Species:

Due to their size and policies the Eternal Union has grown to include multiple species.

The Iscandarians are one most prominent of all the Eternals Union’s species and the original species that comprised the EU. They come from their homeworld of Alas Prime, in the system of Iscandar. Iscandarians are humanoid, however unlike humans their ears are pointed, as well as their skin being near white, and rarely for a few Iscandarians, a strange silver color. Another unique physical feature is their veins, which glow underneath their skin to indicate their magical ability, and while any Iscandarian can have any different color, some are more common depending on their sub-type. Iscandarians also have a far better memory and rate of knowledge absorption than humans, however they still have a similar level of comprehension compared to humans, so the Iscandarians are technically at the same level of intelligence as humans. Iscandarians are also very long-lived, with most living around a thousand years.. There are four Iscandarian sub-types, these being Earthen, Sentinel, Caster, and Immortals. Earthens cannot cast magic directly, rather their magical abilities help make them excellent farmers, engineers, and other more physical tasks, however Earthens have existed within other roles. Sentinels much like Earthens cannot cast magic, with their natural magic abilities instead be granted as the gift of flight, with them having the unique feature of angelic like wings. They also tend to be the warriors of the Iscandarians. Casters can cast magic directly, hence their name. They are the ones who drive forward the Magitech, magical sciences, and other sciences of the Eternal Union. The final type are the Immortals, of which only four exist. They are in Iscandarian religion blessed by Faust for committing great acts that serve everyone and advance the Union forward, they can be said to be a combination of all the other subtypes, with non-Sentinel Iscandarians who are ascended into Immortals gaining the Angelic Wings. They are amongst some of the most powerful beings with magic, unrivaled anywhere else in the Union. They are also biologically immortal.

The Yordles are a long-lived race and have pointed ears similar to the Iscandarians. But unlike the Iscandarians, they are very short. The tallest recorded Yordle reached a height of 4”6, with the average height being around 3”8. Male Yordles have a cream color for their skin and females have a pale purple color. Yordles are also a very magical species, although magical talent doesn’t always manifest in every member of the species. One part of their magic that manifests in every member of their species is a sense of community. They always tend to be friendly and often act as the EU’s diplomats.

A few human colonies have joined the EU, the only difference is that being around the Iscandarians and Yordles seems to have activated a latent magical talent.

Constructors are the final species of the EU. They are a “true” synth as the Iscandarians call them, using biomass to form their bodies and then they are planted with various cybernetics.They operate in the public, serving various industrial, maintenance, and other roles. They are six-legged, and fitted with a wide variety of tools for use.

Description of government:

The EU Government can be best described as a Benevolent Theocratic Dictatorship, although the label isn’t entirely accurate. The Immortals themselves have told authority and final say over everything, however a Senate exist consisting of two Senators from each planet in the Union, as well as a Congress that is divided on population lines. These two usually bring matters of concern from the population to the Immortal’s attention, which is usually put into effect. The Senate is also responsible for setting up the Courts of the EU. Beyond that various government offices exist to help manage the Empire. Individual planets and colonies are free to set up their own government systems so as long as they obey the laws of the Eternal Union. Citizens of the EU also enjoy extensive civil and political freedoms.

Beyond that major industries are entirely nationalized and fall under the control of the government, however small private business still exists. Private property and a wealth gap also exists, but both are small compared to other more traditional capitalist societies. Basics needs and healthcare also covered by the government, but has to work if they seek more

Description of military:

The EU Military is divided into four divisions, and Immortal Aaliyah act’s as it’s Supreme Commander, along with a council of Generals and Admirals.

EU Armed Forces
The EU Armed Forces is responsible for maintaining all ground-based forces, as well as non-space flying vehicles and the wet navy.

EU Starfleet
The EU Starfleet manages the space-bound vessels and stations of the EU.

EU Expeditionary Corps
The Expeditionary Corps is part military, part civilian force responsible for exploring planets and space. They also include a subsection known as the Diplomatic Corps, which act as the representatives of the EU.

EU Special Forces
Operating alongside the EU Armed Forces, the EU Special Forces are more elite forces trained to either act as the elite units in battles, or go behind enemy lines for missions that the Armed Forces cannot commit to themselves.

EU Intelligence Agency
Acting as basically the spy agency of the EU, they gather intelligence through undercover operations, partake on special missions even the Special Forces cannot accomplish, or act as assassins when the opportunity to take out an important target arises.

Technological Overview:

The Iscandarians are a very advanced society, mainly due to the longevity of their species as well as being amongst the oldest living species within the galaxy. They make heavy use of magic, as well as magitech, the combination of magic and technology, within their society. They still however use many forms of technology that do not use magitech, although it is extremely rare to see these pieces of these technology.

For FTL, the Iscandarians primarily rely on both gates between their major worlds as well drives for exploration. Both use a system of magical dimensions that was discovered shortly after the Iscandarians entered into the space era. The system is known to allow for fast, efficient, and safe FTL travel between various worlds, although the drives have a similar flaw to the Roman’s wherein weapons systems are disabled shortly after a jump. The FTL system is also used to allow for instant-communication between all Iscandarian vessels. When not using FTL propulsion, Iscandarians either use efficient but slow and cheaper ion drives for civilian ships, as well as small craft where the loss of speed does not effect them much, and then fast and powerful antimatter drives for most military ships, as well as a few larger civilian craft. Anti-gravity based propulsion powered by magic is also frequently used, mainly for maintaining space stations in orbit, floating cities in the skies of their worlds, as well as for propelling non-space flying craft, ground vehicles, and allowing water naval vessels to transform into aircraft when needed.

The Iscandarians used many forms of power to help keep the Eternal Union up and running. Their primary source is in antimatter based reactors which used magically enhanced antimatter to produce both mana and regular power for the various components of their magitech devices. Another common source of power is manafusion reactors, which operate using various magically enhanced materials to produce both mana and regular power. While not quite powerful as their antimatter brothers, they are more easy to setup and easier to downscale and port around. As such they are mainly used by first in-colonists as well as to power ground craft and aircraft, although large water naval vessels and all space-based craft that are not small use antimatter reactors as they can support them.

The Iscandarians weapon technology has been advanced a great deal within only a few decades, due to the cold war with the Romans as well as the on-going war with the Romans, however they are still somewhat hamstringed. Many forces, due to the fact that many new weapons were only able to recently enter mass-production due to other pressing projects, are still using first-generation energy weapons and kinetic weapons. This has ham-stringed the EU Military somewhat, but with further expansion of military facilities and weapons factories, its becoming a non-issue. Balefire has started to replace most energy weapons within the EU, as its acts as the magical equivalent to plasma weaponry. Kinetic weapons have also significantly improved, with rail-guns in space now experimenting with various different types of tipped shells, including balefire and more recently antimatter, although those shells are rare. Explosives weapons have also improved significantly with more advances in missile technology and types of explosives. Antimatter weapons are also on the forefront, although they are exceedingly rare, with missiles still be limited to the testing phase and a extremely limited number of tipped shells granted to the fleets. Antimatter projectors are also in the development phase, but they have been put on hold for more practical improvements in weapons tech.

Ground Forces carry a lot of devices to use with them, such as radios, in-built displays providing battlefield information, and various others. They also have unique devices called spell matrixes. Embedded into armor, these can cast various spells and keep their own mana store, as such those who can’t tap mana directly or even this without magic entirely can use these, and the Iscandarians often use spell matrixes as a trade good.

The Eternal Union has heavily developed augmentation technology, of both the genetic and cybernetic kinds. However with the development of these two types of augmentation they have also developed synthesis, a combination of both types. While synthesis can be a terrifying thing to see, it is on a purely opt-in basis for Iscandarians or other members of the EU who wish to devote their lives to the EU, as it involves receiving memory wipes and biological immortality due to how expensive a Synth can be to create. In addition to these AI, robotics, and nanotechnology are also heavily developed. AI can be implemented into a person’s mind through use of cybernetics. It is to be noted that one has to be very careful after receiving a AI implant, as destruction of the implant can cause severe mental instability, especially if the AI and the person’s mind end up merged into what is essentially a single consciousness. Nanobots can be used to augment systems that are normally un-augmentable due to their nature, such as the respiratory and circulatory systems. Mind-wipe technology has also been developed to allow them to modify memories, although this technology is not used often outside of synthesis.

Iscandarian manufacturing is highly efficient, using robots and AI to streamline the process. Iscandarian manufacturing is centered around Arcano-forges, powerful factories powered by many magical devices and other things.

Stealth technology only exists for vessels smaller than frigates, although it is highly efficient on the ground and provides many elite units.

Cultural Overview:

The Eternal Union share’s a set of overarching ideals mainly due to how omnipresent the belief in Faust, the Goddess of Harmony, is within the Eternal. An essential ideal behind the EU is the belief that one must do their best to act towards the Greater Good of all, and this has even been used to justify acting against the other morals and ideals of the EU, even including a set of rules said to have come from Faust known as the Unforgivable Crimes. The other commonly shared belief, besides the belief in Faust, is that through trying to achieve Faust’s mission that all will be led to a Harmony, a state where not only does their exist mutual peace, but there is no problems, no want, no worries.

Out of the individual species, the Iscandarians are often known to have a extremely strong belief in Faust compared to the other species of the EU. This stronger belief in Faust also extends to a stronger belief in accomplishing the great mission that is achieving Harmony. This attitude manifests often in a holier-than-thou and arrogant attitude that the Iscandarians have towards non-EU species and nations, although some Iscandarians have managed to contain this attitude, especially the Immortals, since they are often the most visible part of the EU. Beyond that the Iscandarians method of worshipping Faust is the Church of Stardust. This Church holds a unique belief that everything, even Faust herself, comes from stardust. Faust was believed to have shaped the Iscandarians early on from stardust. A common method of burial under this Church is to have the deceased launched into a star, so that when the day comes that the star collapses into stardust once they they have been returned to stardust and the cycle of creation and destruction may forever continue. The Iscandarians also by extension cherish the act of creation, and have a great respect for the arts and music.

The Yordles themselves are a very friendly and communal species. Even non-humanoids that feel completely different to the Yordles will usually find themselves at ease. This is in part thought to be due to the innate magic of the Yordles, although it has never been entirely confirmed. Yordles, due to being a communal species, share a greater appreciation for art and music created by groups rather than individuals, although they still value the individual. As such symphonies, large bands, and murals created by the community are usually what the Yordles bring in the form of culture. The Yordles belief in Faust does not have a Church, but it is commonly held that Faust early on prevented the Yordles from warring with one another and guided them to being a communal species. Whether or not Faust created the Yordles is a belief that is debated often in their communities

The Arabs and Slavic cultures that from Humanity that the EU haven’t changed much, besides becoming more progressive and taking on Faust. This is often seen as Faust sending their respective Gods as her agents to make sure they are safe and protected.

History:

The early history of the EU begins with the future Immortal Taegan. While the Iscandarians were a peaceful people during that time there was still backstabbing, wars, and other political conflicts between the various nations. It was under Taegan however who led an international effort, citing that Faust would wish that her children, to end all war and unite the Iscandarians under one front. Taegan’s message quickly spread, and while a few government’s wished to remain independent Taegan had won the hearts and minds of the people. While Taegan celebrated his success from Iscandar’s largest city, those observing watched in awe as he was struck by a golden beam of light. He had suddenly grown the wings of a Sentinel, despite being a Caster, and seemed to have been imbued with much more magic power. He was christened a Immortal and the Eternal Union declared under his authority.

Later on, as the Eternal Union grew more prosperous the Immortal Aaliyah was declared. Prior to the formation of the Eternal Union she had been from one of the Sentinel Nations and served as a warrior. After the EU was formed she joined the Expeditionary Corps and began exploring ruins of the old Iscandarian nations on Iscandar. It was after she returned from a solo-mission that she was found to have been christened a Immortal. She spoke secretly to Taegan about the nature of her ascension. It was never revealed why Aaliyah had become an Immortal, but she and Taegan formed the Immortal Council which now acts as the EU’s main governing body.

Years later two Iscandarians, a caster and a earthen, named Jharak and Elora respectively developed the FTL Drive that would become the foundation of later EU space travel. With it’s development both had become Immortals, and joined the Council along with Taegan and Aaliyah.

It was after the EU’s first reaches beyond their Solar System that they met the Yordles. In the years following the formation of the EU where the Iscandarian culture become more uniform. It was also during this first contact with the Yordles where the Iscandarians learned that their holier-than-thou attitude would not be acceptable. Due to the friendly nature of the Yordles however they looked passed it and an great relationship grew between the two nations. Both learned that they had a belief in Faust, with much of the mythos being similar or the same. In a effort to figure out why the two species grew together. The Yordles accepted the Immortals as Faust’s will and asked to join the EU, and were accepted in warmingly.

Shortly afterwards some of the human colonies in the sector were discovered. Without much to turn to and with a friendly hand reaching out to them from the EU, they joined and found prosperity that had escaped them for a while.

It was however that they encountered the Romans. Hoping for more peaceful relations like they had had with the Yordles and Humans before them, they were turned away in horror at how aggressive and militaristic the Romans were. They begun expanding their military and weapons technology reluctantly.

With the conquest of Forsythe and relationships between the Romans and EU deteriorating further, things became balanced on a knife’s edge. It was the final straw however when the Romans opened fire on the last independent human colony in the sector and the EU fleet that had been sent to safeguard them.

While the initial part of the war was defeat for the Iscandarians, new weapons technologies helped even the odds, the war turned into a stalemate. The Iscandarians and the EU now reach out, looking for help amongst the stars. They also seek the same Precursor tech, discovering that their may be magical connections that would not only help them win the war, but advance their knowledge of the Arcane much farther.

Other:

“To war we march, for the glory of our families, and for the glory of the Empire.”

Species:

Romus Humans - When the initial colony ships crash landed on what was later to become New Rome, much of the equipment that was to assist in creating a livable environment was destroyed in the impact. Scientists aboard the ship with assistance of their labs created genetic modifications that would allow the human body to survive in the higher gravity of New Rome. This later with natural adaptation creating what today is the Romus Human, a stronger version of a normal human. The Scientists, against the orders of the Colony Leaders, also used gene modification to make Romus Humans more intelligent as well as more resistant to viruses, bacteria, and other toxins, although they have not acquired total immunity and there is a few notable diseases exclusive to Romus Humans.

Humans - Various human independent human colonies were taken control of by the New Roman Empire in their initial conquests.

Solusi - The first non-humans to fall prey to the ambitions of the New Romans, they are a cat-like race known for their sharp claws and prowess in combat. They usually reach at 6ft or slightly below it, and have varying coat colors and other details on their bodies. Prior to being absorbed into the Empire they were ruled by various separated clans made up into a loose confederacy. Each clan would have their elders pick a younger member of the clan to represent them on a Council of Clans.

Forsythe - The Forsythe were a semi hive-mind conquered by the Romans, and became a point of tension between the New Roman Empire and the Eternal Union. The hive-mind itself was merely a neural link that would enforce peace and truth between all Forsythe, and was also used as method of that allowed all Forsythe to discuss political issues, making the Forsythe into a successful direct-democracy. They were a bug-like race, with eight legs and were pure black. They had a stinger similar to a scorpion on their behinds and also had two more appendages equivalent to hands.

Description of government:

The New Roman Empire uses a system similar to the Roman Republic and the later the Roman Empire. It also borrows elements from various other governments from Earth. The Emperor, or Empress exists as the executive officer of the NRE and also acts as the Supreme Commander of the military. The Legislative branch consists of a Senate, consisting of citizens deemed worthy of Senator status who are then elected by full citizens. Areas for the elections are divided into different districts depending on population density. The Senate is also responsible for creating the courts so they also act as the Judicial body. The Senate suggest and votes on various laws, which can be vetoed by the Emperor in which case the law is called to vote by full citizens to be put into law. The Emperor also may create other Executive Offices to help manage the Empire and has a Cabinet of Ministers that act as his advisors on various sections of the Empire.

One other of matter importance to the governance is full citizenship. As certain matters pertaining to the government require one to be a full citizen, it has become a point of contention. Romus Humans are automatically full citizens(this excludes regular humans or other sub-races, as they considered inferior to the Romus Humans), and the only way to earn it is by 10 years of military service or making a great contribution to the Empire, usually by discovering a valuable new piece of technology or discovering a planet that has the potential to become a profitable colony.

Description of military:

The Roman military is divided into four divisions, each has its own overall leader but all are directed by Princeps Supremus, which acts as a secondary commander to the Emperor, usually being his Minister of War.

Malleus Imperii
The Malleus Imperii are the ground-based forces of the NRE. They operate with a wide variety of soldiers, synths, mechs, tanks, and vehicles. They are also responsible for flying non-space forces as well as the water-based navy.



Classis Imperii

The Classis Astrorum operates all the space-based forces of the Empire.



The Legions
The Legions are the supreme troops of the NRE, being deadly on the battlefield and also responsible for most special missions. They have their own unique vehicles and Synths, but share their rank system with the Milites Populi.

Imperial Intelligence
While not technically a part of the military, they do often use the military to their own ends. Imperial Intelligence was created by the Emperor in secret to act as his own personal military, secret police, and spy agency. They have been involved in gathering the data needed for key Roman Victories and maintain disorganized rank system. This makes it so if one cell is caught the rest of Imperial Intelligence and the other cells are not exposed.

Technological Overview

There are three substances that are a extremely important part of Roman technology or are frequently used within Roman tech. These are antimatter, Rominium, and Negative Energy. Antimatter is pretty much the staple in Rome as it used in a lot of weapons as well as a power source for most of Rome. Rominium was discovered in Precursor excavations and the named Rominium with the government claiming Roman Scientists had invented it. It is made using artificial means. Rominium acts as a powerful superconductor, and is used in all power lines within the Roman Empire. When blended with either tungsten or titanium, it is also an effective starship armor. Negative energy now only serves the purpose of powering anti-gravity devices, but it did power warp drives before the Romans switched to their Universal Jump drive. Romans also have magic, but it is currently very limited as it was discovered only recently.

The main form of FTL used by the New Roman Empire is what they refer to as a Universal Jump Drive. When traveling to another location there is a universe which acts a secondary one to whichever the Romans are located in at the time, and they they will travel through this universe to reach their location. This is one of the fastest forms of FTL known in the universe, but does have it’s own limitations. It requires a rather large amount of the ship’s current power production to activate the drive, so weapons are offline for about a minute after jump, depending on other systems within in the ship and the size of the reactor itself.

Antigravity uses negative energy, and it has given the Romans a very fine control over it. It has also been used to produce gravity on Roman ships. Within civilian areas the antigravity has been used to expand space and create flying cities, factories, and farms, as well as propel various transports. The military uses it mainly as their method of propelling planet-bound fighters and bombers, as well as giving water-naval ships the ability to transform into aircraft.

The Romans use a wide variety of defenses techs on both the ground and in space. As mentioned above the Romans use Rominium mixed with tungsten for bigger ships or Rominium with titanium for lighter ships as the main armor for space-bound vessels and stations. All stations and ships use shields, the shields can easily be shaped depending on the need of the vessel or station. All space-bound vessels and stations, with the exception of small craft, incorporate Faraday cages into their designs to protect from EMPs. Stealth-craft exist, but they are limited to a few frigates and smaller ships. Ground forces use exclusively titanium for armoring, with infantry having powered armor. All infantry have a small shield in their power armor, although it usually doesn’t last long under sustained fire unless the unit is an elite one with a better suit of power armor. Power armor also incorporates a wide variety of communication devices, with specialized stealth devices for some units meant to engage in special operations.

Weapons technology in space centers around antimatter and plasma. Antiproton beams are a common weapon larger ships, with ships that lack the space for them having accelerated projectile weapons that are tipped with antimatter, and a wide variety of antimatter missiles of varying payloads. Plasma cannons are used on most ships, and the only weapon that small craft have other older generation rail-guns or antimatter missiles. Ground forces have no antimatter missiles, and instead will use either high explosive missiles or tactical nukes if the situation calls for it. Other than the infantry as well as other vehicles use a mix of plasma and accelerated projectile weapons, as well as explosive weapons.

Nanobots are also used, mainly for medical purposes as well as for the implantation of certain augmentations. They are also used for fabricating electronics.

A.I has been developed for calculation and research purposes, but it has been shackled to prevent uprisings.

Memory Replacement and removal has also been developed, and is often used to flash train soldiers.

A huge part of Roman technological development is their cybernetic and genetic modification. They have both been developed extensively by Romans, and they are capable of extreme modification. While civilians are capable of getting cybernetics to an extent, genetic modification is much more limited for civilians, although it is often used on plants and animals to increase production heavily, which has given the Romans a great bounty of food. Cybernetics can also with the use of nanobots put nano-scale augmentations on systems that are not normally augmentable, such as the nervous system. Synthesis has also been developed which combines the two. With synthesis it is common to make what are called “true” synths. These are synths made from dead flesh with no living flesh, cybernetics are then incorporated and a shackled A.I added as a brain.

Cultural Overview:

The Romans have changed significantly in culture since their time on Earth and after the development of their own Empire and culture. A prominent note is that they have abandoned all other Earth Languages and exclusively use Latin, although records of translation matrixes and other Earth Languages are maintained on the chance that Earth survived Nuclear War, which they believe to have happened due to the their belief in the inferiority of the base human species.

In addition to adopting Latin, the Romans have also adopted old Roman and Greek architecture, as well as as the old Roman Gods, although a good percentage of Romans are agnostic or atheist. The Romans have begun using many old forms of art and writing style, which again come from the old Romans.

The Romans themselves have also become an Authoritarian society. While some civil liberties exist, they are small and usually not much. This is in part thought to be do to how eerily close the colonists who founded the Roman Empire were to fascism, but it seems they have drifted away from that throughout the history of the Empire, although with the creation of Imperial Intelligence it seems the Romans have once again begun drifting towards fascism. Oppression and discrimination against non-Romus Humans has also become a commonly accepted cultural practice. Some Romus Humans have been seeking to change both of these however, wanting for a Roman Republic and the dissolution of the Emperor office, as well as a tolerance of non-Romus Humans. Another group, while not seeking to destroy the Emperor’s office, does seek to make people more tolerant as well as make the NRE more honorable, although they have not been clear as to how they wish to do this.

The Humans who the Romans conquered were of Arab and Slavic descent, and thus show elements of those cultures as well as believing in Islam and Christianity respectively, although they are more modernized.

The Solusi have elements of Warrior and Ancestor worship, as well as having a very strong leaning towards honor through battle.

The Forsythe, do to their nature as hive-mind, don’t have much of a culture, but show many elements of the a greater good mindset.

History:

The history of the NRE begins with a secret mission launched in the last days of a pseudo-fascist nation who had gained control of Europe had idolized the old Romans and resurrected latin. This secret missions consisted of a few Colony ships using experimental FTL technology which were to be sent to a system with a habitable planets, however a failure in the drive caused the group of ships to land somewhere near the core, far away from Sol. With equipment destroyed the ships were forced to crash land on a nearby planet that their scanners had shown was livable.

From here the colonists learned of the higher gravity and caused some earlier issues, but with the labs aboard the ships genetic modification was carried out, and the Romus Humans were born. More was carried out as the colonists decided that is was likely they never contact Sol again, and even if they did reach it in the future, it would have been likely destroyed by Nuclear War. Thus they declared the formation of the New Roman Empire and christened the world they had landed on as New Rome.

From their the Romans rapidly rebuilt their society, using some cloning in the early days to rapidly expand their population. Soon they had rebuilt their ships and were expanding across the Golden System, which is what they had christened the resting place of New Rome. It was not long before they also discovered remnants of older Empires which had been in this system. It was these ruins that helped the fledgling Empire take control of the sector of space in which they rested.

It was not long before they discovered the colonies of other ships that had fled Earth, they easily took control of these as it was believed they had only arrived in this sector long after New Romans and thus had not been as well developed as the Romans. This is where the policies of discrimination against non-Romus Humans began.

Shortly after that as the non-Romus Humans continued to expand they met the Solusi who they saw as a wonderful opportunity to continue the growth of their Empire. It was during this war however the Romans contacted the Eternal Union. At this point the EU had absorbed, not through war but through diplomatic annexation, other human colonies as well as the Yordles. It was during the first contact that the Romans realized the EU would become a great threat to their power. The war with the end of the Solusi ended and one with the Forsythe began shortly after, that, the EU moved into stop the Romans but they were too late due to how small and weak the Forsythe were compared to the EU.

A period of almost cold war began between the EU and NRE. While the EU had the advantage of having superior shielding and armor tech to the Romans, as well have a strong magitech and being extremely knowledgeable about magic due to having it since they were first a civilization, the Roman’s access to well-trained forces and weapon technology were a considerable to the EU. The EU began seeking to create better defenses as well try to even the playing field when it came to weapons technology, while the Romans sought improve their defenses while trying to prevent the EU from getting the upper-hand with weapons.

The cold war continued for a few years until the Romans sent an invasion fleet to the last independent human colony in the sector. However, a EU Fleet arrived nearby, ordering the Romans to withdraw. The Romans, seeing their chance, fired upon both the EU and the humans. A brutal war started, with it at first looking up for the Romans, however the EU Generals and Admirals quickly adapted to the Roman’s strategies, and with new weapons being fitted onto ships and given to troops fights became bloody ordeals upon which there stood no clear victor. The War with the EU turned quickly to a stalemate, with both sides not being able to find anywhere to gain an advantage over the other. The EU, learning of the existence of the Precursors in the sector, also began searching for their tech to gain the advantage, with battles being fought over the ruins of the Precursors.

As the race for Precursor tech continued, both sides are turning to the International Community to find assistance to finally end the now decade long war.

Other:

The UU is made up entirely of a single species, any other species in its grasp reduced to at best satellite states. The Union maintains a racial purity almost fanatically. This species is known as the Aelosians, a species of avians with hollow bones, light weight, a healthy covering of feathers, and a height ranging from 3'11" to 5'1". Despite their unintimidating frame, they have ruthlessly and uncompromisingly become the rulers of hundreds of galaxies.

They are limited in number, however, and a majority of their workforce and army are made up of robotic hosts, of varying appearance. They share two aspects, however, loyalty to the Union and hyperintelligence.


While it is a Union in theory, in reality, it is at best an autocracy. Ruled by a single dictator who has lived for perhaps millions of years, it is an ancient empire with a significant military presence to impose order on those they see as primitive savages. Each galaxy is represented by a single person, making a council of advisors to the dictator that is more than enough to fill an entire congress hall. Most scouted galaxies have no council members, however, as they are simply considered too unimportant to put that many resources into.

The downside to this massive government, however, is the pure bureaucracy involved. Entire galaxies have been lost as a result of a bad paper shuffle, and distress signals have not seen responses for tens of thousands of years. It is a slow, hulking beast, kept beating by its pure mass. Soldiers and politicians of the Union have learned to act on their own without exterior support, making the entire government a fractured mess, held together purely by the utterly ruthless nature of the Aelosians.


The military is an incredibly varied set of armies and ships. Each military is organized based on the needs of its specific sector, where there may be thousands of sectors in a single galaxy. In this specific galaxy, however, the military forces are organized into the UUGN and the UUGA. The UUGN is the Universal Union Galactic Navy, a name adopted by many more galaxies than just the small scout contingent of this galaxy. It is made up of hyper-advanced ships, albeit in few number. In a direct fight, a single frigate could take on a small fleet. As such, their weakness is not in direct, pitched battles, but rather guerilla attacks, ambushes, and simply avoiding the areas they are in.

There are currently twenty UUGN vessels in the galaxy:
1 Galactic Carrier Titan
A star-sized titanic ship, it is heavily armed, armored, and massive. It acts as the warp gate connecting the galaxy to the rest of the Union.
2 Valkyrie Class Carriers
A 175000-meter ship, it contains a wealth of drone fighters, and can carry frigates from place to place. As it is much more lightly armored and armed, it is much more maneuverable.
3 Pheonix Class Battleships
A 100000-meter ship, it is a massive, hulking and unmaneuverable ship. It could take months for one of these battleships to align to its next destination, and it simply relies on heavy firepower and the element of surprise -- the hulking ship doing best when warping into a preplanned destination, that, for example, may be known to station a fleet.
5 Awe Class Cruisers
This 2030 meter ship is a massive step down from the other ships, making up the much more practical and everyday side of the fleet. Along with frigates, it is what a majority of enemies will be squaring off against.
9 Magpie Class Frigates
Clocking in at 546 meters, it is one of the smallest ships in the UU arsenal, and by far the most practical. It is the single most common ship to encounter in the Union due to its reliable nature.

The UUGA, the Universal Union Galactic Army, is a set of ten thousand soldiers, clad in gear incomprehensible to many traditional species. They follow in the footsteps of the Navy, capable of tearing through an entire planet's worth of soldiers with few casualties in a direct fight. The best way to fight them is not in direct battles but in unconventional warfare. They are also few enough in number that they are easy to overextend.


"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
The Universal Union employs technology so advanced that galaxy hopping is a relaxing journey to them. They carry generators that draw power from both vacuum and exotic matter. They also employ warp technology that breaches the fabric of the universe. In short, they are more advanced than words can express. However, most of this technology is not made by them. It is instead stolen from other species and improved upon until it meets the standards of the Union. There is little to no original designs in the Union, which is a major malus to them. They, in particular, have not yet truly discovered any sort of shielding, and instead, rely on superalloys.

Due to the bureaucratic nature of the Union, galaxies with little Union presence in them might see the rest of the Union advance far beyond them, becoming as alien to the Union citizens in the galaxy as the Union citizens are to the rest of the galaxy.


The culture of the Union may seem pure evil at first, but every action has a reason towards a greater goal. Any Aelosian is indoctrinated at birth to feel no remorse from kicking puppies, as long as kicking said puppies furthers their goals. The culture is utterly unfettered, and as a result, they are ruthlessly efficient in many tasks. However, due to their pure size, they are at best dismissive and at worst snooty, seeing most species as so far below them that bothering to conquer them is too much of an annoyance, like a human not noticing a single gnat. As a result, they are actually rather passive, except for when they feel they stand to gain plenty from intervening.

As a result of their ruthless nature, they are not above trading. While it may be an annoyance to conquer a species, it is a lesser annoyance to simply convince them to give up their technologies for review by the Union via trade. They make use of old, primitive designs from their perspective, which to many other species is rather advanced.


The Union started off as any other species did -- a tribal conglomeration using naught but rocks as tools. From here, they advanced throughout the technological ages, until they reached the space age. There, that was when their real history, and destiny, began. Their homeworld is in fact so old that its star has long gone supernovae and taken the world with it. But before then, it was your standard star-faring nation. With eyes full of hope and an optimistic outlook, they spread throughout their little region of space, another sector in a galaxy full of species.

They were an enthusiastic member of their respective galactic society for thousand of years, always a fair trading partner, a good ally. By when they were betrayed, everything changed. Inside every cynic, there is a disappointed optimist, and the Union was very disappointed indeed. Their boundless optimism turned to boundless hate at those who betrayed them and those who failed to act. That boundless hate turned into a boundless lust for ruthless revenge. And revenge they did, turning plows into knives, tractors into guns. They sabotaged themselves to see the rest of the galaxy go down with them.

But they did not fall. At the end of the great war that had sparked, they alone stood. They stood starving, stood faultily, but they alone were the dominant species in a galaxy where genocide had, for a short while, became perfectly acceptable. Except for the fact that to them, genocide never fell out of favor. It had won them the war, no matter the costs.

The ends justify the means.

Now the sole power in the galaxy, they took the technology that remained from every other empire and began improving, and experimenting. They were unethical, but they got results. They were efficient, and once again ruthless. They didn't kick puppies, they mulched puppies into liquids needed to form healing compounds. Once they had stabilized their position in the galaxy, they looked up to the stars beyond their own, and they believed it was their manifest destiny.

Billions of years ago, they conducted their first successful extragalactic warp. From there, they blossomed. While initially an efficient empire capable of responding to quickly, they rapidly suffered fatigue as galaxy after galaxy fell to them. It was simply too much to govern, and the bureaucracy only continued to grow, until it was what it is today.

Their culture was the one thing that, oddly, stayed the same. Indoctrinated from birth, morals were rare in their society. The result was all that mattered, to everyone, everywhere. Even after billions of years, they retained the genetic memory of the disappointed idealist. Their technology evolved imperfectly, as they came to rely more and more on stealing the ideas, concepts, and designs of other species.

The most common appearance of this species is the average height masked figure, clad in yellow robes and a pale mask.


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Their ruins, spread across the galaxy, are generally fantastical in nature, making heavy use of magic. There is no set version of these fantastical items, however. Some may be bombs, some may heal those around them, others may even flay people alive.

The agents of this persuasion make appearances almost at random, showing up just about anywhere. No clear details have been extracted from them.

Billions of years ago, before the formation of true galaxies, before even the UU, there existed those only known now as the Fallen. They were the masters of the arcane, capable of incredible magical feats. They spread far and wide, and eventually discovered a terrifying secret, one that would be their undoing. They found their star to be a gateway to something greater, some magical nexus connecting dimensions. More importantly, they found what is known today as heaven.

They gathered their resources, drawing from the magical energy of their protogalaxy, they poured all they had into ascension. They gathered the keys, the artifacts. They trawled the universe, locating artifacts ancient to even them; adding them to the vast cosmological puzzle that was their warmth and light in the sky.

They made a tragic mistake.

And so did their sun disappear, their entire race vanishing from existence. They left behind a legacy of magical inclination, the only evidence they ever existed in the first place. Nobody knows where exactly they went or what exactly they did. They appear in many legends, their presence still known in some form.

They've become more active in the last few billion years, much to the chagrin of the Universal Union. They are slowly returning, taking an active hand in affairs that they would otherwise have not interfered in.

Name of nation: Ouroboros Congregation
Species: The Ophis are colony-beings formed from swarms of eel-like creatures. The eels entwine their bodies and latch onto each other, sharing brainpower and muscle strength to form walking, thinking beings. The Ophis themselves are very difficult to permanently kill, as a surviving clump of eels can be regrown by a skilled caretaker into the formerly deceased Ophis, though they will not be exactly the same.

Description of government: Neo-Feudalism
The Lords of the Congregation each hold sovereign authority over their personal domains, reigned in only by a unifying Constitution and Congregational politics. Every three decades, a Lord is elected by the rest of the Congregation to serve as the Warlord; figurehead, moderator, and arbitrator. Only they have the authority to call the Lords to assemble for political discussion or to war against outside threats. They may decide to use these assemblies to reign in unusually unruly Lords, discuss amendments to the Constitution, or to give the other Lords an opportunity to witness the settling of a dispute between two others. If the Warlord declares a call to arms, any quarrels between Lords of the Congregation must indefinitely cease, and the Lords must each swear their allegiance to the Warlord until the resolution of the war.

Description of military: Each Lord maintains for themselves a personal armed retinue. The sizes and composition of these forces vary. Additionally, they maintain defensive fleets to guard their subjects from outside threats and their fellow Lords. These fleets tend to be small compared to the levies Ophis Lords have been known to raise, little more than a police force and border patrol to dissuade domestic piracy and foreign raids. However, Ophis industry and a substantial number of mothballed ships means that a moderate sized fleet could be raised as quickly as new recruits can be trained. Lords have known to require compulsory service and annual military drills to keep their subjects battle-ready.

Technological Overview: Nuclear space age. The Ophis largely utilize technology developed thousands of years ago after their first global war, just prior to their second and final one. Advances have been made, however. The Ophis utilize both nuclear fission and fusion powerplants, with arsenals consisting mostly of mass drivers and missiles. Silicon computing is lacking, in some respects, but not entirely useless. Computers in the domains of the Congregation are intended to supplement Ophis scholars and warriors, not replace them. This is seen best in targeting and sensors; while many Ophis can often calculate orbital maneuvers and targeting solutions faster than their computers, they can't see in infrared or determine surface gravity and altitude on the fly. Because it seems a crime against god to take the Ophis out of war, scholars have not taken computing much further than needed to cover the weaknesses of Ophis. This limits their industry in some ways, but the Congregation and the Ophis have done very well in making up for it.

The Ophis make extensive use of cloning and bio- technology, growing vats of eels and tweaking their genes just right to resurrect a fallen colony-being or create a faster, stronger, smarter one.

Among their limited access to exotic technology is their system of FTL. The FTL drive requires a steep gravitational gradient in order to be activated, with such an environment typically only found near stars and black holes. After the drive is activated, the vessel appears to be removed from realspace. Data on navigating while the drive is activated is limited, as the navigators themselves often do not survive the experience. In the event that they do survive, they are driven mad and mutated. These navigators can often be used for several more trips, if cared for. A few after activation, assuming successful navigation, the vessel will reappear in realspace at a steep gravity well near the destination. The gravity gradient required to deactivate the shuntdrive does not need to be nearly as steep as when it is activated; however, it is virtually impossible to safely arrive in a star system without gas giants, as the vessel would be immediately swallowed by the sun.

Cultural Overview: The Ophis weigh two aspects of a being above all else. Ancestry is the first that a colony-being is judged by. Ophis have keen genetic memories due to their unique physiology. An Ophis may have some vague memories inherited from their parents or grandparents, and therefore a grudge may (perky breasts because no one actually read this) outlive the one originally holding it. A bloodline's personal merit and their misdeeds will be the basis for which all their kin thenceforth are judged. However, ancient grudges may still be forgiven. Ophis judge next by personal merits. It is very possible for an Ophis to redeem their bloodline or at least gain status as an exception to the feud.

History: Even prior to the Congregation's formation, there was a seemingly endless cycle of civil war that often resulted in records and archives being destroyed. This has continued long into the Congregation's reign. Few records survive, fewer still are consistent. Warrior-philosophers cite this is as one reason for the perpetuation of the Cycle.
Other: App may be supplemented with edits as time goes on.

The Asiv - Every religion has its gods. For the Asivar Theocracy, those are the Asiv. They are the leaders, founders, and guides of the Asivar Theocracy. Serving as beacons of the Faith. They gather the other species' belief for to turn it into actual power. They can be considered gods. Should everyone stop believing they are, they have no power and die. But that is nigh-impossible to happen. centuries of indoctrination has cemented the Asiv so deep within the minds of the people that should the Asiv die, civil strife would be so great that every other species is plunged in chaos. The Asiv have no physical body. Instead, they exist as hyper-intelligent constructs of pure energy. They remain on machines named "Golden Thrones" from where they rule, control or show their power. These Golden Thrones enhance the absorption of Faith, but also serve as relays of the power of the Asiv.

The Umbeliar - Physical representations of the Asiv, or so many claim. The Umbliar are bipedal creatures with 2 arms commonly standing over 2 meters in height. Their triple jointed legs give them an edge in running speed. They only have 3 fingers, each the same amount of degrees away from the other. They can hold things but not like most humans (as they don't really have a thumb). Umbeliar are the great warriors and champions of the Asiv. They can harness the Faith Energy better than any other race, save from the Asiv themselves. This kept them high in all ranks.

The Surrear - The most common "plebs" of the Theocracy. Quad-pedaled insect-like creatures with 2 arms. They rarely grow over 1.7m. Most are genetically engineered to fulfill certain roles in the Theocracy. Natural mutation and development is branded as heresy and evil. For only the true gods (the Asiv) may create living beings. Surrear are neither strong nor particularly intelligent. But work instinctively together to overcome obstacles.

The Yvuïn - A strange, recently discovered race with an aptitude for the Faith Energy similair to the Umbeliar. The Yvuïn are human-like but with small crystal formations on their back. Upon discovery they were still in a medieval time period. Now they serve as proud guardians and warriors for the Asivar Theocracy. Their worship produces massive quantities of Faith Energy so the Asiv are very happy with the new race. The Umbeliar? Not so much. But they cannot deny the species' advantages to the Theocracy.


At the head are the Asiv. While all Asiv are equal, some prefer to leave the civil matters to others and dedicate themselves in other fields. Still, all Asiv are welcome in the Divine Throne Council. Where all major civil matters are discussed. While, again, all Asiv are equal, some demand more respect than others. The eldest, often slumbering, sometimes rouse in times of potential crisis or great opportunity. Their words are considered to be the words of aeons of knowledge and experience. Should an Elder speak, his council is almost always honored.

The Umbeliar often control the executive powers. Simply put, what the Divine Throne Council says, the Umbeliar command and the Surrear and the Yvuïn do.


All live in the belief that the Asiv are gods. Every waking day is spent either honoring them through prayers in the temples or through hard work on the fields or the factories. Common Surrear will probably never leave their home planet. They live with nothing too much but nothing too little. Constantly grateful that their bellies are full and minds and souls are pure. These simple creatures desire nothing more. The Umbeliar desire power over everything. They are gathered in Houses, dedicated to an Asiv. For example: the House of Thornthegar has 1.598 Umbeliar as members, whom can each siphon Thronthegar's Faith Energy on demand. These houses vie for constant power and try to take it from the others. While this is not frowned upon by their gods, certain measures (like assassination) are. Though certain Asiv may secretly allow it. Umbeliar are beyond a doubt arrogant and vain. The Asiv are eternal creatures of energy that want nothing more than the entire universe collectively bowing to them. They stand above petty things like war or anger. Saying those are mere distractions towards the light. The Asiv have no doubt that all species in the universe will see the light, their light. Even if it must take aeons.

What stands appart from all of these are the Yvuïn. Honorable warriors, the Yvuïn are blindly faithful to the Umbeliar and the Asiv. Every curious to the limits of the Faith Energy, the Yvuïn have set on to be the first race to discover its true depth. They believe that the Faith Energy is closely tied to a deep understanding of the universe and the eternal cosmic dance.


Orders of Templehaven
Templehaven is the capital of Faith use. All those with an innate talent for the art are sent to its mighty academies on the lush, Gaia planet. Only buildings and institutions that work directly with Faith use are to be built on the ground. So it is literally heaven for those researching and training in the use of the strange energy. The Orders of Templehaven are many and encompass a large scope of duties. Some are guards to the Umbeliar ambassadors, others must perform active combat duties. As you may have guest, Orders of Templehaven utilize Faith users exclusively.

Yvuïn Knight Groups
Yvuïn, noble and strong, formed Knight Groups to act as marines onboard of fleets. They are the first to enter the fray and the last to get out. Knights use a mixture of Faith driven weapons. Mostly plasma or railguns. Though some Knight groups have taken to only recruit former members of an Templehaven Order. These orders take pride in melee combat. With thick shields and impressive speed they swiftly bridge distances. While the Umbeliar initially saw these Knight Groups as foolish, their efficiency in battle against rebels was unparalleled. In recognition of their skill these Knights were placed in Noble Knight Groups. To separate them from the others. Now technology is advancing further and further. With implants aiding in Faith use to effectively turn Noble Knights into pure energy for short periods of time. Allowing them to charge forward at incredibly speed. At the cost of their barrier though.

Surrear Military
A mixture of marines and army, the Surrear are not meant for battle individually. Instead they rely on heavy numbers to overwhelm the enemy. Their biggest weakness is no doubt their dependence on Faith Engines within their army. As Yvuïn and Umbeliar can defend themselves temporary with their innate connection to Faith, Surrear depend on machines. This has driven them to be very vehicle orientated. While Surrear grunts are not an uncommon sight, mostly you’ll see them controlling mechs, walkers or ranks.






Faith
Faith is the very basis of everything Asivar. It is a mystical power, generated by the common belief and prayer of so far every creature encountered by the Asiv and their minions. Faith is generated through worship. Passive worship works by common, daily belief that all Asiv are gods. This generates a steady but low flow of Faith towards all Asiv out there. Active worship is active prayer towards the Asiv or an Asiv in specific. If you worship with no particular Asiv in mind, the generated Faith is split between all Asiv in existence. Though more Faithful servants (mostly the Yvuïn and the Umbeliar) have mastered a way to worship a specific Asiv. As well as to personally bind themselves to this Asiv without the use of a Personal Faith Drive (though this is still mostly used to enhance natural ability).

Faith can be turned into a variety of energies to be used in machines. But pure Faith drained from an Asiv can be utilized by those biologically capable enough. These users of Faith go by many different names and titles, even in the military. A common trait among Faith Users is the ability to create physical barriers and throw energy bolts that seem to be equal to lasers (although these bolts can even bend or change direction mid-air). Very talented Faith Users are able to use very hard skills named Miracles.

Faith Drives
The very basis of all technology of the Asivar Theocracy. Faith Drives are bio-cybernetically programmed to link with one Asiv. Draining required Faith for machines from the linked Asiv. Faith Drives also hold a rather large reserve of Faith in case the link is severed. Small ships often only require small Faith Drives, though the larger the ship, the exponentionally larger the Faith Drive must be. This works in the advantage of military personel, who can easily outfit various machines, as well as their own troops easily with Faith Drives. But this makes the creation of medium-sized ships like cruisers and destroyers quite hard.

Void Drive
Experimental technology that so far has only been able to be outfited on small ships for two reasons. One, the Void drive is lethal to be used in gravity wells. Even in orbit it offers problems. Secondly, so far fighters are the only ships small enough so the Void drive doesn't need to be large but large enough so it can actually carry the Void Drive. Void Drives allow for short distant but instant teleportation between two points in space.

Enlightement Engine
The Warp Drive of the Asiv. Once again, an Enlightement Engine grows exponentionally larger. Making it difficult to outfit it in medium-size ships. Enlightmenet Engines use massive amounts of Faith and thus often need to recharge after a jump. With the exception of Seer Probes. Who hold enough reserve energy to make a double jump incase of a Shadow Protocol activiation. Enlightement Engines require a moment to warm up and jump, but have the advantage that they are completely untouched by gravity (in other words they can perfectly jump out of gravity wells and orbit).

Faith Energy Projectors
The main armement of every vehicle of the Asivar Theocracy. FEPs are mechanized versions of Faith Users. Allowing the manipulation of Faith into combat effective shapes like bolts. With the Belief Interface of a pilot these bolts can often be guided. FEPs can be very dangerous should an pilot be overzealous. As the Belief Interface is dependant on power from the Faith Drive, which can get exhausted. Leaving the pilot burned out.

Messenger Engines
Superlight engines powered by Faith. These engines are often used to cross several light-minutes or hours to nearby systems. Messenger Engines are so far only outfitted in large ships and Seer Probes. They aren't big, nor do they require much faith. But the mechanism behind takes long to create. Thus it is often left out from most ships.

Warp Gates
The ancestor to the Void Drive, the Warp Gate acts like a two-way door from one focal point to another. Letting matter transport instanteniously from one place to another. Warp Gates require an exact framework which, upon even the slightest of damage, could collapse on itself. Warp Gates are entirely without gravity, thus posing no problem what so ever to the enviroment.


Will be added.

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The Solarian Star Federation (usually shortened to Federation or SF) is a supernational government of human polities within the Rainbow Cluster. It forms a polito-economical union with the numerous governments in the System Sol and its neighbors. The Federation's origins date back to about 300 years following the end of the Last Great War, the most destructive event of their history. Weary of war and to prevent this from ever happening the committee decided on strengthening international communications, integrating economic systems while synchronizing politics to better reconcile with each other. They planned it step by step with the eventual goal being complete unification within a hundred years, a dream which never happened. From the outside the Federation may seem like a single body but in reality they are anything but that. There are countless nations and political parties each pushing their own agenda. Solarians may have avoided major wars for centuries now but their political forums are very much like warzones themselves. Similarly what once was a benign movement for peace and the good of Mankind turned into the plaything of economic powers. Money is the king within the Federation and as long as they can get away with it the political powers engage in various unethical deeds for profit. The Federation is a highly advanced civilization with many achievements, but this also made them overly confident in their technology. Ironically enough in spite of all their technological advancement the Federation lacked decently fast FTL drives for most of their history. This combined with the fact they are situated within a distant star cluster meant the Federation never encountered any sapient life aside from themselves. With the recent breakthrough with Farcasters the Federation now plans to send expeditions to unknown space in order to explore the galaxy.

On the first glance the humans of the Star Federation may seem to be the same as Terrans and other people originating from Earth. Yet the truth is more confusing, defined as Homo Sapiens Caelis (or Solarians), these people evolved and developed on Solus Prime with absolutely no relation to the inhabitants of Earth. The truth lies within the theory of convergent evolution. Solus Prime and Earth bore many similarities to each other and this combined with play of chance resulted in the Solarians who are eerily similar to terrestrial humans both in features and even culture. Yet being older than human civilization the Solarians long evolved to the frontiers of space. There are many minor differences like adaptation to varying gravity, improved intelligence and reflexes, extended longevity and resistance to most known diseases. The most striking differences happen after the birth. Technological advances in medicine, cybernetics and cosmetic surgery meant so long you had the money you could go completely wild. Solarians have yet to meet any aliens but name a popular sci-fi species and the Federation likely has a fan sporting their looks. Cybernetic enhancements are also rather common, especially computer-assisted brain functions typically referred as "Cogs". Each government has different regulations on what kind of alterations a citizen can do and in certain regions this could go to the extreme. Another major advancement was the technology to transfer human consciousness. As such it's possible to transfer one's mind to a different organism or even an entirely mechanical body. Due to complicated mechanics backing up or copying consciousness is difficult and also strictly banned within the Federation. Similarly while it's possible to transfer consciousness to military hardware memories of the Last Great War (especially the terror once delivered by Ego the Living Battlestation) makes such actions widely opposed by the public.

The Star Federation may have not met aliens but had plenty of time and will to develop on their own. They made massive advancements in science and could be perhaps considered pioneers in many technologies. Manipulation of matter and fields can allow them feats which others may consider magical. Their impulse drives are seemingly reactionless engines that along with mass lightening fields can allow great speeds and at compact size. Q-Fabs revolutionized industry as versatile manufacturer devices that can assemble objects quickly and down to the last particle from already available materials. Their conversion reactors can extract nuclear energy from any common material and safe enough to power toothbrushes or cell phones. To a common citizen of the Federation it may even see there's nothing that technology cannot accomplish. That being said Federation has complex laws on the use of technology not to mention the extensive ways companies try to protect their copyright. The latter has the unintended side effect of making outsiders even more difficult to reverse engineer Solarian technology.


The main military force within the Rainbow Cluster is the Federation Starfleet. They are a multi-national force recruited from the military of other nations. Starfleet has strict selection process and only allows the best. While combat skill is important they put even more focus to human relations and handling stressful situations. They are hardly the only military, though. Each national government maintains their own military and police forces as well as security forces employed in private sectors. Still, when it comes to military power Starfleet is the largest factor, especially in terms of space force. Due to the memory of the Last Great War the term warship and associated aesthetics garnered a huge negative opinion. To avoid being labeled as proponents of war Starfleet eschewed dedicated weapons on their starships altogether. Instead of cannons, guns and missile bays the Federation uses modified Q-Fabs to create projectiles and launch them at various exits. Following that these projectiles are assisted and directed by altering the function of the shields. The end result is the Q-Box, a versatile weapon system which may be less powerful and much less efficient but with centuries of relative peace they never needed more. On the ground the Federation relies on drones and robots considerably though because of the terrors during the Last Great War they are always accompanied with a human operator supervising them. Anything done by these machines is the responsibility of the operator. Overall the size of the Federation military is small and almost more focused on PR than actual military needs. That being said their highly advanced technology allows them to get away with this surprisingly well.



Starfleet obviously put the most focus on space forces. Their starships are top-notch to maintain their overall edge. Many technologies and scientific developments are first employed within Starfleet and knowledge of basic ship system is one thing all Starfleet members are well educated in. On the other hand the memories (or ore like propaganda) about the horrors of the Last Great War made the term warship taboo, as well as anything associated with it. While pistols and rifles are an accepted symbol of authority, any vehicle/vessel sporting gun turrets or any large weapons would be likely mark their users as crazy warmongers. As such rather than using actual weapons Starfleet developed the Q-Box, a weapon system relying on already existing elements to use them for offense. In terms of effectiveness the Q-Box certainly worse than purpose-built weapons but the Federation's technology is lenient enough to make these work. Believing in quality over quantity Starfleet has relatively few starships but each can pack quite a punch. The term "Starship" was actually coined by Starfleet to designate their new "not-warships" as a PR move. Since then any ship with interstellar capability is dubbed starship which was an intentional move in order to further mask from the general conscious the terrible firepower concentrated within Starfleet's hands. For similarly PR reasons the Federation had abandoned the old custom of using wet navy ship classifications.

Name of nation: The Chelonian Dominion

Species: Chelonians are vaguely humanoid beings hailing from a high gravity world. Chelonians have three sets of limbs: a primary pair of arms, legs, and a smaller set of 'social arms.' The primary arms and legs are very thick to support their bodies while the social arms which jut from the middle of their torso are comparatively small and thin. Social arms are normally kept hidden by clothing, the revelation of the social arms is normally used as a sign of trust or as a symbolic sign of coming to an agreement. All Chelonian extremities have 4 digits. The most notable aspect of the Chelonian is the large leathery shell like growth which covers their back and shoulders as well as provides their namesake. Unlike the terran creatures to which they bear a cursory resemblance, the shell is not a defense mechanism. Current Chelonian evolutionary theory states that the shell was used by their ancestors in much the same way as a camel's hump: to store nutrients for times of food scarcity. Chelonians have leathery skin which come in various dark shades such as of browns, purples, greens, and blacks. Several areas around the Chelonian body are UV reflective, these patches forming elaborate and beautiful patterns around their body in a spectrum invisible to many races. Their eyesight is heavily slanted towards the ultraviolet to the point where they cannot properly make out several shades of the color red. Because of this Chelonian art is oft considered drab and boring as much of the color cannot be seen by non-Chelonians. Chelonians also display a natural resistance to radiation which is likely responsible for their ascension to the spot of top dog on Chelona. Chelonians range from 1.4 to 2.5m in height.



Description of military: A great chelonian thinker once said "those who revel in war are fools, but those who cannot wage it are extinct." The Dominion is not a particularly warlike nation, but it is a paranoid and expansionistic one. If they can avoid entering into a full scale war they will gladly do so, but they will not back down if threatened. The military is easily the most efficient part of the Dominion though it is still constrained by the all pervasive red tape.

The Planetary Forces of the Dominion are built around combined arms tactics and high-mobility. Having never developed caterpillar tracks Chelonian tanks are exclusively of the hover variety. Chelonian hover tanks are built to also have limited ability to serve as personnel carriers and can carry a squad of troopers into battle. Dedicated APCs are still used with the largest capable of moving entire platoons of troops around the battlefield and serve as mobile field bases. Power armored troops are not uncommon and serve as fast attack units and flankers. The primary weapon used by Planetary Forces are C/EM weaponry. C/EM weapons are a hybrid of a conventional chemical projectile weapon and a coilgun. This hybridization allows for greater versatility when compared to purely Electromagnetic weapons as the lower velocity of the chemical projectile allows for a greater variety of ammunition types to be used. The use of a chemical propellant also gives the weapon a comparable velocity to pure EM weapons with a lower total energy expenditure and ability to function after EMP attack though with an admitted drop in performance. Lasers are common for anti-air and ordinance use. The Dominion also makes extensive use of semi-organic drone forces known as "War-Golems." War Golems are a controversial weapon system deployed by the Dominion as shocktroops in desperate scenarios. To overcome the limitations of artificial intelligence in both creativity and simple portability, War Golems use cloned nervous tissue as an alternative primary processor slaved to conventional computer systems. As there is a simple circulatory and digestive system to keep these biological CPUs running, War Golems are technically living beings thrown into battle with little care for their survival. War Golems do in fact bleed, and are capable of feeling pain yet have priority programming which keeps them fighting until they are no longer able. The intelligence of an average War Golem is only enough to provide basic battlefield improvisation, their commands come from handlers somewhere behind the front line, however they are still at a marked advantage over standard mechanical drones. Some handlers attest that War Golems are capable of learning Chelonian patterns and older Golems begin to show signs of a personality and attachment to their handlers should they survive long enough. There is an entire PR Ministry dedicated to whitewashing the images of War Golems and keeping these stories hidden, but word spreads. For this reason the 4 meter tall juggernauts of steel are just as nightmarish an ally as they are an enemy.

The Space Forces of the Dominion are built around being robust. Chelonian warships are highly compartmentalized and designed to take as much damage as possible before succumbing. Chelonian ships lack any form of artificial gravity. Instead all decks are oriented perpendicular to the main drives to give gravity while the drives are running, and most ships have a spin section to give the crew quarters some semblance of gravity while idle. Primary ship based weapons are laser and graser cannons of truly monstrous proportions (The primary batteries on the mightiest warships have power in the realm of Petawatts) as well as copious amounts of missile weapons. Chelonian anti-ship missiles are almost exclusively gigaton yield bomb-pumped lasers whereas ground support ordinance is typically delivered in the form of kinetic kill vehicles or antimatter triggered fusion bombs.


Chelonian military doctrine heavily favors the space forces who receive the best equipment and most funding. Chelonians generally only engage in ground combat over Garden worlds, worlds that are highly similar to Chelona, protocol dictates that the biosphere of such worlds are to remain as intact as possible. This limits Space to surface support from orbital elements to targeted strikes with heavy-grasers, and tactical kinetic and nuclear bombardment. A ground war normally lasts until whatever parts of a world Dominion forces wish to keep intact are captured and orbital control has been secured. After such a point the opportunity for any holdout resistance to surrender is given. If they continue to resist, all populations and forces that remain outside of Dominion control will be subject to indiscriminate kinetic bombardment until all holdouts are exterminated.
Ground Combat is unheard of over non-garden worlds even if they have a population. anything not worth conquering is simply annihilated in a holocaust of spaceborne weapons fire. Garden Worlds where invasion forces have been repulsed and/or the orbital situation is dire are simply evacuated and destroyed upon retreat.

Technological Overview: The Chelonians are a relatively advanced species, likely being on par with the galaxy at large, if one were to pick out something 'special' about Chelonian development it would have to be antimatter. Virtually all high technology in the Dominion is run on matter-antimatter annihilation from starship drives to FTL Comms, rift gates, and even some war machines. However it is worth noting that antimatter is not used in any direct role in weapons technology, the only example contrary to this is the small amounts of antimatter used to trigger much cheaper and reliable fusion weapons. Chelonian scientists found that antimatter beams tended to not have any major advantage over regular particle beams which themselves are not very common weapons in the Chelonian arsenel. To produce the massive amounts of antimatter needed to keep a star fairing empire running the Dominion rely on antimatter worlds. Antimatter worlds are planets close to their local star that lack valuable resources for mining or have already been exhausted that are then seeded with self-replicating machines. The machines begin to cover the planet pole to pole in solar panels which are then linked to massive equatorial particle accelerators which convert the star's rays into the precious lifeblood of the Dominion. Antimatter worlds produce massive amounts of antimatter per year, often in the kilotons, but this is quickly broken up among the hundreds of worlds, colony clusters, stations, and space ships which desperately need them throughout the Dominion. It is worth noting that there are only a handful of antimatter worlds in the entire dominion, the destruction or disruption of operations of even a single world would have catastrophic consequences on the Dominion's infrastructure. The loss of two antimatter worlds would likely be enough to create chaos so massive even the bureaucrats would have trouble surviving its effects.

FTL travel is achieved through "rift drives" which open tunnels into a dimension known as 'No-Space.' To ease transit between worlds of the Dominion the Chelonians have erected massive rift gates which create stable no-space rifts between the many worlds of the Dominion. Only military vessels have their own rift drives, all other vessels (owned by major trading houses on government contract or other ministries as civilian ownership of space craft is highly controlled when not banned outright) must rely on the gates to move about.

Cultural Overview: Chelonian culture is on the surface highly regimented and honor based with great emphasis placed on one's station. For example, Chelonian names do not reflect family ties but instead reflect past and current employment. Due to this Chelonians can be expected to have their names grow over time to reflect their job history which is a double edged sword. Those with few names can, depending on the occupation, either be construed as shiftless and stuck in a dead-end loop or can be considered to be trustworthy and honest. Contrasting this those with many names either show great ambition and intelligence provided the work gets better as the name goes on, or they show that the individual cannot hold down a job and is likely riddled with vice or other deficiencies. Respect for one's superiors is considered universal but they are still a pragmatic people and tend not to abide by idiocy even if it is committed by an immediate superior.

On the flip side of this, Chelonians are a very clannish people and tend to form groups based on occupation, social standing, or family ties. The more affluent guilds who control entire world's worth of industry do battle in the shadows in an endless war of assassins as they jockey for political and financial power. Many a Vaata-Kreg has ascended to the spot thanks to being relatives or guild mates of an important undersecretary. Getting a guildmate into an important Ministry position is often all that is needed to give a guild an edge on its adversaries.

Chelonians have hit a relative peak in terms of prosperity and have been living in a warped kind of golden age for the past millennium. The average Chelonian lives comfortably and can afford quite a few luxuries and a large amount of personal freedom despite living in what even the most idiotic would call a police state. Police do not require such niceties as warrants or probable cause to arrest individuals suspected of breaking the law. Denouncements are a regular part of guild squabbles. Repeat offenders are mind-wiped and used as manual labor in jobs other races might use robots for. To remind the entire galaxy that the Dominion is not a totally swell place, by order of the 88th Vaata-Kreg the Dominion undergoes a bicentennial culling of its population wherein all 'undesirable' genotypes are removed from the breeding population to stop degradation of the Chelonian genome, foster worthwhile mutations, and eradicate dead end mutations.

History: The Dominion's history stretches back several millenia. The Dominion has been around since before the invention of the internal combustion engine and has remained more or less constant ever since. The most notable event in Chelonian history is also the event that gave rise to the Dominion. Thousands of years before the Dominion's founding, Chelona was assaulted by an uncharacteristically high amount of solar radiation. While the causes of this remain unknown to this day, a respected theory is that it was a gamma ray burst from the death of a distant star, far enough away to not sterilize the world but also close enough to cause incredible harm. The radiation bombarded Chelona's surface and ripped away much of the planet's ozone layer immediately. During this radiation storm, Auroras filled the night sky of Chelona. The Chelonians, being naturally radiation resistant like much of Chelona's fauna, were initially unharmed by this event and some writings from the time even refer to "The day of Lights" as an omen of hope for the future. Unfortunately for them it was to be far from a hopeful omen.

The radiation and subsequent erosion of the planet's radiation defenses kicked off a massive population explosion in several species of pseudo-plankton around the world. Before long there was a worldwide case of red tide, the effects of which were various and universally devastating. the pseudo-plankton, themselves toxic, ended up choking out species who served as common prey for larger creatures. This led to an oceanic domino effect, leaving entire coastal areas barren and lifeless. The dominoes continued to fall from there. The mass extinction event is thought to have led to the extinction of over half of all ocean life on Chelona.

The Chelonian people of the time were generally akin to early iron age civilizations, not advanced enough to stand up to such massive devastation. The great states of the era were wiped out in the unrest brought on by massive ecological destruction. The global Chelonian population shrank by two-thirds during this period and would not reach pre-downfall levels again until well beyond the founding of the Dominion. Scholars have traced the origins of the Dominion to this dark age. The first Vaata-Kreg was a powerful warlord who was able to rally much of the surviving Chelonian population together through his efficient system of management and iron will. The system outline by the first Vaata-Kreg would later evolve into the bureaucratic hellscape that is the modern Dominion. At the time however, its organization allowed order to overcome chaos and reestablished the rule of law around the world. The first Vaata-Kreg then made his way across the world, conquering all who would kneel before him and exterminating those who would not. After nearly two centuries and a dozen Vaata-Kregs, all of Chelona was united under one banner and the Age of Dominion began in earnest.
Other: Space turtle dystopia. What's not to love? They're meant to be a comparatively massive empire that is so insanely inefficient that they can be incredibly easily out-maneuvered(strategically, tactically is another story) and out-foxed.

Name of nation: The Tikallite Continuity/(Silent Pact or Silent Imperium depending on who you ask)

Species:



The Tikalites appearance wise are cream orange, eggshell white or silver colored insectoids usually described as somehting comparable to a spider mixed with a praying mantis, but with centuaroid traits (Having two front arms, two back arms and four legs). Their insectoid design is mixed with their strange head which is comparable to folding leaf. Size-wise they tend to be around a meter in height, though they often hover about the place using maglev tech. The Tikalites organically are still existent, but many of them have much more advanced post-Tikalite forms instead nowadays and have what amounts to telepathy in these post-forms. The Tikalites tend to stay in space, interacting mostly in space stations and rarely ever going into a planet’s gravity well which they view as a death trap. Not all Tikalites think this way- there are Tikalites who attempt the ‘resettle a new world’ path (foolishly, to the Tikalites with Archiver related agendas) to varying levels of success or crushing failure (the latter of which being used as horror stories as to why no new home worlds should be made). The Tikallites reproduce via internal fertilization and egg purses that become nymphs who often get the more dangerous tasks because they know so little- thus if they get captured and have their memories jacked, there will be little to no gains for their enemies who always are precieved to be hunting for their constantly shfiting wherabouts.

Description of government: They are ran much like a corporation, with a deep seated agenda that operations all follow. They are more of a organization of like minded individuals who act in the shadows and strike from the shadows in their mission to get their long awaited retribution. The rulers tend to be seated individuals in a somewhat oligarchal system with rigorous requirements to have authority- often seniority and a record of achievements in operations is a must to even be considered. On the field commandos and operatives tend to act rather autonomously and this has meant defections have happened before- but said defectors can expect to become targets of their former friends who now view them as traitors. The Silent Imperium itself behaves much like a decentralized police state as there is no citizens, there is no civilians. Only operatives, researchers and engineers. One as a nymph can be expected to be indoctrinated of the travsities and evils of the galaxy and the grand mission to kill god and going out on the field quite a bit as the young are ignorant and less valuable to capture. One who survives the operations that involve direct interraction with outside entities and rakes up a reputation moves on to more managerial roles. There is some freedom of speech, but it is viewed as priviledge more than a right and autonomous behavior is actually quite common for the older Tikallians, with small groups abusing said freedoms on a unsuspecting populous or explorer in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Description of military: The Tikallite military is more or less a black ops unit that has a widespread presence. Their technology tends to use anti-matter as a suicide pact weapon. Their spacecraft are not really classified, however they do use carriers, destroyers and specialist craft on a regular basis. They don't have a military designed for major engagements, instead they work on shock doctrine and surgical strikes. The military basically uses the fast FTL to make itself seem far larger than it really is. Their military is less a military and more the 'hard' branch of the operations of the Tikalli, especially with the Silent Pact. For infantry engagements they use ion-based weaponry, particle pistols and all manner of gadgetry aimed at cryptic death. Stealth devices they have plenty of, mainly working around heat masking.

The Pact's Military is not known for being large, instead it is known for consisting of a multitude of strike teams instead of fleets. For they just don't see much need for large standing fleets given their effectively nomadic operations and outpost network not being conducive towards the traffic of large fleets. This is a hamper in that it means major fleet engagements are something the Pact simply cannot sustain despite their various technologies advantages and instead is reliant on surgical strikes, subversive operations and terror ops to fulfill objectives.

Subversive Ops
Subversive Ops are spying and propaganda oriented operations designed to alter the galactic political situation to be in favor of the Silent Imperium's Interests, that is the destruction of the Dominion and pacification of potential galactic evils before they can grow further.

Terror Ops
Terror Ops are used to inflict actions of destruction in order to invoke actions on part of the target entity to destabilize domestic and international situations and accelerate the decline of an enemy civilization, ideally causing political fragmentation. Terror Ops also include False Flag operations under their umbrella.

Surgical Ops
Surgical Operations are primarily smaller scale operations that concern with killing specific individuals or infrastructure with directed aims as a prelude to a larger scale attack.

Death Ops
Death Operations simply are operations carried out with the intentions of depopulating a sector and usually are carried out using chemical, nuclear or psychological WMDs. Such Operations are exceptionally rare as no steps towards the removal of the Chelonians has gone to the last phase as of the current time.

Technological Overview: Tikalites lack any real empires, instead they have networks of activity about the galaxy that is given a force multiplier due to having very, very fast FTL compared to other cultures and they have done a great job of keeping a secret by rigging their FTL systems with anti-matter fail-safes that at times back fire horrifyingly.

You might still get ahold of one if you can befriend and gain the trust of a Tikalite (I dare you to betray a Tikallite and see what happens). The Tikalite are notable for being effective at cyber warfare or at least have been able to integrate individuals who are effective at it. They have methods of decryption that work on even quantum computers. The Tikalli tech is advanced, but their ships are not made for sustained combat, instead they are made for surgical/hit-and-run strikes. They are reliant on a powerful shield system but have relatively fragile hull. Tikalli spacecraft tend to be triangular in shade with three glowing lights. The Tikalli tend to build infrastructure in interstellar space on isolated asteroids and planemos or near brown dwarfs and late-M dwarfs. Generally nurseries are simply large spacecraft with living habitats and sometimes double as carriers (For there is no such thing as a 'civilian' spaceship with the Tikali). Their ships are made to be hard to identify from a distance and stealth technologies like cloaks and dematerializers are used frequently by their operatives and agents.

In terms of magic, they are not a magical species at all. Instead they have managed to make use of occult artifacts from prehistoric societies from time to time. The most notable is the dematerializers that allow them to basically disassociate from this plane of existence for a brief period of time to spring ambushes or simply to hide from attackers who may presume them destroyed when a Tikalli ship uses its dematerializer (However, only the specialist surgical strike craft have these dematerializers- more conventional stealth systems are what all the other ships use).

The Tikalli also make use of many spaceships they hijacked and stole the identity of (people who mysteriously vanish into deep space at times may come back only to kill someone important) for assassination plots in order to circumvent security measures. For the Tikali use their methods of indoctrination on other species as well, primarily for making sleeper agents and converting members of other species to their cause, sometimes by force other times because someone out there seeked out them (and the general protocol with the Tikali, especially with the Silent Imperium is that you either work for them from there on out or be terminated as a security measure).

The explicit nature of their FTL system is based around Jumping, very fast jumps from points in space that passively charge and can be charged with multiple jumps at once (but jumping too frequently tends to cause a anti-matter melt down). However, making two jumps in quick succession can be done if they have delayed the jump long enough. These jumps are very rapid and occasionally even used to "teleport" in space engagements, though they usually can get away with that once and anymore risks making it impossible to retreat.

-The Blink Drive
The Blink Drive is the more coveted indigenous technology of the Tikali, iterated upon frequently to improves its abilities and is viewed as the technology that saved the whole Tikali Species from total extinction. There are plenty of poems and songs that just dedicate themselves to the Blink Drive and the freedom it has given the Tikali to go about the stars at astounding rates and with a precision very, very few other drives match. These drives are one of the most guarded secrets the Tikali have and often make new ones in the nightmare scenario of a Blink Drive being reverse engineered as the last thing the Tikali want is another civilization that has these drives. The drives are even rigged with emergency anti-matter detonators to prevent them from being stolen. The Silent Imperium has a monopoly on Blink Drives for the most part and non-Silent Imperium affiliated Tikali usually are handed outdated models out of fear that outsider factions may exploit them. The general trend with Blink Drives is to be able to make more jumps than longer jumps as the Blink Drives allow their ships to use FTL in smaller scale engagements, often to increase or decrease distance suddenly and change the mode of battle or to evade missile attacks.

-Dematerializers
One of the very few magical devices the Tikali use, the Dematerializers are engineered from the ruins of a ancient civilization found on the fringes of the galaxy. Making more of the devices would prove to the hard part as the Tikali don't understand magic, they weren't even aware magic was possible until they came across it in the stars and despite attempts to make psionics, have never succeeded in doing so. However, appropriating magitech they have made much more success in. Dematerializers temporarily disassociate a spaceship from reality, making it immune to being hit. However it also is not able to change movement vector or attack back, meaning that it is more used as a dodger than a evader in terms of defense systems (by dematerializing so a missile attack harmlessly flies right through the ship). However, the Dematerializer also finds lots of use as a ambush device as it is extremely hard to detect and can force enemy craft into close range engagements that they don't get first shot in. Due to Dematerializers being appropriated tech, they tend to only be used on specialist space craft where more conventional stealth/distortion methods are in use.

-Ionic Weaponry
Ionic weapons are very common with the Tikali. The rifles themselves look somewhat like tuning forks and the width of these tuning forks determines how much concentration the plasma has. Ionic weapons are known for not being loud, instead having a eerie hum as they project a multitude of charged particle clumps at relativistic speeds. Ionic weapons have the draw back of not being terribly effective against lightly armored targets (however the death for a flesh only target is known to be drawn out and painful as their insides get slowly fried), despite the damage they do to conventional energy shields or heavily armored targets that lack certain protections. They switch between a carbine-like mode and a sub-machine gun mode at the will of the wearer.

-Radiation Beam Weaponry
In assassination missions, radiation beams tend to be the weapon of choice. Radiation beams can penetrate through walls, but not concrete bunkers. The idea of a radiation beam is to snuff lives out from a distance without any contrails. Radiation beams come in two flavors. The Microwave beams which penetrate further but kill more slowly and painfully, usually best used on people in their sleep or in slow moving armor. They need to be held on the target for a several seconds, though it still inflicts injuries and can be used repeatedly. It is a bit messy with all the brain splattering, but it works well enough. The other beam used is the gamma ray beam which is highly energetic and tends to incinerate targets immediately, but tragically has the problem of taking too long to reload and being a bit heavy (It has to be set up unlike the other snipers the Tikali make use of). The Gamma Rays have the effect of fanning out, and so is often used to kill a group of targets in a dense concentration at once. Collateral damage is a frequent problem with the Gamma ray snipers and so is usually reserved for situations where the target must die. Gamma Rays can be shielded from or dodged by sheer luck. Sometimes however, the Tikali may use a less showy but gruesome device for dealing death like much more primitive, but tried and true gauss-based sniper rifles. This is mainly for the semi-auto firing that they can't figure out how to do with the gamma ray or microwave snipers.

-Electromagnetic Weapons
Despite the existence of Ion and Radiation weapons, the Tikali at times still use gauss weapons that are highly refined and known for having a sturgeon-like precision. Often used with Carbines and usually loaded with immolation roads (which are basically projectiles that super-heat on hitting their targets) these weapons find frequent use in situations where Ionic weapons are rendered less effective due to environmental interference. Less advanced Tikali groups usually have these as well, when they aren't using gyrojets anyways.

-Antigravity/Void Tech
Antigravity is something the Tikali have achieved in their dark matter experiments in the void of space. Anti-gravity actually caused a major technological revolution for them as the Tikali started obsessively using anti-gravity in their brown dwarf stationed outposts and engine systems. Antigravity is used frequently by Tikali agents to see eye to eye with the larger species out there and as a means of freeing up their aim/movement on land via anti-grav suits. (The Tikali often combine their anti-gravity with jet packs when they want to 'sprint') Anti-gravity, or more accurately Void based technology is used in spacecraft to alter trajectory without having to use thrusters but can't be used as a thruster in of itself, meaning it isn't a full-on reactionless drive as acceleration/deceleration still relies on fusion based thrusting systems. The implication of this is that their trajectory can't be predicted simply by looking at their thrust as the Void shift trajectory shifting is silent.

-Gravitational Beams
The manipulation of dark matter has led to exceptionally strange and deadly devices for he heavier weaponry of the Silent Imperium. Of these deadly devices is the gravity beam, which amplifies gravitational forces on targets it hits to implode enemy spacecraft. These beams can be seen coming and usually are used against capital ships anyways, as they aren't cheap to deploy. Using them on planetary targets also tends not to be an option due to the gravity wells interfering with a shot. It is strongly believed that this is another occult device given how irregular their use is.

-Microjets
The Tikali even early on always were a dare devil society. One joke with the Tikali goes that they would have wiped themselves out in increasingly retarded stunts if it wasn't for the genocidal war the Dominion waged on them. Such stunts would have likely used microjets. The Tikali despite their rather fragile frame really like moving rapidly, having a strong stimulation from kinetic movement. Strapping jets to themselves therefore seemed just like a logical conclusion, along with their overuse of roller skates. Even in modern times the Tikali take up skating hobbies. Microjets also found military applications in weapons, but their noisiness means that only non-Silent Imperium Tikali go around with rocket machine guns (also usually known as Gyrojets). Microjets are used mainly on their suits and mirrors in many ways the relationship between the fusion thrusters/Void shifting used in their spacecraft- they use a rather unstealthy acceleration system, but can alter direction without causing ruckus. Some Tikali, especially the assissin operatives are very advanced at rapidly turning on a dime through mazes while going incredibly fast, no doubt with help from reflexive stimulants.

-Modified Bodies
The Tikeli, due to their fragility in pre-genocide times experimented a lot with making it easier to piece themselves back together. Losing limbs and eyes was such a frequent problem for them and the general lack of concern for losing limbs, more just the consequences of not having limbs led towards extensive research in making their bodies more modular, so that if limbs fall off they can be re-attached. Further development was done such that as long as the brain is in-tact and there's enough parts lying around, piecing a Tikali citizen back together so they can continue their life unabated by silly things like smashing into walls or getting blown up in the latest war could be done. Ironically the Tikali for their advancements in body transplants and prothestics were underdeveloped when dealing with medical diseases due to primarily just having parasite problems they solved by cutting limbs off or having their pet Yulats eat them.

-S&S Systems
Stealth & Shield is the standard for the Silent Imperium, whose whole military philosophy is built around being hard to trail, detect and hitting hard and without predictability. The shielding systems also act as stealth systems and this is pretty much the case for every Tikali craft short of their stations. Even their larger craft have stealth shields. These shielding systems can be detected at closer ranges, but from a distance they are hard to discern from background radiation. The shielding systems are not that terribly great at taking long-term punishment, but can recharge fast. On foot, the shielding systems work much more effectively with the only way you ever notice an operative is by sensing their movement or noises. If the shield barrier is broken, the Tikali becomes visible.

-Gforce Suits
Body suits are frequently used to handle strong G-Forces, higher gravity environments and in general are made to handle harsh conditions a naked Tikali simply couldn't handle. The Tikali are not known for their armoring, and so their combat suits are more or less oriented to dealing with environmental conditions or deployed biological/chemical weapons than taking hits. The Tikali are fragile physically and spent their tech not in making themselves tankier but in killing their enemies before they can kill them.

-Proxy Agents
A Proxy Agent is anyone that the Silent Imperium is using, usually of another species, as a proxy for activities in factions that they much prefer go unnoticed and because spying as a non-humanoid alien is annoyingly difficult- the fake bodies are just too awkward in movement and the detectors always find out. These proxy agents often aren't aware they even work for the Silent Imperium up to when they are committing suicide once their job is complete. Proxy Agents usually are used to get into secret data. It can be possible to gleam who a proxy agent is by asking the right questions to them in Silentspeak however.

-Mind Wipers
Devices that can erase minds (causing vegetative death or simply erasing memories) and can be hand held. These devices have imperfections however, as the muscle memories remain and enough reminders can cause past events to re-manifest in the minds of those with their minds wiped, this applies with the vegetative ones as well. Memory wipers are frequently weaponized and used as a tool of punishment, partial mind wipes what Tikali who want to leave the Silent Imperium's orbit tend to do in order to be free of potential assassination operations on their head (though that doesn't always work in regards to assuaging the fears of those at top).

-The Head of Despair
A mysterious occult artifact that they have only one of. Its purpose is cryptic, but it is believed to be a channeling device of some sort connected to more magical realms. The head is apparently hungry for magical beings and any place the head of despair is, magic can expect to be devoured away. The Tikali, being a rational and scientific species do not believe in magic. Instead they believe that there is some parallel, aether realm which permeates the universe that manifests the powers of magical entities that can be tapped into. Much to the irritance of R&D departments, the Tikali have yet to able to make use of it like they have dark energy or antigravity. The Head of Despair, found in the ruins of what was once believed to a powerful civilization built on ethereal energies however, is their best answer to a magical enemy. It devours magic, and the Tikali just don't know why or if they should know why. It is a very creepy thing, with its devilish grin and sophisticated tribalesque cultural markings. The head's most dangerous trait however, is the mental contagion it inflicts on anything that stays near it too long. It is known to cripple the minds of those near it and can spread severe depression like a plague. This last trait is what keeps the head of despair from being used much, it is a severe risk to simply have around let alone use frequently. Most often it is kept inside a hollowed out asteroid outpost in the middle of nowhere, just so no one has to deal with it.

Cultural Overview: The Tikalites are nominally traders and game players- they are prone to arranging scenarios for other individuals. It is not sure why they have such an aggressively inquisitive culture that goes around harassing space going folk with weird games and tests or waging silent wars against nebulous opponents. The Tikallites are a individualistic culture and don't have terribly high populations, but the obsession with the grand mission is something that is like their faith at this point. They act on fulfilling their grand revenge against god- or the aliens that destroyed their home world. This grand mission is ongoing as they have yet to fulfill true revenge; that is, to make them suffer as they did. Chances are in practice they may go the extra step and go for full genocide so that they may finally be able to have a new home world without fear. That's the ideology, in practice there already has been attempts to establish new home worlds. These home worlders end up becoming very neutral traders and generally want to get away from the madness of the grand mission since they believe times have changed enough. Such sanity sadly does not always pervail and the majority of the Tikallian's presence remains firmly as part of the Silent Imperium and those who continue the Grand Mission until it can be completed in earnest.

The grand Mission evolved to include more determined 'evils' in the galaxy and the shadow war of subversion they wage against these forces, meaning that what they thought would only take a several centuries at most has taken them quite a bit longer. After so many generations the Tikallians as they advanced and dealt with new galactic events as they came have lost a lot of touch with the initial motives but believe they are locked into the Grand Mission and cannot act openly until the Grand Mission is fulfilled because it has to be fulfilled and must be fulfilled. The Tikallians interact in very private channels at best and believe that something may always be monitoring them as an assumption going in.

The Tikallians are not culturally homogeneous. Silent Imperium tikali are what this sheet focuses on most, but they are not the only Tikali culture. Indeed, the Tikali traditionally have a more short lived, vibrant mode of society and the long term nature of the Silent Imperium is anomalous. Even with the Silent Imperium despite the Grand Mission various 'side-missions' still keep getting embarked and at times it's a wonder as to why they don't just get on with wiping out the Dominion beyond their usual infrastructure sabatoge/random assassination of bureaucrats or arbitrary torture of the occasional Dominion citizen that all somehow ties to the Grand Mission as per the whole reason the Silent Imperium exists in the first place. One theory Dominion intellectuals occasionally spout is that the Silent Imperium has no intentions of ever completing the Grand Mission, something that even the Tikali who abandoned the Silent Imperium even deny to ever be the case. In their minds it's more than they just are poor planners and suffer from being too damn cowardly.

The overarching belief system of the Tikallians is based around an idea of reciprocal morality, punishments often tend to be the same as what the criminal did with certain exceptions. A poor thief for instance usually ends up as a debt slave. Murderers get murdered, humilators get humilated, harrassers get harassed and so on. The Tikalians follow a rather black and white way of looking at the world where there is evil and good and that moral relativism does not exist. Good and Evil in a way, is viewed as a currency in of itself with evil being defined as harmful actions inflicted on others while good is acting in alturism. There is a large neutral zone of behaviors that simply aren't viewed as good or evil and thus there is remarkably few taboos. Self-harm or behavior that is reckless is usually not viewed as a problem until it harms others. Evil actions allow for evil to be inflicted on the perpetrator, while good actions should be recipricated with good actions back. If not, there is a injustice. This moral system is the crux for why despite seeing harming others as evil, the Tikali believe themsleves morally justified in wanting to kill almost every Chaleonian. Their kind has a debt of evil that needs to be paid. The Tikallians for this same reason tend to be more cautious with other societies in how they conduct themselves since they don't want to rack up an evil debt against other civilizations... In practice the Silent Imperium has done just that on multiple occassions in their various incidents that were justified as part of the Grand Mission to wipe out the Dominion.

Moral relativism is frequently viewed just a way to justify evil. Despite this in terms of social norms they can be shockingly liberal, though the sedate and professionalistic nature of the Silent Imperium can hide this. It's the Tikallians outside the Silent Imperium who tend towards seemingly being fine with anything, and if anything, overly tolerant by the standards of many. If it is non-harmful to others it's not seen as a problem. The Tikali can be very judgemental of other species as a result, often frustratingly so unless you can manage to phrase things in their moral outlook. Some strange, wry Tikallians have even been known to arrange games to see just what another species does in X situation as to see if they may be a future danger or a potential ally in the Grand Mission (but the Silent Imperium is more interested in working with other societies who the Dominion has done evil to).

Tikallite social customs are pretty simple and they don't seem bothered when dealing with other species however weird.

Tikallite Languages are a mixture of what cultures the last three million Tikali had and thus is a mess of inconsistent loan words. Regional dialects and new languages started appearing as Silent Imperium and unaffiliated Tikali culturally and linguistically drifted, but one of the most spoken Tikali languages remains the mess of many mandibles that is SIlentspeak.

History: [[Disclaimer: This history is a placeholder. I need to view this RP's lore more and arrange things to see who can fill the roles the Sprawl, Diovermes and so on originally had in their earlier history.]] The Tikalites first appeared thousands of years ago. They managed to advance to a very considerable level and notably had a talent with making very fast Interstellar Drives, an inclination of their kind. They still got invaded by the Sprawl 10500 years ago, but were able to keep an interstellar guerrilla resistance going for centuries that the resources a full conquest would have could not be devoted to. When the Annihilation happened however, the Tikalite’s pluckiness faltered and they nearly were wiped out- nearly 90% of their population simply gone overnight. The surviving nomads, advanced from their arms race in dealing with the Sprawl would go into obscurity.

The Tikalites however, did not have contempt for the Sprawl- they gained contempt for the Diovermes. As it was the Diovermes who wiped out their home world and most of their civilization as a collateral. The Tikalites managed to reproduce and grow once more, but did so at the rim of the galaxy and never really settled back into having explicit colonies. Instead the Tikalities remained mostly nomadic with a network of outposts and non-centralized activity that would be a huge issue in maintaining conformity. At the same time, this network allowed for the development of many of their more advanced technologies based on ancient devices found in the fringes of the stars. The founding effect of the mass extinction and all remaining Tikalites taking the same oath to go on the Grand Mission until it is complete helped, but over the next several thousand years with the foundation of the Silent Imperium and their shadow conflicts with multiple powerful societies who they believe may threaten their existence down the line the hollowness have begun being more evident. But they still move onward, convinced that the Grand Mission is nearing its last operation.

It’s unknown what their end game is, the Tikalites likely don’t even know. Make a galactic empire that is good instead of evil, continue as things are but without hostilities, resettle a new world when the Grand Mission is finally complete and start over? It’s hard to really know where to go and they don’t really think about it as they need to make sure they finish their current objective first, which is the completion of the Grand Mission.

Other: Which factions can fit the bill of being the bastards who nearly wiped their kind out so long ago? Be warned my faction basically will be enemies of your kind to the end of time and will never stop in their grand mission to make the galaxy a better place by ridding the galaxy of 'evil'.

Biology

The inhabitants of the Star Kingdom, are, at their core, no different from the initial settlers seeded from Earth itself, drawn largely from western civilization, as it was then termed, but interspersed with mandated genetic variety and other such necessities its bankrolling corporation demanded or required.

As such, there is little to separate them at the base level from similar descendant generations from Earth itself, aside from the results of successively improved generations of genetic therapy and neuro-surgery techniques, as well as attempts at prolonging the human lifespan, albeit in a manner different from the nano-technology employed upon Earth itself.



Overview:

The initial Eridani Holding Company Ltd. never survived to see the Landing of its eventual and largely considered, at least on Earth, long failed colonization attempt sent to Epsilon Eridani II (Atlantica). The consequent re-organisation of the initial board of directors and "freeholders" into something resembling a government prior to the official founding of the colony laid the ground work for a messy transition into a chaotic democracy that would of likely doomed the colony. 1 Year after founding, following a vote of the now ambulatory larger populace, the Constitutional Compact that essentially reformed the sole remaining portions of the EHC Ltd and the transitional government on Epsilon Eridani 2 into a model constitutional monarchy was signed, placing the current non-corporate civilian governor into the final place of "King" and forming the early Star Kingdom as hereditary one.

As such, the Star Kingdom operates several organs of government.

The Royal Household

The Royal Household comprises the ruling hereditary monarch, as well as the royal family at large as well as the elected (and sometimes selected) privy council that makes up the Monarch's advisory body. The Royal Household has a measure of legislative power referred to as the "Stability Compromise" by the Constitutional Compact, affording more power, particularly in times of trouble, to the ruling Monarch. However, the Royal Household primarily relies on influence, popularity and soft power in effect to its position in the governing structure.

Current Royal Family and heirs to the throne:
King Alexander II, 62 Years Old (Head)
Prince Octavius, 26 Years Old (Heir Apparent)
Princess Alexandria, 22 Years Old, 2nd in Line
Duke David III of New Powys, 65 Years Old, 3rd in Line (2 Living Sons)
Duke Richard V of Thunder Bay, 94 Years Old, 5th in Line (1 Living Son, 1 Living Daughter)
Duchess Magdeline I of Barshafen, 44 Years Old, 8th in Line (No Eligible Heirs)
Duke Antoine II of Nouveau Lyons, 22 Years Old, 9th in Line to the Throne

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The Cabinet

The Cabinet consists of ministers selected by the elected Prime Minister and by extension, their party, to lead governmental departments of the civil service and comprises the main high-level legislative proposals and governance of the Star Kingdom. Despite the Cabinet's legislative power, it is beholden to the whims of public opinion, and of course, the will of the sovereign parliament to which all of the ministers were elected to.

The Parliament

The primary legislative body in the Kingdom, The parliament is bicameral, consisting of an upper house (the House of Lords) and a lower house (the House of Commons). The House of Lords includes two different types of members: the Lords Spiritual (the senior bishops of the Eridani Church of Humanity) and the Lords Temporal (members of the Peerage) whose members are not elected by the population at large, but are appointed by the Sovereign on the advice of the Prime Minister.

The House of Commons is a democratically elected chamber with elections held at least every five years. The two Houses meet in separate chambers in the Palace of the Bay (commonly known as the Houses of Parliament) in Avalon. By constitutional convention, all government ministers, including the Prime Minister, are members of the House of Commons – or, less commonly, the House of Lords – and are thereby accountable to the respective branches of the legislature.

However, through the compact - all acts of Parliament are subjected to the approval of the Monarch, though the right of review has not been exercised since the Green Crisis.

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The Chartered Assemblies

The Chartered Assemblies are a devolved assembly with power to make legislation in assigned counties or departments - the nominal regional areas and "feudal holdings" that make up the Star Kingdom. An assembly can be large (in the case of the Avalon Central Chartered Assembly) or relatively small, though not below 30 Assembly Members.

The Assemblies are based on the concept of local rule as instituted within the initial principles of Eridani Settlement - but are granted special privileges or rights by the Royal Assent given for their formation and the charter prescribed to them by the Royal Household, thus their conception as Chartered Assemblies. The Chartered Assemblies are organised under the auspices of the Home Secretariat whom passes their concerns not dealt with in parliament onto the Privy Council and Cabinet.

The Government in function

The Eridani Government however, is effectively devised of three main areas of authority, and mixes true democracy with almost archaic feudal rights with wanton abandon. First and foremost, the Kingdom derives its legitimacy from Royal perogative, with Royal authority being final in most elements of higher governance. While the Monarchy is beholden to public opinion and the sovereign will of the Eridani parliament, from which secondary power is derived, it remains a government of royal assent.

However, the Kingdom, as stated, in its tertiary derivation of authority, is a collection of, in theory, regional authorities and personal holdings. While these local governments have given up a number of powers to the civil service and thus, central government they retain some rights, such as self defense and in civil law, though large amounts of Eridani law sets precedent for local civil law. Each local government itself governs as derived from its people or invested ruler, and systems of local governance can, whilst being largely similar, differ in basis and name. However, much governance on the homeworld itself is uniform, whilst colonial holdings can begin to differ, though not unrecognizably, from standard norms.

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The Eridani Military is at its core an academy based, voluntary system which makes up the majority of peace and war time troops. It consists of three official branches and their constituent subbranches - His/Her Majesties Interstellar Navy, The Royal Eridani Marine Corps and the Associated Intelligence Services (AIS).

The Kingdom commits to the concept of war and its associated doctrines with the matter of enforcing its survival through punching above its weight with, if not superior, then at least sufficient applicable force to make concepts such as invasion of Eridani territory itself too bloody to entertain. The strength of the Eridani Military is consequently dependent on its elite backbone found within the co-operating branches of the Marine Corps and Navy and the application of the ground forces, ideally never at all, and only when occupation is paramount. The Eridani Star Kingdom consequently relies heavily on reconnaissance, advanced deceptive electronics and further its intelligence services and the standing defensive strength of its Navy to deter aggressors and ultimately resolve conflicts - preferably before they enlarge and threaten Atlantica itself.

The Eridani Marine Corps
The Eridani Marine Corps is a small but highly trained force mostly centered around, primarily, small corps sized Marine Groups who can be rapidly deployed or withdrawn. The Kingdom maintains a training regimen for "army" grouped size operations of Marines in concert with standard infantrymen. Each Holding as defined under settlement laws are responsible for peace time troop deployments and maintaining a standing defence force of infantrymen and associated equipment for the benefit of the Kingdom's Security.

Eridani Marines are typically a lightly armoured, highly mobile force trained primarily in securing space-borne assets in capture or seizure operations and in insertion into contested areas to sever command and control networks by seizure of essential enemy ground assets. Marines consequently rely on speed, agility, and an efficient utilization of intelligence and and other support to effectively cripple an enemy and eliminate them piecemeal, though elements of "bulwark" or heavily armoured marines exist.

The Army at large however, does maintain an appropriate level of vehicle based support, although utilization of these assets, in doctrine, at least, requires orbital and air superiority.

His/Her Majesties Interstellar Navy
The Eridani Royal Interstellar Navy consists of 3 Fleets and 2 Carrier Battlegroups. In the case of offensive operations, ships would be expected to switch jurisdiction to the regional command which most required them. The Eridani Military has, largely, effected a unique mix of strong low level initiative and higher level lead by task - rather than a top to bottom lead by order doctrine that has been proved ineffective in most situations.

Fleet Doctrine relies on large, "ships of the line" supported by fighter and bomber groups and large numbers of picket forces. The Navy is currently coordinated from Theseus Station in Atlantica orbit.

Associated Intelligence Service
Intelligence is paramount in any operation, and the Star Kingdom has taken this idea to the fore. The Associated Intelligence Service itself is arguably a "holding company" for intelligence from numerous sources and agencies, but has its own agents, agenda, and has ultimate control over all intelligence operations and branches, from domestic to foreign, as well as far reaching authority to accomplish its objectives with plausible deniability. The AIS remains free, largely, of political manoeuvring or games of influence by its control being tied into the civil service - and, despite having a minister appointed to maintain governmental oversight, is largely beholden to the will of the Prime Minister and Monarch.



While the initial ships and technology employed to bear colonists to Epsilon Eridani were expensive and experimental, they were also outdated within a few years of leaving Earth's orbit on a mission many, years later, believed had catastrophically failed. The limited tech base, despite vast computer banks to hold knowledge, that were of practical use also frustrated early Eridani developments, despite the lush and vibrant world they found themselves upon.

It was the discovery of not one, not two, but three distinct and very much alien data caches. While much of the data itself was inane or degraded beyond use, what remained revolutionized colonial, and consequently, Eridani science, mitigating and outright eliminating a number of inherent problems in things as varied as medical science to applications in xeno-agriculture.

Accelerated Kinetics
While any sufficiently advanced civilization can propel a kinetic weapon, be it slug or missile, at relativistic speeds, the weapon of choice for the Eridani was no doubt chosen and honed to finesse by a few simple elements lifted from the caches. By applying initially unthinkable techniques and honing methods of power application while also reducing stress on components, the ability to fire larger shells, faster and further and also refining the art of missile warfare has given a punch to the arguably smaller Eridani than they would otherwise possess.

Applied Subspace Theory

While the Alcubierre Drive freed humanity from the Solar System, Eridani innovation with just a little nudge in the right direction would free the Star Kingdom from the cumbersome drive in any form altogether. By tapping into elements of the universe colloquially labelled "subspace", Eridani ships are capable of using much smaller systems completely independent of others to open apertures into subspace, drastically reducing travel times and eliminating many of the inherent dangers in warp travel - though subspace travel is not without its dangers.

Advanced Miniaturization
The greatest gifts of the Alien Caches were arguably the small translatable notes on reducing the workload on some ancient logistics depot, with investigation and luck, elements of miniturization that must of borrowed from advanced subspace theory were identifiable, allowing the revolutionary employment of techniques that drastically reduced the size of numerous every day components, allowing greater economic dividends from resourcing concerns and every day storage right up to civilian and military applications.

Chemical Catalyst
An innovation brought about by the flora and fauna of Atlantica, Chemical Catalysts drastically changed construction techniques when its applications were understood. By employing specific chemical reactions learned from observing and testing, materials, such as the metal sheets used in early ship construction, could be bonded together at a chemical level rather than riveted or bolted together, with obvious implications.

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Overview:

The culture of the Star Kingdom is heavily influenced by the origin of its initial settlers - primarily those nations of the anglo-sphere and western europe, though with smaller notable groups from beyond headhunted for the initial project. Eridani Culture has thus taken a cosmopolitan blend of them all, though arguably dominated by a British-American core, with tinges of German and French influences melding into and around it.

Arguably, it is the legacy of western literature, music, cinema, art, theatre, media, television, philosophy and architecture that define and remain influential and respected across the Kingdom. With an understood legacy from science and technology to cuisine and sport.

That said, the creeping eventuality and entrenchment of a class system, though not one typically of excess or cruelty - and a means of definition in opposite to current Earthbound Solar Culture, duly influenced by its nature as a capitalistic society. Eridani are everything from liberal to conservative, and the varied entertainments and ways to lose money emulate and revel in that.

Culture

Music
Eridani Music harkens back to the impact of "soft power" - that of cultural dominance rather than military. Cultural values have long since incorporated the even more vibrant styles of the newer outer colonies and their more divergent communities, and has a large appeal across much of the Kingdom. The vibrant Atlantican scene continues to push the boundaries, as musicians continue to fuse and innovate new styles akin to the development of many new styles that appeared in the first colonial period. The strong, if overlooked, military classical bands also have their adherents, even if they may not appear in the popular charts.

Arts
The Kingdom has inherited a vast legacy of prominent artists, actors and great creators of works from not only its own nascent development - but Old Earth and other associated sources. In the age of expansion it has continued to develop this strength - another aspect of "soft" diplomatic power, in order to entertain and bind its citizens through a new common culture.

Literature
Much like other fields, the Kingdom lays claim to many great authors throughout the ages. Modern Authors are able to claim a continuing of this legacy. The "Chronicles of War", is a collection of fiction and true stories based around the idealisation and realities of conflict and is pointed to as an example of great literary work even in the harshest of circumstances. Authors have continued in such a fashion, including the Colonial Epic of "Oh, Capella" and "The Green - An Ode to Silence" - a story concerning the grave tragedy experienced during the Green Crisis.



It was not uncommon, as Earth began a slow descent into a form of madness, for corporations to float, and sometimes even, for a while, proceed along a path to attempting to send a group of people to some god forsaken rock utilizing little more than an experimental warp drive strapped to a space shuttle. While the initial plans for the Eridani Expedition could be called something similar, it had considerable more clout attached to it and perhaps, most importantly, the financial backing to see it through, despite all attempts to strip that away.

Corporations had, by then, exceeded the reach of most governments - and the largely selfish motives were tempered by the reality of the mission and what it required. Several ships, considerably larger than a shuttle but, all the same, using experimental cryo-techniques, gene-bank storage and even more untested warp drives would eventually be at the core of the mission to Epsilon Eridani. It was without much fanfare the mission was launched, and within a few short years the holding company meant to keep watch over it had been subsumed in some hostile takeover, and the mission, in most circles, largely forgotten - whilst others remembered and, with no contact, assumed it must of simply gone the way of some others - tragedy and failure.

That had not been the case, and while lacking the means to contact Earth itself - many who had taken the opportunity to either be gene sampled or outright shipped off into space had seen the way things on Earth were going, and of them, many believed that it was Earth that would be consumed in tragedy and failure. Finding Epsilon Eridani II, consequently named "Atlantica" to be a vibrant world far beyond the most optimistic projections, if a more watery world than the one they had left, were, if not content, willing to start over.

One year in from initial landing, it was clear that the tenuous interplay between a corporate sponsored administrative board, the civilian governorship, employees and "freeholders" - that is, the thousands required to make the whole thing work but who had no actual meaningful stake in the "shares" of the company could not stand. The eventual agreement on a governmental form that essentially landed the employees, erected a monarchy but protected the freeholders under a constitution was the unexpected but eventual outcome, and the settlement of Avalon was officially incorporated as the capital of Altantica, and the nascent Eridani Star Kingdom was born.

After nearly two decades of hard work, however, it would be the "Green Crisis" - a failure in the xeno-agricultural methods that would nearly end the colony, only saved at the midnight hour by the intervention of the monarchy, thus cementing them in the publics eye, and the translation of key portions of the newly discovered alien caches of data.

The Eridani Star Kingdom consequently began a roaring pace of expansion, free from food and general resource shortages, eventually becoming space borne only 50 years after landfall - and planting a colony on the far less habitable but mineral rich Epsilon Eridani V five years later. Within another decade, a patchwork of mining stations and colonies began to litter the system - and its military began to earn its pay against the ever present threat of piracy.

Within another decade, subspace travel had been successfully employed and the Eridani Star Kingdom began to push beyond its solar system.