PLANETARY SURFACE

Terraforming microbots were initially seeded on the planet during the first phase of colonization, and humans lived in gigantic domed habitats (which were created by the nanites) during this time. Their infection occurred while terraforming was ongoing, and in the chaos, it was never finished, but the nanites went on replicating, creating a gigantic grey goo swarm outside the domes. Inside the domes, full terraforming occurred. Kludging put in place massive ultra violet emitters, functioning as suns in each dome, and a dyson sphere around the sun reduced its radiation effect upon Pandaemonium and extracted maximum energy and fed it to microwave collectors around the planet, and these supply energy into the planetary system.

Life outside the domes is extremely dangerous. The nanites are not aggressive, but breathing them in is fatal. Travel between domes is common and necessary to transfer electrical energy and people, but hazardous and requires breathing assistance, and is commonly carried out by humanoid robots and gypsy caravans. Without these people the planetary system would collapse. They fill in gaps in the infrastructure.

Electrical energy is supplied to planets through enormous cables and collection dishes, etc, but some of these have broken down or degraded or were destroyed in conflicts over time. Gyspy caravans load enormous snail-shell batteries full of power and sell the energy to other domes or entities, laboriously moving the batteries between domes. As such these caravan groups are quite wealthy, and the pay is very good for anyone who signs on to guard and aid a caravan, but it's still extremely dangerous.

Additionally, the dyson sphere that was being constructed around the star Hades (or Luciver, which might be more appropriate) was only half finished. In its present state it is failing, the star is seeming to grow in strength. The star Luciver is slowly swallowing the Dyson collectors that chain it and breaking through. Its an emerging crisis that is slowly decreasing the energy sent to Pandaemonium and will ultimately doom the planet and kill everyone in it, as well as the space station.