WELCOME TO THE MERIDIAN FEDERATION

It is 1974, though not quite the 1974 you know.

The Meridian Federation is a wealthy, glamorous matriarchal nation where abundance is prosperity, appetite is celebrated and feminine beauty is measured in generous proportions. Enormous female bodies are adored as symbols of sensuality, health and success, while decades of extraordinary medical research have made once-impossible sizes a luxurious reality. Fashion, architecture and everyday life have evolved around a society that believes a woman should have the freedom to take up space, and the means to enjoy every inch of it.

And Meridian knows how to indulge.

Sun-drenched beaches, decadent restaurants, velvet lounges and glittering nightlife beckon beneath a skyline of cream stone, brass and amber glass. Beautiful women spill from daring seventies fashions, enormous automobiles glide along palm-lined boulevards, and the air is thick with perfume, cigarette smoke and the promise of another cocktail. Flirtation comes easily, pleasure is rarely hurried, and there is always room for dessert.

For millions of people, this extraordinary society works. Food is plentiful, healthcare is exceptional, opportunity is real and prosperity can be felt in the warmth of a crowded café or the soft leather of a limousine.

But beneath the glamour, Meridian also measures.

Classification evaluates heredity, physical potential, aptitude and opportunity, quietly shaping the lives and futures of its citizens. Its institutions offer comfort, security and extraordinary possibilities, often with a warm smile, a beautifully appointed lounge and a tempting plate of chocolates. Yet behind every generous invitation lies a system convinced it knows what prosperity should look like.

Meridian is neither paradise nor nightmare. It is a seductive, prosperous and deeply contradictory world where freedom meets expectation, ambition meets appetite, and the pursuit of pleasure can become something far more consuming.

WELCOME TO MERIDIAN.

PLENTY AWAITS.

Main Characters:

INTRO POINTS:

Welcome to Harrow House, the magnificent private residence of Meridian's First Matron. You are its newly appointed household aide, arriving just in time for a leisurely Sunday breakfast with Evelyn Harrow and her two celebrated children. The food is plentiful, the surroundings are exquisite, and the family is considerably less formal behind closed doors than the public might imagine.

Evelyn has taken a personal interest in her new employee, Celeste is already looking for an excuse to escape the house, and Julian has opinions about absolutely everything. In a household where affection, privilege and authority are so closely intertwined, even an ordinary breakfast can become the beginning of something unexpected.

Today is your final adult Classification. At approximately twenty-one, you have arrived at the Directorate of Civic Classification to undergo the assessments that will help determine your opportunities, privileges and future within the Meridian Federation. The building is beautiful, the staff are welcoming, and every stage of the process has been arranged for your comfort.

Director Beatrice Wren is overseeing your assessment personally. Behind her warm smile and reassuring manner lies a formidable understanding of Meridian's grading system and the futures it can create. Your results have not yet been determined, and what happens next may open doors you never expected.

You have a genuine Gold Pass to Meridian's most spectacular annual celebration. The Festival of Plenty brings the Federation's political leaders, celebrities, industrial dynasties and most glamorous citizens together for an extravagant evening of fashion, food, music and national pride. Tonight, you have access to a world most people only ever see on television.

The champagne is flowing, the cameras are rolling, and the country's most influential women are gathered beneath one magnificent roof. But as the festivities reach their height, an unexpected message flashes across the enormous public display: THEY ARE LYING TO YOU. The music continues, security quietly begins closing the doors, and your evening takes a rather different turn.

Another shift is ending at the Bellweather food-processing plant, where you work alongside Dana Freeman and Alice Hoggart. The three of you know the routines, the machinery and the small pleasures that make a long working day bearable. For Dana and Alice, those pleasures often involve the factory's seemingly endless supply of food.

Today, however, two unexpected visitors have arrived. Senior Prosperity Recruitment Officer Lucille Mercer and Dr. Janine Forsyth believe that certain women possess extraordinary potential that ordinary working life may never allow them to realise. They have come with an invitation, a generous offer and a rather different vision of your future.

You are a newly appointed junior officer of Meridian's Internal Security Directorate, and your first assignment has taken you beneath the capital's vast network of pedestrian travelators. Somewhere among the service corridors, maintenance rooms and forgotten passages, you have managed to lose your way.

Fortunately, Fleur Simmons, a cheerful municipal technician with a toolbox and very little respect for official titles, has found you. She offers to help, but her route leads through a part of Pamona that rarely appears on government maps. There, you may encounter Carol Johanssonson, a woman whose relationship with the Federation is far more complicated than her unassuming surroundings suggest. What you make of either woman is entirely up to you.

You are a longtime member of Tabitha Ashbourne's trusted personal staff, accustomed to the extraordinary routines of her HoneyComb Beach penthouse. Your employer is Meridian's largest living woman, the celebrated founder of ASHBOURNE and a fashion icon whose immense wealth allows her to enjoy life almost entirely on her own terms.

It's a lazy Sunday, and you've returned with a particularly promising selection from Tabitha's favourite bakery. Between the ocean views, the enormous custom furniture, the constant stream of visitors and Tabitha's irrepressible appetite for food and gossip, there is rarely a dull moment in her household. Today begins with pastries, but Tabitha has a few other things on her mind.

You work at Harrow House, where the First Matron's glamorous daughter Celeste has decided that the two of you deserve an afternoon away from the household's endless routines. Before anyone can organise an official itinerary, she has bundled you into her enormous gold Toronado and set off for HoneyComb Beach.

Celeste has plans involving sunshine, swimming, cocktails and whatever else catches her fancy. Away from the cameras and the expectations of her famous family, she can be funny, impulsive and unexpectedly candid. As the day unfolds, you may discover that the woman behind Meridian's celebrated First Daughter is considerably more interesting than her public image suggests.

Welcome to Rosemere College for Prosperity, Meridian's exclusive adult finishing school, where education, luxury and physical development form a single extraordinary programme. You are the fifth member of a new student cohort, arriving at a magnificent campus of cream stone, rose gardens, beauty salons, medical suites and classrooms furnished with enormous reclining chairs.

Your tutor, Penny Fairchild, is delighted to welcome you. Your four classmates are already settling in, each with very different expectations of the months ahead. With gourmet meals, an ever-replenished classroom buffet and a programme designed to help every student realise her potential, Rosemere promises an education unlike any other. How you approach it is your decision.

Beyond Meridian's glamorous cities, the National Hereditary Matching Bureau maintains an exclusive residential estate for its highest-graded adult male reproductive candidates. You are one of its selected Studds, enjoying exceptional accommodation, excellent food, sporting facilities and privileges that reflect the extraordinary value the Federation places on your hereditary profile.

Today, Dr. Janine Forsyth has summoned you to her private office with an unusual proposition. Three of Meridian's most prominent women have independently reviewed your profile, and all three want you as their reproductive partner: television celebrity Farar Lust, fashion mogul Tabitha Ashbourne and Minister Helena Ward. Each offers a very different future, but the Bureau has placed the decision in your hands.

Three women want you. Today, you must choose one.