Kingdoms and Thorn Terms
Business, The: The business refers to the criminal underground and the behind-the-scenes agencies and organizations that deal with them, including law enforcement, anti-terrorism, international espionage, some military and paramilitary, special forces, and intelligence.
Department, The: A branch of the Thorn Re-public government that handles defense and law enforcement which cannot be handled within the bounds and parameters set by Thorn Republic law.
Genetically Modified Human (GMH): A human who has been genetically modified to have special abilities beyond the norm, e.g. telekinesis, telepathy, biotransferrence, etc.
Hero: A vigilante fighting to defend a person, group, or organization. This can sometimes include retrieval work or criminal containment.
Kingdoms City: A city which has no federal government but rather is composed of multiple jurisdictions ranging among counties, industry districts, ethnic burros, religious quarters, etc.
Naturally Gifted (NG): A human who has naturally inherited special abilities beyond the norm, but who was neither genetically modified nor the offspring of one who has been genetically modified.
Normal: Common parlance for a regular-type human, e.g. He’s a normal.
Operative: A member of one of various military, peace-keeping, and/or law enforcement agencies and organizations.
Projects, The: The branch under the umbrella of the Department which handles genetically-modified human operatives.
Regular-Type Human (Regular): A human who has no special abilities and is genetically baseline.
Shifter: A human with the ability to modify mole¬cular, genetic, or dimensional structure, e.g. a gene shifter modifies genes. The unqualified term, e.g. She’s a shifter, always refers to the ability to alter one¬self so as to appear as someone or something else.
Special-Type Human (Special): A human with special abilities regardless of origin, e.g. natural-born, genetically modified, etc.
Special Unit, The: A post-Rebellion unit within the Department hired out by various kingdoms to enforce law when special-type humans are involved.
Thorn Rebellion: When the team operatives within the Projects rebelled against the Thorn Republic and wrested away control of the western half of the continent. Eventually, the Rebellion ended in a treaty between the teams and the Thorn Republic. The general citizens of the western cities were not consulted but were left to their own devices with government in disarray.
Villain: A vigilante whose work involves infiltration or invasion of an enemy. This includes retrieval work and several forms of anti-criminal activity.
