Chapter 1-Introduction

The Solar System is the home star system of the human race. By the creation of the Solar Coalition, Humanity had been in space within the Solar System for over 1,200 years. The Solar Coalition treaty was signed to replace the Commonwealth Treaty, Interstellar. The treaty was made at the height of the K’talla War.

The K’talla forces had conquered 80% of the Commonwealth System beyond the Solar System. The Solar System governments felt that the human world would be the main K’talla target. After the First Battle of Sol was won by humanity with the aid of the Sleip and Jonnerian, the Coalition Treaty was formed so the Solar System would speak with one voice at the forming of the League.

After the League was formed the Solar Coalition set about perfecting the defense of the Solar System. The League tried to develop a grand strategy of defense against the K’tallan offensive.

The Sleipnir were unwilling to aid any human offensive to retake the conquered Commonwealth worlds. If the humans wanted those systems back, they could take them back on their own efforts. The Jonnerans took the necessary steps to organize the League’s defenses.

They established the third Unity to develop the region of space just rimward of the old human commonwealth and UPW Spaces. The Third Unity consisted of the New Commonwealth formed by all of the refugee population from the conquered colonies and all of the rescued space stations and space habitats.

Some of the populations were taken in by Jonnerian populations out of necessity. Many were resettled with NCW communities when possible, but the other refugees chose to remain with the Jonnerian communities that took them in during the crisis. These Jonnerians began to culturally change after three generations. This was the foundation of the Companion Sept.

To defend the lightly populated UPW systems the Jonnerians proposed the use of robotic warships. These measures led to a major Jonnerian presence within the UPW spaces. These Jonner worked so extensively with the UPW navy and populations that the Machine Talker Sept developed from the relationship.

The Jonnerians negotiated with the Sleip to look at measures of defending the core human worlds and systems. Part of those measures was a detachment of Sleip ships in those systems, including Sol. the Sleip also stationed large module arsenal shoals within those systems, with human permission.

After several decades the Sleip developed several new types of Edits to fight in the K’talla War. These edits were placed under the command of several Jonner families. Since the war stretched for centuries, those families developed into a new Sept, the Minion Sept. These fleets were based in several star systems but not the Solar System.

The Jonnerians aided human efforts to liberate the K’tallan occupied systems. These were joint operations between the NCW, Companion Sept, Minion Sept, Machine Talker Sept, and the UPW fleet.

Among these factions was the Exile Navy. The Exiles were the remnant of the Commonwealth Navy. The Commonwealth had formed a force from all the human communities of the Commonwealth to try and build a truly neutral force for the betterment of Humanity. After the K’talla conquered most of the Human systems, the Exiles felt it their sacred duty to liberate those human populations. The Exiles consisted of the old Commonwealth Navy, their support facilities, and many new recruits from the refugee populations.

These campaigns often ended in sorrow. Some advances were made, but each time the K’talla would counter attack and win back any liberated systems. But these campaigns continued decade after decade. The Humans found it unacceptable to just give it up.

The Solarian powers were involved in some campaigns, but were not involved in each of them. Their most important focus was the defense of Sol. As the homeworld of Humanity, it was a major target of the K’talla.

While there was only four full scale assaults on the Solar System by the K’talla war fleets, there was constant proving attacks by the K’talla over the four centuries of the Human-K’talla War.

The total casualties measured were in the tens of millions. Most came from space communities, but up to a quarter of them were Solarians.

The total war force of the K’tallan War, changed most of the human society almost all other human activity came to a halt, but humans did try and advance their civilizations.

The UPW subcultures became more conservative and static. They tried to emphasis the cultural tenets which were their strengths through the generations.

The League human factions turned their energies to expansion and new population growth. Their populations grew twenty fold during the war, despite war losses.

The Third Unity spread from a few dozen star systems to over two thousand in the four hundred terran years. The Companion Sept focused upon gas giants using sky city technology. The NcW and Jonnerian First Unity Septs moved throughout the area helping to develop the space.

The Solarians continued to develop as Humanity had for ages. While the K’talla attacks disrupted such projects as the terraforming of Venus and Mars, Humanity repaired the damage and pressed ahead.

 



Chapter Two

The various fleets and military services that waged the K’tallan War were numerous. The K’talla were united, but humanity was fragmented as were their allies.

The Solarian treaty members were the Mars Republic, the Earth Alliance, and the Imperial Federation. Each had member states, but those were the signature members. It also included the primordial terrestrials that were still alive and dealing with the Solarians. These include the Crinoids and the Theropods. Certain concessions were granted them by the Solarian governments for the Terrestrials aid against the K’talla.

The League saw these minor populations as a part of the Solarian Coalition. To honor all agreements the Solarian Coalition must defend the old legacy star colonies of the primordial terrestrials.

The oldest species is the crinoids who have one surviving extrasolar colony and a small population in Antarctica.

The theropods have populations on the crinoid colony, but there is also one world where a residual population was settled by the crinoids and allowed to develop.

These two systems were developed to have a major military defense force. These are also guarded by the League as well.



Chapter Three

It was not known till after the war that during the First Battle of the Sol, that the strike on Earth that devastated the biosphere of Earth and killed over a billion people was not performed by the retreating K’talla, but was launched by the defending Sleip to test the mettle of Humanity.

This event would have consequences centuries later. The Exiles would find these events intolerable, especially as the Sleip were conceded the planet Neptune.

These agreements would push the Exiles to Exodus the known human space.



Chapter Four

The Solarian Coalition found that the era of the K’talla War was a trying time but the challenges brought out the best in Humanity.

The planets Mars and Venus were still going through centuries of terraforming. Earth spent decades repairing the damage from the Ktallan assaults and the Sleipnir testing.

Also resources are tapped from the Solar System and neighboring star systems to develop and build major new fleets and vast system wide defense capacities.

Another major endeavor by the Solarian States is to research all of the technology and science that has been discovered by exposure to the war and alien races, especially the Sleip and Talla. These technologies include the ability to manipulate space/time through metric engineering and how to tap gravity fields for power.

The solarian Coalition also had expeditionary fleets set to aid in the liberation efforts, but also to the lleyu trying to aid in their war against the Ktalla. This expedition was a diplomatic nightmare. The Talla blame Humanity for the start of the whole war.

The whole effort was a mixture of Talla rebels, N’talla revived soldiers, the Ptanj mercenary fleets from the Union, the Ileyal royal fleets, the Ileyoll member state fleet, and the Solarian expeditionary force.

These expeditions were a matter of tension between the Earth Alliance and the Imperial Federation. Each was the major collective of the States of the Solarian Coalition. The Imperial Federation forward focusing on the League’s efforts to liberated occupied human worlds. The Earth Alliance (Diqui Lianmeng) wanted to seek other strategic options to try and turn the K’tallan war effort.

Once the Sleip refused to take the offense against the K’talla, and the primordial terrestrial could not furnish any significant immediate war effort, the Diqui Lianmeng sought other potential contacts.

While the Imperials focused on close ties and direct war efforts with the League, the Lianmeng launched out to explore stray contacts. The Chinese and Russians hit upon the idea of trying to reestablish contact with the Talla and negotiate a cease fire to the war, which had gone so against the humans once the Talla introduced the K’talla super soldiers.

Negotiations was difficult, but the humans learned that the K’talla had seized power and the Talla were in rebellion with Allies.

With this information the Solar Coalition agreed to a new grand strategy. The Mars Republic would be accepted as independent, but would be expected to take major commitment to the Solar System.

The Imperial Federation would focus to take over the Solar contribution to the League expedition. The Diqui Lianmeng would continue to send expeditionary forces to scout out the K’tallan space beyond the occupied worlds and aiding the Talla.

There would be observers from all factions on all expeditions. These observers would have full ability to report to their home capitals.

The First Alliance expedition after the change of strategy agreement was to establish a military base of operations within the same region of space as the anti k’talla alien alliance.

The second expedition of the Alliance was to the Ileyol thrown world. This was an effort to try and exchange war tech and aid the Lleyoll with intelligence about the K’talla.

The third expedition of the Alliance was to take part in a joint strike with the N’talla and Ileyoll royal fleets against one of the three major K’talla shipyards. The result was a disaster with most of the attacking force destroyed.

The plan had been for the human ships to piggyback on the alien ships and attack. Human FTL does not have the strategic speed to counter the K’talla strategic movement. The Alliance resolved to improve their technology after this campaign.

There was no agreement between the Talla and n’talla and humans. The past history was to extensively negative. The Ileyoll were more willing to negotiate with the humans.

The result from these exchanges would not go rapidly. But in the end the Diqui Lienmeng fleets would develop new technologies centered upon phase shifting.

Weapons systems were refined to fit upon smaller ships designed than older ship designed.



Chapter Five

The Imperial Federation is made up of many of the states once called West Civilization. Over the centuries these states have politically changed but culturally have changed slowly.

The major member states of the Imperial Federation are the Republic of the United states, the commonwealth of Nations, Brazilian Republic, Nihon, and the Indian Republic.

History unfold after the Third World War to drive separations in human civilizations.

The Imperial Federation is driven by the rights of the individual above all other aspects of legal or philosophical theory.



Chapter Six

The Diqui Lianmeng is made up of many old nations that opposed the Western nations. These include China, Russia, the African Union, and the Muslim Association. Of these four powers, the first three are the ones with active space presences. The populations of Venus have their greatest ties to China and Indonesia, but are still recognized as partially independent.



Chapter Seven

The planetary forces of the League have a sizable contingent ofthe League have a sizable contingent of Solarian military with them.

The League has shared war tech among the various to best fight the K’talla. But eachfaction uses it to develop their own doctrine.

The Imperial Federation’s acceptance of cybernetics, bionics, and genetic engineering allows them several military options. The Imperials also use AI’s at the warbot level, which their opposites do not.

The Diqui Lienmeng use far more mundane troops with extensive power armor and countermeasures of complex natures.

 



Chapter Eight

The space fleets and starships of the Solarian powers changed drastically over the course of the K’tallan war.

When the Talla attacked the Commonwealth the fleets were the old member nation fleets and the Commonwealth Interstellar Navy.

The nation fleets were system ships and big fleet tenders, with packets and couriers for small communication missions. Each nation used a different policy, but after 150 years of interstellar travel the Commonwealth Navy was formed.

The balance of power was maintained by the Commonwealth being based out system. The idea was that the Commonwealth Navy would take responsibility for most interstellar actions, while not traveling back to the Solar System with any warships.

The nature of the Carsmir Inducer allow FTL travel, but it still required a relativistic ship to utilize the system for interstellar travel.

This meant either very large starships or the use of a fleet tender for ferrying forces and system ships over the interstellar distances. This was sufficient to allow the old solarian powers to strategically balance the Commonwealth of Humanity.

The Periphery War or 1st Interstellar War was mostly fought between the UPW and the Commonwealth Administration. The UPW objected to the aggressive unification policies of the Commonwealth, not keeping ties to the home system. In this early period the Treaty of Separation was in effect but was not as ossified as in later eras. Each of the major member nations of the Commonwealth had various stances on the UPW’s push for full recognized independence.

USA: Sympathetic, but not more than informal support

Commonwealth (British): sympathetic and vote often for peace.

India: sympathetic but believe a legal solution

United Europe: Believed that the rebellion was illegal

Russia: supportive of independance

Brazil: supportive of the Commonwealth

African Union: Supportive of the commonwealth

Mars Republic: Neutral

China: Sympathetic but disapproves.

In the end the commonwealth Administration found the threat from the UPW and the growing political hostility from Earth to much and agreed to the peace settlement.

After the war interstellar technology changed slowly with more efficient designs. The Commonwealth expanded the Colonial Authority and pushed new efforts to explore. The Solarian States moved to strengthen their fleets and devise counters to the concept of relavistic bombing, after the war.

The Solarian nations also tied their oldest stellar colonies closer to them. This created a two tier stellar civilization for Humanity. The oldest colonies keep their alliance to their parent nation, while the post commonwealth owed more to the colonial powers. This led to some tensions at the legal and political level but never at the military.

During the Second Interstellar War, or the Periphery-Jonneran War, the Commonwealth was mostly ignorant of the affair. Much of the combat was in star systems beyond the core UPW five main systems.

Everything would change after a Commonwealth Expedition encountered Talla colony world. The first expedition was scientific that had detected unusual gravity waves from the star system. Once they realized it was a space faring species they departed without making contact. The second expedition tried to make contact but were told to depart by the Talla. The third expedition was to insistent and was attacked by the Talla destroying several ships. The regional Commonwealth respond with a partially martial response, and the Talla went to a state of war and attacked the Commonwealth.

The Talla were more advanced than Humanity and wanted to inflict enough damage upon human space to remove any contact.

This war caught the humans off guard. The Talla used superior technology with the limited goal of driving humans out of the star systems close to their colonies to wage the war.

These efforts were successful at first, but the humans went on the offensive. These expeditions were defeated by the Talla, but they despaired that the humans would not get the message.

The Talla found that their war against the humans could not move past a stalemate. The Talla had no interest in diplomatic interaction with the humans, and the humans stubbornly pursued hostilities.

In a bid to pursue the war the Talla debating reviving their past super soldiers, P’talla or maybe creating something new targeted specifically at the humans. Ultimately both steps were taken. New war technology designs were developed. Then the K’talla were developed to work within the psychological aspects of the human species.

The Talla planned was to withdraw from the war with humans directly. They activated the P’talla and used their super soldiers to bolster the defenses of their core worlds, just in case the humans tried any deep space strategic strikes.

The K’talla were developed into a major force and then unleashed upon the Commonwealth of Humanity.



Chapter Nine

The K’talla onslaught was devastating to humanity, and the first existential threat to the species since all humans were on the home planet with several polities having large arsenals of nuclear weapons.

The Talla had withdrawn from any combative encounters for over two terran years when the Ktalla attack fleets attacked. Within just half a year the Ktalla had conquered and occupied all of the Commonwealth systems on the side of human space closest to Talla space.

As the K’talla fleets prepared for the assault upon Sol System, they launched probing attacks on all the systems in the other half of human space, including the UPW.

All of the forces in human space began to try and defend, but many were destroyed with ease.

The assault on Sol led to a seige of all the major planets of the system and rampant destruction system wide.

Strange some targets were not attacked.

 

The Jonnerian involvement was part of the UPW’s efforts to help the Solar System. Unknown to the humans that would also bring the Sleip involvement in the Second Battle of Sol.



Chapter Ten

After the K’talla’s strategic advance was halted at the Second Battle of Sol, they set about strategically consolidating their hold upon the other Commonwealth star systems.

The League agreement laid out that the Sleip would only help defend existing free populations of humans, including the refugees in League space, Sol, and the few other still human held systems.

Introduction

The Ptanj are a species that have been starfaring for over 18,000 Terran years and spacefaring for almost 20,000 years.

During that time this was a prosperous civilization with many ebbs and flows.

The largest and most destructive event was the Dark Realmer War. This war against a hostile A.I. civilization almost caused the extinction of the Ptanj. Only the intervention of the Worldborne Oley and desperate measures by the Ptanj avoided this extreme.

Now after centuries of collapse and decay, the Ptanj have rebuilt up to 3 new stellar civilizations: The Starworlders, Ptanj Union, and Ptanj Association.

 

[Ptanj Renaissance, Ptanj Wandering, The Ptanj Association]



This would be the start of a major awakening of the Dark Realmers across a broad stretch of the galaxy rimward of Ptanj space. That would be aChapter One–History

The Ptanj ventured into space with no outside alien contact. They built their first space faring civilization in their home system over 2000 years. During that time, interstellar probes were sent out, and technology was advanced.

After all that time they developed their first superluminal system. They developed a primitive hyperspace drive system. They used that technology to send out early explorations proves and expeditions to all of the stars in their local stellar environment.

They found many systems which they were able to planet engineer and establish colonies over thousands of years. Throughout that era the Ptanj advanced their technology and made their first contact with a  wide ranging exploration team from the Malanthekar. This lead to long range merchant trade expeditions. This set up a trade route that lasted centuries and was cultivated by both sides.

During this era the Ptanj pushed outward on all fronts, constantly exploring. During those explorations they stumbled upona barren world that showed indications of ancient works and habitation. The expedition moved in eagerly. But they discovered that the ancient works were the result of an AI mining operation. The Ptanj attempted to examine the technology, but awoke the intelligence that ran the base world. This ‘Dark Realmer’ began with a horrid capture and examination of the Ptanj explorers. The AI of the mining colony would send out signals to awaken other Dark Realmer AI’s scattered all along a vast region of the galaxy located toward the galaxy’s rim from Ptanj space. This would set off a chain of events which would devastate the Ptanj Civilization.



Chapter Two-Dark Realmer War

Raiding forces of the Dark REalmers fleet lashed deep into Ptanj space at Ptanj worlds in a drive toward the Ptanj core worlds.

Each world hit was exterminated with violent intensity. The Dark Realmers sought to destroy all capacity of the Ptanj. Their strategy was simply one of total destruction.

The war’s first period saw numerous attempts by the Ptanj to stop the Realmer fleets. The Realmers had superior superluminal travel, which allowed them to gather forces and strike at Ptanj worlds. These led to numerous battles, which the Ptanj lost.

Eventually the war entered a second phase where the Ptanj could put sufficient forces in remaining systems to defect Realmer raids.

The Realmer technology was more advanced, but the Ptanj had adequate capacities to attack and hold against the Realmers.

Chapter Three: Star Worlders

After several years the Ptanj were worn down and more systems began to fall and be destroyed. This caused great concern on the Ptanj core worlds. The ptanj felt they needed a new strategy to assure the survival of the species.

The ideas developed led to the Starworlders. The concept was to build large self contained generation ships which had self-sustaining capacity, a quiet FTL, and a large capacity of the Ptanj culture.

As each starworld was constructed it was launched deep into the galaxy away from the warzone. The idea was to use a transit FTL jump to displace the starworld outward to a random point in space-time of the galaxy.

Each starworld was built to one of three patterns. Each of the patterns was design to have an initial start of 30,000 Ptanj. All of the patterns had the concept of existing for centuries.

Pattern One: This pattern was designed to support up to 250,000 populations, with the concept of lasting thousands of years. And could travel much further distances.

Pattern Two: This pattern was designed to be more modular than the other two the idea was to allow the star world to grow as large as necessary to support a growing, open ended population.

Pattern Three: Designed to build a rapidly growing colony once a distant, ut suitable world had been found.

 

Each pattern represented a different population preservation strategy.

The first pattern was to run as far and as fast as possible. The second pattern was to sustain a growing population indefinitely. The third pattern was to establish a remote and hidden colony.

 

The starworlds put a challenge upon the Ptanj construction, since the starworlds construction was displacing warship building.

The Ptanj launched roughly 10 starworlds per year from the core worlds. The Ptanj records from the war were flaw in preservation, but over 2,000 were known to be launched over 2 centuries.

 

The starworlders made no attempt to remain in contact with their parent civilization or each other.



Chapter Four–End of War

The end of the Dark Realmer War came in a quiet dwindling of activity. But by the time it ended, the Ptanj civilization was collapsing with over 2/3rds of their former habitated systems devastated and depopulated.

There was a chance encounter between a new Ptanj starworld and a wandering Spacebourne Oley ship. The exchange led to a first contact between the Ptanj and a Deiwos child race in the Oley. One result was recognition by the Oley that the Realmers are a leftover force from the Deiwas Civil War.

From this the Ptanj learned of codes and command features that allow the machines and AI’s to be directed.

It took several ‘months’ to get that information back to the Ptanj core worlds. The Ptanj defense forces used the information to win some major battles against the Dark Realmers. The Realmers withdraw from the war.



Chapter 5: Core Worlds after the War (Ptanj Union)

There were 15 heavily populated core worlds of the Ptanj civilization. Only 11 survived the war, the other four were depopulated by Realmer attacks.

Those eleven worlds that survived lost starfaring, but they began to rebuild for centuries after the war. Many of the core worlds reestablished connect through radio communication.

Several of the core worlds developed sublight starfaring and reestablished a stellar, multi-world polity. These worlds could not easily aid each other in rebuilding beyond moral support and information exchanges.

Eventually a successful breakthrough at the old Ptanj colony discovered new FTL technology. The older hyperspace access technology who still know, there were even preserved hyperspace ships, but the technology was not trusted. The dark Realmers had proven capable of tracking and engage ships traveling in such methods.

The Ptanj built upon knowledge gained from the Malanthekar allowed Ptanj scientist to develop the singularity tunnel and gravity wave rocketry. Once developed this technology quickly allowed the 11 old core worlds to develop the Ptanj Union.



Chapter 6–Ptanj Association

Most of the Ptanj worlds were destroyed during the Dark Realmer War. On the far side of of Ptanj space from the Realmer strategic attack vector over 200 Ptanj systems survived the war.

These systems had developed along the trade route toward the Malanthekar Expanses. When the Dark Realmers sweep be the core worlds they annihilated dozens of systems on the far side of Ptanj space but were unable to be through before they retreated and ended the war.

Those 200 plus systems were able to keep their population and their starfaring capacity. Over the centuries of silence these worlds and systems built the Ptanj Association.

Unlike the older Ptanj civilization, the Association is a much more open politically system. Each system stands equal to the others in the Association. A whole new civilization was built.

 



Chapter 7 Tensions between Ptanj Polity

After all of the Ptanj redeveloped and reestablished contact with each other there were increasing tensions.

The Ptanj homeworlds still felt that their old right to rule the Ptanj species still stood. Over 2,000 terran years had passed. To the Starworlders the old space was half legend, and had little bearing on the Starworlds future. Each world was a community, with their own take in history.

To the Association worlds, the old Ptanj ruling polity which had developed from the homeworld were considered to blame for the Realmer War. Such matters of ancient history were considered established academic fact among the general culture and society of the Association.

The old core worlds had looked at restoring Ptanj unity as an almost religious tenet. But also no Ptanj had every waged war upon another after the Ptanj first became starfaring, so military action was considered anathema for the Union. But warfare of limited types had occurred between worlds in the early days of the Association. And the starworlders still occasionally battled.

So all the proclamations of racial unity by the Union was meet with skepticism. The Union proved frustrated at the attitudes of the other Ptanj, but had to face several strategic realities.

 

1 The 11, old core worlds of the Ptanj Union had to rebuild everything from start. Their total population was only 5 billion across 11 star systems.

2 The star worlders had settled diverse new worlds or stayed space based for the last 2,000 years. They were scattered across over a quarter of the galaxy.

3 The new technologies developed by the Union may allow rapid travel at galactic ranges, there were limits to how many ships and weapons the Union could produce and upkeep.

4 There were almost a trillion ptanj in the Association and their ships were still capable of striking at the old core worlds.



Chapter 8–Ptanj Timeline

–Ptanj civilization is at its height, with strong dealings with the Malanthekar

–Ptanj exploration ship stumbles upon a Realmer base world and is destroyed

–Realmer War starts with heavy attacks falling upon the Ptanj outer colonies.

–ptanj halted the initial attacks by the Realmers to great cost

–The war raged for centuries with decade of stalemates. Across the Ptanj space, worlds were devastated, and Realmer bases were destroyed in return when found.

–Fearing the extinction of their species, the Ptanj developed the star worlder project. They designed 3 patterns.

–Initial encounters with the Oley eventually lead to aid in the form of Spaceborne Oley ships aiding Ptanj fleets. Also Oley transit and tensor field technologies were incorporated into the Starworld designs.

–Also with coding information gained from the Oley, the Ptanj were eventually able to push the Realmers back but not before their core worlds were devastated or destroyed.

–The Realmer war ends in silence as the Realmers withdraw from all space near Ptanj

–The Ptanj civilization was exhausted. The Ptanj lost 7/10 of their initial population.

–the 11 surviving core worlds collapsed into barbarism and low technology existence

–a third of the surviving Ptanj had scattered aboard the Star worlds and began to build new societies between the far flung worlds

–Over 200 of the surviving outer colonies in Ptanj space on the side away from the Realmer invasion survive and preserve starfaring, these go on to form the Association.

–the Association chose to avoid the old Ptanj core worlds since most had been sterilized, those at barbarism level are left untouched by choice and law

–each of the 3 populations went their own way for 2,000 terran years

–the surviving 11 cor worlds, eventually recover. Four of them enough to establish radio communication with each other. The first colony was the first to return to space. The 11 core worlds built a starfaring sublight society over 2 centuries.

–the Ptanj Association formed a slow expanding polity, technology, and new worlds are only added to a society that is based upon conservation, collectivism, and efficiency

–the Ptanj Association slowly expanded into new territory. Eventually this brought them up to the remnant worlds of the imperial melanthekar’s territory

–This brought both into conflict. The imperial Melanthekar at first held the strategic advantages, but the Ptanj eventually stabilized the situation and drove the Melanthekar back across their borders. This resulted in a cold war that went hot several times over the centuries.

–Starworlders interconnected and begin pushing their range further and further out from the old Ptanj space.

–the Ptanj core worlds began to slowly pull themselves out of their new stone age induced by the last Realmer campaign

–the First 1,000 years each civilization went their own way.

–The association build up to a 1,000 major systems. Sharing borders with the Imperial Melanthekar. Their technology and economy slowly grew. The Association adopted a conservative culture and approach to all things.

–The core worlds are aware of their past but had to rebuild an infrastructure, knowledge base, and educating their populace. Four worlds established radio contact, and 3 learn sublight starfaring.

–the starworlders had developed new star worlds and a tenuous far flung culture. They keep contact with the Oley and encounter others.

–by modern times, the first contacts between the 3 Ptanj cultures were renewed

–the attempts by the Union to claim leadership were rebuffed

–The Association keep its focus upon the Malanthekar and the Trade Area, but cautiously keep contact with the Union.

–The starworlders varied in their reaction to the Union. Some wanted to be left alone, others welcomed new, deep ties to the old homeworlds.

–each of the starworld patterns had led to different approaches to survival over the 2,000 years

–Many of the first patterns ranged far away and developed very solitary cultures. Three did renew their ties to the old home systems in alliance.

–Many of the second pattern keep expanding in population and size. These starworlds form the core of the Ptanj Starworld Concordant.

–the third patterns went out to form independent, remote colonies. Many failed, but others succeeded. Some stayed independent, but most joined the Concordant. Two allied with the Union.



Chapter 9–Structure of the Association

The 2,000 years gave the Association time to expand from 200 star systems to over 2,000 star systems. Not all of them were majorly settled but were each tied to a complex stellar economy.

Unlike the Ptanj prewar patterns, the Association Ptanj tried to tie in all star systems in a region into a functional system instead of only using the most optimal systems.

Instead each system was used to some capacity. To capitalize on this strategy, the Association built a large number of diverse ships to fit all the needed niches.

The goal was to use the whole resources available to the Association in a wise manner. But the idea is to plan for the future. The concept is to save for prosperity while refining it all. This has become a problem due to the Tranc Stealth Ops service pirating things from economic hub systems. The Association has a culture of planning long term and methodical execution. This leads to stockpiles and strategic reserves. With the close proximity of the Association to the Tranc’s home area made them an early target.

The Ptanj were aware that some alien force was pirating their frontier systems, but believed it was various independant alien sub-factions from the Expanse or a group of Malanthekar.

The Ptanj of the Association had developed a class system over 2,000 years. There was considerable vertical and horizontal mobility, but it was formal with official testing, rewards, and recognition.

This led to considerable stability with an outlet for innovation and creativity, while allowing considerable stability.

Sovereignty was at the star system level with an over-government that was responsible for multi-system tax at common defense, frontier development, crisis response, and long term development loans.

The armed/military services were divided into five services.

1 Frontier Navy- This was the most populous and largest service in facilities and numbers.

The service was responsible for patrolling and monitoring the edges and borders of Association space. Along uninhabited frontiers they were responsible for survey and exploration as well as patrol.

On border areas, the frontier force is responsible for patrolling, recon, and rapid defense response for systems that come under attack along the frontier regions.

2 Home Fleets- the most costly service is the defensive fleets stationed at the regional hub systems and the original colonies. These forces were originally built in response to the long running issues with the Malanthekar, especially during their Extinction Wars. The activity of the Tranc piracy has just made the fear external forces that more focused.

The sabre rattling of the Ptanj Union has forced the fleet to consider the need for an expeditionary mission. Such a force would be designed for operations beyond the Association’s space. This would be strikes on the Ptanj Union worlds with sufficient forces to devastate those worlds and overcome the superior technology of the Union Forces.

The defense/home fleets are built most and stationed at each region’s/sector’s assigned economic hubs and the main systems. The main systems were the closest toward the original Ptanj space; the original 200 colonies to survive the Realmer War.

The old deal worlds ‘behind’ the Association were left abandoned or only touched as for security or memorial purposes. There was ample survivors’ guilt for centuries. Out of respect for the first century they left the dead worlds alone. After that the economic and security needs forced occupation of those systems.

The security reasons were for fear of the Realmers return. The Realmers technology had never fully been understood especially their superluminal travel methods.

For economical reasons several of the planetary engineered worlds were resettled. The original Ptanj Civilization had ‘terra firma’ multiple worlds to fit the home world environment of the Ptanj.

3 System militias–each star system tries to afford the best military it can both in surface tactical, spatial troops, and system combat ships. Each system is expected to spend 25 annual to upkeep these forces.

4 Association Army-Most of these forces are stationed on the hub war systems and major worlds.

The Army is trained to deal with most surface combats including airless and toxic environments. Most of the units have some form of light contained combat armor. Heavy units do exist but most are tracked vehicles. Weapons for the units are modular, for various environments.

Most common types by Terran term heavy tank, light tank, battle transport, engineering vehicle.

Weapons modules are put on the vehicle to fit mission needs and operating environments.

5 Crisis response service-this service represents the central government across a wide range of missions that are not military: space patrol, law enforcement, space rescue, medical emergency, and major crisis/disaster response.

The Association has a mostly local manufacturing economy. Food and necessities are created in the local star system as much as possible, they rest will be shipped from the nearest economic hub systems. At this scale the economy is a planned matter with things being managed regional.

The economy has an individual as well. This is an open economy for the local free mortal availability and small individual production.

This approach ensures adequate supplies, personal freedom, and efficiency at the macroscopic scale. The key is the necessity of transparency and integrity at all levels. Several layers of oversight attempt to assure such matters. A respect of an equilibrium between the individual and society became general ethic for the Ptanj of the Association.

This leads to a methodic and stable, yet only moderately innovative society.



Chapter 10–Structure of the Union

The Union was built upon 11 surviving old worlds and the homeworld of the Ptanj. The Union feels tied to the long history of the old Ptanj civilization.  Much of which survived, even during the long night. But the society also dealt with thousands of years of enforced stone age existence.

This produce an odd dichotomy with the society. It had deep roots, which furnished a strong sense of identity and interconnection. Yet the urge to get back to the stars drove much of their development to give the Union a very dynamic core, and a sense of purpose.

The idea for their government is a federation. Each world keep considerable autonomy. While there was the historical ties, the rebuilding had proceeded at different paces at each world and unique cultures had developed. So in social matter and management of their own star system.

Technologies and Development

After rebuilding enough of an infrastructure for spacefaring, the next step was to send probes to all the old core worlds. The last campaign push by the Realmers had left the whole main region of Ptanj space devastated and then sweep past to push further into Ptanj space, all in one strategic push.

The forces that attempted to defend the Ptanj worlds fell or were driven back. The last force defeated the Realmers push but were forced to proceed to the colonies that would form the Association. These were the only worlds surviving know to the force.

[These factors would play up resentment in the Union years later. The force had been the one farthest from the war front, but was also devastated in the final campaign. It took decades before the Association could even visit the nearest worlds. They spent that time just trying to secure connects between each surviving world. None had been major colony worlds and the original Ptanj economy had been very interconnected. It was almost a century before they could even visit the nearer dead worlds]

Eventually the Ptanj Union was able to connect the 11 surviving worlds were connected by constant radio communication and regular transportation by sublight ships.

The first major step was to get probes to all the nearby systems, to find who had served and to what level.

The second major step was to build radio communication and try to set up a steady exchange between star systems that were able to communication.

The third major step was to get some sub-light capability to visit the nearby worlds that were in radio traffic.

The fourth major step was to get sublight ships to visit the star systems that were known to have surviving populations, but were primitive still in their surviving technical capacity.

The fifth major step was to set up regular routes of fast sublight ships between the technological systems. And also to send large slow boat ships with large amounts of equipment and population of experts to help the surviving primitive societies to rebuild.

The sixth major step was to set up, or as many worlds as possible a network of directed radio signal stations that beam constant updates from each world back to the primary world, and all the closer systems.

[The primary system was the first one to recover sufficiently to return to starfaring. It was the first ancient stellar settled from the homeworld. It would eventually become the capital of the Ptanj Union. The homeworld had been devastated but the homestar system had survived with numerous spatial habitats which had never been attacked. The home system was the first to establish the radio communication, using old radio telescopes from before the war.]

The seventh major step was to get a regular space faring packet circuit running between each star system.

The eighth was to funnel around the two most valuable assets on rebuilding civilization: skilled experts and knowledge. The first had to be sent by ship while the second could be transmitted by radio.

The ninth major step was to restore the capacity of superluminal travel. This created a complication. The rebuilders had both the theory and materials to redesign and develop hyperspace drives, much as the old Ptanj had used, but there was considerable concern about using this technology. The Dark Realmers had proven able to detect when a ship entered and exited hyperspace from great range, at least over a light month.

The fear that any attempt to reuse hyper space technology would draw the Realmers back to attack the surviving worlds. Even without that technology the Ptanj Union was attempting to practice silence as much as possible. Even their interstellar radio communication was very linear, minimum power and directional. Once the proper alignment was known and established lasers and maser communication was used instead.

Their need for a restoration of superluminal travel, but unable to use any of the known technology forced new consideration and research and development. Both the old home system and the primary/capital had the rebuilt technological basis and people to invest in the necessary research and experimentation.

Eventually research led to the ability to create tunneling singularities. The concept was to create a momentary wormhole. This was similar to the effort of the Malanthekar wormhole network, but did not create a permanent singularity.

Many methods had been examined. The technology data of the Realmer inversion technology was studied, but the negative effect on organic systems was discovered.

Several features of hyperspace technology was also discovered that had not been known by the Old Ptanj. The end result was a decision to develop the singularity tunneling effect.

The concept was lifted from old observed data from the Malanthekar civilization long ago bought by the Old Ptanj from Gaolyslu traders. This gave them a potential new field of technology and a new superluminal drive system.

[the homeworld Malanthekar would come to the same technological concepts.]



The Aracana took to outer space as a religious drive. The ancient legends about the battle in the heavens had driven the Aracana to look outward from their planet much earlier in their civilizational development than other sapients did.

The Aracana had witnessed a titanic battle around their planet’s satellite that had lasted over three orbits of their satellite. These events focused the Aracana’s attention on their moon for centuries.

Once the Aracana achieved space travel, they risked much to land on their moon. Several lives were lost on the expedition. There, in a deep, dark crater, the Aracana found a massive alien wreck. It was an ancient Imperial Malanthekar star battleship, the loser of that long ago space battle around their moon. A steady flow of craft to the crash site and their satellite continued after that find.

In time, the third planet in the Aracana system was found to be warmer than they prefered but Aracana are adaptable to life, so a colony was set up. Great orbital habitats were also constructed and the resources of the system harvested to build an interplanetary civilization. During this entire period the Aracana were unraveling the secrets of the huge alien crash site.

This era also saw intense extensions in Aracana astronomy, including looking remotely for signs of alien civilizations. These sky surveys for indication of a repeating, low energy signal from a nearby star system. Attempts to communicate via radio wavs with the system produced no response, just a slow, steady repeat of the same signal year after year for decades.

All of this observation also found evidence of a potentially habitable planet in another nearby star system.

Both of these facts began the Aracana discussing the idea of habited instellar expeditions. Each targeted star system would have three planned missions.

Two robotic missions to send back pictures and information on what they found from direct observations. The other two were a small crewed ship who were to arrive on site and begin the process of building up a local habitat and begin planning the long term investigation of the star systems if possible. The last two missions were small, slow boats designed to arrive at their target star systems over decades after launching. There were subtle differences in each mission based upon the expected target mission profiles.



1) Robotic flyby interstellar probe of the alien signal

2) Robotic prove collection to investigate the potential habitable system

3) Relativistic manned mission to the alien signal

4) Fast, crew suspended animation to second home

5) Slow boat large crew for the alien signal 3000

6) Generation ship with 15,000 to second home (growth to 60,000)

 

1. The plan was to get a close look at that repetitive alien signal and get there as fast as technologically possible. So the Aracana’s first interstellar mission was to be a rapid flyby and through the target system. There was no plan to attempt to slow down much. The probe would dive through the heart of the system dispatching secondary probes and real time beaming the signal back to the home system. Many of the technologies used for the mission were just developed. The propulsion technology was an inertial fusion rocket motor in a two stage drive system. (Dadelum system inspiration)

The whole mission was at 12% the speed of light. The distance to the star system was 11.5 terran light years.

The mission was a success, it found a large damaged spherical alien space ship in orbit around the inner star system of the target star. The main prove was only able to image it remotely but was able to send two staggered subprobes to writhin dozens of kilometers of the orbiting wreck. The probe drifted on out of the star system. It was found centuries later and brought back to the star system it first passed through, which by that time had become the location of the Aracana’s Grand Library

The launch stage was recovered and used for other missions.

1. Unlike the mission to the mysterious alien signal, the mission to the star system with the potentially habitable worlds would be methodical, without the focus on haste. When the first mission was launched the ship for the second mission was still being built.

The goal was to send a very capable robot mothership with a diversity of secondary crafts to arrive and operate long term in the star system. With that in mind a more extensive infrastructure was developed in the home system. A sail propulsion system was developed. This was used for the probe with the sail later used as a drag anchor later to swing the probe around the target system till it could enter orbit around the star.

The robotic ship had probes to send to all the observed major orbital bodies to including orbitors, landers, and impactors. The whole mission would still have operational units when the manned mission arrived decades later.

1. The first inhabited interstellar voyage by the Aracana was a ship launched to the second alien wreck with a crew of 1,200 individuals. The ship was launched with the crew most in hibernation. The rocket was launched with three booster stages and a braking stage and one braking sail. The first stage was a massive frame not designed to go much further than the home system edge, but it did get the whole structure to 5%C. It was manned with a small crew to return it to the home system for later usage. The second stage was meant to be reusable but was purely automated. This second stage got the ship up to 105C. The third stage was purely disposable and was the first use of antimatter for major space propulsion. It slammed the spacecraft up to 50% C where it coasted for the eleven light years distance to the target system. During this voyage a constant crew of 4 was constantly awake to monitor the ship and slumbering crew.

The ship carried a deceleration stage and a large space sail to slow the ship by braking against the interstellar medium.

Once the ship was slowed down and within the target system the mission plans began with the first objective of establishing a main base and the other to begin close observation of the alien wreck. The crew of this mission had come as a vanguard and no intention of ever returning to the home system.

1. Using the technology they developed to the last to mission, the Aracana launched an inhabited mission to the system they had come to name Second Home. this ship was a sister ship to the third mission. This expedition also included 200 crew. Their goal once they arrived at Second Home was to study the whole star system but with their greatest focus on the habitable planets which could be planetary engineered with effort.
2. The fifth interstellar mission was targeted at the future library system. The ship design was an upscaled version of the habited ship from the 3rd and 4th voyages. The ship was built to carry up to 3,000 instead of 200. The velocity was aimed for 30% C instead of 50%. Once in the target system the 3,000 set about building a major habitat and the long duration study of the alien wreck.
3. The last of those first planned six interstellar missions was the generation ship sent to Second Home. the ship was launched as a generation ship with 15,000 and a planned transit time lasting almost 2 terran centuries. By the time it was scheduled to arrive the ship population was up to 60,000 individuals. During the ship’s journey 3 other supply missions had arrived just like the first one. With the arrival of this ship the real terraforming beyond in earnest. The idea and decision was to terroform both worlds of the orbital twins, and the third world which was a large ocean world. This ambitious project of terraforming three planets was undertaken by less than 100,000 Aracana. The plan was expected to take almost 1,000 terran years.

After the launching of the first six interstellar expeditions, the Aracana established a regular schedule for follow on missions using the same technology. While these mission cycles were moving forward, the state of affairs at each star system began to slow change.

In the second home system, their terraforming efforts focused upon the fourth world. This planet was cold and marginal for the Aracana.