In the near future...
BIO-HACKING has been legalized, thanks to pharmaceutical companies and their pursuit to halt incurable diseases. This has opened up the doors for a huge black market industry. In Jersey City, a young woman gets her first hack in an attempt to protect her and her friend from a group of bio-junkies that harass them.Â
Technophile, Purist, Hero
Hilt is in her mid-twenties, living in a rundown apartment building in Jersey City with her Mom. Saved from a disease as a child by a medical bio-hack, Hilt has been living with this for more than half her life. Aside from this one hack, she has steered clear of black market bio-hacks. However, after a ruthless encounter with a group of bio-junkies, Hilt takes matters into her own hands and decides it's time to upgrade herself.
Gearhead, Storyteller, Best Friend
Bard has been escaping into his stories since a young age as a coping mechanism to deal with the trauma of losing his parents. He uses laughter and sarcasm as a front for his insecurities while creating worlds and characters with similar problems. Bard lives with his Grandma in Jersey City where he runs Bard's Tales: a one-man-show where he tells compelling stories to audiences using projections, sound effects and music. He has an assortment of creative bio-hacks and most recently a projection hack built into his arm.
What is Bio-Hacking?
Real World Definition
The activity of exploiting genetic material experimentally without regard to accepted ethical standards, or for criminal purposes.
In The World of Genhack
Bio-hacking has been legalized thanks to pharmaceutical companies pursuit to halt incurable diseases. Cybernetic chips are used to increase stem cells that can prevent cancer and other diseases from killing a subject. This development caused an influx in bio-hack awareness and home experimentation ran rampant. Soon, a huge black market flooded the industry and a shift in human interest changed. Bio-hacking led to governmental collapse when regulations and legality came into question. Corporations began controlling most of the United States and the epicenter grew in Chicago where the innovators of medical bio-hacks, BIORITE and PHARMAlabs, have their headquarters.
The Genhack Movement
Generation Hack or Genhack or even Gen H began like many subcultures: with music. After a keynote speech by neurobiologist Dr. Shandi Kramer, the term Generation Hack became widely known. However, it wasn't until the Jersey City band, Solis Obitum, created a song based on Kramer's speech, that it grew to a subculture status. This song became so acclaimed amongst bio-hackers and grinders alike, that they all started flocking to Jersey City and the surrounding areas. Soon, it was the place anyone and everyone wanted to be. Most big time black market bio-hack designers began in the slums of Jersey City and their products still thrive their today.
Bio-junkies
With black market hacks on the rise, it didn't take long for hacking to become another addiction for the high and low classes. The streets of Jersey City were ravaged by bio-hacking and gave way to bio-junkies: individuals that hacked themselves with anything and everything they could get their hands on. Botched DIY surgeries left most of them scarred and barely functional, but the worst ones succeeded and stalk the streets looking to wreak havoc. At the top of the list is Pike, who leads a gang of bio-junkies that most of Jersey City fears. Hilt and Bard made the mistake of crossing his path and have never recovered.
Legal Bio-hacks
After the medical industry was thriving, corporations wanted in on the action. The first start up to successfully create a mainstay bio-hack for the masses was Lifehack. It overtook the cell phone market within three days, putting those companies out of business in less than a year.
Black Market Bio-hacks
While corporations of all kinds were thriving with legal bio-hacks, the black market industry was where things were truly successful. A lot of bio-hack designers, like Drestin, create hacks to compliment legal ones. However, designers like the now infamous DEX, create hacks to basically turn individuals into DIY superheroes. These designers are the true innovators and the best ones are funded by corporate elites to push the boundaries.
Implant Clinics
Legal or not, once corporations became the reigning power, all bets were off. Many surgeons branched off from hospitals and created implant clinics in order to help prevent DIY surgeries, some for monetary gain but the good ones cared about human life. One in particular, Dr. Jakob Grazner, is well known for caring about his patients and wanting to help society and prevent future bio-junkies.