Editing Setting:Nutopia (section)

=Mercs=

"Merc" is the blanket term used to refer to the most elite, most heavily modified, and often most brutal soldiers the corporations had at their command. The name is derivative of the fact that many of these corporations had Private Military Companies on the payroll for security, or even as wholly owned subsidiaries. As advances in warfare and the way it was fought continued to blossom, the sacrifices that militaries asked of their best men became ever more extreme. The extensive body modification now common after the Fall was pioneered amongst the armed forces of the world first. Extensive research into prosthetics yielded replacement limbs and even organs indistinguishable from their original counterparts, or even with improved capabilities. The most extensive modifications naturally found their way to those with need of them in an operational capacity. Special forces who could look into the infrared spectrum at will, mountain troops with enhanced endurance and EOD technicians with blast resistant endoskeletons.

Northrop Grumman were the first, however, to successfully implement the most extreme modification available in terms of cybernetic and biological modification. An Illium-Russo Conglomerate fighter ace was badly injured in a simple car accident, to the extent that not even the most advanced cybernetic augmentation could save her. Under dubious circumstances she was transported to an American medical facility. There her brain, brain stem and a few inches of healthy spine were sustained in a specially designed cask. The system allowed the pilot to control the entire airframe with her mind, changing course and lining up targets at the speed of thought while being able to pull incredible maneuvers without fear of blacking out, the only restriction on agility being the strength of the airframe. 

The Cerebral Suspension Cask (or as it is or commonly known the "Brain-in-a-jar" or "Headcase") was a breakthrough of such magnitude that it, and its descendant Upload technology, warrant their own discussion. Suffice to say the military applications were incredible. Experienced troops could come back from nearly any injury, could download their memories for use in the training of other personnel, and had more command of their given chassis than any unmodified pilot. Vehicles were designed with the capability of CSC pilots in mind, leading to a great increase in the power and complexity of land and air vehicles. The process and its results were proven most publicly in a famous incident during the NATO wargames, when that same Illium Pilot, flying a never before seen variable geometry, linear aerospike propelled stealth aircraft disabled fourteen veteran (but unmodified) pilots in conventional fighters in less than five minutes in a "cannons only" dogfight.

As corporate control strengthened, the corporate mercenaries at their command made more and more use of what would become their signature modification. Pure human piloted military vehicles became alternately rarities or relics. Even non-CSC pilots used extensive uplinks to their cortical stacks to achieve the same effectiveness, and they were not preferred, their bodies took up space that might be used for armor and ammunition after all. Even the infantry began to change in major ways, bodies specialized for their given rules to such extreme degrees that they were barely recognizable as human. Armacor made famous through a television series their Paladin assault teams, 9 foot tall power armored knights fighting crime, saving hostages and shooting away to the rooftops on high powered grapple lines. The truth of the late night abductions or the messy espionage raids would only become known later. Illium went the biological route, turning the various Russian special forces into purposefully terrifying genetic hybrids. MVD trackers armed with dog noses and bat ears could hunt by a number of unlikely means, while genetically bulked hulks could tear a normal man limb from limb with ease. The Spetsnaz, ever in love with the capability for a surprise attack, even took to a number of non-standard modifications like venom injecting fangs or claws, or skin that could excrete slippery or acidic coatings.

Regardless of their shape or size, "Merc" became the term that referred to these extremely modified corporate troops. Those that remain active, still under the sway of corporate hard coding and brainwashing or simply possessed of a bloodthirsty attitude, are the most dangerous threat to physical survival that any Delver is likely to face. Conversely, those that have overcome their training and wish to assist in hauling humanity from the ashes can be an incredibly powerful ally. 

==Mercs After the Fall==

During the fall the central command structure of the mercs collapsed nearly instantly which prevented them from organizing any credible resistance. By the time a provisional chain of command was re-established it was already too late: the corporations had lost, they just refused to admit it. Before the collapse of the last holdout of organized corporate resistance, many surviving mercs were given a standing order to destroy any rebels encountered. Now nearly two decades after the fall very few still follow that directive, as most of them have realized that the new world order is here to stay and there is nothing they can do about it anymore.

Soon after the fall the scattered merc units began to re-organize, and at first the last order of their now mostly dead corporate masters were a natural thing to follow as the new settlements were poorly defended and raiding was very rewarding. But soon thing began to change the settlements began to have better fixed defenses and more trained militia. Sensing the change in the winds there were increasing amount of mercs that hired their services to defend the settlements. Things took an turn for even worse for the mercs with the appearance of delvers, the delvers competed for the same salvage and spare parts as the mercs. While the delvers weren't as well equipped or experienced as the mercs, their greater numbers began to wear down them down. The last nail to the mercs coffin was the organized an common defense for settlements and first after-fall cities, based around fast VTOL transports that could rapidly deploy reinforcement to any settlements under attack.

These days an slight majority of the mercs are either hiring themselves to the settlements for maintenance or equipment or are part of delving teams. In any cyborg city like The Junkyard or similar you can guarantee that in the bar there is an old, beat-up hardshell merc going on about the "good old days" to anyone who will listen. They tell stories about their pre-fall exploits under the corporations and stories about vast, invincible, unstoppable, burning and pillaging hordes of state-of-the-art killing machines. Those honest-to-flying spaghetti monster raider mercs that refuse to trade or barter are an dying breed, but while no means rare they are slowly being wiped out by delvers or simply by the lack of salvageable spare parts.

==Biomercs==

When the corps ruled Mercs were, as now, the greatest fear of the common citizen. Massive vehicles and and armors that prowled the streets and leveled homes on a whim. There were, however, a more secretive kind of hired muscle employed and engineered by the corporations; Biomercs.

Designed and deployed for missions where a 126 ton thinktank just wasn't the right tool for the job, Biomercs were the Corp's hitmen and assassins. Rigged with the latest and best biomods and cybernetic parts most Biomercs would never pass as human. Animal limbs and organs along with weaponized appendages created perfect snipers and close range massacre artists. They specialized in pin point precision and high speed attacks.

Perhaps even more frightening were the covert operatives. Externally a normal human, and internally shielded so that cursory scans will turn up nothing amiss, covert biomercs were the ultimate tools of deadly infiltration.

Nowadays Biomercs are becoming less and less common. They were by their nature on the bleeding edge of genetic modification, and needed constant monitoring and medical assistance when not in the field. Most died or went insane after the fall from simple withdrawal symptoms. Those that managed to survive by finding caches of medical equipment are loathe to move far from their lairs except to fulfill their encoded desire for the hunt. The Coverts, to, are a dying breed. A good deal of them went active as soon as the Corps started to lose control and were killed in the ensuing violence. Most Communities are diligent enough to catch any trying to sneak in, and some will even allow in "reformed" coverts who have gotten over their old genetic imperatives and memetic commands.