“I do not know what weapons World War Three will be fought with, but World War Four will be fought with sticks and stones” - Albert Einstein

In the Twenty First century SST (Standard Sol. III Time), Terra entered an age known as the “Era of Fear and Terror”. The age would begin with in the first year of the century and would not officially end in Terra’s known history. Terra would not see the light of peace again.
In the first decade of this century, the organized governments of Terra would lose unification and soon lose power. Countries that became known as super powers became corrupt and dealt in weapons and arms, which in turn would be used against them. Terror became a weapon of these people. These terrorist will in spite enough fear in the people that they will soon give away their own rights to live knowing that they are safe. This will give rise to government leaders, which will control information of the people and attack other countries with dictators saying they posed a threat to the country. But soon people would become wise to this trickery and begin revolting.
With the nuclear attack on New York City’s main island, Manhattan, the super power known as the United States soon broke apart. Other powerful countries would break apart after similar attacks on their countries. Cities and provinces would begin to look out for themselves and would ignore the country’s government. Survival of the fittest became the life style of everyone on Terra. The governments in the local area tried to keep things in order but were usually corrupt and local gangs took control. Nuclear attacks would become very common. The chaos, which was contained on very small scale in minor countries, now existed in places where such chaos was not seen since the age where terrans were nomads. The exact number was never figured out, but a total of sixty nuclear based warheads and ten atomic based warheads were launched in the first half of the century. Almost 20 percent of land on Terra was uninhabitable by terran life. By 2130 SST, boat or air travel was destroyed and the war became local.
It was estimated that at least 450 people died a day after the attack in New York City. Countries known as France, Canada, United States, Germany, Spain, Russia, Japan, Great Britain, were ripped apart and became independent cities with their own government without ties to anything. Governments similar to China would stay together for a good amount of time before splitting because enforcement from their armies. The style of government was compared to that of the governments in the early Middle Ages of Terra in which a large castle would consider a city, with a small city within and the farms owned by the city. Gangs roamed the streets of once large industrial cities, which were reduced to barren nuclear, waste lands stealing, killing and raping. Human life became as worthless as the dust people stepped on everyday. At the beginning of the Twenty First century, the human population of Terra was almost seven billion. By the end of the first three quarters of the century, it was barely three hundred million.
In the year 2178 SST, a change was brought about. The cities were starting to evolve into states. Soon countries began to form again. But the war still plagued the land and people would world would still live in much chaos. Countries similar to France, Great Britain and the United States formed. The United Theocracy of Western American States (UTWA) would become the most dominant and enter an official war with the Eastern Democracy of America (EDA). While this was going on, Europe, Asia and Africa struggled to rebuild their other countries. The Republic of Anglo-Saxons (Known in slang as “The Republic”), once Great Britain, allied itself with the UTWA, being the only real people with a navy. Unlike the countries of before, these new countries would unite under the focus of religion and their spiritual beliefs. This would make the UTWA and the Republic powerful allies.
Unlike the UTWA, the EDA was based on a democracy similar to that of the latter United States of America. This made it much weaker in government audacity than the UTWA. The UTWA would tolerate those who did no believe in Jesus and his teachings by setting up camps in nuclear filled areas they had captured in their war against the EDA. These people would usually live up to ten days in these camps. With the EDA fighting both the UTWA and the republic, it soon was destroyed and those who supported it or ran the government were put up on a wall and shot.
The New Theocracy of France learned of the Republic and the UTWA’s victory and followed its example. New France soon took almost all of Western Europe which included the areas used to be under control by Spain, Germany Italy. The new Asian empire developed shortly after which controlled the Japanese islands, China, South East Asia and parts of the former Soviet Union. Western Russia became known as the Victorian Alliance, named after it’s uniter. The Alliance would ally itself with New France and “culturally cleanse” it’s own population.
Fighting became intercontinental once again once people heard of these empires forming. Cities in South America were still completely entangled in war and the death rates were continuing to rise. The cities in the former EDA were in complete chaos and life never returned to normal. The war for the second time became official in 2181 when the Alliance attacked the Empire of Asia, in an effort to bring it’s cleansing to the rest of the world. But the Alliance was in no way prepared for a war and lost a large amount of land. The Empire of Asia soon wrote its boarders on European soil. This brought New France, the UTWA and the Republic to the aid of Alliance. The India subcontinent, now somewhat united under it’s own theocracy aided Asia in it’s war against what they called a “raging Christianity holy war”. Very few saw that this was only leading humanity down the same path that it went on before.
During this time, hundreds of light years away another green planet was developing. Life forms, similar to humans evolved and because nomadic. Biologically, they were nothing like the latter Terran, but from the outside appearance they looked exactly the same. There were some small differences though. These new life forms had either green or purple hair, unlike the shades of brown on Terra. The new life forms also had no variation in their eye pigment. All these life forms had blue eyes. The life forms evolved into tribes and traveled around their three continents. They soon developed language and called themselves Tarken.
The tribes soon found agriculture. Tarkens saw that they could planet seeds and they would produce a fruit prolific tree in the next warm season. The nomads then created their first civilizations. The brought their ideals and practices with them into their new towns and farms. Other tribes joined the cities, integrating their culture with the town. Unlike Terran, the Tarkens have a strong sense of unity and a wanting to unite into something larger than themselves. They saw early on that in numbers, there was strength. The culture of the Tarkens then became their own religion and life style. No longer could other tribes join these new towns.
This lead to war between the Tarken people. The world of Tarken then entered into an age of constant war. The Tarkens developed weapons made of steel and iron. This age would be similar to that of medieval Europe on Terra. They’re being no actual countries; small cities or manors would be self-sufficient areas, fighting other manors. Manors would sometimes unite with others to fight a common enemy. This gave raise to the first states and countries of Tarken. Manors would either unite or take over each other’s manor, expanding their land. The people of the Tarken manors, unlike the Terrans would accept defeat and convert to the victorious manor’s life style.
Small nations would soon form. But without long-range communication, the other Tarkens never heard of them. Art and Literature didn’t evolve much during this time. But Written language became very common in all manors. During this time economy really didn’t mean much because all cities used something similar to the manor system to keep it’s populations running.
Another Tarken trait that is not similar to Terrans is that they put much stock in their pride and honor. Instead of currency those with honor were those in the higher class. This would take the place of economy throughout Tarken. Because of this Tarkens would invent their own honor code similar to Chivalry or Bushido for their combat. The honor code became a sort of taboo and everyone knew of it. It would be spread across the battlefield and soon reach all over Tarken. No man or woman would ever strike another in the back and would each fight fairly. There was no honor in killing a man who had not seen your face. This honor code would be branded in each Tarkens memory and it will not fade through time. During a war on Tarken, only those who had taken up arms would be attacked, civilians would never be harmed.
One day, a farming peasant looked up into the dark green night sky and saw a star and began to wonder if his people would ever unite and be able to reach those stars. He became determined to build the state, which would bring his planet together. Him and his children created a state bent on unification and the dream of building a ring, which would unite the world. His state would take over the large neighboring states and become one of three countries, which would be the last of the warring states.
Each of these three countries would have different social and economic beliefs. They would be in constant war with one another. The cities on each of the borders would be under constant attack and no land in the war was actually gained. Each country was controlled loosely by a mail carrier system which would be man driven. While each country was trying hard to main it’s borders, and it’s cities within, each person would be proud to be in an official country.
Luckily, the leaders of each of the countries were tempered by wisdom and the honor code. Each of them saw that this war was leading to nowhere. So unlike Terrans, each of them met at a summit on a neutral land where they agreed to end the bloodshed. They agreed on one final battle. Each side would commit twenty thousand men and women soldiers and fight in a battle royal. Retreat meant defeat of the war. The victory of the battle meant you would gain control of all of Tarken. The battle was to take place in ten days and the news was spread to all the corners of Tarken by the tenth day. On the eleventh day, the armies of each side came to a field at the base of a mountain. Each army was lead by the prince of its state. Each prince yellowed out “For Tarken”, and the battle began.
The Battle would last for 4 days and about everyone who entered the battle would not come back. In the first two days of fighting, one of the sides retreated after their prince was killed. The prince gave the soldiers reason to fight. Without the prince who got to that status usually from honorable combat service, the soldiers would lose hope that they could win. There was a 5-hour period of rest to let the army retreat. During this time, Counters would come on to the battlefield and count the number of dead and try to identify the bodies. The battle soon raged on again. Two princes would be fighting by themselves, away from the major battle. One would fight with a sword and the other, a staff. The two would force each other into a cave inside the mountainside. There, one would slay the other. The Prince with the staff picked up the corpse of his rival and brought him out to the field of battle and displayed him to everyone. Then with pride, he buried his worthwhile enemy. With that last death, the war finally ended.
The same tribe who had the peasant farmer, who wanted the war to end, finally united the Tarkens. With the victory came many changes. While each of the cities was their own government each one would now be apart of a larger government. Official calendars were formed with official languages and visual representation of the language was chosen. In the official Tarken calendar, the Tarkens entered an age know as the third epoch. The first epoch was the era of nomadic tribes. The second was the constant warring states of Tarken.
One of the biggest changes was the formation of the official spiritual belief. The belief refused to call itself a religion. Their official beliefs in destiny and that every Tarken was born to do something. There where no creator gods or higher beings controlling the universe around them. There was only the will of destiny, which had been set down along with time before the existence of time. The word destiny became written as a single character, and would not be used in any other words in Tarken. The symbol would be similar to the infinity of Terran, but instead has three loops. This symbol would become to represent more than just destiny, but the Tarken soul. Another part of the Tarken belief is that everyone is destined to be with someone else. The people would create arranged marriages based on whom they were destined to be with. Tarkens would train in the reading of destiny and would then decide whom they would be destined to be with. Some families would introduce the two as soon as it was decided. Other families would not do that and not let each other person change the other’s destiny.
The man who won the final battle was known as Nota. When the world was united he crowned himself Aria, or destined leader. He would be known as Aria’Nota. He created the belief system along with the laws, which governed it. His family became known as the royal family of Tarken. But Nota never had children, thus the royal family did not continue after him. He created many books, which contains his ideals, which would be left to interpretation. This brought about the different people who had different interpretations and created the radical, the moderate and conservatives Tarken.
One of the major breaks through in technology was in communication. While there were no wars on Tarken in the third epoch, after the second epoch, the people didn’t feel like a nation. But with the new inventions like the radio and the telephone, the people of Tarken really united. Similar inventions to the automobile, plane and train made world trade possible. The use of fossil fuels was very short lived on Tarken because of their toxic gas out put. Solar power became most dominant. Nuclear power came short after but only before Tarkens were able to remove the unwanted radiation it gave off.
The Tarkens entered into an age similar to the information age of Terra. For a long time things were good. But one invention came to shock Tarken at its very foundation. Scientists created the matter-energy stream. This allowed for the creation of matter through conversion of energy. Simple ore and compounds such as steel and iron because easier accessible as pushing a button. This destroyed the capitalist style economy Aria’Nota had emplaced. All those people who mined ore and created basic compounds lost their jobs in an instant. This became known as the Tarken Industrial Revolution.
Luckily the problem became solved quickly. The Dria (elected leader) understood the problem and founded a plan to solve it. With in six months of the invention, the Tarken economy fell apart and many people were without homes and foods. The Dria created a new economic system for the Tarkens to live by. This new economy was a complete resolution. All currency as disbanded and became devoid of meaning. All independent companies became under control of the local government, which answered to the larger government. All the workers were not paid for their work and all material goods became free. Larger things like land and homes and things of personal value had to be bartered for. Since Tarkens didn’t have a natural instinct for greed, the new economy completely worked. People began working because they liked their job and wanted to help Tarken become strong again. Many people left their jobs in favor of jobs they originally couldn’t do because they required money or training, which costs too much.
The government would control all things, which couldn’t be replicated and took those funds and divided them as they saw fit according to static sent to them by all the cities. With out money as a blockade, Education became completely open to all, without having to worry about the type because all schools gave the same level of education with the same level of supplies. Health care exploded across the world as disease, which required much funding to cure, were cured soon after the change. Diseases similar to the Terran Cancer were cured with in 4 months after the change was distributed across the world in 2 months. People who wanted to farm became largely important because complex organic compounds could not be synthesized by the matter-energy conversion. But the farming community exploded because people who always wanted to farm entered the field and helped to increase the amount of food for the public. Simple proteins and other things required for life were able to be replicated and ended the Tarken world hunger. Soon the funds would be able to put into the military, which was switched from being a policing force, to a space navy.
With materials no longer a problem space travel became a priority for many people. Many people believed that Tarkens should be going out to search for new life. Tarken III, the third planet in the Tarken system, was able to support Tarken life. It was suppose to have a very tropical environment. In the next years, Tarkens would send colony ships to Tarken III. Tarken III became the first planet colonized by the Tarken IVs. Soon after it was agreed that Tarken III would be a planet just for destiny and would be untouched by technology. They wanted Tarken III’s destiny to evolve normally. Some say when the first Tarken colonists arrived at Tarken III they found another species of Tarken. This turned Tarken III into a complete colony of monks devoted to destiny. The monks would never leave Tarken III, but would maintain continued up links to Tarken IV. There were uplinks for people at Tarken IV to arrange for someone on Tarken III to arrange their destined marriage. Soon every Tarken had their marriage arranged by a Third Tarken (A of the Tarken IV race born on Tarken III).
Tarkens then spread their colonies to the outer planets of their solar system. Slab colonies, which were just large slabs of metal curved at the angle of a planet, were built in the atmosphere of Tarken V and VI. Tarken V became the head quarters for everyone on space exploration. Tarken VI became the first civilian Tarken colony. Traveling between the planets took days, even months. Many Tarkens were trying to create something new that would allow for a fast trip. The creation of the compression vortex created speeds unlike anyone had thought before. A huge circular shaped structure was built at Tarken. Using a graviton generator it compresses the points between spaces and allows ships to travel at speeds fast than light. Unfortunately while this did solve the problem of space travel outside their solar system it was practical for traveling between the interplanetary colonies. A new type of impulse engine based on electromagnetic energy was created to produce extremely fast speeds, which allowed for fast travel between the Tarken planets.
The new Dria decided it was time to create the one icon that had been past down in the Tarken religion. Now that supplies and materials became almost unlimited, he endeavored to build a giant ring shaped space station, which would go across all of Tarken. It took many years to build this station but it was completed. It became home to the capital of the Tarken government. It also became a huge city, which went across the whole planet. It became a symbol of the Tarken’s unity. The Ring became a slang term used to describe the Tarken government was even adopted as a proper name for the government. The Ring from far away looks like the rings of a planet with a large gravity well. But it is made up of a single thin ring structure, which comes out in long thing spires in which there are buildings and cities.
Tarkens soon found that their population began to spread very thin. The amount of space and land they were taking up was a lot larger than they were reproducing. It was soon found out that the Tarkens didn’t have a high reproduction instinct. They didn’t feel the need to reproduce as much as the other creatures on their planet. So campaigns were created and new laws were created to keep Tarken population growing fast enough. Tarken married couples were not allowed to not have children any more. Many people didn’t mind this fact, but soon saw it as a hassle. The campaign still goes on to help keep the population high.
After Tarken colonized the outer planets of their solar system, with the invention of the compression vortex, they were able to colonize planets outside their solar system. The Tarkens colonized six other solar systems using the compression gate. Gate hubs were created to make travel easier and faster between the planets. Many people living outside the Tarken system felt that they had left the unity of Tarken. But they knew that they were helping Tarken spread their unification across the galaxy. Out of the solar systems they had watched in the skies and visited they never found intelligent life forms. They found large creatures like themselves and many planets with plants, but none with intelligence. One day, an old Sky watcher (those who look for new planets that can support life) turned on his old radio and turned it to the correct frequency and heard the words “Yesterday, December 7th, 1941, a date which will live in infamy...” All of Tarken listened to this pilgrimage.
Of course Tarkens didn’t understand a word of this message. But they intended to learn. The Tarkens set their sights on where the message had come from and opened a compression vortex to the Fourth planet in the system where the message had come from. When they opened a gate to the planet they found a red dust ball. The moved on to the next planet closest to the sun and what they found amazed them. A planet around the size of their own Tarken IV with huge cities stretched across their continents. They had never seen anything like this. They found the planet in complete rumble. They came down to the planet’s surface to find parts of the planet in extreme weather conditions. Some parts were frozen under hundreds of meters of ice and only the tops of the buildings showed, or were in a desert where the heat evaporated any liquid with in a matter of minutes.
They began downloading everything they could from the activate computers they found. They started to learn the language and sent all their information back to Tarken where children learned of a legendary planet called Terra. The people back at Tarken began learning everything they could, from Terran’s history to Terran native languages. English became a required class at Tarken schools. People every day would come home and turn on their radio at home to listen to radio transmissions from the past. They would follow events as they unfolded even though they happened years ago.
The first Tarken Project was started up by the Tarken Dira, to begin uncovering all the ruins on Terra, to find out all it’s secrets. He called this project, Project Earth, after the name of Terra in English. The scientists of Tarken looked at the sun of Terra, Sol and saw that it was the same type of star as the one that Tarken orbits. Sol being much younger than Triestek (The Tarken sun), it was on its way to its death. A station was built in orbit around Sol to monitor its progression. This was engulfed into Project Earth as part of it.
Once a history log was basically completely of Terra’s timeline, many people were surprised. They saw a culture based completely on war and self-destruction. Many people came back from their ideals about this legendary race that came before the Tarkens. All Tarkens have an instinct to praise those who came before them, like elders. But many Tarkens saw the Terrans as lower than them because they destroyed themselves. But many Tarkens defended the Terrans saying that even though they were in fault for destroying themselves, they were still wiser than us because they came before us. Even though these ideas spread across the Tarken network, human culture was being integrated into Tarken identity. English music appeared all over the planet and certain terms were coined. Some times phrases or terms came up that they could never understand their meaning because they seemed like gibberish. For example, the word “Rainman”' never figured out, but it was one of the first words hear by Tarkens from Terrans. It was then used as a phrase for a wife to say to her husband as a sign of affection; in the similar way she would say that he is handsome.
Terra’s lands were slowly being unveiled like a man digging for treasure. The Tarkens never knew what they were going to find. Mean while orbiting Sol, the Sol station that had four crewmen, one named Jem’Tal were noticing changes in Sol activity. Jem’Tal became famous for his work on Sol because he was wearing an implant, which allowed him to record him memories and have them sent to back to Tarken. Even though Tal was ranked Jem (meaning “Fresh eyes”, the lowest military rank) he was seventeen years old, the youngest scientist to be in the Tarken navy ever. He was sent to Sol to witness it’s final moments. When Sol was beginning to die, the station sent back notice to Tarken that everyone should be evacuated. But their message was unanswered.
They soon found out that Tarken had made contact with an alien species. They had already been moving people from Terra back to Tarken to get ready for the first contact between the two races. But the Sol part of the project was still very important to them because it could have importance in saving Triestek one day. Unfortunately, Sol’s implosion came almost one day early. Unprepared, the Sol Station, along with 4 other cargo ships had been destroyed in the blast, with a death count unheard of on Tarken for over six thousand years.
In recent events, the Tarkens have been preparing to meet with the team from the new alien race. New technologies such as genetic engineering have appeared and began to take shape in Tarken society. Also, in the years after the beginning of Project Earth, there was an unprecedented military build up of weapons, including the introduction of a new ship class, the Moonshine, with the flagship being named Moonshine. Also the Ion cannon had been invented which was a weapon with a huge amount of energy. The introduction of the Daybreak class came almost 3 months before the one-year anniversary of the destruction of Sol and Terra. Soon people were flocking to the space navy to join to be able to serve upon such a ship as the Daybreak.
On the one-year anniversary of the destruction of Terra, the Tarkens finally meet another intelligent form of life in their galaxy.