Earth. Third planet from the sun of the Sol System, and the ancestral home of the human race. In the pre-Orion Federation days it was the beating heart of human politics and operations. Under the jurisdiction of the United Earth Confederation (UEC), it became the capital of a space power that came to control a number of systems and planets within its grasp. Under the UEC, Earth prospered like none other, seeing myriad building projects and environmental restoration projects and even interstellar trade agreements that brought it immense wealth and prestige. In its heyday, it was a force to be reckoned with and Earth remained at the very center of it all.
…And then came the development of the Orion Federation. A grand idea of interstellar unification that brought humanity to the forefront as one of the three major Founding Species. Yet the trouble came when the blueprints for the future Sphere would leave Earth woefully out of the equation, and indeed this would sono be followed with the formal creation of a new ‘human founder world’ to fit in and maintain humanity’s prestige and status within the new Federation. It saw a lot of political power be moved from Earth to the new Founder World, which would not only strip much of the significance of the planet outright at the time but also see what little remained there dwindling or leaving it over the next thousand years of the Orion Federation.
~A Golden Age: The Age of the Federation~
Indeed, the glory days of Earth as humanity’s seat of origin and hub of power would eventually themselves be lost from most human memory due to the widespread diaspora of humanity to the stars. As most humans by far would be born far from their species’ former world of origin, even memories of it would become conflated as being mere legend and myth to many. Humans, a species spread so far and wide within the boundaries of the Sphere, coming from one small planet beyond the Core Systems? It was laughable at best to some! Even so others would still be born upon the surface of the third planet from the sun of the Sol System, human or alien, and others living closer to where the Sol System was located would remember the fact it actually existed as a literal planet and one left with the forgotten zoning designation of ‘designated historical site’ that kept it from being turned into an industrial world like the rest of the Sol System was.
Yet the planet itself never lost all use, at least, mostly ending up used by the Orion Federation as a place for Inner Systems residents and on rare occasions from elsewhere to go for a vacation. But much as the other systems of the Federation-designated boundaries of “Sector 7” of the Inner Systems, it was nothing special with regards to the wider Sphere and would find itself lost as but one mere planet and place amidst the many other systems of the Inner Systems around it.
Over the course of time, though, Sector 7 would find itself turned into a hub of civilian production and manufacturing, including producing many civilian-grade computers, common and luxury civilian spacecraft, general communication satellites, transportation vehicles, and other such goods for the wider market. Yet at the same time, it would see a little bit of history along the way compared to other ‘far more eventful’ areas of the Sphere. In 2908 it would be the place from which the former radical “Humanity First Front” terrorist organization would emerge, before the organization was rooted out and destroyed finally after decades of struggles in 2936 on the planet of Hethar IV. The sector would also celebrate and host the opening of the first civilian-grade servitor robot factories emerge in 3082, and become host to a Federation-wide major sporting event in 3057, 3143, and 3346 respectively. In 3488 it would even be the sector where the famous Federation weapons developer “Thrak Ok’hael” would be born and dream up the space warship concepts that would one day debut within the Orion Federation Military only three decades later. (Etc).
In the end Sector 7 would find itself not being much of a place of much focus or attention, and did so for a number of reasons. It was not a hub or any sort of military manufacturing or military-related industry, and this was not looked at by the military in that vein. It avoided becoming a chaotic and open frontier of major food producing importance like the Outer Systems, nor was involved in the likewise chaotic and criminal allure of the Periphery Systems. It was a middle-ground sector among the sectors of the Inner Systems, not the most profitable but just average enough in comparison to fall by the wayside of notice, and likewise was not amidst the hustle and bustle and politics of the urbanized Core Systems or the even greater Founder Worlds. This would ultimately make this sector one of the most ‘ideal’ locations of a number of secretive ‘Orion Federation Black Sites’, wherein the government conducted top-secret research or developed and tested more secretive or taboo forms of technology away from prying eyes. It had a lot of supplies flowing in and out, worlds for setting up on that could have easy cover such as one of a ‘new and budding business’ or ‘industrial research station’ or such, etc, allowing for the hiding of these ‘government black sites’ in plain sight as well as being tucked away in corners no one bothered with inside the sector to boot.
Among the parts of the Inner Systems that it existed, Sector 7 would become the most littered with myriad top secret sites concealed within its borders. Of course not everything of such a nature was located there by the former Federation, but it was still a hotbed of such activities at the same time.
~3700 and the First Contact War~
Eventually the fateful year of 3700 rolled around, and when the invading barbarians came to blows with the Orion Federation it would see a shift in Sector 7 for better or worse. Civilian production in the area was cut in certain areas, both taking up a portion of military production to support the war effort and continuing the production of dual-use goods that both the military and the civilian market could make use of. It was also here that a few of the government projects being worked on in secret within the sector would manifest during the atrocities perpetrated by the Orion Federation during the course of the war. Whilst the Federation was not the only one to commit such atrocities, the invaders doing just as much, this was all among the events and actions that would help in part to turn Sector 7 into a warming hotbed of issues.
The wartime rationing of certain civilian-grade consumer goods, the cessation of producing some goods or stripping of them from the sector to send elsewhere, and even the rationing of food to an ever-increasing extent, would all be used to fuel the war effort as well as feeding and supplying other much more affected and damaged areas. This was stacked with a rather steady large influx of general refugees being put to work in the sector’s old and even fresh newly-built facilities to support the war, or frankly replacing the jobs of others already living there who were being conscripted into the conflict. This time would also see a ramping up of government activities, both using refugees as ‘participants’ in some but also using their general presence to build up more industrial facilities to help mask the government sites. This refugee measure in part was covertly justified in the eyes of the government due to the Sphere-shocking exposure of three such government black sites elsewhere in 3716 within the chaos of the ongoing conflict (and the convenient misplacement of a few top secret government documents into the hands of a media company). Combined with stories of the horrors from the front lines, and other heaping frustrating factors forced upon the locals, Sector 7 seemed stable on the outside but was bubbling up bit by bit with dissent, anger, and increasing instability becoming more and more common.
Yet still, though, the sector held up under the pressure ‘well enough’ in the end to not immediately pose any major problems to the Orion Federation’s government by the end of the war.
~3730-3740: Post-War Period and The Great Decline~
After 3730 came along, and with that the end of the First Contact War, Sector 7 was able to reestablish a certain amount of greater stability within its boundaries on the part of the Orion Federation’s government. This was a minor event some loyalists tried to label ‘the great miracle’ and use as propaganda, but this would only increase the infighting as a number of top government loyalists sought to keep a firm hand on Sector 7 and its valuable ‘black sites’ in lieu of the looking civil war era. It was also perhaps the last time the government would be able to do such a thing with success, as with the general post-war decline that began to occur.
This was a boon to the struggling and declining Federation government itself at first, and effort was made by certain military loyalists to keep the projects there afloat and to use them to prepare for the internal struggles to come. In this period the Nilati war hero General Arkas, a Nilati married to a human woman as his comrades knew him, was placed in the system to help protect it from ‘terrorist threats’ but mostly as a way of protecting loyalist assets in that time period from rival factions. Yet a slow but gradual backsliding still occurred due to dwindling resources from infighting, a reversal of some of the actions taken to keep the system loyal in lieu of new resources struggles, and the involvement of inter-factional struggles stirring up the population of the sector to boot.
The final nail in the coffin was the sector being devastated by an unthinkable and notable large-scale Stellar Storm, which in the Sol System alone devastated the habitations of Venus and its population by roughly 89%. This at the same time saved most of the Earth, which was hidden behind Venus at the time, from devastation and the storm-triggered secondary large-scale solar flare that occurred afterward. But the widespread issues, ship-disappearances, and finally the destruction of many hyperlanes within the Sphere would prove too much of an opponent to maintaining proper order. Sector 7, as with many places, would be among the places that erupted into conflict during the ensuing civil war that erupted into life in 3740.
~The Orion Civil War of 3740-3760~
During the roughly first seven years of the war the loyalists would fight to and would maintain control over Sector 7 and its neighbors, though the individual they had chosen to place over Sector 7 itself would prove to be their undoing. Increasingly tyrannical and hostile measures were used by the loyalists within Sector 7 in particular, as it stood to hold government black site operations that were rather valuable weapons and materials for the loyalists to use, and the flagrant revelation of some such operations into the open to keep them going at the cost of locals was among the horrors that were perpetrated. Eventually the likes of General Arkas himself, a tentative loyalist (who had hoped to and helped to keep people safe during the former war by joining this particular faction of loyalists) as civil unrest erupted elsewhere, would be broken away by these actions and turn (alongside the many soldiers loyal to him) upon what remained of the nation he had devoted himself to alongside other rebels in Sector 7 in 3748.
For the next twelve years, General Arkas would launch a campaign to bring about order and unity within Sector 7 before branching out to its neighboring areas within the Inner Systems. It was also within this time period the war hero would forge his own mixed bag of a reputation from then onward to boot. On one hand, he would focus on minimizing violence and seeking the peaceful integration of new systems and planets. Many hydroponics works would begin being built on planets who cooperated, both to try to help feed locals and his own armed forces, whilst attempting to use it as a bargaining chip to try to push for a more peaceful resolution. He likewise brought in many powerful people and populations into his cause along the way, working to gradually build steam in his actions instead of rushing to an attempted, hasty, and ill-supplied pyrrhic victory otherwise. Or at least that is how he wrote about perceiving the situation in a general and strategic sense as he went about taking more systems under his command. He even went about arranging for the future repair of damaged hyperlanes, and until then seeking to maintain and organize trade routes to keep his conquered or peacefully acquired systems afloat and happy.
On the other hand, Arkas made many ‘deals with the devil’ in promising reward to powerful people to get them on his side over the likes of other factions and foes during the civil war. He also commanded those below him to pirate and raid the food supplies and shipments from areas beyond what borders he could maintain, and even took food from certain newly-conquered areas that had shown any notable resistance, to try to remedy the food situation (and ensure loyalty) elsewhere in his accrued territories whilst likewise punishing those who had shown ‘too much resistance’ and were seen as ‘still too tough to integrate’ at first. Sometimes food was even used to pressure weaker opponents along the warpath into submission with silent force, and trade routes to keep his areas of control afloat would favor certain ‘more important’ ones over others due to the occasional fluctuation of resources that existed for most of this time within his accrued territories. Not to mention the ‘quiet acquisition’ and pardoning of government black sites and such in the region, both exposed and ones still kept off the books, to feed into his own war effort and internal works despite the many crimes committed in them and criminal researchers/developers working inside many of them (ones not abandoned at the time at least) still.
~Rise of a New Nation: Ashes of the Federation and the Age of Sundering~
In the wake of the Federation’s fall, it would take another 8 years of war, negotiation, and internal struggle for General Arkas to reach the full extent of what he felt he could take and reasonably control. Within this period there were likewise those under his command who protested that they could still go further and remain stable, however, and wished to push further and harder outward to continue to fuel more conquest. The General disagreed and would eventually halt his push about 7 years after the end of the civil war, though the dissenters would in turn seek to provoke action or set out against orders to continue ‘the fight’. One bickering and debate led to another, then came arrests and warrants, and in the end the dissenters would rise up in rebellion to launch a coup against Arkas and those still loyal to him.
This sub-conflict, known as the “Erubirungehr Rebellion” (due to the group calling themselves the “Erubirungehr”, or basically ‘conquerors’ in a rather corrupted word in this case taken from one of the older human languages [German]), would last one year before being put down by Arkas and his loyalists. It saw scattered fighting within Arkas’ territories, however, and showed much of the weaknesses of what had been established. Likewise the war was only a year, but it was no less brutal in its showing and actions than the recently-ended civil war. This very thing would be what inspired Arkas, and many of those who he managed to keep on his side, to agree to meet upon his flagship (a cruiser named “Sainur” (or “survivor” in the Hiigüül tongue) in the Sol System and work upon as well as lay out the very document that became the “Sol Accord” or “Sainur Constitution” as it is more formally known as by ‘modern’ times.
It was a document that laid out the new government, as well as being something that appeased those that Arkas had to appease (some of those people of power came at a price in certain cases after all) but likewise set into motion and entrenched rights and so forth that would protect the population in a balance to this. It took eight Earth months to work things out and negotiate it fully in turn, before it was finalized and signed in mid-3770. Further, the establishment of Earth (already used for a long time by Arkas and his people as a main base of operations during the civil war) as the capital of the new nation was formalized in turn (as was still calling it “Earth” in the human and other tongues).
Arkas, bearing long-term complications from injuries from his last several personally-involved battles, would eventually pass away quietly in his bed of medical complications six years later in 3776. He was roughly at the end of ‘middle age’ and into early ‘old age’ for one of his species.
~The Sovereign Union of Sol and Current Times~
Over the next eighty-four years, the new nation of “The Sovereign Union of Sol” would work in its internal matters for the most part, only paying attention to outside powers if engaged with. They would war with those who sought war or conflict with them in defense, engage in trade with those who were willing to trade, and generally seek to maintain both a steady and stably-sustained national presence without provoking another major conflict with external powers. It wasn’t a time of ‘isolation or utter neutrality’, as some outsiders have often jabbed at locals with, but one that saw smaller conflicts, sought to make improvements to various economic and military technologies, and sought to improve conditions in a form of vertical growth that would bolster up the nation heading into the future.
In this general vein, it could be said that The Sovereign Union of Sol has been quite the successful nation. On the other hand, a lack of wider large-scale participation in events and the like has left the very same nation behind in terms of political alliances and so forth on a greater scale. Involvement with the matters of the Periphery has been frankly nonexistent in the personally-involved sense to boot, even if trade could maybe have reached that far from the Union’s borders potentially), and no expansion to ‘stabilize or bring order to elsewhere’ has been undertaken outwardly either. In this vein the Union has been somewhat more isolated or sidelined, even if in trade it has managed to vastly improve its own internal food security and production (among other things).
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