When it takes place: The year 2010.
The Basics:
On March 23, 1998 the Galatea research satellite exploded while in orbit, irradiating most of the planet due to radiation being dumped into the jetstream with the satellite's fall. Within hours there are reports all over the planet of emergencies and people manifesting amazing powers either in response to those incidents or as their cause.
And that is where the simularities to what everyone else knows as the Aberrant universe end.
In each case of someone with amazing abilities or powers, a tragedy follows as those powers fail and the user is left marked forever by them. In the case of Randel Portman the courageous fireman was able to absorb the heat of the fire and save the children, but he now glows with an eerie flame-cast light and wherever he goes a chill follows as his body sucks the heat from the air.
And so goes the list...by the year 2010 there are thousands of these aberrations, these "flares" that light up for just a moment as if touched by the hand of god, and then settle back with nothing to show for it but scars of power. Some of them still have some sort of useful side-effects, an increased tolerance for pain or inhuman beauty, or merely an increased ability in some skill or another...most of them seem to be harder to kill than "normals" as well, something those Aberrants caught in the first wave of mob lynchings discovered to their chagrin.
Why has this happened to these people? The Aeon Society, in conjunction with a United Nations medical council, formed an initiative to help those affected by this seemingly malignant force and called it Project Utopia. Through this Project's work it was eventually discovered that those who "flared" did so because of a small node, named after the doctors that discovered it, in their brains seemed to channel a kind of ambient "quantum radiation." The only problem was that, although this could theoretically lead to some forms of great power, the bodies of these "aberrants" had only been able to control this power for a moment before violently rejecting it.
And so most of these unfortunates have become the haunted, and sometimes hunted, outcasts of maintstream society. Only the lucky few have been affected in such a way that doesn't drastically affect their lives, and an even smaller percentage have been affected in ways that are actually beneficial...of course some are just clinging too hard to their old way of life to find one that better fits what they now are.
Teragen? They prefer the name Novas. Some gifted with Insight, Anger, or Arrogance have splintered off from society in an attempt to not end up as side-show acts or as part of medical examinations. They're tired of having spent the last twelve years as freaks and outcasts, and some of them are even looking into ways that might lead to ending their body's rejection of the Quantum radiation. One member, a mysterious figure known only as Jerimiah, seems to have come further than any of them in this respect although he refuses to share how exactly he has done so. Terrorists, philosophers, and those that would think that the changes their bodies have been wracked by somehow make them better than those around them.
Aberrants? All of them are aberrants, really, in one way or another. The only difference between these folk and those that the rest of the world calls "aberrants" is that these people are organized. They realized long ago that something is wrong, some of the bigger "brains" sure that there is an asnwer to what's going on, and that the higher-ups in Project Utopia's mdeical services have a glimpse of what it is...but it's kind of hard to sneak around or break in when you stand out like a sore thumb. They try to offer a place, a sense of community, to those that have been cast out, and they attempt to reach out to those that have somehow managed to keep their places in "normal" society.
How it Works:
Divis Mal, Michael Donighal, attempted to bring about a world full of people more like himself. Something, however, went wrong. He helped release something into the world that he hoped would change people for the "better" but something has been holding them back, tainting the flow of "Quantum" that enters through their nodes.
On March 23, 2010, he will finally fix it, and the world will change all over again. No longer content to be outcasts and freaks, these people that have been denied their true potential will rise up and take a fresh look at the world that looked down on them for twelve years now.
What this really means, system and story-wise, is that during creation the character must be given a minimum of 5 Permenant Taint. Other differences include:
~Abilities and Attributes bought with Nova Points work normally.
~The wound penalty benefits gained from Mega-Stamina still apply.
~Lethal soak for 'Novas' still works the same.
~Eufiber still exists, but the secret of it's creation is closely gaurded.
Supposedly a chemist accidentally discovered an amazing treatment
for a synthetic material. Leaking "Quantum radiation" does seem to
have an amazing affect on the otherwise merely stylish and useful
substance.
~Dorm still works as per normal.
~No access to Mega-Attributes or Quantum Powers other than
Body-Mod., although the ST may rule differently, of course. There's also always the option of allowing Enhancements, if not anything
else.
~Russia and the other nations of the world can be handled however
best fits the STs vision of the world. Did it pull through by the skin
of it's teeth? Did the eruption of that Russian pencil-pusher really end
up changing the world even if his euphoric revelation only lasted a
moment? Perhaps the entire world's in the depths of an economic crises even now?
And then, of course, exactly twelve years after the first explosion Divis Mal finds that his first efforts had been hindered by some sort of "anti-Quantum" that had irradiated the planet from orbit. This time he tries with even more power, more determined than ever, and succeeds.
At this point, all the powers/Megas/etc. bought at creation become fully active as they would be in any normal Aberrant game. What they do with it then is fully in their hands.