Zigsa's Nest

Zigsa’s Nest is the first survivarium ever built, and the model for all the others. Here Zigsa and her broos wrote the Karma Sutra and sent it out to tell the world how to survive the end times of the hanyo universe.

Inception

Zigsa escaped from hanyo town some time in [[2071], and began her long trek through the Tarim Basin to reach the Flaming Mountains. There she happened upon a narrow river valley next to a cliff with ancient caves in it. These caves had the remnants of ancient frescoes in them. exhausted by her journey, Zigsa lay in the river's mud for days, picking moss off the rocks to eat, until a little of her strength returned. Then she slowly began collecting other escapees, most of them sick and burned by the radiopoisoned desert. Gradually, as her strength grew, and with the help of her newfound friends, Zigsa began working out some ideas for a new society that had come to her while she was being tortured at Test to Destruction Centre 8. These included the Antisense Code and the system of karma.

Zigsa's ideas and beliefs began to heal her rescued people, and slowly they began to wake up and dream of a future. As their numbers grew, concealment from spy satellites and other hazards became more important, so the people began planning to deepen the caves and put in false walls to make a hideout for themselves. This project grew into a full world-building exercise, and by 2073 they had blasted rock to create the first stage of their underground hideout. The Survivors wished to fill it with the ten treasures: people, plants animals, air, light, water, soil, love, karma and knowledge.

Building

As their numbers grew, the Survivors became more ambitious about designing their new home. They rescued a number of RanDees from a hanyo lab facility, and these RanDees brought with them plans for a new kind of fusion reactor that did not require extensive water-holding pans to function. Assuming they would need those pans, the Survivors had begun blasting the rock for it, but this labour was not wasted because they converted that space into the baths and related structures of the Hub. By 2085 the Nest was fully self sufficient in food and air. It had a central forest under the baths and long tunnels radiating out from the Hub, along which the older Survivors lived and worked. Another breakthrough came when they discovered the Pushpa-Piacenza process to make babies.

Safekeep Day

Security threats led the Survivors to seal the blast doors of the Nest on 1 August 2088, which became known as Safekeep Day. However, this made it possible to send out the Karma Sutra, disguised as innocuous puzzles, to infect the corporate servers of the hanyos and spread Antisense among the victims of hanyo town. This led to a worldwide underground movement called the rootkit, spread by rootkittens. A total of 798 survivariums were set up worldwide, of which 745 made it to the Flowering.

After the Flowering

Once human settlement had shifted to the bashas on the surface, the Nest became the depository of all precious artefacts from the past, including the largest collection of printed books in the world: almost a million volumes. It is also the museum and resting place of all that is most valuable to Florian culture. Many monuments commemorate events from Zigsa’s life. The murals made by the First Survivors are worth seeing. Most Florians begin any large venture with a pilgrimage to the Nest, to contemplate their history and prepare themselves for life-changing events.