Welcome¶
This is based on an Obsidian Vault containing information about my Growing Horizon world building project.
Growing Horizons is a somewhat hard science fiction world building project that grew out of a piece of Mass Effect fan fiction, that had its Mass Effect elements completely removed.
The World¶
The world of Growing Horizons is located in the 'local bubble' of space, around 50 light years around the solar system and Earth.
It is the year 1969, and Mariner 3 discovers a large alien structure on the surface of Mars, just shortly after Apollo 11 lands on the moon. Followup missions of the United States and the Soviet Union discover that that the alien structure is an alien city, at least 150.000 years old.
By 1991, the Soviet Union lands the first man on Mars, four weeks before the Soviet Union breaks apart.
The year is 1994, and an archaeological dig of the University of Mexico City opens up the Great Pyramid of La Venta, discovering a high grade steel door barring the way to the central chamber. It takes some time to open it, allowing the scientists to discover the mummified remains of an alien inside, resembling a large, four armed snake, with feathers. The alien, named Quetzalcoatl by the scientists, proved that there were ancient aliens and it was only the first discovery of several members of the species all over the world. One such discovery was made in China, near the tomb of the First Emperor, containing not only the remains of an alien, but also an almost fully intact alien shuttle craft and a massive library of documents written in ancient Chinese, detailing everything the alien knew and could put into words.
It is the year 2004, and Cassini-Huygens reaches Saturn. After the Cassini Titan Lander detaches and enters the atmosphere of Titan, Huygens does a flyby. The images of Titan show what lies beneath the surface of Titan for the first time, and a strange lighted feature that seems to raise up from Saturn's Moon. Cassini's first images from the surface of Titan show ice and liquid methane flowing over its surface. A short while later, Huygens detects signals coming from Titan orbit, and humanity establishes contact with the first alien species, the Heptapods (heptapoda sapiens titanii).
The year is 2034, and SETI, for the first time ever, detects a signal from outside the solar system. It is a deliberate transmission from Beta Hydri, containing an hour long transmission of the first episode of Carl Sagan's Cosmos, followed by a digital first contact package and more than 1 TB data to establish a connection between not one, but two alien species that would be called Tiaunt and the Ineryn.
It is the year 2095, sixty years after the first Indian Space Elevator entered service, humanity has spread into space, millions of people settling asteroids, Mars and the surface of Jovian and Saturnian moons, discovering that five more of the Jovian and Saturnian moons have a native Heptapod populations. But not everyone is satisfied. An ore hauler coming from a mining settlement on a Near Earth Object, has been hijacked and reprogrammed and doesn't slow down as it comes closer and closer to Earth. It impacts directly on Beijing with the force of a medium strategic nuclear device. The nations of Earth panic and close off traffic from Cislunar space to the rest of the Solar System.
It leads to massive economic strife on Earth, as raw materials from space don't make it to Earth, China and East Asia erupt into the chaos of civil war and the space settlements are forced to fend for themselves, supported by the Heptapods on Titan.
It is the year 2167, Earth has only recently climbed out of its economic crisis from the Beijing Impact and tried to reintegrate the now fiercely independent non cis-lunar settlements, which have formed into their own nations.
A mining and settlement mission from the Federated Habitats of Ceres, a member of the European Union, lands on the asteroid 846 Lipperta. Only to discover that the asteroid has been hollowed out three thousand years ago and now contains more then a hundred space craft of extra-solar origin and on them the members of two distinct alien species, the Quetzal and the Ormiold (related to the Ineryn at Beta Hydri) , that have fled to Sol to hide the destruction of their home worlds.
The year is 2189, and a mission of the Tiaunt and Ineryn make their way to the Solar System, using a more primitive version of the FTL drive used by the Quetzal and Ormiold.
Direct contact with the two alien species is peaceful, as they were already known about and diplomatic contact is established.
It became clear that the Ineryn were survivors of the Ormiold that had fled to Beta Hydri and settled on the world of the Tiaunt, leading to a global thermonuclear war that had lead to a nearly 3000 year recovery to a tech level only slightly ahead of Sol.
To simplify contact with extra-solar polities, the nations of Earth and the Solar System, be they human or Heptapod, form the Solar Federation, charging it with interstellar diplomacy, as well as traffic and commerce control of the solar system.
In a similar vain, the nations of the Tiaunt and the Ineryn form the Union of Jeratir, named after their name for their sun, Beta Hydri.
The Year is 2203, and a joint mission between the Solar Federation and the Union of Jeratir leaves for 61 Virginis. For decades it was known that there was activity in the system and if there were any Quetzal still in their home system, they should be contacted.
At arrival, the joint mission discovered that not only had the Quetzal survived the destruction of their home world, fleeing into space, creating many nations around the outer gas giants and asteroid belts of 61 Virginis, as well as an orbital rung-world mega structure in orbit around the dead Quetzal home world, Cterin.