given me an idea for a george orwell style book, to look at the world and the univers around it from another perspective:
there's this world, whether it's flat, round, pyramid shaped it doesn't matter, but on this world are lots of great cities.
some of these cities have known each other's existance since time began and have formed a community similar to the EU, other cities were built to take care of the population of the old city, some cities are in groups together, all with similar architecture etc, as they have all been constructed under the same civilisation and race of people. some of these cities are at war with each other, lying around the landscape are small villages where people have ran to when their city was blown up. a few of these cities think they're the only city in existance, other cities know that others exist but arnt interested in contact, but just watch over the other cities who are yet to make contact with the outside world.
one of these cities is a fairly average city for the area it's in. it's a very small city, on it's on island so cut off from other civilisations. Most of these cities happen to be on their own islands, but a few have discovered aircraft, as boat voyages across the sea are too long, can get rough and are hazardous.
This particular city has many islands nearby, but alas, none of them are inhabited, and most of these islands are unsuitable for the people of the city, so for now they're stuck on the island they've been raised from.
story continues about this city's search for other civilizations.