TIMELINE
2032
First human expedition to Mars by SpaceX.
2035
Global warming, caused mostly by pollution, continue to cause region wide natural disasters. United Nations establish a permanent commission to regulate efforts from countries in moving to renewable energy sources.
2038
Dynamotors Ltd., an aerospace company, patent a space-able nuclear fission engine capable of reaching a top speed of over 50,000 km/h (circa 13 km/s) in space, nearly the speed of the Voyager I probe launched in 1977. The breakthrough is the ability to reach that speed in a short amount of time. This will cut by one third the time needed to reach Mars, the inner planets and the asteroids belt of the Solar System.
2040
Dynamotors test the first unmanned spacecraft equipped with its prototype nuclear fission engine, the Prometheus. The spacecraft is launched from Cape Canaveral successfully and reach Mars in 34 days.
2041
After several years of planning and construction, HyperNet, an high speed world wide web is opened to the public and his first dorsal is deployed on the Atlantic Ocean between France and United States.
2042
European states are united under a single flag, not just economically but also from administrative and military point of view, the old continent is now the EUF, European Union Federation.
2043
Bekenfeld an energy market company, cooperates with Dynamotors for the construction of the first commercial nuclear reactor based on the revolutionary fission engine used on the Prometheus spacecraft. Multiple countries sponsor the initiative with the common goal to abandon fossil fuels.
2048
Pollution levels, dramatically high, lead to toxic smog clouds that periodically force the population of cities in affected regions to relocate.
2049
The United Nations enforce a 5 year terms for the ban of all fossil fuels in favor of any other renewable energy source, including the Type-10 nuclear reactors manufactured by Bekenfeld.
2050
Russian Federation joins the European Union Federation after an economical crisis that crippled the country. EUF reasons were mostly dictated by the possibility to exploit the country vast natural resources.
2055
In the last two decades, humans were able to establish a quasi-permanent presence on Mars. However, many scientists dismissed the endeavour stating that “there is nothing important or profitable to look there”.
2061
The last car fueled by petrol is sold for buying for an electric car in Agadir, Morocco. The main reason is the very scarce availability of fuel that led to an unaffordable prices.
India launches a military offensive on China on the Himalayan border for the old territorial dispute, after two months of conflicts the war risks to see an escalation to a nuclear exchange if it wasn’t for United States and EUF mediation. Peace is signed with minor border alteration in late November.
2067
The first asteroid mining operations are performed in space by the newly founded corporation ExaCorp, joined shortly by Weymore Mining and Kovalev Materials. All three companies profits are so big that they can rival small Earth nations.
2069
Thanks to the shifting of the focus from Earth resources to the near space asteroids, the later called “Last Conflict”, a small low-intensity border skirmish between South Sudan and Uganda ends. Countries unwilling to play political or military aggressive strategies and diverts their attention to the recent evolution of the space industry.
2071
Several companies merge together to counter the dominance of so-called “Space Corps”, corporations that have the biggest part of their revenue based on space operations like ExaCorp or Dynamotors. The latter expands its business no more only on space propulsion but on construction and engineering and is renamed Dynacore.
Amongst the merge, the biggest new competitor on the market is AuraCorp that spans from spacecraft reactors development to the space tourism sector.
2074
United States is the first nation to create a space-based military branch, followed shortly by China, India and the UEF. Most South American countries joins together to form a continental government called South American Confederation, or SAC.
2076
Several countries impose strict tariffs on corporations, especially the ones involved in space mining to prevent them for becoming much more influential than governments.. There is also a great debate over assigning or not asteroid belt regions to Earth countries. Overshadowed by Earth events, amongst many space mining spots, nations and corporations battle over the control of single high mineral asteroids. Spacecrafts employs both projectile, missile and high energy laser weapons to disable rival vessels. Both corporations and governments keeps this so-called “secret-war” away from the public eyes in a sort of mutual agreement transforming asteroid rich regions in unregulated conflict zones. Casualties are reported as “accidents” in official paperworks.
2077
Whistleblowers expose the “secret war” to the public, in just one year from the start, thanks to the fast-spreading of informations that the technology provide. United Nations are assembled and deliberate to send observers to prevent this “shame” (as it was branded the secret war) to ever happen again. Previous discussion about assigning asteroid regions to countries are dismissed and mining operation were forbidden to state funded enterprises, effectively striking a big win for the mega corporations.
2080
The year will be remembered as the start of the new economic boom. Thanks to progression in science and technology, the quality of life of the whole mankind increases dramatically. Megacorporations runs the market and pay impressive salaries that allows families to live on the shoulders of just one worker while at the same time guaranteeing high living standards and purchasing power. Amongst other corporations, Solaris Group launch the “New Dawn” project to end, once and for all, the critical humanitarian condition of most African countries thanks to huge investment and aids, effectively making them new and profitable markets to invest in.
2083
A think-tank group funded by Solaris Group, Blue Sky Consortium and United Solutions start elaborating the plan for the creation of a global unified body to manage and regulate space exploitation. Amongst political, diplomatic and economic matters, also military branches are contemplated.
2084
Asteroid mining operations continue at a steady pace, new minerals are discovered and new materials then manufactured.
2090
Vitruvian Genetics, a pharmaceutical company, patent TotalVir, an antiviral drug able to efficiently combat more than 94% of known diseases, including HIV and Ebola. Vitruvian Genetics stocks (VTG) are suspended from most markets due to the massive price increase.
While aging process is still impossible to stop, human progress in the field of medicine allows now for a sure-recovery of 98% of cancer patients.
2100
Humans begins the 22nd century in a world different than the century before. The total population is stable at around 16 billions, concentrated in mega-cities that expands also vertically in the sky. Technology, especially artificial intelligence, helps and automate the daily tasks of every individual although there are no clear sign of a possibility of evolve this into something sentient.
Mega-corporations runs the markets and establish themselves as global superpowers while the new unified nations try to combat this phenomena by limiting and taxing them more and more. This creates tension between CEO and government representatives, that are solved usually with corruption and bribes.
2104
The United Nations Space Consortium (UNSC) is founded after a positive vote at the United Nations Assembly. The UNSC main task is to regulate each spaceborne operations and fund corporations and countries towards progress in technology and science.
2107
A census of the humans on Mars reveal a total population of 30.000 citizens. Most of them working on scientific laboratories that leverage on the exotic planet for performing different types of researches.
2112
United Solutions, an engineering megacorporation, is tasked by the UNSC to develop the first Sun orbiting space station. The station will be totally different then the now several hundreds smaller stations orbiting the Earth. It will be rather a permanent installation in space that not only support mining and space related activities but also host a permanent population for an indefinite amount of time. The station will be under the UNSC jurisdiction and will be a neutral ground for all countries.
2115
In the last three decades, many countries followed the UEF and SAC example and started joining together, the outcome is the formation of many bigger states like the Central American Union (CAU), the Asian Confederation (ACO) and the Indian Ocean Republic (IOR).
2120
The Schiaparelli colony, Gallipoli Outpost and Lowell Starport on Mars are devastated by a series of supermassive dust storms in the so called Promethei-Terra disaster (named after the region where the three human installation were located). The death-toll rise to nearly 10,000 people, forcing the UNSC to re-evaluate the martian colonization effort.
Scientists predict the possibility of more storms in the months to come on Mars due to anomalies in the Sun affecting the martian thin atmosphere.
2121
UNSC order the evacuation of all the human personnel on Mars. The drastic decision is fostered not only by the small benefits of the operations performed on the red planet but also by the imminent christening of the Sun station being built by United Solutions that will substitute Mars as research ground. Terraforming technologies being still more theories rather than concrete science prevent any effort in making Mars effectively a living planet.
2126
After circa 80 years of efforts towards renewable energy sources and the reduction of pollution levels driven by UN, the Earth is slowly recovering from the reckless abuse of the 20-21st centuries. The influx of the population towards megacities and the availability of space (mostly asteroids) resources allowed flora and fauna to flourish again in many regions that were abused and exploited. Large portions of Siberia and the Amazon Forest are now heavily protected under special laws and human presence is quasi-forbidden apart from scientific expeditions. The nearly total melt of the north pole ice cap is stopped and ice is actually expanding at a steady pace.
2130
Professor Adam Vaughn, a scientist from Cambridge, publish theories about the possibility of developing a Faster-Than-Light (FTL) engine, using a newly discovered mineral called Neutrite, present on asteroids.
2133
The United States merge with EUF and Canada to form the North Atlantic Alliance (NAA), a federal state that spread for most of the northern earth hemisphere. The NAA government, due to the immense economic and political power that can exert, is able to take the edge on the mega-corporation influence over the worlds affairs, thus re-establish a balance between private and state long gone since 2077.
2145
The United Nations passes a motion to create a unified currency. Named “credit”, it will facilitate operations between countries removing bureaucracy involved in foreign exchange and its fluctuations.
2150
United Solutions complete the Sol-orbiting station that was commissioned in 2112. The station is first populated on August 2nd by maintenance personnel and its initial task is providing a communication center to facilitate space based operations, performing research in high-low gravity environments and start the construction of a station based shipyard for building next-generation starships. The station is named “Helios One” and feature a perpetual counter-clockwise rotation to simulate Earth gravity.
2161
Adam Vaughn found Vaughn Propulsions, fueled by UNSC subsidies and interest in exploiting FTL theories. This mark the beginning of the “Homeworld” program by the UNSC, aimed at making humans an interplanetary species, not jsu bound to the Earth.
2166
A continent size comet is spotted by Indian Ocean Republic Astronomy Bureau on a path with a 65% possibility to hit Earth in 2188. Regardless the effort to keep, at least initially, the new discovery secret by IOR government, the news spread fast generating chaos and panic through the rest of the world. It was estimated by in the first day alone more than 200.000 people died from news related events and chaos. The UN call for an emergency commission to be established to plans how to deal with the threat.
The comet is renamed “Inferno”, not only due to the risk that pose to the human civilization but also by the tail that is actually red-colored. The actual position is estimated to be between Neptune and Uranus.
2167
At the start of the year, the total death count caused by the Inferno comet hysteria is estimated to have reached a peak of two millions. Many countries has military units deployed through all their territories and the subsequent economical crisis caused by market crashes devastate the life of billions of people, with corporations shutting down and families reduced into total poverty.
UN emergency commission, called the “Doomsday Council” burn immense amount of credits between counseling and research initiatives, thus enforcing the UN to ask countries and corporations for funds continuously.
2169
The Doomsday Council update the hit possibility of the Inferno comet to 82% and declare that in case of hit, there are no chances for any life form on Earth to survive. All the efforts are then diverted to find a proactive way to deviate the comet path, or at least reducing the size via massive bombing.
The South American Confederation cease to exists as an entity due to the total collapse caused by both the economic crisis and the massive poverty, the North Atlantic Alliance intervene with military presence through all the biggest cities enforcing martial law and, authorized by an UN motion, effectively include the continent in its territories. The same fate happens to the Indian Ocean Republic that became part of the Asian Confederation. The world is now divided between six countries:
- North Atlantic Alliance, that controls the former North America, Europe, Russia and South America
- Asian Confederation, former China, most Indian Ocean facing countries till Iran
- Central American Union, formed by Mexico and Central America states
- Pacific Union, formed by Australia, Japan, Philippines and all the Pacific Ocean Islands
- The Cone, composed by nearly all african countries below the equator
- North African Council, formed by the arabic-speaking countries from Iran to Morocco
2170
David Bradley, former secretary of the UNSC, is elected secretary of the United Nations. On the seventh day of his nomination (July 28th), during a UN Security Council meeting, announce his plan to unify the six countries under a single planetary umbrella to face as a single entity, with a single goal and the totality of the effort, the Inferno comet threat. He deliberately decide to broadcast live the security council on HyperNet, but inform the six head of the states about being broadcasted just at the end of his speech, after his question “would you, in the interest of your citizens, in the interest of mankind, follow me in this endeavor to guarantee a future for our species?”.
The outcome was clear, a “no” from anyone of the world leaders would have put their countries in revolt and all of them accepted. The event became legendary and marked the creation of the “United Systems Federation”, a planetary-wide body to guide the mankind towards his battle for survival.
The United Nation Space Consortium became part of the Federation as a division tasked to continue its governance of space operations.
David Bradley take the role of President.
The name “United Systems” symbolize the union and cooperation not only by nations but also by a multitude of corporations and organizations, hence the “System” word. The USF (also US was used as an acronym, since the United States were not existing anymore as a body, replaced by the North Atlantic Alliance) logo is a star, representing the Sun, in front of a planet (Earth) with two oblong shapes pointed upwards, to represent the efforts to reach united higher goals.
2171
The Doomsday council, now embedded as an office of the United Systems Federation announce its cooperation with Vaughn Propulsion to find a solution to the comet threat.
2172
After two years from its creation, the United Systems Federation (USF) manages to reestablish some sort of economic stability although the gap between rich and poor people expands dramatically. The fear of the comet is kept at bay with a massive public relation campaign aimed at showing the population the efforts and the resources diverted to find a plan.
2174
To further optimize the spending, the USF Federal Army (US-FAR) is founded. Its aim is to replace the former six constituent countries armies. Many questions the role of the FAR as having one single governing body for the full Earth prevent previous-eras wars, but its purpose is mostly aimed at peacekeeping operations and population control duties in poorest (hence more difficult) regions of the planet.
David Bradley is re-elected for his second mandate as USF president. The federations political form resemble western 21st century countries representative democracy where electors can vote for a parliament (Federal Parliament), a senate (Federal Senate) and directly a president with a 4 year mandate.
2175
The Federal Astronomy Department (US-FADE) correct the previous Inferno comet direct hit from 82% probability to 61% accordingly to the latest observations. The gases inside the comet, released along its way, modified the path. During the same year, the Space Administration (US-SPACE) launches the first manned mission on the comet, achieved thanks to the new revolutionary engine built by Vaughn Propulsion. While not being a real FTL drive, its performances allowed the vessel to reach the comet in less than 1 month, while the comet was approaching Jupiter.
2176
AuraCorp acquire Vaughn Propulsion, Adam Vaughn became part of the company board of directors.
2177
After ten years of simulations, planning and research, the famous Doomsday Council announces the strategy for dealing with the comet, that will be composed by two steps:
- A mass driver cannon will be build on the Helios One Sol-orbiting station, and in 2181 will fire at the Inferno comet, aiming to deviate sensibly the path.
- If the above plan will not succeed or, if the projectile, instead of the forecasted deviation would generate a meteor shower of dangerous size, a contingency plan will be enacted that will foresee:
- The construction of series of “Generations ships”that will be launched before 2188 towards Alpha Centauri, Barnard’s Star and Sirius, with the aim of finding a new place for mankind
- The construction of deep reinforced “ark” bunkers, that can self-sustain as a last resort
The plan generate discomfort amongst people as the second option pure existence means that the first could, possibly, fail.
2178
Ann Lau is elected as President of the United Systems.
The construction of the mass driver on Helios One is progressing as expected. Mining operations in the solar systems continue at a steady pace.
2180
Trident Corporation reveals the first gravitational generator, thanks to the exploit of the space based mineral called Mendarite. The generator allows to create a gravitational field in defined spaces, like a starship, that allows the crew to walk around as if they were on a planetary body. A series of generators are immediately installed on Helios One for testing purposes.
2181
US-FADE publish a new report about the Inferno comet. Against all odds, the probability of an Earth hit decreases again, this time to set the percentage from previous 61% to 24%. The news generate a wave of celebrations around major Earth cities. President Lau states that regardless of the updated estimation, the contingency plan will proceed as planned, however, the firing of the projectile from the mass driver cannon is delayed by two years, since FADE confirmed that in 2183 the trajectory will be “final” and no natural events could then modify the trajectory in a significant way.
2182
Jordan Takeda is elected as third President of the United Systems.
On February 8th, FADE states that, due to the recent additional expulsion of gases from the comet, the final path will no longer has any chance to hit the Earth, nor any other major bodies in the solar system, it will more likely enter in the long run on a out-of-system course given by the Sun gravity “sling”.
The Federation announce a week of celebrations that will be held in all cities and, for the first time in history, the whole population of Earth can rejoice united. The day will be remembered and celebrated as the “Future Day”, becoming a global holiday.
2183
Thanks to the events related to the closing of the comet impact threat, economies boom, the United Systems Federation finances, due to the massive increase of revenues, are diverted to cope with the lower strata of the society with welfare programs.
2184
Plan for the construction of an artificial island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean are laid down by the Federation, it will serve as the seat for the major federal offices. Its name will be Pax Astra.
2186
Takeda is re-elected as President of the United Systems.
2189
Pax Astra is completed and all of the federal departments and headquarters are transferred there. The President office, the Federal Presidium, is located at the island center.
2190
Thanks to the successful economic reinvigoration, Takeda is elected for the third time as President of the US.
2194
AuraCorp patent the Vaughn-1 engine. The engine, mounted on a starship allows to reach speeds beyond the speed of light making it the first real FTL engine but it must be paired by sub-light thrusters for infra-system travels.
The “hyperdrive”, as it’s now commonly called, engine will open for the first time in human history the capability to explore the stars: distances that required generation ships and centuries, if not millennia, to travel, can now be exploited in a matter of weeks. The hyperdrive however relies on a a “hyperlanes” network: invisible highways that, due to gravitational fluctuations and fields, allow stars to be connected only in a specific pattern. Hence travel between star A and B, may require the hyperdrive equipped engine to pass through star C and so on. This limitation is however minimal, since hyperlanes to nearby stars are easily individuated and mapped, and it’s discovered that follows the common sense (so nearby stars are usually connected between each others).
Mashal Farooqui is elected as President of the United Systems, her presidential campaign is focused towards the expansion of the human presence on the Solar System along with additional fundings on the research for habitable planets in the nearby stars.
2195
A probe equipped with a Vaughn-1 engine reaches Alpha Centauri system successfully.
President Farooqui announces the Horizon Program, an effort to reach nearby stars with manned starships no later than 2200.
2196
Exacorp build the first human orbital mining station in the Solar system, orbiting Io.
2197
Weymore Mining, following ExaCorp example build its first orbital mining station, this time orbiting the dwarf planet 136108 Haumea.
The United Systems entrust the construction of 3 military-focused starships to Dynacore. The Consortium define them as “Frigates” in consideration of future increase of starship size, “Mercury” is the name given to the class. Skepticism around militarization of space and the reasoning behind it were taken care by President Farooqui statement about the incognita of an expedition towards other stars.
2198
The USF charge Geomax Aerospace for the construction of a research vessel: it will be the first human ship to reach a nearby star leveraging on the AuraCorp’s Vaughn FTL drive, and Binary Aerospace for the mooring of a construction vessel that will assist mining industry firm in expanding the station building efforts in the Solar system. Mashal Farooqui is re-elected president.
2199
President Farooqui shuttle, that was returning to Earth after a visit to the Helios One station, experience a catastrophic system malfunction during the atmospheric re-entry phase and crashes in the Himalayan range on July 20th.
The Federation Provisional Authority, an emergency body formed by major ministry and prominent military personnel ordered a 5 days global mourning and new elections before the end of the year. The president was working on a final charter of the Federation, bringing substantial modification to its structure. The charter is anyway approved by both the Senate and the Parliament.