as well. Such was the case with nanites in 2082, when the UNN Currency Redefinition Act ushered in the era of a single, global currency with intrinsic value.

The UNN also heavily restricts dissemination of information deemed sensitive (such as the names of the first two megacorporations in the early 21st century), and bans tools designed for circumventing security countermeasures. The reasons are understandable, as the UNN chose to replace humans with robots in many applications. The executive arm of the UNN, for instance, chose to carry out law enforcement through m/35-16 security robots: Incorruptible, implacable, and vulnerable to hackers. Not everything is carried out by robots, of course: The UNN military and Home Office is composed predominantly of flesh-and-blood soldiers.

## Military

The UNN maintains the largest military force in existence, divided across a number of branches of service:

* Navy: Responsible for the UNN military's technological sophistication, maintaining and staffing its ships, and conducting research.
* Marines: The principal combat force of the military, fighting the battles of the UNN on land and in space. Marines are experts in combat techniques and perform a variety of duties, including subjugation of rogue colonies, prisoner transportation, and staffing the UNN Honor Guard.
* OSA: Officially a research branch, the OSA is actually the UNN's secret police and black operations division. OSA members are trained in psi techniques and used for interrogation, assassination, counter-intelligence operations and more.

The Colonial Air Service cooperates with the UNN Navy and Marines, providing airborne services for colonists and transportation of convicts.

In practice, the UNN military is a well-financed, ruthless force. A combination of efficiency and intense secrecy allows it to maintain the UNN's position as the most powerful entity on Earth.

UNN military equipment is a mix of reliable and experimental technologies, in part due to the low tolerances expected in military specifications. This allows highly experimental weapons, like fusion cannons, to be procured with a minimal amount of testing and development, particularly for long-term environmental impacts.

## Notable members

* William Diego
* Croker
* Marie Delacroix
* Thomas Suarez
* Malone
* SOLDIER G65434-2

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 System Shock 2 manual: "*In 2072, Earth and the colonies elsewhere in the solar system are governed by vast megaconglomerates, the largest of which is the TriOptimum Corporation. Most people have little to complain about, though there are rumours of strange research projects on mutated humans locked away in corporate labs. However, when a TriOptimum employee named Edward Diego, with the help of a hired hacker, released the ethical constraints on a powerful AI named SHODAN (Sentient HyperOptimised Data Access Network) on Citadel Station, everything changed. SHODAN went rogue, killed most of the Citadel inhabitants and transformed many of the rest into cyborgs. Only the actions of the hacker, overlooked at first by SHODAN, were able to avert the destruction of Earth, as plotted in one of SHODAN’s many plans. The hacker destroyed a mining laser aimed at Earth and jettisoned a group of biological “groves” (laboratories in which SHODAN was developing mutagenic viruses for use on Earth). He then blew up a set of antennae through which SHODAN planned to download her code into Earth’s computers and, finally, destroyed the space station and SHODAN herself. Earth’s close call sent shock waves throughout the world and disturbing indications of similar rogue activity were discovered in several other corporate AIs.*

*The events on Citadel station have led to a general unrest and rebellion against megacorporate government. The previously ineffectual governments of Earth’s nations were now banding together to form the Unified National Nominate (UNN) and stand up to the suddenly defensive corporations. Governmental controls over business were stepped up, and national governments instituted severe political controls, using newly built-up military forces and secret police to force control over society and business. Bureaucracy became the watchword of the day and technological development slowed to a crawl, as everything had to be signed and countersigned in triplicate. Attempts were made by the UNN and national governments to take over megacorporate holdings completely, but the corporations were not yet powerless and they made a stand. An ever-widening rift between the public and private sectors developed, as governmental attempts to shut down noncompliant factories were met by well-armed TriOptimum soldiers and other mercenaries. A wary truce settled between governmental and megacorporate forces and things became stable… for a while. Now, thirty-five years later, with technological advances considerably slowed, the world has devolved further into a group of heavily armed rival regions. The UNN maintains strategic control, but has failed to win the hearts and minds of the lower classes. The unsteady truce between the public and private sectors holds shakily in place.*

*Then, UNN Nobel Laureate Marie Delacroix, working under a grant from the dwindling resources of the skeletal TriOptimum corporation, publishes preliminary research findings of a Faster Than Light (FTL) mechanism. The device works by bending and warping space around the device.*

*Delacroix 03.Dec.08 Re: Madness*

*To: Korenckin, Anatoly*

*Anatoly, you ask to me to provide you an executive brief of the potential side effects of the real world utilisation of the FTL device. Are you sure you want to know? What if I told you it would somehow introduce an inconsistency into the chronographic continuum with entirely unimaginable results? What if I told you Einstein was right and the thing wouldn’t work at all? What if I told you it could bend space and not be able to bend it back? Would any of those things halt your crusade to get TriOp back on top?*

*However, Delacroix herself has serious concerns about the reliability of the device and its unexplored*
side effects.

*Once the rumours of the device are leaked out, the UNN is unable to control public enthusiasm. The UNN allows TriOptimum to develop a prototype, which tests successfully. TriOptimum then begins production of an FTL starship, the Von Braun, but the UNN refuses to let it out of the naval yards, citing various regulations about tests that must be done before approval can be given. Popular opinion is that the UNN simply doesn’t want to let TriOptimum gain the amount of power that the only working FTL ship would grant it.*

*By 2111, it is clear that the device performs as advertised. However, the potential side effects of its extended use remain unknown. The device has caught the imagination of the public. With the conditions on Earth worsening and the disappointing results of the in-system colonisation, hopes are high for brighter pastures outside the confines of our solar system.*

*However, the UNN is loath to allow TriOptimum to be the principal beneficiary. Months of debate, negotiation and threatmaking ensue, culminating in the mysterious death of one of the most vocally anti-TriOptimum*
UNN officials. Before the government/corporate split comes to open war, however, a compromise is reached between the UNN and TriOptimum, brokered by William Bedford Diego, a UNN Navy captain, husband of a TriOptimum board member and the son of the infamous Edward Diego.

*The Von Braun will be allowed to make a maiden FTL voyage, but only with an accompanying UNN escort. The military heavy destroyer Rickenbacker will be tethered to the Von Braun for the FTL journey, via a complex set of interlocks between the two ships’ systems. UNN personnel will be stationed aboard the Rickenbacker, ready to deal with any hostile aliens. A fanciful news video shows hypothetical footage of the two ships facing a fleet of menacing “alien” ships and of the Rickenbacker detaching to fight while the Von Braun escapes.*

*Korenchkin 04.Dec.08*

*Re: Madness*

*To: Delacroix, Dr. Marie*

*Marie, thank you for your insight on the FTL drive. We will take your comments under advisement. Please note that we have asked the Seattle group to move the date of the primary device trials up by two months, to commence on 19.DEC.08.*

*Diego 17.Mar.04*

*Re: Yanking My Chain*

*To: Korenchkin, Anatoly*

*Anatoly, there's only so much corporate calisthenics I can go through before I start to feel a little queasy, so let's get down to brass tacks here. We don't like each other. We each have our own motivations for undertaking this mission. So let me give you a little warning. I cannot be circumvented, I cannot be tricked, I cannot be manipulated and I cannot be bought. You come at me straight and keep the fancy manoeuvres for your next board meeting. Just because my father swam with the sharks doesn't mean that I do.*

*The excitement once again fuels talk of discovering extraterrestrial forms of life, a topic more or less forgotten since exploration of the solar system turned up only a series of barren, lifeless landscapes. Anatoly Korenchkin, a brutally effective TriOptimum executive, is chosen as the captain of the Von Braun, despite Captain Diego’s objections. There are strong and fairly substantiated suspicions that Korenchkin ordered the assassination of the UNN official some months earlier. Marie Delacroix is appointed the Von Braun’s chief engineer, tasked with keeping her nascent FTL drive functioning. Dr. Delacroix is vocal about preferring a longer period of testing for the FTL drive and goes on record as saying that the ship is not yet ready for the field. However, pressure to launch the mission is growing daily, and the Von Braun/Rickenbacker mission embarks in early 2114.*

*A few months into its historical journey, the situation has begun to deteriorate. Tension is running high between the civilian elements of the Von Braun and their military counterparts on the Rickenbacker. In addition, Delacroix’s predictions prove to be accurate, as the Von Braun is plagued with numerous malfunctions. The coolant tubes on the engineering deck are constantly leaking, the scrubbers in the air-recirculators on the hydroponics deck have a tendency to pump out pure carbon dioxide and the integration of the core computer system, XERXES, is buggy and inefficient.*

*Korenchkin 15.Jun.14*

*Re: First Contact*

*To: Zhukov, Vladimir*

*We’ve picked up a transmission from the surface of Tau Ceti 5. I have been in negotiation with Captain Diego of the Rickenbacker and after some... coercion, he’s agreed to go planetside as a joint venture. Imagine, this historic mission might become even more historic. First Contact. And who is there to get exclusive rights to all media, patents and land grants? TriOptimum. Miri, I told you this would be worth it.*

*These events only exacerbate the tension between the military and civilian elements of the expedition (though there is limited fraternisation between the crew of the Von Braun and that of the Rickenbacker) as a complex web of interpersonal relationships begins to form. Still, after four months in space, it becomes clear that something is going to come to a head. The exact timing and severity of the conflict is all that remains to be determined.*

*And then, the remarkable happens. On June 10, 2114, the transceiver onboard the Von Braun begins receiving fragments of a distress beacon emanating from the Tau Ceti system, billions of miles outside the borders of colonised space.*"
2. ↑ Medium armor: "*The SenniTech class 3 armor requires a strength of 4 to equip. It is composed of a triple-layered composite of self-stiffening resins and long-chain replicating polymers. Heavier than the Dartech class 1, the class 3 also provides substantially more protection from hostile firepower. The SenniTech subdivision of the TriOptimum military provides the armor for many light infantry platoons of both the UNN and corporate military forces.*"
3. ↑ Chips: "*Crack-O's Potato Chips, voted the UNN's national food product in the early 21st century, are made from slices of common potatoes deep fried in hydrogenated oils. This treat is often supplemented with vitamins to boost its questionable nutritional value. "When you need a tasty treat, Crack-O's are the chips to beat. Eat `em by the bunch or by pound, new improved Crack-O's won't let you down." - Crack-O's Neuro-Net Promotion 2111.*"
4. ↑ SS2 fiction: "*The UNN senate sub-committee was hastily assembled. Senator Cal McGill was elected the chairman. Cal McGill had been on Korenchkin's payroll since she was a freshman. The committee was comprised of sixteen members. Seven were senators, four were scientists, one was an economist and four were senior officers from the upper echelons of the UNN military.*"
5. ↑ Nanites: "*Efficient Nanite based technology was introduced after a series of radical experiments at the University of Masala in 2078. Nanites are sub-atomic machines that are capable of being programmed to perform a nearly infinite variety of tasks, from forming themselves in a replication grid to form into arbitrary objects, to fighting bacteria and viruses in the human bloodstream. In other words, nanites (combined with replication tech) created the "every material". The UNN Currency Redefinition Act of 2082 opened up the door for moving financial transactions to a strict Nanite basis.*"
6. ↑ Soda: "*Invented in the early part of the 20th century, soda was created as a refreshing beverage, a mixture of carbonated water and corn syrup. For such a trivial seeming product, soda and similar beverages fueled the rise of the first two mega-corporation, the names of which are illegal to publish by UNN Information Ordnance #234/fd34. Net rumors suggest that these two corporations' marketing skirmishes turned into physical ones, promulgated by the destruction of offshore bottling plants by hired mercenary squads in 2023.*"
7. ↑ ICE pick: "*The ICE pick's limited power supply and custom-programmed nanites allow for one successful hack, regardless of the skill of the user. Banned as illegal in most countries and aboard UNN ships, the ICE pick is nevertheless a great help for any hacker who can afford the prices the black market charges for the device. A persistent rumor in the hacker underground is that "Cantor", the ICE pick's inventor, has offered his own ice-breaking algorithms as a reward to anyone who can demonstrate to him a system the ICE pick can't break."*"
8. ↑ SS2 fiction: "*In order to fight rampant technology in the private sector, the UNN had to grow its technological sophistication. Law enforcement officials were replaced by cybernetics. Tall, strong, tireless, unmoved by the sight of cash or the touch of a woman. How does one blackmail a m/35-16 security bot? Stripped of the normal, time honored tools that have served criminals since the inception of time, Anatoly had to become more creative. He couldn't beat the system. So he hacked it.*"
9. ↑ Character generation: "*Your tour of duty at the UNN Home Office is finished. After a year of practice in the honor guard, you look sharp in a uniform. And you're a lot better at keeping your rifle in tip-top-shiny condition. If you had been bored much longer, you might have been tempted to take pot-shots at the tourists. Still, the maintenance skill might come in handy someday.*"
10. ↑ System Shock 2 manual
11. ↑ System Shock 2 manual
12. ↑ System Shock 2 manual
13. ↑ Character generation: "*Your tour of duty on the UNN Antigua is finished. You kept the Antigua running for six months, when every system in the book crashed daily. But your real problems came when the convicts the Air Service was shipping through decided to try a revolt. It took you the rest of the trip to get the smell of explosives out of the air scrubbers, but you learned how to repair the damn things.*"
14. ↑ SS2 fiction: "*The battle of Boston Harbor, or more accurately, the media coverage of the battle had made him a national hero. A doomed uprising carried out by a badly led and under-equipped insurgency against a well financed, numerically superior and ruthless military force. However, the media portrayed it as anything but a foregone conclusion, and thus Diego came out a hero.*

*The insurgency, led by a band of tech-nostalgic teenagers, was put down in three weeks and the conflagration laid waste to a good portion of downtown Boston, Charlestown and Cambridge. But in the end, it was Diego who kept the peace, who restored order and oversaw the executions of the ringleaders.*"
15. ↑ HackSoft: "*This piece of software was developed by a rogue group of former TriOp employees who grew disgusted with the secrecy maintained both by their employer and UNN security forces. While officially illegal, this soft has replicated and spread virus like to almost all corners of patrolled space. When equipped, it allows one to hack into many computers aboard ship, allowing access to restricted areas, shut down security systems, alter replicator databases to allow purchase of previously restricted items, along with other nasty tricks.*

*"It's a nice toy, but is it really necessary? Jeez, the Hacker didn't have to use any off-the-shelf crap back on Citadel Station. When you boot that puppy up, you might as well be wearing a sign on your head that says: Hey, look at me, I'm a newbie!" - Todd Spokane, President, Western States Binary League."*"
16. ↑ Fusion cannon: "*The fusion cannon requires a Strength of 4 and a Heavy Weapons skill of 6. Both modifications will increase weapon damage. The first modification also increases clip size, and the second also reduces ammo consumption.*

"Early experimentation with atomic fusion yielded disappointing and potentially dangerous results. However, scientific tolerances were considerably lower in the UNN military specifications, so TriOp rushed headlong into production on these god-forsaken devices. Is fusion weaponry incredibly powerful? Of course it is. What is its long-term environmental impact? I have absolutely no idea.\" - Dr. Marie Delacroix, VB Chief Engineer.*"*
17. ↑ Toxin grenade: "*The Disruption Grenade is the only profitable product of the UNN military contractor Flegel-Kraft. Amongst a host of eccentric, technically complex weapons, including the Sulfuric Putty Pancake and the Magnesium Tommygun (neither of which proved themselves in the field) Flegal-Kraft introduced this small, but deadly, explosive. Its explosive radius is much smaller than that of an incendiary or fragmentation grenade, but almost nothing can withstand the center of the explosion.*"