Disclaimer: this is a rough draft; once I've tweaked bits and pieces here and there I probably will put it all on a nice PDF with pics an' stuff, just like Celkan did with Miharu's diary (then again, I might not, seeing that I'm a lazy bastid and all that).

I'd like your input on this so far, and I'd also like to know if some parts are kinda too strong (I think everything passes muster, but you never know; I'll let FM prove me either way).

So here we go, in parts:

Part I: Of How we came to be Here, and why in Heck did we Chose to

In the beginning, we all came from Earth. Good ole' Earth, Terra Firma, the Globe, The Third Planet, etcetera etcetera. Of course, by then we already had opened up McDonald's (and cities around said McDonald's) all over the Solar System, too; so we had men and women from Mercury, and men and women from the Jovian moons, and men and women from Mars (debunking that BS about men being from one planet and women from another).

However, it was BOOOOORING!

We'd had quite our fair share of wars in the past, both planetary and out in space, but since the last one people had become whiny babies and refused to fight no more, becoming instead "good buddies" and working together for the "common good".

However, in addition to boring, it was becoming a nightmare. No matter how efficient their use, how perfect the recycling, we were running of resources within out little star system; the beaches of Venus were all but bereft of sand, and the Asteroid Belt looked more like a dust cloud than anything else. Add to that that Einstein had conspired against us a bunch of centuries ago by making us unable to exceed the speed of light, and thus travel to other star systems, and you can see how the people of Earth were beginning to get desperate.

It was then that the scientists made a happy discovery.
"Guess what?"- they asked.
"What?"- the rest of us said, with apathy. I mean, these were SCIENTISTS, geeks whose idea of a good time was an all-nighter playing D&D, and who had made a bunch of promises about life in space and expanding our dominion over the universe and had YET to deliver. So it was perfectly understandable that we treated them the way we did. Anyway, then they said: "We, like, found a wormhole!"
And we went: "So?"
And they went: "Like, with it, we can travel to distant stars and see what's out there!"
And we're like: "No WAY!"
And they're like: "YES way!"
And we go: "NO WAY!!!"
And they go: "YES WAY!!!"

And so on and so forth, until by the tenth or eleventh time they realized we were making fun of them, promptly gave us the finger (which he happily returned) and went off to do their science stuff.

Turns out the scientists were right (who woulda thought it?) and they had indeed discovered a wormhole, and the thing did lead to another star system altogether. We rejoiced about both being able to escape this smelly little star system as well as for the opportunity to fight for all-new resources all over again (no one said this out loud, mind you, but we were all thinking it). So the people of Earth and its colonies celebrated, and we held "much parties" (the scientists were not invited to a single one, tho, they being geeks and all).

The terraforming of the planet dubbed "Earth II" (you have to hand it to them for originality) was a mighty task whose scope dwarfed even the work done on Mars. Millions of tons of materials and equipment poured into the Sol II star system (there's that originality in names again), as well as millions of people of all trades: scientists, terraforming engineers, doctors, deep-space pilots, prospectors, nurses, workers, meteorologists, botanists, environmentalists, dealers, pimps, smugglers, politicians, you name it. From the highest callings in the Human Sphere of Existence to the lowest dregs, they all flocked to the new planet and began to shape it into our image. When the geeks-sorry, scientists finally perfected the portable gravdrive and thus we could cross over bunches at a time instead of in single line, the work began to go much quicker and more time to fool around and have fun was found. Everything was going well, and the terraforming of the planet was expected to be finished within a century. We'd also found a bunch of other wormholes, though not a one led to a system as promising as Sol II.

But of course, scientists love to discover something only to then discover something else to screw the original discovery up, and with the wormhole it was no exception. Some geek or other began to postulate that wormholes were not forever (unlike, say, diamonds) and that, in fact, the Sol-Sol II wormhole was about to die on us. Of course, we immediately chastised the party-pooper and silenced him. And, of course, what he had just predicted had to come down.

Imagine this: you're the captain of a star freighter, happily dreaming about that week off in Waikiki once you return to Olde Earth, and then, when your ship is expected to jump to Sol, it simply doesn't. It SIMPLY doesn't. And no amount of hackling, yelling, threatening or bribing your jump operators makes the damn ship jump; nothing does. Then you notice that all the ships around also aren't going nowhere, and you begin to worry. Maybe, you think, that geek with the doomsayin' was right. Maybe, like, the wormhole just collapsed alluva sudden. And then you think of all the things back home you're never gonna see again, like your family and your pimpin' ride and those waikiki girls in their skimpy outfits, and you get mighty mad. And then you think of those who were in-transit when the wormhole collapsed, and you calm down a bit and smirk and think that at least you didn't go the way those suckas did, you know?

I tell you, Science brings nothing but trouble. We'd have been better off if we had burned those scientists in their D&D books the moment they mentioned the wormhole, but it was too late now. We were stuck.

And boy, were we ever! Probin' and testin' and bitchin' demostrated that not only had the wormhole collapsed indeed, but that it would also take a couple of millenia to open back up. Millenia! Why, by then, even the Simpsons would have ended their run! Not to mention we were stuck on this side with no support from Olde Earth, and Earth II was still not quite finished yet. Yup, we were well and royally screwed.

So we did the only we could do in such a situation: we chose a bitchin' name for ourselves- The Dispossessed. Neat, huh?

I like.

You have NO idea how loud I was laughing while I read this.

Bitchin'

you're the captain of a star freighter, happily dreaming about that week off in Waikiki once you return to Olde Earth, and then, when your ship is expected to jump to Sol, it simply doesn't. It SIMPLY doesn't. And no amount of hackling, yelling, threatening or bribing your jump operators makes the damn ship jump; nothing does.

LMFAO....

Pretty good, but I think ctishman's backstory-in-a-nutshell is funnier: http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/1/8729#100649

Now that is funny

Ah-ha! Jex DOES have a talent other than breaking laws and senseless killing =P

Part II: Of How the Three Nations came to be

So there we were, stranded on a half-baked planet that could feed us, but not provide us with the higher-end stuff we needed: polymers, efficient fuel, medicines, Cable TV. What were we to do? our bitchin' new moniker for ourselves (the Dispossessed, remember?) could only carry us so far.

The first idea (okay, the ONLY idea) was to use the emergency protocols to deal with the matter for the time being. So we brought down all our ships, and rationed our food and supplies, and began to assess what we had, what we lacked, what we needed, and what we wished for (returning to Olde Earth was at the top of the last list). It was when had to decide what we could do without, though, that the problems started: raids, riots, general unrest, boy bands, the works, as everyone tried to get for himself (and at the expense of others) what he believed he needed. It looked like we had all come willingly to our tombs and none were happy about it; so, naturally, we had to take some of that frustration out on our neighbor.

Just then, when things were getting really sticky, a group of people came forward and came out. No, not like that. Rather, these people admitted to having the secrets to Genetics and Cybernetics, the Big Two No Thank You's. Not to delve in ancient history, but, if you don't remember, those two sciences were struck down by Humanity when they conspired to kill off the entire species during that very last conflict I mentioned earlier, known as the Guise Wars. People had used those sciences to create an army of nonhuman cyborgs and critters that almost laid waste to the whole shebang, and thus when humanity had triumphed over these monstrosities (called Guises, hence the name), it was generally accorded to kill these particular scientists, and to cast all that knowledge into oblivion, so nothing of the sort would happen ever again.

However, some scientists had survived the purges, and decided their knowledge was too valuable to forget. So they kept to secrecy, and passed their science on from generation to generation, and now they were here, in Sol II, offering us their wares so we could survive.

Now, hey, we were all for surviving; I mean, we'd kinda become attached to the lives we had, and so we'd be immensely disappointed were we to lose them. So these guys, for all their sciences stood up for, were, like saviors. They were scientists, after all, and haven't I been saying scientists are always out looking for Mankind?

"So"- these outed scientists said -"we could use gene teraphy and cybernetics to adapt our bodies to the exisiting planetary conditions, even if just for a bit, so we can keep on the terraforming!"

And some of us were like "yes, yes! Preach it, Brother! I'm, like, too important to die!"

But others shunned away in horror, spouting libel and slander (wait, can you spout libel? isn't that, like, in writing?) about the Guise Wars and the Two Big No Thank You's, and refused to hear anymore.

But the scientists kept on -"We could become better, stronger, faster, cuter! we could make Terra II a paradise using nothing but our own modified, assisted, and enhanced hands, and then, eventually, when Terra II has became the stuff dreams are made of, we could all becomes ponies, and prance around the green fields of our beloved planet!"

And THAT's where a good number of us went "Oooo-kaaay... I ain't gonna become no prancing pony!" But we still wanted the stuff that made sense, you know? so we could survive. Even so, many went over to the "Eeeek! Genetics and Cybernetics are Teh Devil!" camp, and then began a great and largely pointless discussion about whether we should, or should not, use these sciences to survive, and how close to a real prancing pony we could become.

In the end, the scientists tired of the endless discussions and began to build labs to start working on our survival, while the haters yelled and whined, and the rest of us kept an eye on both of them to make sure we got the goods that we required without the "ponyfication". And thus did we, the Dispossessed, became three people: the Whiners, the Prancing Ponies, and the Few Remaining with Common Sense. Over time, these names changed (somehow) to the Itani (uttini?), the Serco (well, they do kinda look like circus freaks), and the Neutrals (I have postulated a Thesis somewhere that the other two groups changed our name from "the Few Remaining with Common Sense" to "the Neutrals" out of sheer spite, since our name was one Hell of a lot better than theirs).

Even with this division in thought, the three people worked together towards the common goal of making the planet wholly livable, albeit each in their own way: The Serco modified themselves and most of our remaining livestock DNA to be able to work the hostile land with honest sweat and toil, like mutated, freaky Amish; The Itani had Visions of Escaflowne and became adept at repairing and re-working all remaining equipment (scrapping our remaining ships in the process) and were soon seen roaming about outside in gigantic, all-purpose robots and exoskeletons; and us Neutrals worked mostly in the Human Resources department, coordinating the efforts of the other two groups, making deals, playing nice, and generally making sure they got with the work instead of the name calling.

Years passed, Darkness crept back into the Forest of the World... no, wait, I mean, TIME passed and the terraforming went along nicely, albeit much slower than before; TIME! The peoples were much chummier now to one another, but there remained lingering doubts, hates and resentments. And how the Hell not, when every year or so the Prancing- I mean, the Serco screwed up something bad with either their animals or themselves, and their failures ran amok and killed people and destroyed installations. The Serco always apologized, put down their animals/freaked-out people, and made reparations, but I'm telling you it was getting on our nerves. You got up in the morning and thought while in the shower "Is this the day I get trampled underneath a Serco Freight Beast?" or "Will some crazed Serco decide to rampage through my office this morning?" or "Did I leave the car's lights on? Blasted Serco, they made me forget", and so on and so forth. And while we the Neutrals (I'm using this name for us now because of its only grace, that being that it's far shorter than "the Few Remaining with Common Sense") were the patient sort (we were planning to pay back the Serco in full once they became ponies anyway), the Itani were most certainly not. And they also were (and still are) a bunch of whiners, ever eager to cry Murder at the first sign of, well, um, murder. Yeah.

Anyway, whining and finger pointing does in the end start to bother you, almost as much as having your family and friends trampled by a gigantic mutant beasties, and so the Serco and the Itani began to grow apart; soon across the planet the domed cities of mankind were either all-Serco or all-Itani (well, there were also Neutrals in these cities, but you get the idea). And as the incidents kept piling up along with the whines and cries of "foul!", the Itani and the Serco became stranged, with only us the Neutrals as a link between the two groups. The Serco and Itani each went their own way, both culturally and technologically, while we remained in the middle, taking advantage of both their technologies, and also tweaking any deals between them to also benefit us. Hey, the middleman must have his Cable TV too!

So things slowly deteriorated, but even so none of us expected what was about to happen next...

This is wonderful... keep it going.

Part 3: Of Akan and the mess that followed

The people of Earth II were prospering: their technologies proven and solid, their cultures rich and complex, their children growing tall and strong in the alien soil, their TV shows entertaining while educative. Which meant, of course, knowing our luck, that something BAD was about to go down.

That something was Akan, an Itani Senator (what is it with Senators, Grand Vizeers and Prime Ministers always wanting to steal the kingdom for themselves, anyway?) A whiner, a bigot and a hater, Akan was the kind of person you DON'T want to see smiling at you. The Serco and the Neutrals certainly didn't like the vibes he gave off, and yet, for some reason, the Itani themselves were blind to his real nature (some have suggested Akan hired a very effective team of Neutral Image Advisors) and in fact worshipped the very ground he walked on like he was a pop star or something.

Akan rose quickly through the ranks in the Senate, and soon after he became Top Dog, it happened. You know, the bombs: many of them, all over the Itani domes. Some say the Serco did it as a practical joke, others point their fingers at Akan, claiming he wanted to kindle a war against the Prancing Ponies (as he still called them in secret); and yet others, more misguided souls, say the Neutrals did it, just to see what would happen (we're stupid that way). Whatever the cause, Akan seized on it and gave off this pompous speech blaming the Serco not just for the bombings, but also for pretty much everything else that went wrong with the Itani...A dome blew up? The Serco did it! A hydroponics plantation died? It sounds like Serco trickery to me! My girlfriend left me for my best friend? The Serco are to blame! With this one speech he set about changing his people's fears and doubts concerning the Serco into outright hatred, and soon enough, the Itani people were mired in a miasma of bigotry called the Pure Humanity Credo. The only good thing to come out of all of this was the "Only good Serco is a dead Serco" t-shirts becoming best-sellers overnight.

The Serco finally noticed what was happening, but by then the Itani were no longer in a mood to discuss anything with them; in fact, the Itani were building an army to "defend themselves from further Prancing Pony aggresion". And those further attacks did come, even after the Itani moved to solidify their borders; some of the attacks even targeted Akan, and yet he miraculously survived every time (while a bunch of his cronies died), which made him spout even more nonsense about the Evil of the Serco, and eventually declare war on his hated foes. The Colony Wars, begun had.

The Itani threw themselves into the war really believing they were the ones under attack, only to find the Serco quite ready for a fight. It seems somewhere along their gradual conversion to ponies, some bright Serco scientist had said "ooo, ooo, let's bedeck (is that even a word?) ourselves wit' weapons 'n' armor 'n' stuff so we look just like teh Governator!!!" and thus pretty much everyone of them was armed to the teeth by then (nobody knows who this Governator was, or where the reference comes from; most Union historians agree, however, judging from current-day Serco, that he was a cad). Also, of course, it's kinda hard not to notice a whole nation gearing up for war, and so the Serco had been preparing for an attack for quite some time now. The Itani saw this, disliked it, and, of course, whined about it, but in the end they kept up the fight.

The Serco, for their part, were unwilling to fight for keeps, and thus for the next year and a half they were steadily pushed back, losing territory to the Itani, who kept calling them "backrollers" while the Serco called them "gankers". Still, the territory captured by the Itani was to become a thorn in their whiny sides, since the Serco population within it was to give them headaches throughout the occupation, doing raids, sabotages and sundry acts of rebellion. Akan "suggested" these rebellions would stop if the prancing ponies within the occupied domes were killed, but the Itani people didn't like the idea (guess they didn't want the term "ganker" to stick) and thus no such thing happened.

As an interesting historical side note, I'd like to point out that while all of this was happening between the Serco and the Itani, us Neutrals were either:

a) running the Hell away from the fighting,
b) wallowing in the smuggling, pillaging, backstabbing and other healthy activities only possible during times of war, or
c) dead.

Anyway, eventually the Serco decided to stop falling back and show the Itani what they were really capable of, and launched a massive counter-strike across the whole battle line, one dark night. The attack totally overhwelmed the Itani despite their shiny battle mecha, and it is said some were killed in the middle of their whine; when the Serco finally called off the offensive, little more than two days later, they had recovered all the territory lost over the course of the war. The Itani were dumb-struck: they had been brushed aside like so much garbage by the impure prancing ponies! Were they not the Master Race, the Pure Ones?

Amid all this death and confusion, many within the Itani government began to question what was going on. But not Akan. Oh no, not him; he was my kind of guy: decided, stubborn, and willing to destroy everything for everyone rather than admit he was wrong. Which, of course, he wasn't (at least not in his eyes). He quickly changed gears on the Itani war machine and went for aerospace superiority. No longer would the Itani battle mecha fight the Serco warbeasts and guises one on one; now they came with aerial back-up, which did bombing runs and other nasty tricks upon the Serco army before the Itani mechanized infantry engaged it. With this one-two combo, the Itani began to push back the Serco once more. The Serco reacted to this change in tactics quickly, however, and were soon churning out Guises in industrial quantities, more than enough to fill to overflowing the gaps left on their ranks by the Itani bombers. The war thus became a meat-grinder, neither side gaining an inch of terrain, while the losses mounted. The Itani were having the worst of it, though, since they were losing real people while the Serco were just losing Guises. It went on like that for about seven years; something had to give.

And what gave way, finally, was Akan's sanity. Faced with the prospect of a stalemate war that would send his popularity plummeting (not to mention the fact his hated foes were not dying like they were supposed to), Akan ordered his bombers to begin striking civilian targets. This had two effects: the first was to create a schism in the Itani government, with roughly half the people in the right places finally coming to realize Akan was a few Xirite plates short of a Vulture; the other effect was the bombing of the Pacifica and New Shanghai domes, which totally enraged the Serco and convinced them that the only solution for the war was the total annihilation of the Itani. The Itani were, as the saying goes, in for it now.

The Serco acted with an efficiency not seen, well, ever again in their long, sad, pathetic history, to be honest. First, they activated assassin guises that had been successfully infiltrated within Itaniland; the Guises found and made short work of Akan and his most loyal cronies. Second, they deployed their secret weapon: fancy single-seat fighters, named Nightwings. These craft could be handled by thought alone (it is generally accepted by most Union historians that Serco were still capable of rational thought back then, though there are some interesting theories that pretend to disprove this) and thus were faster, nimbler and deadlier than anything the Itani had in the air. The Serco aircraft struck the Itani air fleet and quickly bogged it down in an uneven fight, such that it was unable to give proper aid to the Itani infantry. Not that it mattered: the largest army ever assembled came forth from the Serco bunkers and fell upon the Itani battle mechas and defense hardpoints, totally overwhelming them due to sheer numbers; The Gankers hath become the Ganked. The Itani government, back to its senses by the death of Akan, tried to contact the Serco to beg them to stop, to no avail: in what became known as the Day of the Prancing Ponies (why they changed it to the "Day of Death", we'll never know. Nobody important died, did it?) the Itani nation ceased to be. Their armies destroyed, their people run down and killed, their domes flattened, their cars stolen and sold to Neutrals who later claimed they had owned them for decades; it was a ghastly sight, fitting for Nero to have played his harp over. The Serco were thirsting for revenge, and they drank from the Cup of Vengeance greedily; they were out for blood, and found aplenty to cover the streets with; they were enraged, and took out... bah, enough with the allegories, suffice it to say the Itani got PWNED. A few escaped to where us Neutrals were hanging out, and we sheltered them (for a fee, of course), but most were killed within their domes. As dawn came the next day and the Serco were beginning to wonder if maybe, just maybe, they had gone a little too far, amid the carnage, the rubble and the wreckage it became pretty obvious that the planet suddenly had 33% less people and thus, 33% more available real state. It was a sobering sight: after all their posing and trash talking, the Itani had proved themselves to be total wussies, and now they were no more.

it's moniker not monkier, I hope anyway.....>.>

*cough*

Part IV: of Life without the Itani

Okay, imagine this: you're a member of a group of people who are using Cybernetics and Genetics to become ponies some time in the near future, and you've just defeated and totally destroyed your most hated foes in a fit of rage. What would you do? strut around and brag about it, "I am Serco, hear me PWN!"? Or lament the savage madness that drove you to kill every last one of your neighbors, man, woman and child?

The Serco, in that signature irrational way of theirs, did both. Or sort of, anyway: their military leaders launched an immediate PR campaign, letting know to all that the threat to their lives and customs were forever safe from the hatred of the whiny Itani, thanks to the sacrifice of a few thousand Guises and Warbeasties; at the same time, the Serco civilian government was speaking of regret, and horror, and that there would a reckoning, and that the Itani had had enough and they should be helped, as few as there were left, for goodness' sake.

Because, of course, amid the rubble and the fires, there were survivors, people who had somehow not died crushed under a collapsing building, or had become a chew toy for the warbeasties and yet lived to tell about it. And then there were those who had wisely sought refuge among the Neutrals before the war got real ugly. Nevertheless, no more than a handful of survivors were found in the disaster area that used to be the Itani nation, and all of them chose to live among the Neutrals afterwards, even when the Serco government offered apologies and reparations to them (I wonder why?). That there were little Itani to apologize to only served to further ignite the conflict between the Serco civilian government and their military forces.

To us Neutrals, the dichotomy of the Serco leaders was clearly a sign of something waiting to happen. As the yells and discussions and finger pointing rose to new levels, we decided to creep away from the Serco just... a little bit more. When, a month later, the Serco military carried out its coup d'etat, we were nowhere near enough so they could try and pin the blame on us. As it turned out, though, escapegoats were not needed, since the Serco populace was actually relieved the coup happened. Why, you ask? Well, simply put, most Serco were secretly against the idea of becoming ponies one of these days, and they hoped each morning that their leaders would wise up and discard that idea entirely. The scientists behind the pony idea were, of course, part of the civilian government just overturned, and thus when the military did away with them most Serco sighed with relief.

Pity. We Neutrals were looking forward to cheap, environment-friendly transportation and beasts of burden.

But anyway, the military leaders had more in mind than just ditching the ridiculous equine dream of a couple of deranged scientists; they were a close-knit bunch of like-minds shaped by a common martial background, after all, and they had a very specific vision of what the Serco could become. Using the same propaganda machine with which they defended their act of genocide, the new Leaders of the Serco took a note from Akan (does anyone else see the irony here, or is it just me?) and began preaching of the superiority of the Serco people, its culture, its military prowess ("We've won 100% of all Wars we've fought!") and its technology. Throwing money at disenters (those that weren't satisfied with the cash got thrown at the warbeasties instead), and focusing on technology, the leaders began to mold the Serco in their image, instilling in them both nationalistic and martial pride by turning whole domes into virtual military schools.

Maybe the Serco people did mind this shift in governement philosophies somewhat, but it's kinda hard to disagree with your leaders when:

A) You didn't choose them,
B) They tend to keep armed soldiers pretty much everywhere,
C) They have been known to throw the occasional troublemaker to the warbeasties, and
D) Their economic policies are right on the money and keep you in the green.

These were soldiers, after all, not mamby-pamby, let's-scalp-them-for-all-they're-worth politicians or economists, and so they did away with the most frivolous items in the national budget (who needs a hedge maze in every house, anyway?) and put the money thus liberated to good use, resulting in prosperity for pretty much everybody. In light of this, the average Serco said "What the Hell...", obeyed orders, joined the military, and began to think of ways to spend his money (at this point some of us Neutrals and even an Itani or two asked if we could join the Serco, but they refused. Bastards).

Lastly, the new Serco government sent messages of enduring friendship to us Neutrals, mostly to show to their people they were not the power-hungry bloody-handed jarheads they really were. And the Neutrals happily accepted the offer, specially since most were country-living peace-loving tree-hugging beatniks who valued prosperity through honest, hard work above all else (a few of us were actually INTELLIGENT, mind you, and knew the best way to prosper was to take the fruits of your neighbor's honest, hard work, and then running for the hills. These enlightened souls, however, for some reason or other, usually ended being kicked out of town and living the rest of their days as brigands or highwaymen. I tell you, some people just don't respect others' lifestyles).

And so, life went on Terra II. The Serco embraced their shiny new militarized society, evolving their techonlogy mainly among martial lines and emphasizing honor and strength among their people, while the Neutrals kept much to their own ways, farming and living the easy life using the best parts of both Serco and Itani technology (many of the Itani who fled to the Neutrals had the skills necessary to maintain and work on the Itani tech, and thus the Neutrals kept it for their own and prospered by it). It was during these times of peace that The Propeller Group was born, a bunch of dreamers and idealists with too much time on their hands and a dream to return to the stars.

Pfft, who needs the stars?

Anyway, the "Props" (as people called them) eventually succeeded, first nearly giving the Serco a heart attack with an unmanned probe (since only a few Serco knew about the Ark, most of us were left in the dark about why they flipped like that), and then finally rebuilding an operational gravdrive. The neutrals went out and explored and found again some stuff we had forgotten, and also found "much minerals" and other goodies in the asteroid fields, minerals and ores that would make us rather well off as their usefulness was discovered.

Chief among these was Xithricite, the basis for the Xirite alloy that protects ships from physical damage to the present day. Its amazing properties were quickly discovered by the Neutrals (scientists rule, as I always say), and a major mining operation was launched to extract as much of the ore as possible. The operation eventually included the creation of a space sation within the asteroid fields where the xith was mined; over time, the station grew as more labs and shops and the living quarters for the personnel needed to run them were added, until it became a huge structure of never-before attempted proportions, floating in the middle of space. Compared to it, Sky Command (the Serco geo-ysnchronous orbital station built to keep an eye on the Neutrals' space antics) was a mere children's toy. Finally, in a fit of insight, the Neutrals decided to keep the xith to ourselves, and never told of it to the Serco.

And so, with the Serco marching on the ground and us flitting about in space for kicks, time passed in blissful (yet thoroughly booooo-ring!) peace and quiet.

Thank God it was not to last.

Lol keep it coming Jex, its excellent. :-)

Part V: of the Birth of the Union

As years piled on years and decades became centuries, the Neutral people of Terra II began to note a very different attitude in their Serco buddies. Generations of them being told how much cooler than anyone else they were, and their learning years spent listening to their betters boasting about their achievements and their virtues, the Serco had become the conceited, snotty little bastards we all know and hate today. First, the Serco one day get up and go "We're, like, no longer talking to you coz you're, like, inferior" and close their borders; a few of us lost some business then, but most shrugged it off and kept on living. Next, however, the Serco began to appear in OUR towns, in small groups of two or three; at first we thought nothing of it, even as they walked among us looking around with disdain. But then they began to taunt and harass us, and then to hurt us and destroy our property. The Serco were obviously just as physically superior to us as they had been since they'd begun messing with themselves, so there was little us Neutrals could do but head for the hills when these moronic interlopers fell upon our towns. Out of sheer malice, they'd slaughter livestock, destroy buildings and raze fields; all the people could do was watch and wait for them to go away.

We still did the stupid thing and tried to reason with them, though; predictably enough, our words fell on deaf ears, so it became pretty much routine: a bunch of Serco youths would come to trash our stuff, we'd run away, and we'd stay away until they got either tired or bored, at which point they left and we'd flip the bird at their backs (the practice of flipping the bird at a Serco's back is a well-established tradition dating back to the time when there were three nations living on the planet. It came about from the simple fact that if a Serco saw you giving him the finger, he usually caught you and took said finger for himself without the benefit of anesthesia. People who had suffered such a fate could be usually pointed out in a crowd by the cybernetic replacement most of them bought, since cloning was very expensive. It should be noted, however, that in the period of time when Akan was climbing to power, it had become a badge of honor among many of the Itani youth -and some Neutrals as well- to have such a prosthesis; people, let me tell you, can be SO stupid...)

Anyways, this may sound like it was working out for all involved, but in truth it wasn't; the victimized Neutrals were left with little or nothing to their name, and no way to recover it. It should be noted that shortly after these incidents began Neutral Insurance Companies decreed that a Serco attack was the same as an Act of God as far as the coverage was concerned; small wonder then, that whenever one of these companies was victimized by the rampaging Serco, its employees received little help or understanding from their fellow Neutrals afterwards.

Of course, we were outraged, but what could we do? you couldn't threaten, force, defeat, or bribe these morons. You could trick them rather easily, but that only postponed the destruction, and next time the Serco came around they usually bore a grudge against the Neutral who tricked them into going to Santa's House or whatever. As the diverse Neutral communities began to talk to one another about the problem, the Serco upped the stakes: they began to raze whole towns, bringing weapons and warbeasts to do the job. The first to go were the settlements close to the border; the people ran screaming while the Serco and their Guises ruthlessly hunted them down, and then proceeded to level the buildings and structures. Once these settlements were gone, the Serco progrom began to move outwards from their territory; people began to flee the lands their fathers had lived all their life in. Those few moronic enough to offer resistance were utterly crushed.

A meeting was called, a representative of each surviving community in attendance, to see what could be done about this situation. An all-out war was out of the question, since the Serco's Military easily outnumbered the entire Neutral population; talking with them had so far proved fruitless and no one believed that would change; paying them to leave us alone was considered a very bad idea, as was stealing their left shoe. In the end, it was the Props (them damned Props) who came out with that everyone else was thinking: there was no way to deal with the Serco and survive, and so the only option was to leave the planet altogether. Most people were not wild about the idea because everyone knew no other life-sustaining planets had ever been found, before the Collapse or since; however, the Props reminded everyone of the (now) myriad Neutral stations dotting the void in systems outside Sol II. Throughout these centuries, the Neutrals had perfected virtually all there was to know and do about building space stations, to the point that all of them were rather easy to live in and quite a few of them grew their own food. The Props argued that, with a little work, the stations could easily hold in the entirety of the Neutral population, thus keeping them safe from the Serco, while a suitable planet was found.

It was a nice plan, but some people still opposed it. Two such people were the heads of the Space Mining and the Space Hookers guilds. Both argued that a station is where a Space Miner goes to mine and rest from his wife and kids and party with the Space Hookers; in short, it was Paradise. Moving a Space Miner's family to the station, they said, would turn Paradise into Hell and bring financial ruin upon both guilds.

They were both quickly told to STFU. BIG surprise there.

The other kind of opposition, the paranoid-towards-Serco kind, made more sense than the previous two morons: if the Neutrals started to work on this massive exodus, wouldn't the Serco in their feeble brains imagine us to be up to something iffy, and thus decide to kill us off sooner rather than later? It was, you realize, a question of some import. If all of us suddenly relocated to where most of the work was to be done (the Props' shops), the Serco could very well think we were gearing up for a fight or something. It could also happen if they noticed the sudden onrush of activity in other areas, like planet-bound mining, manufacturing, and harvesting (we were gonna need all the food we could get our hands on).

People pondered on this conundrum for quite a while until the Props once more came with the solution: there was a part of the Serco government that still listened to the Neutrals: Sky Command. They, after all, not only watched us flit about in space, but from time to time demanded cash or goods to let us keep doing that. Through Sky Command, they argued, we'd tell the Serco of our plans and thus (hopefully) we'd avoid any misunderstandings.

Of course, there was a good chance the Serco would still take the news badly and rush to kill us anyway, but everyone agreed that a 50% chance of escaping bloody death was one Hell of a lot better than a 100% chance of meeting said bloody death, and so the plan was on.

The conversation between the Props and Sky Command, explaining what we were about to start working on, has been recorded for posterity. A transcript follows:

TPG Guy (TG): Come in, Sky Command, this is TPG Phi Delta Seven requesting acknowledgement. Come in, Sky Command...
Sky Command Traffic Control GUY(SG): This is Sky Command, Worm! Resistance is Futile, state your business...
TG: We hereby declare a Code Omega and request contact with a Triumvirate representative...
SG: Whoa there, Nelly! What makes you think the Triumvirate has interest in what happens to you scum? Thinking a little too much of ourselves, aren’t' we?
TG: Hey, you can't refuse a Code Omega!!! It's in your <EXPLETIVE DELETED>manual, you damn people CREATED it!!! Go RTFM if you don't believe me!
SG: ...
TG: ...Um, I kinda blew it there, didn't I?
SG: Sure did, worm. Say goodbye now...
TG: NO, WAIT!!!! THIS IS REALLY REALLY IMPORTANT AND WILL BENEFIT THE SERCO GREATLY!!! BESIDES, THIS SHIP DON'T BLOW UP PRETTY!!!
SG: Don't blow up pretty, huh?
TG: N-nope...
SG: And you're sure this "really really important" thing will benefit the Glorious Serco people?
TG: Absolutely. Trust me. You can eavesdrop if you like, and if it doesn't, you can blow me to bits.
SG: Well, I can do that anytime I want anyways... Very well, patching you through to Premier Kumani. This had better be good...
TG: (sigh of relief) Oh, it is, sir. Thank you, Sir.
(static noises while the comm is rerouted. At this point, you can hear some Serco singing "You make me feel like dancing" in a bad falsetto amid the static).
Premier Kumani (PK): Premier Kumani here. What is this about a Code Omega?
TG: Your, um, Premiership, I bring a message for the Triumvirate, on behalf of the Neutral People.
PK: The entirety of the Neutral People?
TG: Indeed, your Premiership.
PK (Premiership, I like that...) *ahem* Very well, do go on.
TG: Your Premiership, it may have come to your attention that a number of our towns have been demolished and their inhabitants killed by groups of Serco citizens carrying weapons and leading Guises...
PK: Is there a point to this? It's not my job to regulate what our citizens do in their spare time.
TG: Well, we know that Your Premiership, but it's not that. You see, we've gotten together to talk about these incidents and their possible causes, and we think we've come up with the answer.
PK: Really? Do tell.
TG: (deep breath) We've decided we're a blemish and a shame on the planet to the Serco people, and we wish to correct that.
PK: Really? you finally realized this yourselves? On your own? No kidding? One of our citizens tipped you off, didn't he?
TG: No, your Premiership, we really did come up with that on our own.
PK: Wow! So, what do you need, 200, 300 warbeasties? And where should I send them? Are you people gathering some place specific or something? Will you allow specta...?
TG: Whoa, hold, hold on, Your Premiership, please hear me out first!
PK: Meh, very well. Go on.
TG: While we thought killing ourselves would be a fitting end for such sorry excuses for human beings, we realized that by doing so we would be putting on you the onus of getting rid of our bodies, and we really couldn't ask that of a people that has already suffered much by our presence. After all, we're quite many, and there will be no easy way to accomplish that task.
PK: Well, I suppose you got a point there, you people are quite disgusting while alive, so I can only imagine how much more disgusting you are when dead.
TG: So we thought, what if we simply left the planet?
PK: ...Come again?
TG: Well, it's perfect, your Premiership, think about it: We'd be removing ourselves from the planet with our stuff, and so there would be no mess left for you to pick up; you could just move right in our territory and take over. No muss, no fuss.
PK: Hmmmm... I’m guessing you have it all figured out.
TG: Um, yes, we do, your Premiership.
PK: And how much… would this costs us, the Serco People, to get rid of you?
TG: We’ve already thought of costs, your Premiership, but we believe we can get most of what we need from the asteroid fields, so we wouldn’t be taking virtually nothing from Earth II. If you’ll allow it, I’ll send you a file with the projected needs for the task.
PK: Send me this file. I’ll review it for the Triumvirate and will contact you shortly on their decision.
TG: Very well, your Premiership, sending the file right now…

Feh, enough. After this they make more chitchat and they say goodbye shortly after. It was a whole month, though, until the Serco responded. The Neutrals didn’t stay put, of course. We started mining for the needed materials out in space and moving some people, mainly techs, women and children, out to the stations without letting the Serco know; this way, should they decide to kill us off, some would survive.

But the Serco’s response was beyond our wildest hopes: they agreed while changing very little to the information contained in the file we sent them, mainly reducing how much of certain ores they would allow us to mine from “their” planet; of course, we had already foreseen this and thus the numbers on the file were padded, resulting in the Serco actually allowing us to mine more ore than we really needed. Figured the dumb Serco, knowing little of space, wouldn’t realize that.

More importantly, they decided to put up a military presence to oversee the project, so we wouldn’t get any “stupid ideas”. This worked very well to our advantage because

a) We had nothing to hide,
b) We were safe from their own “sports raids”, and
c) We could leave all security to the Serco, and put our people to work where needed.

So the Serco were working with us to save ourselves from their genocidal ways, and more besides. Interestingly enough, when contact with the Itani was made and they asked us to help them fill out their “Chronicles of Exile”, we left out this little bit of information, and, quite frankly, all others that pointed to us taking advantage of the Serco’s single-digit IQ. We didn’t want them to think the Serco were complete morons, or that we were heartless manipulators willing to use any advantage at our disposal. They would discover both of these facts on their own anyway, that’s what we figured.

So, with the Serco giving a hand, we set to work on leaving the planet. Some suggested at this point to delay the actual leaving indefinitely by guile, to in effect never leave while looking while we were actually leaving, but most decided even the metal morons would eventually catch on, and our goose would be cooked. We had made our bed and now had to sleep in it; we HAD to leave.

As work continued, however, it soon became apparent that a more efficient way to do things was needed. The communities were acting in concert to some extent, but in the end each was responsible for managing its own resources, projects, and personnel. This meant that Town A would finish its project in time, only to have to wait for the lazy gits in Town B to finish their related project, and meanwhile all the assets in Town A were not being used. And when the difference in asset levels between towns was too great (or when the towns didn’t like each other that much), this loss of efficiency was even more evident, not to mention more costly. It soon became clear we had to centralize all efforts and their organization, if we were to pull this off within the timeframe and resources we had.

In short, a single government to rule over us Neutrals was needed.

It wasn’t easy, but then again dissenters were few and far between (when the option is unification or gruesome death, only the most densest individual chooses the latter), and the draft for the new government, in effect a whole new Nation, was nearly finished in under a month. All we needed was a name.

The meeting is legendary. Any Neutral could come and propose a name, should he choose to, and elaborate (or not) on why he thought that name would fit us best. The actual event took place in this huge plateau, fitted with the latest tech to fit the need: giants screens, lights, and a revolutionary new sound system that allowed anyone to be heard clearly anywhere else in the plateau, regardless of distance. That way, no voice would really go unheeded. Once everyone who chose to had a say, an electronic ballot would be taken to choose a name from all those suggested. It was to be an exercise in über-democracy. Of course, Serco military units were stationed around to make sure nothing untoward happened.

All but the oldest, the youngest, the laziest, and those who really had to finish some projects, assisted. It was an impressive sight of humanity, together for a single purpose. The sound of so many voices chatting it up resembled the roar of an angry ocean, and the throng looked from afar like a living carpet. It was a grand sight.

At the appointed time, the crowd fell silent as the spokesman for the council of mayors strode forth to give the opening speech.

“We are gathered here, my friends, for an event of untold significance. We’re here to name the future, to decide on the name that will identify us, and the generations to come, as the honest, hard-working single community we all are about to become. The name has to speak of our achievements and our ideals, and yet also speak of our roots and origins. It must tell clearly of our Union as a people, and yet still pay homage to the Sovereignty, the Independence with which our Territories prospered here in Earth II…”

Out pops Genius: “So why don’t we call it the Union of Independent Territories?”

The whole plateau fell in deadly silence. Remember that, thanks to the revolutionary sound system (whose first and last use was that very same day, for some reason), everyone had heard that anonymous "genius" speak out from somewhere in the crowd. People mulled the name in silence, their faces clearly showing the dislike for such a long, unwieldy name. Presently, people began to whisper and then to argue out loud, until the council of mayors called to order. People waited in not-quite-silence, then, while the council itself argued of something amongst themselves.

A few minutes later, the council’s spokeman once more addressed the audience:

“Heh. Um, well, I guess we might as well start with this then. Right. And, um, we, the council, that is, think, that, maybe, um… that suggestion should be our first proposal of the night…”

There was a confused roar from the crowd, but in the end it quieted down without any kind of consensus. And so, in the giant screenboards “The Union of Independent Territories” went up, as suggestion number one.

There were more than ten thousands proposals, some grand, some wordy, some humble and some right out ridiculous or frightening. Some elicited cheers, others outbursts of outrage, yet others apathetic silence; most, however, received nothing but polite applause. The speeches behind them also varied in length: most people just came on and said the name, and left. Others gave a little speech about why they thought their name should stick; some tried to, but in the end were too bashful and relented halfway. And one rather long-winded fellow ranted on for an hour on the advantages of the name “Doombees” before he was forcibly removed from center stage.

That was Day One (a whole day, too, from dusk to dawn to dusk again). In the days to follow, vote after vote was taken by the Neutrals, each vote dropping a number of names from the list, so that it became smaller and smaller and smaller, narrowing the choices for the next vote. People cheered when a bad name fell to the side, or groaned when a good one didn’t make the cut. Excitement and anxiety and uncertainty were in the air…

At the end of the tenth day, we officially became the Union of Independent Territories.

You won’t find a single Union scholar willing to discuss how this came about, and so I’m not going to try. I’m just going to add that, in the silence that followed the announcement, you could clearly hear the Serco soldiers laughing it up.

ROTFL! Ironic that Jex Kerome, the galaxy's biggest super crime-lord, has a sense of humor. =P

Part VI: Of our Leave-Taking

Recipe for Planetary Exodus:

Ingredients:

- One medium-large, not-quite-terraformed planet on the other side of the galaxy.

- One small nation of inventive people, half of which is hard-working and peace-loving, while the other half is actually smart.

- One larger nation of powerful, hateful, ganking, bigoted, narrow-minded, snotty, "fugly", pompous, stupid, arrogant, backrolling, xith-smoking, war-like superhuman cyborgs who've already wiped out one civilization.

- Spacefaring technology, both for traveling about and living out there.

- A daring plan, preferably one that's the last, best hope for peace (you heard it here first, folks!).

- Salt and lemon to taste.

Directions:

Put the small nation in the planet; slowly stir in the spacefaring tech until you get a homogeneous mix. Add in the war-like cyborgs and beat the crap out of the small nation with them; keep beating them up for half an hour, or until the small nation says "Uncle". Quickly pour in the daring plan in one fell swoop; mix thoroughly. Serve piping hot, adding salt and lemon as needed.

In an impressive act of ingenuity and courage, the Neutral people had decided to leave Earth II to escape the Serco depredations, and had, in fact, managed to secure the help of the Serco themselves to achieve this very end. Then, for their crowning achievement, they went and gave their fledgling nation one of the stupidest names imaginable, but no point in crying over spilt milk, right? So, from that day on, we were no longer the Neutrals, but the Union (the Serco, however, took special delight in treating us with our full title, knowing it irked us some).

With the new centralized organization, the project took off like a dream: resources were more efficiently used, personnel moved about to where they'd be of most help, solutions quickly found to lingering problems both of technology and logistics. In no time flat were the first (official) shipments of resources and people ready for launch, and in November 1st, 3692 AD the first Exodus craft, christened "Hope", launched, to the cheer of the Union people (and some of the Serco, too). Union PR (newly established) kept everyone both in Earth II and the stations informed of the Hope's trip to its destination, even as work everywhere continued. When the Hope finally docked in space with UIT-1 (our old, original xith-mining station) there was a second cheer and a ceremony as the first of our people stepped inside. We were officially getting out of the planet.

Then the Serco pulled their own twist on the event: in a massive broadcast, they re-christened the planet "Serco Prime", and spoke of the bright future to come once "the vermin was out". For a moment there, some feared the Serco would go back on their word and attack us after all, like some kind of cruel joke, but it turned out simply to be a rather subtle "Now Hurry Up and Get Out" message, even when they knew it was not going to be fast.

For the next decade, the Union launched Exodus craft after Exodus Craft from Serco Prime to UIT-1; once there, the people were catalogued, sorted into one of the many stations ready to receive people (and some who weren't yet), and sent once again into space. You see, we knew that if we remained close to the metal morons we'd eventually have to deal with them again, so it was in our best interests to move as far away from them as possible. In order to do so, the plan called for the construction of space stations progressively farther into uncharted space, once our explorers (out looking for planets to colonize) found a suitable spot; once such a station was finished and ready, recently-arrived people and resources would be assigned to it, and new exploration flights launched from there. The plan called for the eventual abandonment, gutting and destruction of the stations in and close to Serco space, until we were all quite an number of systems away from them; in this fashion would we move our population, one station at a time, away from danger.

The last Exodus flight to carry Union citizens from the planet into space was another much-watched event, both for the Serco and the Union. To us, watching the craft, appropriately named "Omega", leave our old home never to return was bittersweet; for the Serco, it was "par-tay" time.

Now, there are legends, myths and stories of this period about pockets of Union people living in very sad conditions on the stations within the Sol II system, surviving by eating mice and other easily-bred vermin, and occasionally raiding Serco Prime for food and supplies, but that's just balderdash. Had any of us been dense enough to do that, it's certain the Serco would have noted and decided to come after us to kill us all. Pay no mind to such ridiculous stories. They are not true, I tells ya; we'd have rather starved than eat mice, or cockroaches. Hmmmm, cockroaches...

*Ahem* anyways...

It took 65 years more to move everyone out of Sol II and thus be able to finally leave for good. The "Omega" Exodus craft, re-enacting it previous role, was designated to take the crew of the UIT-1 away. When the craft was 2 kilometers away from the station, the crew activated UIT-1's autodestruct sequence, and five minutes later the last symbol of our people in the Sol II system ceased to be. Sky Command unmanned defense drones confirmed the total destruction of the station, and then followed the Omega until it reached the wormhole to what is now the Dantia system. The Omega crew radioed in "This is the Omega Spacecraft, engaging gravdrive..." to which the Serco answered "Huh? you ain't gone yet?", and then the Omega warped, the Union of Independent Territories leaving Sol II for good with it. It was the year 3777 AD.

Part VII: Of how the Corporations came to Be

Let us backtrack a little. It had taken 85 years to get our people the hell away from the Serco’s reach, but if you have half a brain (Serco need not apply) you’ll realize that amounts to about four human generations, as in, people being born and growing up and having babies of their own, FOUR TIMES. Now THAT is a long time, and much happened, and it should be covered, since it explains some of what happened later.

Like I said before, the Union was building new stations as fast and possible and then filling them up with people just as quick. Now, a space station is not like the family sedan, where you just make sure to keep it fueled, oiled up and few other sundry. No, the upkeep of a space station requires WORK, and, most importantly, people trained to properly carry out said work. That meant, of course, that we had these huge “lost in space” crash-courses set up to run our people through them as soon as they came off-planet. The courses covered everything from EVA suit-up to work drone operation to taking a leak in zero-gee, and the Union citizens were set up to learn as many of them in the shortest time possible. These people, after all, would not only be expected to set up shop and become independent in a brand-new, rushed-to-order (and sometimes, not-quite-finished) space station, but eventually they would also be required to eventually provide personnel to help with the construction of new space stations. Thus, it was necessary that everyone KNEW how to do these things, and training began as soon as a kid could talk; in fact, the last flights of people to leave Serco Prime had had the theoretical courses while still in the planet. Not a one was spared this fate, and the pace was dictated by the need to have fully-trained people, like, yesterday. By the way, it also meant that everyone had a job, and thus beggars and stuff like that were unheard of, and so the Union was at first a communist’s Paradise. Marxists rejoice.

So our indoctrination to life in space was ruthless, yes, but it was born of desperation and quite good at separating the wheat from the chaff, if you ask me. So a couple of stations were lost due to hasty mistakes, operator errors, gross miscalculations, or catastrophic system failure, who cares? All the people inside were most likely deadbeats, anyway! Those who survived invariably proved to have what it took to survive in such a radically different medium than a planet. Of course, the newer generations were the ones that demonstrated the greatest capability for adaptation, from those who left Serco Prime while still in their infancy, to those born in space of space born people (wow, try and say that fast three times!); coming to the Universe knowing of nothing outside station and space, they excelled at learning about their environment and eventually surpassed their planet-born teachers and betters in all areas of life. They improved on station, vehicle and spaceship design, found means to allow every station to become self-sufficient by completely overhauling the onboard recycling and food-production systems, and even found ways to take a leak better in zero-gee. Unconstrained by previous knowledge and dogmas of life with a sky overhead, the new Union citizen adapted his civilization to space in an impressive short time, for dorks stuck inside a tin can and nothing to do for fun, anyway.

One such adaptation came, oddly enough, from competition. As the Union crawled away from Serco Prime one station at a time, and the station crews themselves came into their own, people began to develop a fierce sense of tribal pride for the station their lived in and their own abilities. Soon, the people from Station X was engaged with the people of Station Z on a fierce battle over who built the best stations, or built them faster, or had the best maintenance crews, or the hottest chicks. Mostly these were sportsman-like rivalries, everyone trying to outdo each other while also making sure they did a good job, for the benefit of everyone involved (yech… excuse me while I throw up). A few times, though, things got ugly or out of hand, and people died and/or resources were lost. Skilled people became a commodity, and any person of renown would be constantly pestered, throughout the useful period of his life, by offers of a better life in another station, with the amounts of living space, food, booze and loose women (or men) reaching ridiculous proportions in some cases. For the most part, though, people chose to remain with the station they were born/assigned to while still keeping whatever gifts the wooing stations sent their way, be it food, gadgets, or loose women. There was ONE offer, though, that was NEVER rejected, and that was what started it all.

That offer was from TPG.

The premier (and so far, only) corporation of the Union, not to mention the one that got our butts off Serco Prime, TPG had lots of clout within the fleeing, fledging nation, and, by association, so did its employees. To gain a position within TPG, even as a lowly space janitor (flying the ubiquitous Hoover-Class ships, like the famous “Eureka”) meant having it better than those around you: more living space, more food, better medical, dental, and of course, assorted groupies and hangers-on attracted to one’s success like Itani to a sappy poetry reading. Of course, a great big deal of that clout came from the fact TPG was the technological shoulders on which the Union stood, so no one complained (much) at first; TPG were our pals, they were our saviors, they were better than sliced bread! However, as the Union became familiar and proficient with TPG’s tech, and as the fright of the days living with the murderous prancing ponies faded into the background, people began to lose admiration for TPG and its employees, and question why it was that they had it so fine. It was only a matter of time before someone did something to spite the smiling giant that was TPG, and when someone finally did, it was a doozy.

The someone in question was, rather, a number of someones. Automation technicians and engineers the bunch of them, they had developed a number of important technologies and devices to make EVA operations safer and more efficient, particularly for mining. By designing remote control and 100% autonomous mining and maintenance drones, self-policing systems, and other, similar stuff that made work in the stations so much easier, these guys had clout, but not as much as TPG. And while TPG advocated the use of people for everything of importance, citing intelligence and ability to adapt, respond to crisis, and learn, these automation geeks advocated robotics for exactly the same reasons. However, it was obvious (to them, anyway, buncha loonies) that the Senate would never listen to them while TPG was up in an altar. One option to put a halt to this would be to destroy TPG (wish they’d gone with this one); the other was to prove themselves at least as good as TPG, if not better, and thus break its control over the Senate, and thus the Union.

In what was (at the time) an impressive coup and PR event, the group wooed a large number of automation specialists from all over the Union, including some right from under TPG's nose, and declared the creation of the Valent Robotics Corporation, whose mission statement was “to meet and exceed our client’s needs for semi and fully automated drones, devices and vehicles for any type of application, from agriculture to deep space exploration, and to totally kick TPG’s butt at its own game while we’re at it”. Okay, I admit it, that last statement is NOT part of the original Valent Manifesto, but you bet they were all thinking it. Anyway, the new Corp made some deals and took control of a couple of stations, and moved all its employees and their families into those. Valent could thus be called the first megacorp in that, by putting all its eggs in a couple of baskets, it had employees working in every field related to the running and maintenance of a station in addition to the corp’s objective of producing quality robotics. While TPG had spaceship designers here and there, and a few bunch of people to cater to them (like the aforementioned space janitors), Valent now was in complete charge of its stations, so it had employees working on maintenance, EVA operations, medical services, food production, entertainment, the works. Every person on a Valent station was a Valent employee working for the corp, and those who weren’t were either visitors, stowaways, or the children of the employees (even the spouses were hired). And while the children were not Valent employees per se, they were seen as company assets, and grew in a communal culture that all but guaranteed they’d grow up to work for Valent.

Valent was successful beyond anyone’s wildest expectations (mainly their own, is my guess): by becoming a single, large block of people, as opposed to a small bunch of nerdy automation techs, they suddenly had as much clout as TPG in front of the Senate, since two station-fulls of people doth make for an impressive number of constituents. Suddenly, the Senate was far more inclined to listen to plans involving robots and robotics, and paid more attention when someone (usually from Valent) pointed out the weaknesses or flaws in one of TPG’s plans. The friendly giant had competition now, and the two Corps looked at each from across the Senate floor with big grins that showed way too many teeth. It didn’t help a bit that the use of robotics for many apps was sound, and thus Valent was soon indeed seen to be as good, if not better, than TPG at what it did.

TPG could have shrugged it off. It could have kept on smiling that stupid smile and kept on working as if nothing had happened; it could have welcomed Valent with a little more enthusiasm, and, of course, it could have tried to strengthen ties with the new corp. However, the original pacifist beatnik dreamers of TPG were long gone, replaced by people who were a little more ruthless and a little more interested in the bottom line; they also had let all this “saviors of their people” business go to their head. The end result was that TPG engaged Valent in a silent but oh so obvious business war, trying still to dictate the direction of Union technology and by extension Union lifestyle, by means of securing tech and development contracts both with the Senate and with the space stations. Valent was only too happy to oblige, and when you consider Valent had people working pretty much in every facet of Union life while TPG was still only building ships and space station infrastructure, you can see how Valent had a small edge, an edge the wily robotics experts milked for all it was worth. It was a short war that saw TPG take a licking, and take the radical step that would define the Union to the present day (ironically, some TPG scholars point at this and say “See? We did get the last word after all!”): it took a couple of pages from its opponent’s book, and diversified the reach of its technology at the same time it moved all its employees into stations of its own.

This had two effects: the first and most immediate was that TPG recovered all the ground lost to Valent and eventually defeated it, much to Valent’s chagrin. Valent’s board, however, was cautious enough to take steps to ensure their dominance in the robotics market, and managed to defeat all of TPG’s forays into it. When the dust settled, TPG was slightly on top, leading the ships market, while Valent led robotics, and with pretty much a stalemate in the rest of the battlefield.

The second and most important effect was that other people who resented TPG realized Valent’s model worked VERY well, so well in fact TPG itself had adopted it. So entrepreneurs of all kinds who were sick and tired of TPG’s dominance began to gather and play their resources, and soon Corp after Corp raised from the ground, so to speak. Soon enough pretty much all stations belonged fully to one Corp or another, and every citizen was the employee of one particular Corp.

The Shattering of the Union had begun.

Part VIII: Of How the Union went Mad, and then subsequently Settled Down

It was the Best of Times, it was the Worst of Times (huh? A Tale of Two what? Charles WHO? Aw, get outta here, kid, don't bother me...) *ahem* The Union of Independent Territories, still migrating as far away as possible from the Serco and their planet, had hit a social snag as its less-than-fair hierarchy, where TPG employees were seemingly above everyone else, caused many people to question its fairness and, in typical entrepreneur fashion, they decided to exploit it instead of having it abolished or changed; this era of Union history is referred to as “The Shattering”.

Hundreds of "Corporations" sprung up over night, covering everything from gaskets to sealers to the little red erasers that go in the end of pencils. Most went for specialization in a single or a couple of products, while the largest ones tried to diversify their portfolios, so to speak. Everyone of these upstart corps wanted the ear of the Senate, everyone of them demanded clout few if any had, and all went into frenzied recruitment drives, hiring hundreds of people at a time, to attempt to acquire both these things. It is said that at the peak of the Shattering the only Union citizens not part of a Corp were the Senators themselves, though not for lack of trying on the part of the Corps. Surprisingly, the Senators chose to remain apart from them, arguing neutrality was required in order to rule fairly for all; that most of the Senators still ended up in the pockets of the biggest Corps was another matter entirely.

Thus, with the Senate in the pay of various competing bourgeois, Chaos ensued. The Senate became an erratic institution, embarking on a course of action (that would benefit one Corp), only to reverse course later (at the orders of another Corp). The Exodus swung left and then right; stations were ordered to be built only to be scrapped halfway through their construction; resources allocated to a project just to have that project cancelled moments later. It was total, lovely, Madness.

Chaos was not limited to the Union's government, however; the Corporations were at each other’s throats, trying to bring each other down by a combination of sales, R&D, and lawsuits. Some corporations died early and fast, a bigger one crushing them in the marketplace, suing them over patents or copyright, or outright taking them over; others merged in order to survive, forming bigger Corps that could defend themselves better. (in particular, the multiple merger of the Pencil Eraser Corp, the Synthwood for Pencils Corp, the Pencil Graphite Corp and the "Metal Thingie to Affix the Pencil Eraser to the Pencil Proper" Corp has always been seen as a stroke of genius, though the resulting corp, "Pencils, Inc." was quickly bought out by the larger Office Supply Corp) It was a dog-eat-dog-merge-with-bigger-dog Universe for a while, as the Forces of Natural Economic Selection allowed the fittest corps to survive by destroying and absorbing the lesser ones, while the bought-out Senators looked on (when they weren't distracted counting their cash, anyway). To this day, there are still remnants, memories and fossils of those earlier corps that didn't make the cut, like the Aputech-5 drones, for example, Aputech itself having been absorbed by Valent, though the corp did realize the value of their Aputech-5 Guardian and kept it on the product line; centuries later, one can't help but question the wisdom of this decision when a bunch of Hive Aputechs gang up on you and blast your ship to atoms, but alas, what is done is done...

This cannibalistic, erratic, wholy unwholesome but completely entertaining behavior was to last quite a bit, until only a handful of Corporations, the ones we know and love today, remained (except for upstart BioCom, of course). Between the Eight Corporations every need a consumer could have was met ten times over (though every one of the Corps had become known for a particular technology or activity) and nine out of ten Citizens belonged to a corp (during this struggle for corporate power, a lot of people had become disenchanted and broken off the engagement, living on the Union's welfare system, a lifestyle that's been referred to as "Paradise" and "Nirvana" in the history books). Valent and TPG, the biggest Corps and the ones who had weathered the Shattering the best, called for a truce, and the other corps, bloodied and tired from the struggle, quickly agreed. It was time to stop fighting and to look around and sort among the bits and pieces on the floor and see what could be recovered from all that mess; the Shattering was officially over.

Two things of importance came from the introspective look the Union took at itself at that moment:

First, it became obvious the Senate was composed of nothing but corrupt morons that wouldn’t mind seeing the Union come apart if that meant money in their pockets; the Senators were forced to stand down and new Senators were nominated from among the brightest people living off the Welfare System. This way, the Corps ensured a smart government that would be free of their interference and thus could work for the interest of all Union citizens; that such a government would thus wield little or no power, no one seemed to notice…

Second, the Union got the time to actually stop, look around, and see where it had ended up. You see, though for all this time the Exodus had become erratic, it had still more or less moved steadily away from the Sol II system. Now that no one was trying to eat into their profits, the Corps could take the time to look around the systems now occupied by the Union, and evaluate them. What they found was a bunch of systems with enough mineral resources of all kinds to last from then until the cows came home (they haven’t yet, don’t worry); that none of these systems had terraformable planets was of no consequence, for the Union had been a spaceborne nation for quite some time now, and was comfortable living in the void. Appraisal of the situation was made, and then scouts were sent back to Sol II; when these scouts returned with news that the Serco seemed to have abandoned space altogether since last they saw them, the decision was reached: The Union would settle on the systems of Dau, Arta Caelestis, and Nyrius. The systems of Latos, Azek, Sedina, Odia, Bractus, Verasi, Pelatus and Edras would be mapped and expanded upon as the Union grew and had need of them, but would be left as little more than a backyard for the time being. Ukari and Helios would be left unexploited, but watch stations would be established to look out for possible incursion by the Serco; all systems between these two systems and Sol II were to be off-limits, so as not to chance the Serco taking notice of the Union.

And thus the Union Exodus came to an end and its people created huge space stations and orbitals they could finally call Home. The Union Government proper and the Eight Corporations built their own stations for their own people. Interestingly enough, the aftermath of the Shattering and the restructure of the Union social order had ended up with the Government having a huge bureaucracy and a large number of secretaries (among them the Secretary for the Supervision of Corporate Affairs, or the Corp Police, as it’s most commonly known), and thus it owned more stations than any one Corp, with the exception of TPG, who had as many (and who had been among the most ravenous of the Corps during the Shattering). The Senate decided to settle in Dau and the Corporations followed suit, though the (now regulated) struggle for resources eventually forced most to move away.

So, after decades of desperate Exodus followed by decades of Corporate struggles and power-plays, the Union was finally settled down for times of peace of prosperity; Historians looked back at the History of the Dispossessed, and made bets among themselves about how long it would last…