Month 144 - Part 1
The Alliance of the Rogen
Alliance Statistics:
Income (as of Month 143): 194,540 MCr’s
Number of Inhabited Systems: 54
Total Population: 157 Billion
Timeline:
Month 43 Eaters launch first effort to destroy the Rogen. The Eater fleet is destroyed in an ambush launched by the Rogen Clan warfleets.
Month 50 The Eaters launch their second effort to destroy the Rogen. The attack force is composed of two hundred and forty-four ships, led by thirty-three superdreadnoughts. The Eater fleet succeeds in destroying the Rogen defenses at the warp point.
Month 51 The Eaters destroy the Rogen home world. The Rogen refugee fleet leaves the Rogen system.
Month 56 The Rogen refugee fleet makes contact with the Union, a remnant of the old Terran Empire. The Union is a multi-racial government comprising the Human and Alar populations of the type T and ST planets of the Paradise system.
Month 57 The Rogen refugee fleet discovers New Rogia. Although the military commanders of the fleet want to continue on, there are few supplies left and given their proximity to their potential allies the civilian leaders of the fleet decide to remain.
Communications are established this month with the Union. The Humans and Alar of the Union are already aware of the Eaters from the days of the old Empire, and take the Rogen warning seriously. The Union is overjoyed that the Rogen have made them aware that the warp points are open, even though that knowledge has come with a price. The Union immediately agrees to a trade and military alliance with the Rogen.
Months 58-70 The Union helps the Rogen to set up their colony on New Rogia. Joint exploration missions make contact with the Shen-zi and the Zantak. Both of the newly discovered races show little interest in continuing contact with the Rogen and the Union, but sustained effort from the Rogen eventually convinces the two races to sign on to the alliance.
Month 71-80 An ever-tightening web of alliances between the Rogen and the other races provides the framework for the Alliance. The Rogen campaign tirelessly for the Alliance.
Month 81 The Alliance becomes a reality as the Union and the Shen-zi agree to join with the Rogen in a common government dedicated to defending the combined races from the Eaters.
Month 84 The Zantak finally agree to join the Union after holding out for additional concessions, mostly relating to their desire for an independent “state-within-a-state”. The Shen-zi also argue, successfully, for internal independence.
Month 99 The Alliance Council begins debates on the merits of expanding the forward defenses into the Harbin system, which on the chain that leads back towards the Rogen home world and the Eaters. The supporters of this plan believe that it will give their defenses strategic depth, while the plan’s detractors fear, including the Rogen, believe that expanding in the direction of the Eaters is folly.
Month 104 The Alliance begins deploying fighters. The Navy is slow to adopt the new weapons system, perhaps because it has the full support of the Fortress Command.
Month 108 The Alliance government decides to expand into the Harbin system, which lies along the route taken by the Rogen refugee fleet, to provide strategic depth for the defenses in the Masada system. This move is taken against the advice of the Rogen, who fear that by moving closer to known Eater systems the Alliance is bringing doom down on itself.
Month 122 Alliance survey units discover the Xeon, a human splinter group isolated since the collapse of the warp points. The Xeon are standoffish and cautious, in spite of spirited attempts by the Alliance to sign economic, political, and military agreements.
Month 127 Xeon ships probe ASR’s Le Harve system through a previously unsuspected closed warp point. When the Xeon ships detect ASR ships closing on them from the inner system they turn and run, leaving the system before the ASR ships can localize the closed warp point they used to enter the system.
Month 130 Xeon ships discover a second alien race through yet another closed warp point, this one located in their first colonial system. Yet again they withdraw without attempting to establish contact.
Month 131 The Xeon launch an attack on the Alliance. The Xeon government is concerned about the fact that the Alliance has direct access to their home system, and the attack is an attempt to seize the closest systems to give the Xeon State a buffer zone. Unfortunately, unknown to the Xeon leaders, the Alliance has colonized several systems in the area and cannot afford to give them up. The Xeon fleet, led by nine superdreadnoughts, confronts an Alliance squadron of three battle cruisers and supporting units. The Alliance squadron completely, and humiliatingly, defeats the Xeon fleet by using fighters, a technology that is unknown to the Xeon State. As a result of the abortive war, the Xeons are forced to sign a trade agreement with the Alliance.
Month 132 The Xeon make contact with the ASR in the Le Harve system. ASR ships and detection buoys pinpoint the location of the closed warp point leading back to Xeon space.
Month 133 The Xeon agree to a trade alliance with the ASR. The Xeon appear interested in a military alliance as well, however, in reality the Xeon State is only interested in obtaining military technology to assist them against the Alliance. The Xeon do their best to conceal the fact that they are in contact with another race from both the ASR and the Alliance.
Month 142 The Xeon attempt to contact the second alien race discovered through a closed warp point located in their first colonial system. The aliens turn out to be the Eaters, and the contact group is forced to retreat. The Eaters, who have obviously prepared for the return of the Xeon, launch an attack into the Xeon colonial system. The Xeon turn to the Alliance and the ASR for help, and inform each about the other.
Alliance Component Races:
Rogen:
The Rogen are descended from ferocious carnivores that stalked the vast jungles of their home world. The typical Rogen is covered in fur and appears at first glance remarkably like a Terran tiger, although closer inspection will reveal numerous differences. Rogen possess two legs and two arms, and the sensory layout of the head is similar to that of Terran animals, but they are whipcord thin and very strong for their size and very, very fast. The Rogen home world is an ST type planet that has a significantly higher gravity than Earth-normal. Because of this the Rogen are much stronger than humans and most other races.
Rogen civilization was organized around a number of Clans that were in more or less constant conflict. Clan alliances were fleeting things designed more for momentary advantage rather than long term benefits. Conflict between Clans was governed by complex rules that were in force for centuries and that were designed to allow the Clans to fight without destroying their entire civilization. The Rogen were brilliant warriors, and their preoccupation with war and means of waging it gave them insight into technological systems that would normally be beyond a race at their technology level.
The Rogen civilization was wiped out by the Eaters prior to the formation of the Alliance. The Rogen managed to defeat the first Eater fleet sent against them. This gave them time to prepare for the inevitable onslaught, but their economy just wasn’t strong enough. When the Eaters returned they smashed the Rogen defenses and bombarded their home world. While the Eaters were destroying the Rogen home world and its colonies, a small fleet of damaged military ships, exploration ships, and freighters carrying the last remnants of the Rogen race escaped the system through a recently discovered warp point.
The refugee fleet traveled for many months before it finally found the planet that became known as New Rogia, the new home for the Rogen people. The Rogen exploration ships also found another intelligent race, actually two, in a system not far from their new home. While settling their new home the Rogen immediately went to work to form an alliance with the aliens in the hopes of building a civilization that would be able to defend itself from the Eaters.
Since settling New Rogia the Rogen have devoted themselves to building an alliance capable of defeating the Eaters. Because of the overwhelming threat of the Eaters the Rogen have moved away from the clan-system that so dominated their old civilization, and have successfully ended the non-stop warfare that characterized their pre-Eater civilization. This is not to say that the Rogen are no longer warlike, nothing could be farther from the truth. The Rogen are masters at space warfare, and nearly all of the Alliance’s military training bases are in the New Rogia system so that the Rogen can pass their expertise on to the other races in the Alliance.
New Rogia now has a system-wide population of over 2 billion. While more than half of this population is not Rogen, and had immigrated from other systems in the Alliance, the Rogen have managed to significantly increase their population since settling the planet. For the most part this has been done utilizing advanced artificial wombs brought from their home planet. These artificial wombs have been used to incubate sperm and ova brought from the home planet, which were collected in a vast program in the last days of the old Rogen civilization. The large-scale use of the wombs ensures that the Rogen race will have significant genetic diversity, but the influx of so many young has strained the fledgling Rogen civilization’s capabilities in many ways.
The Union
The Union is composed of two different races, Humans and Alar. The Union is a remnant of the old Terran Empire, and was isolated when the warp points collapsed. Aside from one major civil war just over twenty years before they learned the warp points were open again, the Union survived the long isolation without incident.
The Alar are a race of lizard-like centauroids that were encountered by humanity during the days of the old Terran Empire. Female Alar are generally smaller and smarter than their male counterparts, and almost every Alar civilization in recorded history has been matriarchal. The males tend to be warriors, soldiers, and heavy laborers within Alar societies, eschewing leadership posts for jobs where they can take direct action. The Alar were humanity’s closest ally during the days of the old Terran Empire.
The Paradise system, the Union’s home system, contains both T and ST type planets suitable for the Human and Alar colonists. Because the T type planet in the system is considered a harsh environment for Humans, by the time of contact with the Rogen the Alar population of the system outnumbers the Human population by almost 100 to 1. This disparity was what led to the civil war that occurred approximately twenty years before the Rogen found the Union. The civil war occurred when a majority of the Alar rebelled against an all-human government that had become increasingly oppressive. Many humans joined the Alar rebels and the war was short, but nasty. Hard feelings persist to today among some groups, although they have largely faded now that the Union has moved out onto the galactic stage.
The Union is a loose confederation that is largely powerless these days. Traditionally within the Union the individual member provinces retained the real power, with Union government only handling national defense and inter-province law enforcement, along with regulating trade. Since contact with the Rogen the Union has largely given up its defense function to the Alliance, leaving it with little else. The Union, and its member provinces, as strong supporters of the Alliance, second only to the Rogen. This is largely due to the fact that the Humans and Alar have had direct experience with the Eaters from the days of the old Empire.
The Shen-zi
The Shen-zi are a race of amphibious crustaceans that are nearly incomprehensible to the other races of the Alliance. As near as anyone can tell the Shen-zi have a somewhat communistic civilization, but all attempts by the humans of the Alliance to understand the Shen-zi social and societal structure have been less than successful. It is nearly certain that in the absence of an overwhelming threat like the Eaters the Shen-zi would have refused contact with the other races of the Alliance. It was only the persistence of the Rogen that convinced them to join with the other races, and it is only the clear threat that keeps them involved.
For all of their reluctance to join the Alliance and their basic incomprehensibility, the Shen-zi were a powerful addition to the Alliance. Their home system contains no less than three habitable type T planets, two of which are rated as benign, making the Shen-zi home system an industrial powerhouse.
Shen-zi are either unwilling or unable to mix with the other races and have maintained separate colonies and fleets. In spite of this the Shen-zi are not overtly hostile to the other Alliance members and have been staunch supporters of the Rogen in the past, they just have little desire for interaction with other races.
The Zantak
The Zantak are, as one human from the Union put it, nothing more or less than large, hairy, spiders. Each Zantak has eight legs and stands approximately 1.5 meters in height. In spite of their completely alien appearance the Zantak are remarkably similar to humanity in their general outlook and in their social and societal structures.
The Zantak were generally uninterested in joining the Alliance, but eventually the persistence of the Rogen convinced them to join for the common good. Out of all of the races in the Alliance the Zantak seem the most comfortable with Humanity.
Alliance Government
Out of respect for the founders of the Alliance, and for hardboiled political reasons, the Alliance Capital is on the new Rogen home planet. The Rogen have thrown themselves into the Alliance, and in spite of their relatively small population the Alliance government is dominated by the Rogen. Perhaps because of their comparative military and economic weakness and complete and total focus on defending against future Eater attacks, the other races have not only accepted this state of affairs but also encouraged it.
The Alliance government is led by a Chief Minister who is selected from the Council of Ministers. Every Chief Minister so far has been Rogen, a state of affairs that is likely to continue for the foreseeable future. Candidates for the Council of Ministers are selected by the member governments by whatever method approved by that member race, and are assigned duties within the Council based on their seniority and proficiency.
The Alliance government has nearly complete authority to deal with foreign affairs and to regulate internal trade and other internal inter-racial affairs. The Alliance has severely limited authority to interfere with the internal affairs of any member race. This is by design, at the insistence of several races that were reluctant to join the Alliance without safeguards. The Alliance Charter underwent several revisions, at the insistence of the Zantak and the Shen-zi, which had the effect of severely limiting the central government’s authority to intervene in the internal affairs of member races, while at the same time reinforcing the government’s ability to regulate inter-racial relationships. For the most part the Alliance government has been focused on the overwhelming threat presented by the Eaters, and has left the various member races to their own devices as long as there is no problems.
The Alliance government, at the request of the Rogen, performed a detailed analysis of all of the data amassed by the Rogen during their war with the Eaters, to determine the extent of the threat to the Alliance member races. The results were so alarming that the entire research effort was classified and the results were buried. The analysis of the size of fleets involved indicated that the Eaters possessed an economy at least ten times the size of that possessed by the Rogen. When coupled with the analysis of the genetic data taken from damaged and destroyed Eater warships after the first attack, the true nature of the threat became clear. The Eaters not only possessed a superior economy, but they were capable of increasing their population at a significantly greater rate than any other known species. These facts called into question the entire defensive effort of the Alliance. If the Eater Hegemony started in a better position than the Rogen and even the Alliance, and they could grow at a faster rate as well, then there could be no hope that the Alliance would ever be able to match them economically or militarily.
While the results of the research were classified at a high level, they inevitably leaked out, albeit in a distorted form. High-level political and military leaders were briefed on the issues raised by the project, based on a need to know, and inevitably they disseminated some or most of the information to their subordinates. This information caused an immense problem at the high leadership levels of the Alliance, in that everyone understood that no matter what they did, no matter how quickly the Alliance grew or how fast they built warships and bases, the Eaters would inevitably grow even faster. The demoralizing effect of this knowledge began affecting the strategic decision making process of the Alliance as early as Month 100. It was at about this time that the Alliance exploration program began changing its emphasis from discovering new worlds for colonization, to expand the Alliance’s economy, to surveying warp points to discover other intelligent races that might be able to help the Alliance defeat or at least defend against the Eaters. The Rogen, in particular, have noticed this pervasive feeling of helplessness within the political and military structures of the Alliance, but have been unable to completely counter them. More and more, as time has gone on, the four other races of the Alliance have begun turning their backs on the challenge of providing from the common defense to the hope that they would be able to find someone, anyone, who would save them from the Eaters.
Alliance Defense Forces
The Alliance Defense Forces have three primary divisions, the Fortification Command, the Navy, and the Army. Of the three, the Fortification Command is considered the senior service and has the first call on resources and personnel. This is largely due to the defensive stance that that Alliance has taken in relation to the Eaters, and while it has its detractors, it is seen by most as a realistic appreciation of the situation that the Alliance faces. Given the fact that the Alliance is almost certainly significantly out matched by the Eaters in both the economic and military realms, and the fact that the Eater’s most likely route of advance is known, a heavy emphasis on fortifications along that route of advance makes perfect sense.
The Alliance Navy largely exists to support the Fortification Command, to escort Survey Command groups, and to provide a mobile reserve in case a threat appears in an unexpected location. A significant rivalry exists between naval admirals and fortification admirals, and the Navy tends to resent its secondary position.
The Alliance Army’s primary reason for existence is to provide common training and equipment for the various national/racial militias, and to provide a framework for large scale operations should such a situation arise. The Army maintains no large-scale units itself, as its mission is largely to equip citizens and militias for last-ditch resistance if the Eaters should capture an Alliance planet.
Naval Strength and Deployment, as of Month 143
1st Line Defense Fleet
Harbin System, Fleet Leader Geli (Rogen) Commanding
6xBB, 3xCA, 5xCL, 3xDD, 3xCT(SC)
2nd Line Defense Fleet
Masada System, Fleet Leader Talk (Rogen) Commanding
3xSD, 3xBB, 3xCA, 9xCL, 2xDD, 12xCT(SC)
Expeditionary Force #1
In transit through the Zhengzhou system, Fleet Leader Gorl!k (Zantak) commanding
ETA to Xeon system: Day 15, month 148
3xSD, 3xBC, 3xCL, 3xDD, 4xCVE, 3xCT(SC)
Expeditionary Force #2
In transit through the Shakar System, Fleet Leader Anderson (Terran) Commanding
ETA to Xeon system: Day 30, Month 147
6xSD, 1xCV, 15xBC, 3xCA, 3xCL, 15xDD, 17xCVE, 2xCT(SUP), 16xCT(SC)
Expeditionary Force #3
In transit through the Lanzhouwei system, Fleet Leader Aldaksorickal (Shen-zi) Commanding
ETA to Xeon system: Day 30, month 146
3xSD, 3xDD, 3xCVE
1st Exploration Fleet
Qingdao system (acting as “gate guard” for Plan Omega)
Group Leader Siril (Alar) commanding
3xBC, 4xCAX, 2xFT6(300xIDEW-E, 175xMF, 4,000xSup), 3xDD(AWCS)
2nd Exploration Fleet
A-045 System (Frontier)
Group Leader Fortrenacklotir (Shen-zi) commanding
3xBC, 4xCAX, 2xFT6(300xIDEW-E, 175xMF, 4,000xSup), 3xDD(AWCS)
3rd Exploration Fleet
Trails Branching System (Adjacent to Xeon)
Group Leader F!lkyk (Zantak) commanding
3xBC, 4xCAX, 2xFT6(300xIDEW-E, 175xMF, 4,000xSup), 3xDD(AWCS)
4th Exploration Fleet
A-046 System (Frontier)
Group Leader Delaudier (Terran) commanding
3xBC, 4xCAX, 2xFT6(300xIDEW-E, 175xMF, 4,000xSup), 3xDD(AWCS)
Xeon Border Fleet
Xeon System
Group Leader Cer*! (Zantak) commanding
3xCA, 1xCVS, 2xCL, 8xCVE, 2xCT(SC)
System Defense Squadron, Rogen
New Rogia
Group Leader Herk (Rogen) commanding
4xCL, 3xCVE, 4xES
System Defense Squadron, Union
Paradise System (Union)
Group Leader Earhardt (Terran) commanding
2xBC, 2xCL, 10xDD, 2xCVE, 3xCT(SC)
System Defense Squadron, Shen-zi
Shen-zi
Group Leader Jialickgonara (Shen-zi) commanding
2xCL, 2xCVE, 2xDD
System Defense Squadron, Zantak
Zantak System
Group Leader Ryl!ck (Zantak) commanding
2xDD, 3xCVE, 3xCT(SC)
Fortress Command
Harbin System: 2xHold-Out Asteroid Fortress, 5xBS3, 7xBS2, 9xBS1, 192xFighters, 35xApin
Masada System: 2xSS, 2xAF(CV), 9xBS4R, 8xBS3, 55xBS2, 354xFighters, 44xApin
Paradise System: 1xSS, 3xBS4, 21xBS3, 402xFighters, 9xApin
Hope System: 3xSS, 3xBS4R
Shen-zi system: 2xSS, 6xBS4R, 6xBS3, 24xBS1, 174xFighters, 18xApin
Trail’s Branching: 5xBS3, 2xBS1, 144xFighters, 15xApin
Zantak System: 2xSS, 6xBS4R, 5xBS3, 16xBS2, 144xFighters, 15xApin
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Continued in Part II.
