I have had an idea for a sci fi series that’s based around “drifter colonies” from my favorite movie, Titan A.E. Though, notably, this universe will have no (known) aliens, and humanity, forced into a mass exodus from a dying earth, take all that they can carry into the stars, welding their aging hulls together into cities that orbit uninhabitable, but stable exoplanets.
The exodus took less than 1% of all humanity from the apocalypse, but all who escaped were in debt to the corporations who undertook the rushed flight from Earth, a debt so large that one’s wealth is measured by how low one’s inherrited debt is (it suspiciously never goes into the black for anyone but the most loyal of corpo servants). Debt is split (with interest) to all your children, so having 3 or 4 children is common, and colonies are overcrowded.
All wealth is held by corporations, each of which has its own star system(s) and cluster of colony cities. These systems are connected by a Gravity-Pulse-Conveyor network, which uses finely-aimed “grav cannons” that propel your vessel harmlessly through spacetime, the “wave” behind and in front of you being slowed by the machine at the other end. To the passenger, the journey takes months to years. To outsiders, dialation takes effect and generations might pass. The node from Sol to Alpha Centauri has been severed, and no one knows why, but there is a perfect mirror of unknown origin, many lightyears tall and wide right at the midway point between the AC/Sol conveyor. No corporate expidition probes can report back after passing through it.
Most goods are bartered, and the most valuable commodity is culture. Baseballs, silk scarves, CDs, barbie-dolls exchange hands for hydroponic produce, metal scrap, and tools. Corp work can lower your debt and get you paid in work coupons for corporate goods, but that’s the minority of transactions.
I’d like it if you’d ask me questions about this world to help me flesh it out. I also welcome ideas!
Earth is gone, snuffed in something akin to a 60-minute war. The exodus was a scramble, and survivors were left in… Well… Survival mode. Our entire species was in shock for years as we slowly consolodated and tried our hand at a civilization without a world. After the dust settled, children grew up only hearing stories about blue skies and horses and nations and oceans. Culture is valuable because it’s the one thing that the corporations don’t control. That’s not to say you won’t find some upper manager’s personal artifact collection, but just that, unlike precious metals or “Mc-Miner-Bucks,” earth artifacts are kind of a black market commodity. Especially things made of organic matter like wood. Wood is equivailent to gold. A bonzai tree would be like a 2lb diamond.
Have you ever wondered why blues singers are so sad? They’re largely loaners, drifters, make-a-buck-as-you-go type, and that doesn’t happen when you have hearth and home. And when Earth became as dead as the stellar neighborhood, no one had a home. That kind of trauma bred spacers. If your ship works and you’re used to the life of just you and your “familial” crew, why bolt your ship to a rusting megahull when theirs debt to be lost? And space hauling is -the- big bucks blue caller job, especially when pirates exist. Ships will also pick up plucky young deck hands and adopt them into the spacer lifestyle. Fares aren’t free, though.