People

Eleven named people in Catena, sorted by side, with what they say and what is said about them.

The principals

Most of these eleven have a fixer card on the gig board in the development build, and their questlines and scenes are designed. Halcyon, Adeyemi and Vector are named in the game's content and exist as characters only in the design. Everyone else in Catena is a voice.

Meridian

The Licensed board, the audit floor, the mascot and the street commander.

Hale

Runs Meridian's Licensed board

Hale alone on a balcony high above the city at night, tired, a handheld scanner at his side.
Hale on a balcony above the city.

Partly built

Side
Meridian
Where
The Coil
Voice
Procedure with the fatigue left in. The join between the two is always the word because.

He is the only Meridian officer who ever sounds tired.

In 2090 he moved the Combine from the purge doctrine to the licence doctrine, after standing at a breach scar and looking.

He is the one man at the top of the Combine who explains his reasoning, and he tells you about sixty percent of it. He omits with enormous skill and has never been caught stating something false.

He does the Cascade crossword and will not write a word in until he is certain of it. He never says sixty percent about himself. Other people say it for him.

I'm going to tell you what you need. You'll notice the shape of what I don't.

You want the badge or the truth first? Trick question. The badge is how you survive the truth.

Sit. There's a chair because somebody argued for a chair.

You did it right and it went badly. Those are different words. Learn the difference tonight, not later.

Register them and they live. Purge them and we all go down faster.

In the comic Sixty Percent

She's not wrong. That's the part everyone misses.

On Commander Adeyemi

Ledger

Runs Meridian's audit function and wrote the registry

Partly built

Side
Meridian
Where
The Coil, on the audit floor
Voice
Precise and polite. He gives your own record back to you, dates included.

His rank is Principal, and he does not use it.

He never raises his voice. He asks permission for things he is going to do anyway.

When he is frightened his numbers get finer, and decimals appear. His notes are stamped between two and four in the morning.

You've been unfiled for eleven days. I've left the field blank. I'd rather you filled it.

Your alias is spelled two ways in this building. I have corrected it to the one you used at the Clinic.

There is a fee. It is forty. I would waive it and the waiver would be logged, so: forty.

You have no file. I have built a place for one regardless. It is empty, and it is the most expensive shelf in this building.

To a Cleanskin

The Captain tells sixty percent. That is a policy. I have never been able to determine who wrote it.

On Hale

Halcyon

Meridian's mascot, on billboards across the city

Designed His streetwear brand exists as content. As a character he is designed.

Side
Meridian
Where
Billboards citywide
Voice
Ad-read cadence: a few beats, a brand noun, a warm exit.

Nobody has caught his smile slipping in public. He was the last celebrated Legend of the Kindling to take Meridian's licence early, and he took it voluntarily.

The Smiling Man, a mural in Overpass Fields, shows him before the licence. People leave things at it.

He sets the camera marks himself, and the marks always put his back to the wall. He tips extremely well and does not eat. He never speaks in the past tense about himself.

His licensed apparel line is in the game's content: his silhouette, his smile, and a coat nobody in the Fringe can afford.

Fly safe, keep it legible, and let the professionals handle the scar work.

Morning, folks. Three things: check your clearance, check your neighbour's, check the sky.

Tier two out east tonight. Shutters down, kettles on, nothing to see. And that's the good news. That's genuinely the good news.

Insurance is boring and so am I. Check your clause before the season turns.

Smile for the checkpoint, rookie. The city loves us again for exactly one photo.

...Do you know how long I've been smiling? Neither do I.

Commander Adeyemi

Commander of Meridian Security

Designed She is named on the creator's Meridian card. As a character she is designed.

Side
Meridian
Where
The Coil, with her units on the streets
Voice
Plain orders.

She addresses officers by surname, never uses a euphemism, and never criticises Hale to a junior.

Meridian Security's units under her carry her doctrine into the street.

The Captain counts you. I'd have done it the other way and we'd be having a shorter conversation.

I'd have done it in one bad year. He's doing it in twelve. Count the two totals for me sometime.

Hold. If we're wrong tonight, this street stops letting us walk down it.

I'm not asking you to agree with me. I'm asking you to be exact, and I'd rather have exact than agreement.

The Undercurrent

Nyx Static.

Nyx Static

The pirate broadcast, and the voice every Legend hears first

Meridian technicians track a signal across a wall map of the city, their screens full of green static.
Meridian technicians chase her signal.

Partly built Her place as the Deadband announcer is designed.

Side
The Undercurrent
Where
Lowline, and over every banner in the Deadband
Voice
Present tense, second person plural, describing with total accuracy what she cannot see.

Nobody has confirmed seeing her.

Before she speaks there is half a second of carrier tone, the same half second every time. Lowline's static-punk producers all sample it. She does not take calls.

Once a year, on Seal Day, there is a minute of nothing with the carrier tone under it. Afterwards she picks up where she left off.

As the Deadband's announcer she does not cheer and does not preach.

New signature on the grid. Somebody's warm out east. Be nice.

Plaza's gone green. Deck's still arguing. Mast is on fire, as usual.

Parade's on the Row. Four blocks of it. Somebody's kid is up on somebody's shoulders and she's bored. Good. Bored is the best thing that's happened to this city.

Three banners on the apron and none of them moving. Fourth hour. I hate this bit and so do you.

Checkpoint's live on the overpass. Go under, not over.

In the comic Pirate Signal

Scrapline

The boss, the archive and the champion.

Big Ferro

Scrapline's boss, and the keeper of the death-book

Partly built

Side
Scrapline
Where
The Ledger House, in the Yards
Voice
The shortest true thing, then silence.

He keeps the death-book at the Ledger House and signs it personally. The book itself has its own section.

He never says hero and never promises a rescue.

Benefits are paid in person on the Ledger House quay steps.

Name goes here. Not your alias — the one your mother uses.

Can you lift? Don't tell me. Show me at five, and eat before you do.

Union rate, union hours. Nothing on that board's worth your legs.

He was accurate. He's always accurate. Get the floor swept.

After the Audit

They can stand there. They're on gravel we laid.

On Meridian Security

He takes what's finished. I've met worse men with better manners.

On the Toll

Mrs. Amperage

Muralist, den vendor and the union's living archive

Partly built A fixer card for her is on the gig board in the dev build. Her den lines are designed.

Sit down, love. The kettle's older than the registry and twice as reliable.

Her greeting
Side
Scrapline
Where
Mrs. Amperage's Underpass, in the Wick
Voice
Warm and unhurried, and she calls you love.

She paints the underpass walls, and has kept painting them through every scrub.

On the back of the underpass door there is a card of small grey swatches with dates under them. She offers the scrub crews tea, and the ones who take it work slower.

She will show you the wall. In the design she is also the den vendor, and hands a Legend the key to a first den. See dens.

They don't scrub what flatters them. That's how you know which walls matter.

A mouth can be leaned on, love. A wall just stands there being awkward. I've buried better talkers than me. I've never buried a wall.

Forty years in this district and I've never once been robbed. Nothing in here worth carrying and everyone's had the tea.

Morning. There's a pot on and there's four chairs, and I've counted you.

To Meridian Security officers

Very polite man. Never once raised his voice at me and I've never once been at ease.

On Ledger

She's got a lovely voice and I've never trusted a lovely voice.

On Nyx Static

I painted what he was on the day. That's all a wall does, love.

On the Smiling Man

Vector

Scrapline's combat champion, and the model for the SALVO archetype

Vector walks past a long queue of dockworkers outside a clinic with a syringe sign, a rifle over his shoulder.
Vector walks the other way from the queue for the needle.

Designed He is named in the game's content. As a character he is designed.

Side
Scrapline
Where
The Yards
Voice
Short instructions on a firing line: stance, breathe, again.

Practitioners run the Vector line, and the line is named for him. He hates that.

He never went back to get spliced clean, even after he could afford to. He corrects anyone who calls it his line.

The powerset Long Writ carries his line in its description, and the SALVO archetype takes him as its exemplar.

Hundreds run it. None of them are me. Say it back.

Good. Now do it when it matters and there's no ref.

Gun before ware isn't a philosophy. It's what I could afford.

It's not my line. It's the line. Learn it.

In the comic Gun Before Ware

Nobody's side

Three people who answer to no faction, and the Toll.

Doc Splice

Surgeon-priest of the Splice Clinic, and officiant of the First Splice

Partly built The First Splice runs in the development build, and a fixer card for her is on the gig board. Her ceremony scenes are designed.

Side
Nobody's side
Where
The Splice Clinic, in Workshop Block
Voice
Plain and clinical, with ceremony in it on purpose.

She was a Meridian bioengineer and left with the licensing keys in her head.

She wakes a Legend's first travel tree at Operator 10. See First Splice.

She reads the consent copy off a worn card every time.

Meridian tolerates her independence, because watching who gets spliced tells the Combine more than any checkpoint could.

She refuses the Revenant rite.

I qualify people for the works. I don't qualify the works for a person.

I'll be here after.

Come back Thursday, fed, and having slept.

They watch who comes through my door. They've watched for three years and they have never come in.

They take samples off the unconscious. I take consent off the awake. Same city.

On Tourniquet

He signs. I sign. His book's longer.

On Big Ferro

Impeccable manners. I've had two conversations with him and prepared for both for a week.

On Ledger

Patch

The Junction's guide, who has never been spliced

In the dev build His first-hour lines are in the dev build.

Side
Nobody's side
Where
The Junction, at the practice range
Voice
Six words or fewer.

He is the first person to reach a new Legend on the floor of the Nexus Well.

He does not ask and he does not tell, about your file or about the loaner.

He does not go into the Wick, and he takes no cut from the kids who run errands for him.

Downhill's free. Go on.

Three and a half metres. Your legs do that.

You don't need the ware for this. You need legs.

Nobody built those. Somebody found them. Same thing here.

The Curator

Proprietor of the Deep Market

Partly built A fixer card for him is on the gig board. The Deep Market is designed.

Side
Nobody's side
Where
The Warrens, under Lowline
Voice
Appraisals: provenance, condition, a number.

He never says no. The price simply rises until you refuse it.

He does not greet you. He looks over your jacket, your ware and the way you came down the stairs, then names a price for something you do not yet have.

The Deep Market takes only Ciphers. See the Deep Market.

Provenance: excellent. Condition: appalling. I'll take it.

I'd have paid more last week.

Everyone's paid for that door. Three factions, twelve years, and not one of them asked what the others paid.

Voices around the city

Lines heard in the street, by place. None of the speakers is named.

The Coil

Pardon petition. Ninety days. Denied in sixty-one percent of Ghost filings and I'm not allowed to have put that in writing.

A Tribunal intake clerk

I don't move files. I move where they land, and the difference is about eleven weeks.

An expediter at the Renewal Line

The Junction

Seed's up. Don't look at your wrist, look at the board — it's the only thing in this city that can't lie sideways.

The Junction's board-setter

Broth. Sit.

A broth-cart vendor

The Yards

Twelve years we've endured. Ask the young ones what endured means and watch them reach for a wrench.

A Scrapline elder

Lowline

Yesterday's weather on the front. Today's on the back. Don't be seen choosing.

A backprinter

The Wick

Union rate, union hours, and I can see the gold-trim board from here so don't insult us both.

A Scrapline board caller

Reclassification assistance, forty metres, fully insured. That's a person, before you ask. It's always a person.

A Meridian board caller

I don't call jobs. Calling jobs is how you end up on a board yourself.

An Undercurrent board hand

Did you see her go up? Off the flare stack? ...No, me neither. Somebody did.

A Wick civilian

Breaker Rows

Two hours. Don't read anything, don't answer the door, don't let anybody be helpful at you.

An aunt in Breaker Rows

West of the wall

Out, or back? ...I'll want it either way. Spell it.

The keeper of the Tally Wall

Three gates. Three difficulties. The signage is enormous because people kept dying of optimism.

A quartermaster at Westgate

See also