Set up in the early days of lunar exploration, the Dark Frontiers corporation is a quasi-governmental corporate entity granted the sole rights to licence out lunar exploration. Overseen by the UN, the corporation was jointly owned by the nations of earth, paying massive dividends to each as shareholders.
The Dark Frontiers Corporation oversees all import and export from Luna via the spaceport at Frontiers Outpost and furthermore holds a near monopoly on the sale of oxygen and fuel on Luna, making it the de-facto government.
The Dark Frontiers Corporation primarily focuses on maintaining the status quo, keeping the peace and ensuring that no other faction or entity threatens their dominance or the steady conduct of business. They also have sub-departments focussing on archaeology and exploration.
The Dark Frontiers base contains the main spaceport, all basic facilities and shops and a heavy security presence. They try to maintain the image of respectable and courageous space explorers representing humanity on Luna, but it doesn’t completely hide the level of bureaucracy and corporate greed.
OreTek - Operations Division
Oretek is the primary holder of extraction licenses on Luna, having claimed one of the largest known mineral deposits on Luna very early on. The company has a very robust and no-nonsense approach. It values hard work and an entrepreneurial spirit and dislikes robots and health and safety representatives.
The mining facility actually consists of two areas. The Dawson mining facility itself, which is a large open-cast mine with lots of drills, side tunnels and huts, and the worker’s village that sits not far from the edge of the mine.
Dark Frontiers - Interstellar Archaeology Department
When the Dark Frontiers corporation was set up to oversee the commercial exploitation of Luna’s resources, part of their initial agreement with the world’s governments included taking over and continuing the archaeological excavations into the old Primori ruins. While initially a source of great interest to governments and corporations alike, the archaeological projects failed to reveal what the purpose of the structures was, or any ways in which they might be profitably exploited. Instead they descended into arguments over theories, funding and internal politics.
While the IA department technically has the right to claim oversight over all new discoveries of “archaeological interest”, the R&D department and their subcontractors have successfully argued that most newer discoveries containing functional Primori technology fall under their purview.
The Primori temple, inside which the IA department has set up its facilities, is an impressive structure, with towering pillars, arches and underground complexes. To avoid damaging possible discoveries, most buildings and facilities have been set up in a small open area that is commonly referred to as “the quad”.
While most of the area has been excavated and explored, the arguing academics always seem to find something new to investigate (and argue over), and badly managed security means that research projects often need to hire outside security to check an area before operations start.
Vemork Corporation, Panlunar Employees and Workers Union
The Vemork corporation is a robotics and engineering corporation that originally rose to fame through a combination of daring AI projects and budget floor cleaning robots. Initially subcontracted to renovate and operate a derelict Qu’nesh manufacturing facility, the corporation took advantage of a poorly worded legal document to arrange a permanent presence on the moon.
From their foothold, Vemork now attempts to expand their influence and power through a mix of shady dealings and the large number of intelligent and semi-intelligent robots produced from the manufacturing facility.
The manufacturing facility is a sprawling complex that sits above and below ground in places, and a large number of robots, as well as some humans, have made their home within the dangerous and poorly monitored slums that can be found in and around the facility.
Due to a mixture of tacit consent and lax oversight, the Panlunar Employees and Workers union has set up shop within the slums. From here they try to agitate for better rights and working conditions for human workers on the moon, and there is a small section also advocating for AI rights.
Acquired by Fluitech Solutions through a corporate takeover, Nakhimov Fujani successfully won the contract to act as the primary R&D subcontractor for the Dark Frontiers corporation. Little is known about the activities that go on within the grey laboratory complexes, but recent developments included several miniaturised processors based on alien technology.
NF are known to regularly use contractors for various sampling tasks, missions deemed too dangerous for regular NF employees or missions where a sufficient amount of plausible deniability is required.
The recent burst of EMP energy also resulted in the accidental release of corrupted nanites into the lunar environment. NF are urgently attempting to limit the damage that this incident will have on their reputation and equipment.
Dark Frontiers - Security Division
The Dark frontiers security division is unique in primarily using robots for combat duties. Well suited for regular patrols and for long term exposure to the new lunar environment, armed robots are ideal soldiers, but due to past incidents of AI uprisings, their intelligence and ability to think for themselves have been limited.
While non-combat AIs organise most daily patrols and logistics, “special operations” will often require a human operative be brought in to either perform or supervise the activity. The Modular Extraterrestrial Scanning Hub (M.E.S.H) serves as a garrison strongpoint and a central node for monitoring an array of sensor towers located across the settled lunar surface.