Prologue (part 1): 2014-2057 – The Dark era

When the history of the humans as a species comes to the forefront of a discussion, the Dark Era is always brought up as one of the blemishes on an otherwise impeccable path towards ascension. Even though the actual dark history contained within this era would certainly prove to be proof for the destructive capabilities of the human race, it nonetheless portrays the adaptability and longing for survival our race inhibits. And it all started on the brink of the 21st century.

The turn of the millennia was pivotal point in human history. After nearly two centuries of heavy industrialization, we were finally starting to notice that our Earth was not as stable as we once believed it to be. We were changing the very atmosphere of our planet and by doing such; we were slowly but steadily destroying our own ecosystem. And if that wasn't enough, after two decades of peace after the cold war era, tensions started rising once more. Even though the Soviet Union had been disbanded in 1989, the newly formed Russian Federation started showing Soviet-like tendencies with its invasion of Ukraine in 2014. Even though the history books officially classify this conflict as a proxy war, it did throw a new ember into the recently extinguished fire of the Cold war. Man is like nature in that way, a fire tends to restart every so often before the blaze is finally halted.

The renewed fire of tension gave way to new branches of research normally dubbed as too expensive or too limited to be of use for economic purposes. War was brewing once again, and every human soul knew it. Common human emotions as greed, envy, pride and contempt fuelled the fires of conflict day after day, slowly opening the pathway to destruction. Of course, looking back at this era, we realize now that it was this very development, our species being on the brink of annihilation, which shifted the psyche to one of nobler intentions.

The saddest part of this was that a branch which got this renewed funding was one that in all honesty should never have been used for internal wars. Space technology should always be focused on exploration and defence, never on destructive capability. But alas, in times of tension and conflict, destruction is exactly what is on the forefront of the military mind, and as such the developments made during these years had potential to destroy worlds as well as explore the outer reaches of our solar system.

A new space race started, as the Russian Federation, European Confederation, United States of America, and the Peoples' Republic of China all vied for orbital supremacy. Newly introduced were concepts that had been mere notions of science fiction a few years before, such as the orbital slingshot built in Southern Germany. Within a decade, all of the countries had performed their own "miracles" of space exploration. The Americans had been the first to successfully perform a manned Mars landing, whilst the Russians had been the first to have a functioning research outpost based on the surface of Luna. The Chinese had created the worlds' first SSTO (Single Stage to Orbit), a vehicle that would prove to be one of devastating destruction in the years to follow. Finally, the European Confederation pioneered a gigantic artificial gravity station that could provide living space for dozens of humans. The station was the first construct to have been built in orbit, instead of assembling the station from modules built on the surface.

But the space race brought more than just innovation in space. Where weapons of mass destruction had previously been airborne or surface-to-air bombs, orbital bombardments were now perfectly possible. The Chinese were in possession of a Nuclear Missile array capable of completely wiping out half of the American continent were it not for the anti-missile defence grid deployed by the U.S.A. All of the major powers had access to these kinds of weapons, and as tensions started rising over the ever-declining pools of fossil fuels, all across the globe humans started worrying about having their homes nuked from orbit.

The blazing roar of war finally came in 2029 CE, when the Peoples' Republic of China started demanding resources from their south-east Asian neighbours. Whilst a lot of the countries obliged, Malaysia refused China access to their resources. In response, the Chinese Army invaded Malaysia, occupying the entire country apart from Kuala Lumpur. In an act of desperation, the Malaysian government called on its Western Allies to help remove the Chinese menace from their soil. Well aware that interfering would likely spark a new world war, the European Confederation and the U.S.A. took over a month to came up with a proper diplomatic solution to the Asian Fuel Crisis, as the conflict had been dubbed by them. All of that changed when Chinese warships fired a city-buster class nuke on the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur, killing over 98 percent of its inhabitants and effectively destroying any remnant of the Malaysian State.

This massive extermination of human life triggered an armed response of the E.C. and the U.S.A., who had both already fully mobilised its armed forces. The repulsion of Malaysia takes place ten days after the massacre of Kuala Lumpur, and the Western Allied Forces manage to repel the PRC army back to Thailand. But the Thai mainland proved to be hard to reach, as the natural bottleneck of the peninsula provided the Chinese with an ideal defensive position, of which they took full advantage. To make matters worse, after three weeks of fighting along the Malaysian border, the Russian Federation joined the conflict on the side of the PRC and launched a massive invasion of the European mainland. Whilst the Europeans had left their back guarded, it still came as a surprise that the Russians would actually attack them, and the initial casualties were skyrocketing.

With the war now being fought on two fronts, the E.C. provided extra funding into project S.A.B.R.E., which was an energy weaponry project. Initial results were promising, but far too crude to be implemented immediately. The first effective laser rifle did not see service until 2031 CE, just before the end of the war.

As the four war economies consumed the world's natural resources at an alarming pace, the remaining countries started suffering from problems as small as energy shortages to full scale famine. Most of the basic commodities the big four exported to the rest of the world were now being kept within borders, leading to a massive shortage of refined fuel, electricity, and food. These shortages spread through Africa and Southern America, destabilising countries in those regions, ultimately leading to a full economic collapse.

Whilst many of the worlds' nations were breaking down, the big fours' war raged on. After the Russian invasion of the European continent the Confederation Army launched a massive counterstrike against the Russian city of St. Petersburg, which was captured and continued to be a beachhead till the end of the war. At the same time the U.S.A. launched their invasion of China, landing at the port city of Hong Kong, which was easily captured. However, Hong Kong was ultimately an insignificant victory for the Allies, as China greenlighted use of the Orbital Missile Strikes.

The first cities to fall prey to the Chinese installations were on American soil, as the Anti-missile grid proved to be incapable of stopping every tactical nuke deployed by the Chinese army. Whilst the war in Europe was a deadly, but ultimately manageable land based war, the American-Chinese conflict turned into a full scale Nuclear Confrontation. Over the span of a year, numerous Chinese and American cities were completely reduced to rubble, with a staggering casualty count of over 200 million humans.

In Europe, the warfront shifted daily as cities were conquered and retaken on a whim. Both sides focused completely of offensive capabilities, but the E.C. was the first to realise that proper defensive tech would be the key to victory. In January of 2031, project S.A.B.R.E. released its first fully functioning laser rifle. The weapon was still too impractical to be used by infantry, but it provided defensive "nests" complete superiority. Within two months, all European cities were retaken piece by piece, and in April of 2031, the E.C. was ready to invade the Russian Federation. The invasion force met ever weakening resistance until the forces reached Moscow. Taking a hint from history, the march of Moscow took place in the summer, and it was history's first successful invasion of the Russian nation. Russia signed a peace treaty in July 2031, gifting the European Confederation a portion of the conquered Russian territory, including the city of St. Petersburg. The total casualties of the Euro-Russo conflict were just over 100 million, a fraction of the Chinese-American conflict.

The most destructive part of the war is now known as annihilation day, a day during which over half of the war's casualties were created. The day started with the last Chinese Nuclear assault on the U.S.A. West coast, during which Chinese hackers managed to cripple parts of the Anti-Missile defence grid. As a result most of the major US cities on the West Coast were reduced to rubble, with a death toll of just over 75 million. In a final push to end the Chinese terror, the U.S.A. unleashed a swarm of nuclear missiles on most of the Chinese coastal cities, killing over 200 million people. This final push was what ultimately led to the PRC's surrender, and the war was finally over.

Total score: Almost 600 million dead, more than 1 billion wounded and a quarter if the planet rendered inhabitable. To say it was a drastic was would be the understatement of the millennia, but humanity always rebuilds, even from catastrophes as devastating as the Third World War.

Following the war, Europe and Russia throw up a new iron curtain between their two nations, eerily reminiscent of the Cold war of the previous century. The team of project S.A.B.R.E. decides to found Sabre Industries on their discovery of energy based weaponry, their first contract having them supply the entire "curtain" with state-of-the-art weapons and defences. The company is split up into two sub companies, Sabre Weapons Co. and Sabre Energy Co., and the think tanks of the energy division pour all their funds into research on nuclear fusion reactors.

Meanwhile the U.S.A. starts a massive land reclamation project to clean up the various states that burned under the nuclear flames. The process is slow, but over the next few years, significant portions of a few states are restored to semi-liveable conditions. However, almost half of the nation remains a Nuclear Wasteland. As terraforming and regrowth are on the forefront of the nations' mind, most of the annual budget is flushed into the project.

In South America the crippled states continue to fight each other in guerrilla warfare, struggling to control the ever declining supplies of fossil fuels. Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru merge into the nation of Gran Colombia to better combat the guerrilla raids of the Brazilians. During these years, images of the so called Jungle Wars shock humankind with their brutality, easily surpassing the brutality of the Third World War, which was much more destructive but not as merciless as the jungle wars. Sure, nuclear fire destroyed many lives, but seeing images of civilians being beheaded by vicious guerrillas still instils shock.

In stark contrast to South America, Africa starts climbing out of the gorge o poverty they had found themselves in for over two centuries. Under the leadership of Nigeria and South Africa, most of the Southern African and Middle African countries form the African Union. Large infrastructure projects are started with borrowed money from the European Confederation, and within five years the majority of Africa's infrastructure reaches a level acceptable enough for the European High tech firms to establish bases there.

Still struggling to reclaim land, the U.S.A. petitions the European Confederation for a joint mission to Mars to start terraforming the planet. The E.C. agrees, and proposes that the U.S.A. join the E.C. under the new name of the United Western Confederation. Patriotism spikes in the US, but ultimately the politicians agree to the formation of the Union, declaring that the financial benefits far outweigh the nationalist feeling of the nation.

In 2043, Sabre Energy Co. succeeds at Nuclear Fusion, and orders for the newly designed reactors skyrocket. The reactors also form the basis of the Martian Colonial Mission, as they allow for construction of more efficient spacecraft.

Scientist from all over the globe start flocking to the U.W.C. due to massive subsidies granted for research into almost every brand of science. The Mars Colonial Mission launches in 2047, with a fleet of over ten spacecraft journeying to Mars. As U.W.C. corporations start showing interest in space exploration, the government grants tax favours and subsidies to any citizens willing to join the Mars Colony.

When the Mars Colony mission landed near the Southern Icecaps, Colonists started flocking to the newly formed base using commercial spacecraft. Within two years the colony of Ares boasts a population of over 5000 people, most of them being scientists. The Martian Terraforming Foundation is formed, and donations from all over the U.W.C. enable the possibility of terraforming. Plans for large atmospheric generators are made, and the process of terraforming Mars starts two years later.

In 2054, genetically engineered lichen is introduced to the Martian soil after two years of changing the atmosphere. The algae survive, and start the natural process of photosynthesis, accelerating the terraforming.

One year later, a new colony is founded, named Novus. This colony is situated near the Promethei Planus region of Mars, a region that showed some Bermudaesque properties as probes and rovers sent into the area experienced some kind of technical malfunctions when operating in the area. Scientists find the source of the anomaly within a month, and the expedition sent to the site of the anomaly would change the fate of humankind forever…