Omaha, NE UCAS - An Overview
By Big Red
Hoi, chummers, and welcome to
Omaha. It’s not what you expected, right? I’ll bet you were
expecting cornfields and cowboys, not skyscrapers and industrial
parks, right? Bet you didn’t know that every megacorp has a
presence here, especially the ones that focus on Matrix or military
hardware? You see, chummer, Omaha hasn’t been a podunk town since
the 1950s.
Just south of Old Omaha was a little US
Air Force Base called Offutt, which during the Cold War became the
home of Strategic Air Command (SAC), later U.S. Strategic Command
(USSTRATCOM), and finally, after the formation of the UCAS, UCAS
Strategic Command (UCASSTRATCOM) . This was the home of the 55th
Wing, as well as numerous other projects. This brought in a ton of
military contractors, from Raytheon and Northrop Grumman to Boeing,
all wanting to be close to the decision makers.
From its inception Omaha proper was a
bustling midwestern city focused mostly on meat production and as a
distribution hub for the railroad. Its centralized location was
perfect for taking east-west cargo and sending it north-south, and
vice versa. And where the railroads went, so did telegraph lines, and
later telephone lines, and even later fiber optic cable. This made
Omaha a central hub for phone, and later internet switching.
While this was all going on there was
also a little known local boy by the name of Warren Buffett buying up
shares of a little known textile company know as Berkshire Hathaway,
eventually gaining majority control. Local legend says that
occasionally Mr. Buffett would run out of money, or need a favor, and
would offer locals a few shares of what, at the time, was worthless
stock. Later, this stock would become the most valuable stock in the
world, leading to Omaha having one of the highest number millionaires
per capita.
Life went on as normal in Omaha, up
until the late 80s and early 90s. As a communications hub, Omaha
started seeing a boom to its tech sector with the growth the internet
(that is the prehistoric Matrix for all you script kiddies), and a
decline in its manufacturing and rail business. This led to the
tearing down of much of the old warehouse district and the creation
of the ConAgra Campus and the Old Market District.
It the early 2000s Omaha became a
serious hub for financial data, with FDR and First National Bank, as
well as Mutual of Omaha, Ameritrade, and PayPal all taking up
residence in the Metro. Add into that the increasing additional
infrastructure as other old world matrix companies such as Google and
Yahoo, HP, eBay, and others opened data centers and call centers.
Omaha was set to become the next Silicon Valley.
>>>>>[Not to rain on Big
Red's parade, but for anybody who's interested, you can find more
about the history of our fair city here, or here, or here (if you're
wanting info on the history of the Barrens...)]<<<<<
-
Darksylvre, Sysadmin (05:41:45/10-07-77)
>>>>>[If you're willing
to trust in that pre-Crash 2.0 drek.]<<<<<
- Big Red, Sysadmin
(05:41:46/10-07-77)
Dragons, Indians, VITAS, and the Crash
By Big Red
The early 21st century was a whirlwind
of growth and change for the Big O. Tech companies expanded into
every section of the city; Berkshire Hathaway continued to grow; and
the city continued to expand West at a massive rate, and the NAN
happened.
Omaha sits in an interesting place when
it comes to Native America, with four large reservations all within a
hour or two of the city, but no real resources. Many of the tribes in
the area, specifically the Omaha and the Winnebago, had no real stake
in the NAN until the NAN forced the Lone Eagle Incident. Omaha was
spared the worst of the Ghost Dance, being that we are nowhere near
any volcanoes, but Offutt saw a marked increase in population as it
was used as a staging ground for troops being trained to run the
concentration camps.
VITAS also mostly passed us by,
probably because for a city of over a million, Omaha was incredibly
spread out and has more hospital rooms per capita than most cities.
(This probably comes from the fact that Omaha is the largest city for
almost 200 miles in any direction.) This lead Omaha to overtake
Kansas City and Des Moines as the largest city in the region. This
also led to further expansion westward, as people wanted more and
more of a buffer between themselves and their neighbors.
Once the Treaty of Denver was signed
Omaha started to take on a new prominence as refugees from the newly
formed Native American Nations relocated by the hundreds of
thousands. For a city not used to massive poverty or homeless, Omaha
did a good job taking care of the issue of the massive influx of
people.
The poor and refugees were herded into
increasingly more crowded slums in North and South Omaha. The Red
Cross tried to house as many as possible, building tent cities at the
edges of the city, with FEMA buying out every hotel room and arena
space in the Omaha area, but the truth is the Big O couldn’t just
absorb 800,000 new people in six months. Utilities broke down;
electricity, water, and sewer services were all overworked – and
then winter hit.
Winter in Omaha is never easy, but the
winter of 2019 was one of the worst. Combine already overtaxed
utilities with extreme cold and inadequate shelter, record low
temperatures, and record snowfall, and you have a recipe for
disaster. Thousands died of exposure. Thousands more died of diseases
borne of overcrowding. It wasn’t until the Emergency Act of 2019
was signed and the federal government declared Omaha a disaster area
and sent gave federal aid offering zero percent loans for 10 years to
build new multi-unit housing.
Local hero Warren Buffett, in
partnership with Kiewit Construction, built the first of the Omaha
Towers to help house these refugees. Five of these structures were
built in total, each containing 10,000 units. These mixed-use
buildings were supposed to be micro cities in their own right. Each
included shopping, office space, parking and apartments. The first of
these was built on land just south of Omaha in what use to be called
Papillion, at 72nd and Giles. Replacing a boarded up Wal-Mart and
surrounding strip mall, it took two years to build and supplied
thousands of jobs. Buffett was hailed as the savior of the city.
Smelling the federal money, other
companies got into the act. One tower went up at the old Crossroads
Mall site at 72nd and Dodge, another took the place of the dying Oak
View Mall at 144th and Center, the fourth was built in Elkhorn on
209th and Dodge, and the fifth was built in South Omaha in the old
stockyards.
In a coup, Kiewit was able to snag all
five contracts. That is not to say they were the only ones to cash in
as large housing projects went in all over the city,. Most were
mixed-use, as the builders would be able to cash in on prime
commercial space – all on the government's dime. As long as at
least 75% of the tower's units were for residential housing, it was a
go This also led to skyrocketing property values east of 72nd, and
the wholesale demolition of some of Omaha’s oldest neighborhoods.
Along with the refugees also came the
businesses that didn’t want to be part of NAN. Omaha became heir to
many of Denver’s larger companies, such as Lockheed-Martin, Wells
Fargo, and Oracle, further cementing the city's tech and financial
cred.
But, it seemed that every time Omaha
was just about to pull itself back from the edge, something else
happened.
By 2021, Omaha was just starting to
come together, the new Omaha Towers were starting to open, more than
50,000 new housing units had been built. The refugees were finding
work and housing, and the city was starting to feel better. And then
Goblinization struck. Overnight, 10 percent of the population just
changed, often in frightening ways. Orks and trolls were suddenly a
reality, just like the elf and dwarf children of the twenty teens.
And just like everywhere else, the citizens were less than thrilled.
In 2022 the second round of VITAS
struck and this time Omaha was not spared. With the city crammed to
the gills with NAN refugees and, building up instead of out, Omaha
was hit hard. Some of the Omaha Towers took a chance and closed to
the public, sparing their occupants. Over the next two years many
projects that had started were abandoned, leaving ghost towns of
skeletal buildings, now open for squatters. Some of these are still
around today, built up by their less than legal tenants and often
nowhere close to code.
In 2029 it was the Crash. Omaha being
heavily reliant on communications, Internet, and finance business,
was hit hard. A city that rarely ever saw six percent unemployment
was now topping 30 percent as businesses closed, merged or
restructured in the wake of the Crash of ‘29.
Out of the Ashes
By Big Red
With the Crash of ‘29, and federal
aid running out, Omaha stopped growing and land prices plummeted.
Eventually the new megacorps started moving in, seeing opportunity in
the heartland of America. Slowly at first, and then more rapidly,
Omaha started to recover.
One of the first things that the
megacorps did when moving in was to buy up the downtown area and
install their own police. Lone Star got the contract for most of
Omaha, but Knight Errant got it for Downtown. During the rough years
many of the subdivisions out west became small walled enclaves, and
the poor were pushed further north, south, and east across the river.
Offutt Air Force Base grew in size and scope, taking up many of the
functions of Colorado’s Cheyenne Mountain.
By 2050, Omaha was once again a
bustling city and a center of Matrix, biotech, and transportation
services. The downtown area was remade again, this time instead of
demolishing everything that came before the megacorps decided to
leave the Old Market mostly intact, but building over it. Most of the
undesirables have been moved out of the city to Council Bluffs, North
Omaha, or South Omaha.
What we ended up with is the very
segregated community we have today.
>>>>>[I remember great
grandaddy Sylvre talking about how it used to be in the "twenty
and sixteen" as he called it. He said people out west thought
everything east of 72nd was an unsafe ghetto... Of course, South O
wasn't as rough and tumble then as it is now. Nowadays you take your
life in your own hands crossing the street there - day or
night.]<<<<<
- Darksylvre, Sysadmin
(02:10:45/10-08-77)
>>>>>['Nowadays'? 'Rough
and tumble'? Who talks like that? Who taught you to talk, Dorksylvre,
your grandmother?]<<<<
- Kuroneko
(02:12:21/10-08-77)
>>>>>[Dorksylvre... Hurr
hurr hurr - you're soooo original... Keep recycling those jokes.
They'll be funny again... someday...]<<<<<
- Darksylvre, Sysadmin
(02:20:12/10-08-77)
Bugs, Halley's Comet, SURGE, and a
Dragon
by Darksylvre
Omaha got a new surge of refugees when
Chicago turned into Bug City back in 2055. This time, the city was
ready and absorbed a good number of the refugees. Despite the city's
readiness and the media's “effort” to get people to “pull
together” and help their “fellow man”, the segregated nature of
the city remained intact. The rich moved out west, and everybody else
moved (or was relegated to) the outskirts in the north, south, and
eastern portions of the sprawl.
The OU grew quite a bit as some of the
city's have-nots spilled over into Market Rat turf. At first the
Market Rats weren't too keen on sharing with “breeders and trogs”
at first, but after Knight Errant stepped up patrols to quell any
“rioting”, everybody worked together to see to it the OU was left
in peace – at least for a little while. Of course, the way KE and
the media like to portray it, the heat backed off because of what was
going on topside.
After Omaha's first big wave of Chicago
refugees, there were whispers and rumors that the Universal
Brotherhood was in town. After the Awakening, Omaha loosened up its
conservative image a bit. Magic was studied at UNO, Bellevue
University, and even most of the high schools. We even got our own
local celebrity mage (more on him below). Still, Omaha's conservative
image wasn't so loose as to allow bugs in. Overnight people were
seeing insect spirits in darkened alleyways, in the storm sewers,
even in the toilet.
The madness lasted for three years and
became so bad that Knight Errant and Lone Star started scanning
people at public venues. Religious events even had to have special
permits from the city and the heat's paranormal squads to come to
town. After a while the fever broke. The Universal Brotherhood,
despite its insidious nature, never came to Omaha, but the paranoia
and fear did leave a lasting impression – or perhaps even a scar –
on the religious community.
Things went back to normal for a couple
of years, and then true to form, life in Omaha got interesting again.
In 2061, Halley's Comet came roaring through our neighborhood and the
mana levels spiked. The SURGE (Sudden Unexpected Recessive Genetic
Expression) brought a new round of changes to society. Without
warning, we were no longer just dealing with orks, elves, and trolls.
Now we had oni, minotaurs, pixies, and changelings to boot!
Humanis and Alamos 20,000 had a field
day with this new wave of metatype diversity. But, not being ones to
set on the laurels of their acceptance, some elements took things
into their own hands. A fledgling movement started in Omaha, calling
itself the Metahuman League. The group's goal was to combat the hate
with education and understanding. It didn't take long for the idiots
in Humanis to mistake that stance for weakness.
In 2063, a group of “concerned”
citizens marched on a Metahuman League town hall event with blood on
their minuscule minds. Surprisingly, nothing happened, especially
after two attendees led a handful of mages in bringing their own
magic abilities to bear on the troublemakers. A Native American
shaman named Talks-With-Thunder and another individual who calls
himself Wakinyan not only helped to erect a barrier, but also sent
the cowards running – straight into the hands of Knight Errant.
The news reports and Knight Errant both
reported that the drekheads were scared so bad some of them actually
turned their blue jeans brown. After the air cleared and Knight
Errant released an “official” report, the public learned Omaha
had a new resident – a dragon. Wakinyan, as he prefers to be called
(his real name is Sturmschwinge or Stormwing), was apparently
awakened by the tearing open of the Watergate Rift when Dunkelzahn
was killed in 2057.
This revelation generated a lot of
talk. The city council and military officials were conflicted. Some
saw the dragon's presence as a threat, considering the shakeup
Ghostwalker's appearance caused. Other groups saw the dragon's
presence as a boon to Omaha's cultural and economic sectors,
considering the wealth dragons command in modern society and the
curiosity some (like Dunkelzahn and Perianwyr) have exhibited in the
same.
In the end, the city, the military, and Wakinyan came to an understanding. Having made lucrative investments in several companies, including the startup Halifax Protein Products, he currently resides in an undisclosed location south of Omaha.
Of course, not everybody was on the
same page. Some Native Americans protested Stormwing's naming himself
after the Lakota thunderbird. The Skinwalkers, a local Native
American gang (or “extremist group”, as the media call them) even
vowed to destroy him for his “crass cultural appropriation” of a
sacred name. Needless to say, Wakinyan isn't losing any sleep over
the debate.
The biggest mystery of all is
Wakinyan's origin. When asked if he had followed Ghostwalker through
the rift, he simply claimed that he woke up when he felt Dunkelzahn's
death, assumed human form, and came to Omaha to hang out and watch
things unfold. When asked how he met Talks-With-Thunder, Wakinyan
simply replied, “We're old friends.” Naturally, this has led many
to believe that either Wakinyan was in Omaha in human form long
before the Big D died, or that Talks-With-Thunder is immortal, like
the legendary Harlequin. Whichever story is true, neither one is
budging from their original story.
>>>>>[You don't know half of their backstory, kiddies. If you even knew a quarter of what I know about those two, the hair on your hair would turn gray. But enough about what I know. Carry on, young runners, carry on!]<<<<<
- -H- (??:??:??/10-11-77)
>>>>>[Ooookay...]<<<<<
- Darksylvre (00:16:34/10-11-77)
>>>>>[Oh, come now, young one. Don't be so stiff and boring! You live in interesting times! Don't just chronicle them, enjoy them. Live them by making your own history! Sow the wind! Reap the whirlwind! Spit in the Man's eye! Just be sure you're not spitting into the wind, else you'll get blindsided.]<<<<<
- -H- (??:??:??/10-11-77)
>>>>>[Don't mind him. Darksylvre comes by it naturally. If he wasn't stiff and boring, we'd have no benchmark to measure the meaning of our lives against.]<<<<<
- Big Red (00:46:20/10-11-77)
