Protogen

Lore & Background

Their actions directly triggered the first major interplanetary war between Earth, Mars, and the Belt. Ultimately, coalition forces hunted down their remaining scientists and facilities, dismantling the group before they could fully weaponize the substance against all humanity. The horror of their experiments left a scar on the collective memory of the solar system.

In Their Own Story

The air in Eros Station's deepest labs hung heavy with the taste of recycled oxygen and metallic sweat. Dr. Julius Stanfield adjusted his goggles, eyes locked on a containment tank pulsing with an unnatural, sickly green light. Inside floated a shape that had once been human—now a writhing horror twisted by alien matter into something unrecognizable. The subject convulsed against the restraints, silent screams vibrating through the reinforced glass. In the corner, a technician checked her datapad, hands trembling just enough to blur the screen. She knew the binary outcome waiting: either this was the breakthrough that would rewrite biology, or another failure destined for the incinerator queue and scrubbed from the logs.

Reader's Guide

Following Eros Station's catastrophic collapse, Protogen evacuated critical assets to the scorched surface of Venus. There, amidst the sulfuric haze, they initiated a desperate gambit: constructing a ring gate using the protomolecule to bypass the slow-boat limitations that hampered military logistics. This hubris didn't just trigger the first major interplanetary war between Earth, Mars, and the Belt; it nearly ended civilization. Ultimately, a coalition of former enemies united to hunt down the remaining scientists, dismantling the organization before they could fully weaponize the alien substance against all humanity.

Did You Know?

• Protogen masqueraded as a division of the Mao-Kwikowski Corporation to shield their illicit experiments on Eros Station.
• The 'monsters' created in the labs were not new species, but former human subjects horrifically infected and transformed by the protomolecule.
• On Venus, Protogen attempted to force the construction of a ring gate without understanding how the alien matter would react, risking a system-wide catastrophe.
• Dr. Julius Stanfield served as the primary architect behind the biological weaponization program that turned the protomolecule into a plague.