Futurescape Series

Rake Cunningham, a chip-enhanced detective, upgraded to sniff through paranoid-conspiracy theories to know which ones are worth following up, stumbles upon a case that is no typical example of corporate malfeasance. He signed on for the enhancement with the idea he'd be taking down white collar criminals and techies, or Machiavellian CEOs just too smart to be caught any other way. What he runs into instead is a plot to depopulate the world in order to return it to an Eden-like state. It will require far more than access to the truth to crush the parties in cahoots. Try a small miracle. He quickly enlists Doc Holiday's assistance. She's known as the queen of the chipheads, overseeing constant chip improvements that keep people employed who would otherwise have no viable means of engaging in such a fast moving economy. If there's anyone equipped to outfit the resistance with all the mind-power they need, it's Doc Holiday. What Rake doesn't know is the other side is led by a no less formidable pair of lovers. Garrett Rawlings is the chairman of the most powerful corporate and military industrial complex super-alliance on the planet. Simone Bolivar is an android who has entered singularity state, evolving faster than human minds can possibly grasp. It's perhaps just as well Rake and Doc Holiday don't know all that they're up against, or they might not even try to save the ninety-nine percent of humanity deemed expendable.

When steering human evolution with designer plagues proves too dangerous out in the open, people are herded into domed cities. There experiments can begin on them in earnest. Sing-Sing is tasked with containing the Singularity effect, making sure that the explosive release of creative energy continues to serve only the top one percent instead of creating an Age of Abundance. Nano Metro is tasked with preparing humanoids to migrate to the genesis ships in low orbit, where their guided evolution will continue to ensure they will one day be fit to occupy every environmental niche in the cosmos. With the Earth quickly headed in the direction of its former pristine Garden of Eden state, and plans for conquering the cosmos virtually overnight well in hand thanks to a well-managed Singularity effect, Garrett Rawlings, Simone Bolivar, and the rest of the FutureScape corporate and military-industrial complex super-alliance ought to be able to relax. But they quickly realize that playing masters of the universe games pits them against alien civilizations with far more experience in this area. If they can't hide the fact that Earth has entered Singularity state until they're ready to fight a war for dominion of the cosmos, they'll be blown off the map before the game has even started. It's the first time that the all-powerful Garrett Rawlings and his lover, Simone, whose mind entered singularity state long ago, have ever played the roles of the underdogs. Garrett and Simone face ever-increasing problems on the home front as well. The resistance, led by Rake Cunningham and Doc Holiday, is coming on strong. If Garrett and Simone aren't careful, the Age of Abundance they've worked so hard to forestall could come around sooner than anyone imagined. And that would mean a total loss of control--the one thing Garrett and Simone will not tolerate.

The planet's ruling elite, the top one percent, finally manages to do the unthinkable: stir the dragon. They awaken the ninety-nine percent from their apathy and despair and sense of helplessness after decades of systematic abuse and subjugation. But the results are not what anyone could have anticipated. The FutureScape board's ongoing genocide, conducted in an effort to return the planet to its once pristine, Garden-of-Eden state, causes a split among the survivors. A small percentage of humanity will remain on Earth to learn the game of power and politics from the masters in an effort to beat them at their own game. To gain the skills, in short, to govern more than just one planet. Why is that so important? Because the rest of humanity, now evolved into humanoids and hybrids, and more aptly labeled trans-human or post-human, are not long for this world. They will use the incubators of the genesis ships in low orbit around Earth, driving their bio-diversification, to colonize not just the solar system, but the multiverse, taking advantage of warp drive engines and other ahead-of-their time technologies. Technologies that might not have been available, ironically, for ages to come, were it not for the desperation of countless minds to escape from under the thumb of a small oligarchic group. Proving, at least for the religiously inclined, that the devil too shall do God's work. And why is it so important that we do more than colonize the cosmos in a systematic way, starting with our solar system, then branching out to our nearest star, and so on? Quite simple, really. Turns out that looming threats from within posed by fellow transhumans, as well as from without—from lifeforms already populating the multiverse—with power to destroy entire galaxies with a wave of their hand, means that spreading out to the rest of our solar system is no real protection at all.