Jack of Harts

We went to space a long time ago.

For a long time, we thought we were alone.

We had three great powers.  The Russians.  The Chinese.  The Western Alliance.

We spread out, colonized new systems.  Sometimes we had a difference of opinion over who owned a colony world.

One of those differences nearly sparked a war.  It would have ended us all.  So we signed the Lunar Treaty, vowing that we would never fight inside the Lunar Orbit.  We would never fight over Earth herself.

Outside the Lunar Orbit, we did some fighting, but it never got real bad.

Then the Peloran made Contact.  Everything changed when they came.  We weren’t alone.  And they helped us get better.  They were real peaceful.

They brought us medicines so we could live longer and better.  A lot longer.  Centuries longer.  With their help, we uplifted animals into full human intelligence.  I grew up in an America where talking dogs was real normal.

Then the Shang came.  They demanded we follow them.  The Chinese did real quick.  I’ve always wondered if the Shang came earlier and prepared them because they picked sides real quick.  The Russians are a bit more complicated.  They chose to side with the Shang, in a manner of speaking.  I think they were just happy to let someone else do the fighting.  We told the Shang to bugger off.  Well, the British did anyways.  Our words were a bit less printable.

In the end, they attacked us.  They hurt us real bad in fact.

We fought back.  The Peloran stood with us.  The Aesiran came in on our side too.

We drove the Shang away.  We survived.

Now, we live free.

We go where we want.  Mostly.  The Chinese and Russians still aren’t friendly of course, so we steer clear of their space.

But the Shang don’t show their faces in our space anymore.

There are a lot of places to go out there.  There’s lots of new people to meet wherever we go.

So we travel and we meet new people.

We like that.