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HORIZON IS OVER!The webpage remains up as a permanent archive of game material, mainly for the benefit of nostalgic players - although if you'd like to run a Horizon-inspired game for your friends, that's wonderful too. Horizon will be succeeded by Legacyin Trinity term of 2006.If you like you can look at the (sketchy, incomplete) GM notes as well. |
The Mayor's GovernmentHorizon has always enjoyed a strange sort of independence, even during the height of the Empire. The Emperor always had a fondness for the city of his birth which made him reluctant to intervene in its affairs with too much of a heavy hand; by and large he allowed the Mayors to conduct the business of the City as they pleased, overruling them only when gross mismanagement was apparent. It's mainly thanks to this tradition of self-determination that Horizon has been able to assert itself as an independent city-state since the war.The current Mayor of Horizon is Colonel Andrew Zero, a military veteran of 76 who has retained his position for some 50 years. He has a reputation for pragmatism and ruthlessness, and these qualities doutbless have something to do with the length of his tenure. In the immediate aftermath of the Last War Horizon suffered a series of weak Mayors, all of whom were regarded as puppets of one or other of the victorious Four Nations and none of whom lasted especially long in the office before disappearing or being assassinated. Mayor Zero's election is widely regarded as the point when Horizon stood up, brushed itself off, and started working its way back to being a world power again. A number of ministries, councils and departments form the Mayoral government, and the bulk of the employees of these ministries are overworked bureaucrats. Corruption is rife and rarely investigated, at this level at least; it's almost impossible to get anything done without bribing a few pen-pushers to submit the relevant forms quickly, or to give you an appointment to see someone who actually knows what they are doing. It's an open secret that within the ministries there exists small, sometimes frighteningly competant cliques, subdivisions, sub-sub-subdepartments and so forth who tackle the genuinely important matters and handle emergencies. How many of these actually exist is anyone's guess; what is certain is that everyone and his uncle has a friend of a friend of a friend whose brother-in-law who was interviewed by shadowy government agents who claimed to come from an obscure outfit with an ambiguous name, such as "the Service" or "the Double-O" or whatever. The ministries of government are as follows:
The Loyal Order of Hounds, which looks out for the welfare of the dogs of Horizon and is responsible for law, justice, and policing. All dogs in the city are honourary members of the Order and are under its protection. All the city's judges are also members, and the Order employs the City Guard - the "Watchdogs" - and is in charge of the Doghouse, Horizon's main prison. The Prime EmergencyAh yes, the Prime Emergency...Towards the end of the Year of Chaos, parties unknown set off explosions in the Imperial Palace, causing it to collapse. In a response to this and a number of other atrocities - including an attack on the Trans-Wall Colonies by the Emperor's Front and the outbreak of the Versinya Plague - full martial law was imposed. Whilst it was eventually withdrawn, a state of emergency persisted - and continues to this day - surrounding the collapse of the Imperial Palace and the subsequent investigation. Elite Watchdog units and Mayoral Legion platoons are empowered to use lethal force to investigate and bring to justice the individuals who caused the collapse, and to suppress certain unspecified consequences of the collapse. The emergency powers, the crisis they were spawned from, and the consequences of the investigation are known as the Prime Emergency. People disappear from time to time, and it is reported that they have been taken in for questioning about the Prime Emergency. Such activities on behalf of the government, however, are very rare indeed - it appears that the Prime Emergency is a very, very specific problem, and one which the government has made little headway in investigating. The nature of that problem is a national secret. The Hive and the Horizon GateThe huge gateway set into the Wall that is the official means of getting in and out of the Treacherous Lands used to be at the top of the Imperial Palace. After the Imperial Palace was blown up, the Gate was exposed; a jury-rigged scaffold allowed people to climb up to the Gate and down from it, and eventually a broad and lavish staircase was built, leading up from the Palace Square to the Gate. The new Mayoral Palace - a masterpiece of architecture - was then built above the Gate, and looks like a large and intricately-decorated outcrop attached to the Wall. It is only possible to enter the Palace via clockwork wing or flying taxi. A balcony at the bottom is used by Colonel Zero for official appearances and speeches - the stairs to the Gate are large and broad enough that a large crowd can stand on the stairs and listen to him.Thanks to its shape, and the constant stream of government workers flying in and out of it, the Mayoral Palace has come to be known as the Hive. Rumours about the GovernmentColonel Zero was never legally elected; he threatened the Moot of Years with a military coup if they did not elect him. The Embassies went along with this because they don't much care who rules Horizon so long as they aren't expansionist maniacs. |