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Post by Insano-Man on Oct 2, 2018 13:29:42 GMT -5
This topic is a child of the Humanity article directory.I WAS HERE FIRSTHistory for humankind is a hard thing to track. In a way, man's history is synonymous with Set's. Humans were the first on the planet and, by most predictions, might be the last, if it ever dunks into a star. To top it off, Set's history is so broken, split up, and filled with holes that it's nearly impossible to tell humans even arrived. For all anyone knows, mankind's always been here, yelling at the crabs to get back in the ocean. At the end of the day, there's only one consensus; humans aren't going anywhere. CHAPTERS- 1. Origins- 2. Earth History- 3. Arrival on Set- 4. The First Jump- 5. The Collection Era- 6. The Blackworlders- 7. The Splinter Wars- 8. The Big Split- 9. Present Day
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Post by Insano-Man on Oct 2, 2018 13:30:59 GMT -5
ORIGINS
Mankind was brought into existence on the planet Earth, in the Sol system, through a successive series of ever-more-ambitious apes - so far as science says, anyways. Earth was a terrestrial garden world even Set can't compare to. Wide blue seas and clear blue skies, vast green forests and lush green jungles. Even the awful places weren't nearly as deadly as Set's blights and meatscapes. Out in the wilderness, there was peace. No crabs. No meat. No sideways hurricanes flinging hypersonic pinecones through your skull. Just bugs, birds, and familiar fuzzy critters.
As with most other intelligent species on the planet, humankind has a small problem when it comes to their homeworld. Not one soul on Set can say they have any definitive proof as to where Earth is now. Some people say it's right under your feet. Some people say it's dead and gone. Some people say it's a bit of both; that Set ate it and humanity hung around to see where it was taking them. Historical records on the subject are nothing but blank space. All anyone knows is that Set is so close to Earth in most places - most places - that it's a decent-enough replacement. Plenty of people have taken to calling it Erf as a result.
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Post by Insano-Man on Oct 2, 2018 13:31:13 GMT -5
EARTH HISTORY
Human history is covered in Looney records that dredge up from the Chambers of Myth on occasion. The rise and fall of Rome, the rise and fall of the British Empire, the rise and fall of the Soviet Union - there's a good basis of accepted facts no one's ever argued about. The vast majority of humans are completely ignorant of it all, but not many have tried to challenge it. Idioms and sayings of all kinds still cite the old days on Earth. Some Looney bunkers even have media libraries from that time - video games, movies, books, and all.
The biggest problem is that history past 2050 A.D. starts to get confusing and contradictory. Some sources say it all ended in 2134 with a nuclear war. Others claim mankind was wiped out on Earth in 2145 by the redworlders. Both tales usually end with an exodus to space, whether by generation ships or otherwise. Some say Set came in and swallowed the planet up in 2194 - and the amount of documents pointing to that date are worth a second look. Everyone has a different history on the subject. Nobody's got anything to back it up.
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Post by Insano-Man on Oct 2, 2018 13:31:54 GMT -5
ARRIVAL ON SET
Just as much as no one knows how humanity left Earth - if it even left at all - nobody knows how humans arrived on the planet. By ship, by portal, by planetary metamorphosis - it's another big unknown. Data leftover from the Pioneer Network suggests the first humans on the planet were Loonies, at the foundation of Madness Command Post in -22 OSC. Other data, from the same source, suggests Madness Command Post wasn't alone - and wasn't even the first. Old records suggest contact with other humans on the planet, with a healthy chunk of astonishment. Whether it's a matter of contradiction or slippery dates is anyone's guess.
What can be said for certain is that Madness Command Post wasn't the birthplace of the Loonies. Before then, there were other Loonies, living in another hole. It didn't end well for them. Something went wrong - what, the leftover records don't say - and the Loonies were forced out. They made a trip out from a place called Tiranova and eventually settled on Madness Command Post as their new home. What and where Tiranova was is another question mark. All that mattered in the end was that the Loonies were the only ones to write anything down.
When Madness Command Post planted its roots, it didn't do it purely by human hands. Vague, partial data from the old heart of the Pioneer Network suggest there were redworlders there, chipping in with getting the lights on. In time, they even earned a good level of esteem - enough to make the administrative council in the bunker. As always, none of the records from Madness are alive to tell much more than the vague details. There were Loonies, working with greyskins in the beginning of time, and nothing else.
Looney history keeps up the excitement, but history for mankind as a whole is harder to separate. There were the First Invaders, who came in, made enough noise to get a note in a file, and left. There were more redworlders, arriving between 60 and 100 OSC, as part of an evacuation, nomad fleet, or dinner date - another question no one has an answer to. They went to ground and integrated with the Loonies - then the Worldship came in between 100 and 200 OSC with the whiteworlders. The greys decided the bugs were better company soon after. Somewhere in all that, the Cult's ancestors arrived to make a stink of everything. All the major players were on the board before the first jump had even gone through.
In all the noise, humans made up a tiny sliver of the population. The Pioneer Network had been formalized in 0 OSC after Madness started growing, but that didn't change much. As a lone Looney network and mostly a single bunker, Madness wasn't much to compare. Up in orbit and scattered around in satellite facilities, there were about ten aliens for every human on the planet. That was so far as anyone knew, at any rate. Things were about to change when Set made its first wormhole trip.
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Post by Insano-Man on Oct 2, 2018 13:32:10 GMT -5
THE FIRST JUMP
When it happened between 250 and 300 OSC, it was called just that; the First Jump, the first time in recorded history that Set ever moved on its own. No one had any idea what happened. Plenty of people died in the process. In the end, most of them were redworlders and whiteworlders. Madness Command Post was mauled by a major geodisplacement event in the process, but something else happened on the ground. More Looney bunkers came to the surface. They'd finally caught wind of the signals their kin were putting out - and started yelling at them to cut the racket.
It wasn't until the Zaschia came in that anyone could see the whole picture. The greys and rock monsters learned the hard way; there were more humans on the planet than just Madness and the Pioneer Network. They looked a lot like the Loonies of today, too. Whenever aliens showed up, they were shot at until they left or stopped moving. When Madness finally mobilized to rein in the others, the Zaschia were ready to bomb the planet apart just to vent. That didn't happen. Instead, the new bunkers were brought into the Network.
It was a game of catch-up for population figures. The Zaschia had brought their entire species to Set. A massive armada of residential ships and towed habitation platforms was parked in orbit. On the ground, the new bunkers had just managed to keep the proportions even. They were many, but they were still Loonies - still trapped in holes, with limited room to grow and not much interest in colonialism. Human hands still ruled the planet from the Pioneer Network, but only as a matter of eminence.
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Post by Insano-Man on Oct 2, 2018 13:33:44 GMT -5
THE COLLECTION ERA
That was, again, as far as anyone knew. As Set started jumping and the Loonies started growing out, people started coming out of the woodwork. Zaschian ships spied towns from orbit. Redworlder space stations picked up signals from undiscovered Looney bunkers. Humans were flaking off the planet like a bad case of dandruff. Historians these days conjecture it was the Chambers of Myth kicking into action, but it's all a guess. For all anyone knew, the Chambers were always working. It was only by the time the Collection Era rolled in that anyone noticed.
The rate of growth for humankind started to jump up by leaps and bounds. Every time a new Looney bunker came in, it surged up. Every time a town was compelled into the Pioneer Network, it took a tiny bump. The addition of infrastructure, outposts, and helping hands made expansion easier and easier. The inclusion of civilian, non-Looney towns made it all the more unusual for the cavemen. Here were people who'd never once known the tender caress of concrete and blast doors, who wanted comfort, safety, and room to grow. Tentatively, the Loonies obliged. They had to keep a watch for the Cult, and having the trust of the surface-slickers was a step in the right direction.
In the years to come, the human population exploded across the planet. With an overequipped army and a space program already in place, the civilian side of things took off. Death rates plummetted as healthcare and railrifle-backed security swept in with the Loonies. Towns stopped worrying about defending themselves from crabs and started thinking about where and how to expand. As the little people grew, so did the Pioneer Network. Industry and expertise from non-Looney sources started taking on a greater and greater role. Before long, Looney bunkers were being built faster than new ones could pop up after jumps.
No one's sure when the tipping point happened exactly, but humans were destined for the top. The earliest surviving records suggest mankind was top dog on the planet's surface when Unity Station arrived, between 490 and 520 OSC. Humans had established a comfortable majority planetside, with a growing population in orbit slowly pushing to overtake the orscruft. Even then, people on and around Set didn't notice. Only the unionites bothered to write it down. It was normal and expected, as far as anyone was concerned. There was no rampant xenophobia, famine, or real estate crisis. Set was still Set, but the Pioneer Network was holding strong.
Things went along smoothly for a while. The paleworlders arrived to complicate interspecies relations, but the age-old alliance of grey and pink reaffirmed it to mankind. Redworlders stood by humans when the unionites spared the baby snatchers from extermination. It wasn't all aliens. It was just those guys that were the problem. The hate was dialed down to factional rivalry instead of full-blown specism. Longstanding issues with the Cult took on the same color - especially with the Cult's growing human membership.
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Post by Insano-Man on Oct 2, 2018 13:34:33 GMT -5
THE BLACKWORLDERS
When the blackworlders arrived, between 770 and 830 OSC, things started to change. Unionites were intrigued. The orscruft were confused. Zaschia were terrified. Redworlders went insane. The sorassan were just kind of weirded out by the whole thing. Even the crabs were given notice by the enigmatic energy beings. Meanwhile, mankind was simmering in the background, completely ignored. Blackworlders roamed through Looney bunkers, phased through bedrooms, and warped on-stage during concert performances. They said nothing. They acknowledged nothing. Humanity was beneath their intangible notice.
It was the entry point for the first roots of genuine alien hatred in the wider bulk of mankind. Loonies were livid over it; there was a security threat on and over the planet, doing what it wanted without so much as a sneer edgewise in their direction. For the other aliens, human concerns didn't matter. They were too busy with the mysterious revelations and sinister whisperings of the strange creatures. Initiatives to contain, remove, or kill the blackworlders were met with shock and rejection.
In the midst of it all, the Violet Uprising started up. The greys had well and truly lost it, as far as anyone was concerned. They set to work wiping out their history - and everyone else's - in a hare-brained attempt to hurt the Cult - which they themselves had brought to Set. The unionites went to work with the Native Uplifting Agreement, trying to spur pseudocrustaceans into higher society. Looney disagreements with the Zaschia on sensitive subjects started to take on a desperate, raging tone. To humans all over Set, the aliens had finally gone off the deep end - and they were trying their best to drag mankind with them.
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Post by Insano-Man on Oct 2, 2018 13:34:44 GMT -5
THE SPLINTER WARS
Everything was put on hiatus when Set jumped between the years of 780 and 850 OSC. It arrived in the Third Invaders' home system - so far as anyone knew - and ditched the blackworlders in the process. The Third Invaders obliged the planet's presence. They assembled a fleet larger than anything anyone had seen before. They attacked the planet, its people, and set to work scorching the Erf as best they could. Up in orbit, the redworlders, Zaschia, and orscruft stood at the gates, bleeding in the thousands each day.
Looking at it from afar, with hindsight and a god's-eye view of the situation, it might've seemed like something that would've restored faith. The aliens were sacrificing themselves en masse in a war no one was ready for. The entire planet could've been an uninhabitable wasteland if they hadn't been up there to safeguard the human majority on the ground. More redworlders died than Loonies below. When the war ended, more Zaschia and orscruft had disappeared than civilians had been lost planetside. The Zaschia had even gone extinct in the process. Surely, the aliens couldn't have been that bad.
No one on the ground saw it that way. Loonies were furious; they'd had their readiness frazzled by redworlder infighting and Cult sabotage for centuries leading up to it. Civilians were fuming; all they could see were their homes being shelled and their families being slaughtered everywhere they turned. No matter how many greys died in orbit, human opinion on the ground had only one thing to say. The aliens were not doing enough. The people on the ground - the humans on the planet - were being passed on, as far as anyone cared, for inhuman lives above.
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Post by Insano-Man on Oct 2, 2018 13:36:38 GMT -5
THE BIG SPLIT
The unity of it all held on until Set jumped, between 790 and 860 OSC. That was the end, signalled by the random hand of fate. Loonies on the ground called on vindictive townsfolk and pulled together as much sway as they could. Rifts tore open in the chaos. Aliens and sympathizers were the targets. Xenocide was the name of the game. Bunkers broke off of the Pioneer Network, found willing partners, and pushed out. Cult warbands with human majorities acted on their own frustration. The Big Split kicked off. The Network - what was left of it - fell apart.
All the fighting on the ground drew eyes back down from orbit. Battered, bloodied species turned around to find what was left of themselves being torn apart by mankind. The tables had turned; mankind had gone insane, as far as they could tell, when everyone else had done their best to keep them alive. Ships in orbit started to bomb out bunkers and turncoat towns. Alien Loonies on the planet deserted, defected, and did their damnedest to pour the pressure on their human counterparts. Cult warbands with redworlder majorities started targeting human refugees whenever a major city was emptied out.
Hate fed into hate all across the planet. Up in orbit, human voices were silent. There were Loonies up there, who'd seen the battle for space first-hand. There were spacers up there, who'd huddled in lifeboats beside glowing eyes and shivering jelly. The humans on the ground who hadn't found a taste for alien blood kept up the trend. They found ships, escaped to space, and blended in with alien refugees. When the fighting died down, the people up above were ready to accept eachother again. The Space Loonies formed up. Spacers started working out a new state of affairs.
The people down below were still watching the fires die in the craters they used to live in. They were still struggling with the Cult of Meat - introduced by the redworlders somewhere around six centuries ago. Wrecks and garbage haulers were still crashing, making it look like the bombardment campaign was still going on. No one came away better for the experience. Set's shot at nationhood was done and over. All that was left was to pick up the pieces and see if living on the planet was still possible.
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Post by Insano-Man on Oct 2, 2018 13:37:36 GMT -5
PRESENT DAY
As it turned out, it was. Humans had been slapped across the head by all the war and carnage, but the human species as a whole had hardly blinked. In all the commotion, humanity had turned out as the top player everywhere. Planetside, in orbit, below the surface - wherever you looked, humans were everywhere. The aliens had all been thinned so low that it was a once-in-a-lifetime event just to meet a boglander. The Loonies called it enough of a victory to stay planetside. The Space Loonies couldn't argue with it; tossing out mankind meant spacing more than three quarters of their membership.
Today, with all the dust settled, humanity's still strong. It's still in the top spot, still the dominant culture on a planet three times the size of its homeworld. People on the ground shoot greys on sight. People up in orbit are trying their best to remember the prettier ones aren't human. Aliens of all walks run screaming from the Loonies and cower behind the Space Loonies. Even then, the sheer volume of humans on the planet means there are always exceptions. Bunkers with sorassan security teams, fleets with tight no-frogs-allowed policies - if there's one thing the human species is good at, it's making up its own rules.
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