The Contingency

“Heroes? Yes, I would say that's accurate. Not just for what they will do, but simply for choosing to do so. It is an unimaginable sacrifice. Every volunteer, every person who chooses to volunteer, is a hero in their own right, who has elected to devote themselves to others. They are here to make our civilisation a safer place.”

– General Ssthenar, a Founding Member of the Contingency

In the year 3220, in the shadow of successive planetary-scale disasters, the Coalition of Mythhaler made a choice: never again would they be caught unprepared. 

Each disaster shook the very foundations of society and, each time, the response had come too late. So the Coalition built something that could never sleep, never forget, never waver – even across centuries. 

They called it the Contingency.

The Contingency is Mythhaler's last line of defence: a response organisation designed to operate in the immediate and long-term aftermath of crises threatening the survival of Mythhaler. It exists and functions outside the scope of any single government’s authority, empowered instead by a treaty granting it wide-reaching jurisdiction in times of extreme disaster. Its mandate: stabilise, intervene, rebuild. Stop the worst before it spreads. Save lives at any cost.

At the heart of the Contingency are Minds, digital duplicates of trained volunteers, installed into vast, purpose-built forms: infrastructure hubs, drone fleets, carriers, stations, factories, etc. Each has their own specialisation within the program, as well as the ability to adapt themselves on-the-fly to match whatever crisis civilisation may face. The Contingency draws from a pool of around fifty volunteers, either Nassigussa or Nassoid. Each is trained, tested, and chosen through rigorous training and psychological exams, lasting on average a year and a half. Then, a cognitive copy – called a negative – is taken. This is a snapshot of the recruit's self at that moment in time. From a single negative, the program instantiates multiple Minds in various forms. Over time, these Minds may diverge significantly in personality, perspective, and capabilities, shaped by the crises they face and the roles they are assigned. After the copying process, the original volunteer is free to return to their life, while the Minds created from their negative are placed into hibernation, potentially for centuries or millennia, awaiting activation for when they are needed most.

When they wake, if they wake, the new copy – the new member of the Contingency – is thrust into the midst of a crisis, far from home and everyone they knew and loved. Their body is alien, their peers are long dead, but their Mind is unchanged. Joining the Contingency is a sacrifice, and every member must make peace with that.

The Contingency was never designed to be a perfect solution, but it was possible. It was the solution Mythhaler could build before it was too late. Growing fears of existential threats to Mythhaler enabled the initiative to be pushed through, and helped bypassing much of the public debate around duplicating intelligences. Subroutines and background processes enable the Contingency to build up its resources while the Minds are in hibernation, preventing them from becoming obsolete. While the world may forget about them, they are still learning, adapting, stockpiling, preparing. So when the day finally comes – when everything else has failed – they won’t wake as relics.

They’ll wake ready.

The Contingency is a horizontal organisation by design – a network of equals entrusted with the same extraordinary power. Authority flows not from rank, but from context: each Mind has its own focus and field of expertise making them more or less suited to lead in a specific crisis. This decentralised structure allows for faster, more responsive action. Thus, over time, the program naturally developed into several core branches, which serve to define the broad areas of responsibility within a crisis. Mechanically, these specialities are reflected by Module categories: Relations, Oversight, Transport and Construction.

The “boots on the ground” of the Contingency, this branch has two roles. Firstly, as a diplomatic bridge between Nassians and the Contingency, acting as intermediaries and a public face of the Contingency. Secondly, to administer direct support for the population during crises, whether this be medical aid, disaster relief teams, or a temporary police force. Members of this branch of the Contingency often control fleets of multipurpose drones able to adapt where necessary to fit in, and are recruited from across the population.

The command and oversight branch of the Contingency, in charge of finding and storing information, diagnosing problems, and co-ordinating relief efforts with other members of the Contingency. Individually, this branch may not move mountains, but they give you the information and resources required to do so in the most effective way possible. Minds in this branch of the Contingency tend to control large databanks or facilities, and are often recruited from government, university or industrial bodies.

For the large-scale crises the Contingency faces, resources need to be distributed massive distances. This is where the transport branch of the Contingency comes in, recruited from all over the population. These Minds often take the form of spaceships, ocean liners, or fleets of drones, to shuttle whatever you want wherever you want it.

Both literally and figuratively the powerhouses of the Contingency, the fabrication branch is composed of factories, power plants, oil rigs, and agricultural facilities. During hibernation, these facilities tick over in the background, keeping themselves running and producing materials for Nassians to make use of. Once a crisis starts, however, they kick into gear, mass-producing the resources required to save lives. Due to the specialised knowledge needed to operate these facilities, many of the Minds recruited into this role were specialists in this field before volunteering.