Motor City
Motor City was the easternmost hub of the Ironworks, a fortified industrial city-state built on the ruins of pre-fall Detroit. During the Ironworks era, the city manufactured weapons, ammunition, engine parts, and vehicles for the entire axis, making it indispensable to an empire that depended on armed force to maintain its grip. The Ironworks came seeking to incorporate Motor City, but by then the city could bargain from a position of strength. The relationship was one of mutual dependence rather than subjugation.
Four things were sacred in Motor City: Islam, Motown music, automobiles, and hard work. The Fallow Hopes faithful anchored the western defenses from the Medina-Dearborn compound, while the Kings' Court kept the Motown tradition alive in Gordyville. These two factions had once waged full-scale war against each other, destroying portions of the Masjid Wali Mohammed and the Fox Theater. The conflict ended in a single night of unexpected grace: both sides sent envoys to rebuild each other's worship sites, and when dawn revealed their shared kindness, they formed the M2 Coalition that governed cultural and religious life thereafter.
The Ramparts defined the city's silhouette. A massive wall of stacked cars, six to ten high, ringed the entire settlement with Eight Mile Road splitting the enclosed area down the center. Beyond the wall's defensive purpose, it served as civic monument and execution site. Lawbreakers were sealed in car trunks and left to die; those who reanimated gave the wall a constant low moan that raised the neck hairs of every new visitor.
Michigan Central Station served as an enormous market and showroom where the first New Locomotives, Iron Dragoon prototypes, and biodiesel engines were displayed for investors. The factories ran day and night. Mayor Shakira Washington of the Packard Clan, a Dieseljock hometown hero installed by popular demand, rejected every attempt to make her a figurehead. She survived multiple assassination attempts, made herself invaluable through increased productivity, and was rumored to be building the first mobile vehicles division of her own personal military.
Slavery in Motor City operated differently than elsewhere in the Ironworks. Slaves were often treated more like paid workers, some drawing stipends and earning promotion, making them slaves only on paper. This relative leniency made the underground railroad especially dangerous here; slaves could rarely trust each other when the line between bondage and freedom was so deliberately blurred.
Four things were sacred in Motor City: Islam, Motown music, automobiles, and hard work. The Fallow Hopes faithful anchored the western defenses from the Medina-Dearborn compound, while the Kings' Court kept the Motown tradition alive in Gordyville. These two factions had once waged full-scale war against each other, destroying portions of the Masjid Wali Mohammed and the Fox Theater. The conflict ended in a single night of unexpected grace: both sides sent envoys to rebuild each other's worship sites, and when dawn revealed their shared kindness, they formed the M2 Coalition that governed cultural and religious life thereafter.
The Ramparts defined the city's silhouette. A massive wall of stacked cars, six to ten high, ringed the entire settlement with Eight Mile Road splitting the enclosed area down the center. Beyond the wall's defensive purpose, it served as civic monument and execution site. Lawbreakers were sealed in car trunks and left to die; those who reanimated gave the wall a constant low moan that raised the neck hairs of every new visitor.
Michigan Central Station served as an enormous market and showroom where the first New Locomotives, Iron Dragoon prototypes, and biodiesel engines were displayed for investors. The factories ran day and night. Mayor Shakira Washington of the Packard Clan, a Dieseljock hometown hero installed by popular demand, rejected every attempt to make her a figurehead. She survived multiple assassination attempts, made herself invaluable through increased productivity, and was rumored to be building the first mobile vehicles division of her own personal military.
Slavery in Motor City operated differently than elsewhere in the Ironworks. Slaves were often treated more like paid workers, some drawing stipends and earning promotion, making them slaves only on paper. This relative leniency made the underground railroad especially dangerous here; slaves could rarely trust each other when the line between bondage and freedom was so deliberately blurred.
Geography
Motor City occupied the ruins of pre-fall Detroit, a dense urban industrial landscape fortified behind the Ramparts. Eight Mile Road split the walled section down the center. Within the walls stood factories, markets, religious sites, and residential areas. The Medina-Dearborn compound sat outside the western wall but was considered a critical part of the city's defense, repeatedly turning back raiders, bandits, and undead before they could reach the Ramparts. Michigan Central Station dominated the commercial district as a showroom and marketplace. Gordyville, the Kings' Court holy site at West Grand Boulevard, served as the cultural heart. A bridge from within Motor City connected to Wins across the Lake, giving the city a direct link to the northern Homeland territories. Saginaw Junction lay nearby to the north with its engine factory. Packs of feral dogs, numbering in the tens of thousands and predating the Fall, still roamed the streets alongside the usual threats of gangs, raiders, and the ever-present zed.
History
Corebook Era
The earliest sources describe Motor City as still a production powerhouse, though the days of elegant luxury cars were long forgotten. All of the city's productive might had been turned to the production of engines of industry and war. The city was a sooty, grim, and sleepless place focused on metalworking and big business. Everything from two-wheeled iron horses to behemoth rail-runners were produced here, keeping the foundries and factories in constant operation. The great fortress city could be heard for miles beyond her massive brass, iron, and stone walls, which further isolated Motor City from the outside world. The hordes that teemed beyond her gates destroyed anyone foolish enough to try and approach the city in anything less than a heavily armored rail-runner.
