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Mars

Sol System

Sector: Jewel Worlds

Capital: Unified Kunlun

Species: Human

Common Languages: Sol Common, Freespeak

Demonyms: Martian

Part of: Sol Alliance

Mars is the fourth planet from Sol, and one of humanity's earliest colonies. Often called “The Red Planet,” it has a surface area the size of Earth's entire landmass. It once had a stable population of several billion people, which was reduced drastically after the man-made disaster known as "Violet Dawn".

Despite its proximity to Earth, during the early years of interstellar colonization Mars was only home to small scientific expeditions and outposts that eked out a meagre existence until the 2200s, when terraforming technology was finally able to slowly reintroduce water and atmosphere to the planet. Currently the atmosphere is breathable but incredibly thin, which makes strenuous efforts outside the arcologies very dangerous. Many regions also suffer from airborne phoron contamination, adding further danger to already hazardous activities outside arcologies.

Until recently an Alliance fleet remained in orbit of Mars at all times, ensuring that the planet remains disarmed and free of armed disputes. Following the so-called “Violet Dawn” explosion in 2462, Mars now finds itself worse-off than ever before; in the wake of an ecological catastrophe and plagued by unrest and violence.

Contents

History

“Students, for our next class on the history of the Interstellar War we will be covering the Martian theater of the conflict. I want you to have the reading completed by Friday – it’s only thirty pages, and it’s been translated into Freespeak by me. Don’t have a synthetic summarize it for you. I’ll know,” – Laurette-079, professor of history, Municipal University of Nouvelle-Rochelle, during the fall 2465 semester.

Early Colonization (2100s - 2190s)

The windy desolation of Mars was far from the ideal colonization opportunity for humanity's first steps into the Spur. Still, with poor conditions on Earth, a societal fervor for exploration and discovery, and its simple proximity, humanity found the appetite for small-scale colonization efforts throughout the 2100s. These efforts would go on to discover immense mineral and fuel reserves beneath the surface of the dusty red marble, sparking further interest and investment in the planet. With the forming of the Sol Alliance in the mid 2100s and the cultural zeitgeist and optimism beginning to reach a crescendo, by 2200 the will to undertake a large-scale terraforming project had reached critical mass and the ever-optimistic Department of Colonization began its attempts to make a "red Gaia.”

Despite these lofty ambitions, Mars did not have the unified populace and shared goals of other colonization efforts; the majority of Martian settlers were either private interests or pre-Alliance national extraction efforts with minimal long-term support originally intended. These colonies, focused primarily on self-sufficiency and Martian resources, were unable to provide the infrastructure, and will, necessary for the Department of Colonization to truly fulfill its goals. Further stymieing the Department was the continual redirection of effort, personnel, and funding towards more promising candidates further away from the Jewel Worlds.

Thus, Mars was mostly left to fend for itself by the nascent Alliance, and its earliest settlers became used to taking care of themselves.

It was not, however, all bleak for Mars. The terraforming efforts showed some promise and its proximity and wealth of resources continued to attract attention; as time passed and the planet became more hospitable, more and more industrialization began occurring on the planet. Power plants, large factory complexes, and gargantuan strip mining facilities were constructed around the earliest colonization sites. As the population grew and the planet needed more workers for its industry, the planet's famous arcologies were built on top of and around the original pioneering outposts. Bright and shining new construction surrounded old, red-caked industrial living facilities with immense support beams tunneling through the ruddy soil to support their new bulk. Despite the lack of care or resources the Alliance as a whole had invested in Mars, the far-away officials of the Department of Colonization expected a booming industrial center in the Jewel Worlds.

History of Terraforming (2190s - 2260)

The terraforming process started during the late part of the 22nd century, with massive terraformers designed to turn Mars’ natural minerals into gasses and legions of civilian workers put into action. The theory behind Martian terraforming was to create an artificial global warming process to rapidly create a usable atmosphere; the method was incredibly slow, expensive, and prone to major errors. Controversial for both its cost and dangers, the terraforming project of Mars is still considered a partial success. It effectively raised Mars' near zero pressure to tolerable levels, and the vast amounts of polarized iron dust - now flowing around the planet's lower orbit - created an electromagnetic shield that protected the Martian populace from harmful radiation until the Violet Dawn catastrophe and even the parts of Mars where the air was thinnest were easily navigable in just thick clothes and face protection.

The Martian World War (2278 - 2284)

Despite lingering and prolific anti-Solarian sentiment among much of the population, Mars' position in the core of the jewel worlds and its dependence on the Solarian Navy - as well as its fractious populace - meant that it was not prepared to openly rebel against the central Alliance government during the Interstellar War. However, anti-Solarian factions in the southern hemisphere known as the Red Coalition began rallying popular and political support based on many, “injustices and wrongs committed by the government against Mars." Long rumored to be backed by the All-Xanu Republic under a top-secret directive known as "Opération Rouge," the Red Coalition seceded from the Sol Alliance in early 2279 and launched a coordinated, surprise attack on the rest of Mars.

The loyalist arcologies - aligning themselves as the Blue Coalition after the Alliance flag and in opposition to the Red Martians - were caught unprepared with the government support they would have relied on occupied fighting to retake the Frontier. The meager forces available to the Blue Coalition other than their own impromptu militias were the 37th Infantry Division (later to become the 37th Martian Mechanized) and the Navy's 228th Garrison Flotilla, mostly consisting of armed civilian ships and ancient vessels. The Red Coalition took this opportunity to seize many lightly defended Alliance outposts early on in the uprising, including several missile platforms equipped with nuclear warheads as Blue forces were forced to dig into the lowlands, turning the former dusty flatlands around their arcologies into bloody killing fields – staining the red fields with Martian blood.

Bogged down by the Blues' resistance, particularly on the Western Front in the arcologies of Babylon and Karla, and unable to break through defensive lines around Crest Olympia, the Reds began to lose ground as regular Solarian Army reinforcements arrived from the broader Alliance, and Solarian Navy vessels began striking their supply lines. In the face of growing losses the leadership of the Red Coalition took desperate measures and chose to use their nuclear arsenal. In 2284, Red command launched a nuclear missile at a nearby Blue arcology of New Dresden in an attempt to turn the tide of the war, destroying it completely, opening the Pandora's Box of nuclear warfare.

The nuclear obliteration of New Dresden caused a fracturing in the Red Coalition, with many arcologies surrendering to the Alliance at the seeming betrayal of Red ideals by their leadership. The rebellion once so close to conquering Mars fractured irreversibly and capitulated within months, and the Treaty of Olympus was signed on 5th of April, 2284, featuring unconditional surrender of remaining Red Coalition states. The Alliance, negotiating on behalf of the loyalist Blue Coalition, used the treaty to place harsh restrictions on the entirety of southern Mars. Any formerly rebellious arcologies were expressly prohibited from maintaining an armed force beyond a light civilian police department, and large, unfruitful crackdowns against separatist sentiment were carried out by the Blues and the Alliance. With the leaders of the Red Coalition executed for treason, the Martian World War had finally come to an end.

The Catastrophe of 2298

The 2298 disaster involved the abrupt failure of Mars' terraforming infrastructure late in the year. Human error caused a widespread meltdown across the sole network responsible for all the terraforming equipment, with the equipment in the southern half of the planet acting in wildly unpredictable ways. The atmosphere was flooded with carbon dioxide that painfully smothered those out in the open unprotected and caused intense, damaging storms that persisted for years after the initial error was rectified. The disaster caused an immense amount of death, suffering, and loss with estimations of the full terraforming process being set back by several decades.

The Martian Terraforming Authority based in Crest Olympia, a blue arcology, launched an investigation and set the blame solely on technicians based in Red Gaia for not properly catching the error after it was made. With the arrest of the Red Gaia technicians and no single originator for the error found, rioting spread throughout the southern Red arcologies and was so vicious that the Solarian Army instituted a crackdown, killing many and injuring many more.

The Violet Dawn Explosion (2462)

On the seventh of November, 2462, an unprecedented disaster came to Mars in the form of the Violet Dawn explosion. Initially an attempt by the Alliance to produce synthetic phoron, the Violet Dawn would be the single most damaging catastrophe for an already beleaguered Mars. Despite minor progress in the field of synthetic phoron, the unfamiliarity of the staff with the material and the cutting-edge research being done resulted in a catastrophic breach of containment as self-replicating phoron, poisonous and flammable, entered the atmosphere and ignited on contact with oxygen. The self-perpetuating firestorms ravaged the planet and resulted in total destruction of the southern hemisphere of Mars, with more fortunate areas merely having toxic phoron particulate contaminate the soil and water. While the official death toll of the disaster is still unclear - and may never be clear - what can be certain is that Violet Dawn was not only the single most devastating loss of life to Mars, but was also among the greatest disasters to occur to the Alliance as a whole. Arcologies and government alike collapsed in the wake of the purple blaze.

Despite dying prior to the disaster, Prime Minister Michael Frost had issued comprehensive orders regarding the Violet Dawn project, and many Navy officers remained loyal to his cause. His orders were that, in the event of a disaster of that scale, Navy ships should not attempt to lend any aid; the predominantly Lunan command structure was often all too happy to oblige. Only a few Navy mavericks were willing to brave the inferno to save their fellow citizens, with many Martians - Red or otherwise - owing their lives to the bravery of the Navy captains. Some officers even ordered their ships into the most contaminated parts of the planet, but while a few were successful in their attempt to rescue their fellow Solarians, many more died as their engines choked and died in the exotic atmosphere.

Despite these few heroes, however, the majority of the Navy ships in Martian orbit were content to let the south of the planet choke and burn in a purple haze, and what remains of the Martian people has not forgotten this betrayal. While the Dawn broke the back of Mars, the people and culture carry on as they attempt to put what remains back together.

After the disaster, Frost's staff ordered those who had defied the late Prime Minister's orders quietly imprisoned and stripped of rank. While many of these individuals would later regain their position after the Frost government had been purged, many more became disillusioned with the Alliance and fled elsewhere.

The Solarian Reunification Campaign (2462 - present)

At the start of May 2464, Solarian forces under the command of Governor-General Tereza Varzieva launched an effort to, “stabilize the planet and restore order to regions outside of the Violet Dawn hazard zone”, thus effectively bringing Mars back under Solarian control. The offensive against the various warring remaining factions -criminal gangs, supply raiders, secessionist forces, scavenger bands, and various other bandit groups - had great success and the sections of Mars outside of the government’s control mostly surrendered or were seized by force within two months, with major Solarian Army operations concluding at the end of June. Arcologies within the Moderate Hazard Zone still face extremely difficult circumstances ranging from environmental hazards, supply shortages, starvation, unrest, and violence. Mars after its violet sunrise struggles onwards, and has adapted to the challenge: scavengers pick over the remains of destroyed arcologies and towns, rural dwellers and daredevils scrape phoron from the ground and the air, then sell what they find to Hephaestus or other corporations. What arcologies remain attempt to press onwards, now with Einstein Engines-produced filtration systems sucking phoron from the air around them.

Environment

A map of Mars immediately following the Violet Dawn explosion. Note that this map displays the wrong capital, as a result of incorrect information received during the Solarian communications blackout.

“It’s drier than a fucking bureaucrat out here. Not a drop of water for miles [both laugh]!” - Unintentionally recorded cockpit conversation between Solarian Army pilots, summer 2465.

One of the first worlds colonized by humanity, Mars’ terraforming was never successfully completed due to budget shortages, internal conflict such as the Martian World War, and simple neglect by the Alliance’s government. It is a dry, desert-like world with a thin but breathable atmosphere known for its temperature variations; with Martian days being cool and Martian nights being lethally cold, limiting the ability of Martians to travel outdoors without appropriate protective equipment, or a vehicle. Mars is known for the Martian dichotomy: the northern hemisphere is mostly dominated by flat, rolling plains while the southern is home to the Martian highlands. Winds — increased dramatically by terraforming efforts — whip down from these highlands into the northern plains, kicking up great dust storms that can persist for days at a time. More recently these winds have brought a new danger: aerial phoron contamination from areas touched by the 2462 Violet Dawn catastrophe.

The surface of Mars is covered in iron-containing dirt, which its winds blow across the northern planes and its highlands. The iron also makes outdoor agriculture infeasible, with metal in the soil often killing any plants long before they grow, and dust contaminating many open water sources. Yet this iron-infused dust is also a source of wealth for many Martians, who harvest the iron using aerial “nets” or sift it out of the surface-level soil. Underground, particularly in the southern hemisphere, rich mines exist for harvesting minerals from the Martian ground, though many have shuttered since Violet Dawn. However, with some having been cut off from broader Mars since the disaster, rumors have begun to circulate that the miners continue to live underground, and now slowly funnel further and further north, seeking to save themselves by their own hands. Some more outlandish theories claim the abandoned miners have formed a parallel society underground, and now plot their revenge against the mostly untouched north.

Mars has two moons: Deimos and Phobos. Both have long served as Solarian Navy outposts with only token civilian populations — mostly the relatives, family, or dependents of military personnel — on them. Known officially as the Martian Orbital Surveillance and Detection Command, or MARORBCOM, most personnel are non-Martians drawn from elsewhere in the Alliance, with specialists from Eris and Dysnomia managing much of the information systems. These facilities were major processing points for refugees from Violet Dawn, and many Martians now living abroad remember passing through their sterile, military hallways under the gazes of non-Martians as they left their planet behind forever.

Despite the harsh and arid environment, many urban areas have developed. This map represents Mars before the Violet Dawn catastrophe.

Economy

“What is built on sand will eventually return to dust.” – Unknown.

Mars' economy was previously developed and mixed, with its largest industries being orbital construction, mining, refining, energy and a small but rapidly growing hydroponics industry. Mars also enjoyed being a center of trade, prior to the catastrophe on its southern pole. In the post-Violet Dawn environment of Mars, the economic state of the planet has shrunk dramatically and is, on many parts of the planet, completely collapsed. Many areas have entirely abandoned traditional Solarian Credits for a barter system and the provisional government, despite its efforts, has made little progress in restoring a once-vibrant economy.

With over half of the planet rendered uninhabitable by the aftermath of Violet Dawn and many of its richest cities - such as Olympia - turned into smoldering ruins heavily contaminated by phoron, much of the Martian economy now lies in literal ruins. Even cities not immediately destroyed by the Violet Dawn explosion have been damaged by it, with trace elements of phoron in the air often sparking flash fires around electronics, previously relied upon water sources contaminated by the same phoron that now causes numerous flash fires around Mars’ remaining arcologies, and the contaminated air chokes the engines of shuttles that once enjoyed easy flights through the low gravity of the planet. The wealthiest - and largest - of the remaining arcologies is now Kunlun, the center of the planet’s official government.

While Mars may have, before Violet Dawn, been known for its energy and orbital construction sectors, the most valuable resource on the planet is now something most residents of the Orion Spur take for granted: water. With the secession of Konyang, one of the Solarian Alliance’s primary providers of fresh water, and the destruction of its southern ice cap along with contamination of open-air water sources by airborne phoron, the water situation on Mars has become quite dire. Einstein Engines has stepped into this market as of 2464 and intends to terraform some areas of Mars to be less contaminated and more readily able to provide clean water and food to those who remain on the planet.

Major Martian Remnants

“I’m gonna die, aren’t I? I’m so cold, and I’m never gonna see home again,” — Rebecca Martins (2440-2462), former resident of Olympus and victim of phoron poisoning, in a hospital in Red Gaia on 09 December, 2462.

Crest Olympia was, until the establishment of the ASSN-PGM government zone, the seat of government on Mars following the immediate aftermath of the Violet Dawn explosion. However the arcology’s status as the most important city on Mars was not to last for long as the capital was shortly transferred to the newly-unified Kunlun. Now, stripped of Sol Alliance patrols and facing a mounting refugee crisis, Crest Olympia struggles to remain a functional arcology in the Martian anarchy. One bright spot in the darkness is the arcology’s good relations with the remaining government forces on Mars, which often send cargo shuttles laden with direly needed humanitarian supplies to its still functional ports.

Red Gaia was, prior to the Violet Dawn catastrophe, an arcology that proudly rejected the Sol Alliance in its official rhetoric. Its government, having witnessed the seeming abandonment of Martians by Sol following the catastrophe, threw open its doors for any and all refugees that could prove their loyalty to Mars above their loyalty to the Alliance. This stance, coupled with the arcology’s almost fanatical dedication to broadcasting it, was disastrous for it. With an extremely overtaxed government, huge overcrowding, and absolutely no outside assistance arriving from other arcologies, Red Gaia, despite its dedication to Martian nationalism, effectively collapsed under its own weight. The arcology surrendered to Solarian Army forces in May, 2464, and was nearly destroyed by rioting following the surrender. The arcology remains heavily patrolled by the Solarian Army, and few believe it will ever reach its former glory.

Unified Kunlun, previously known as Kunlun and Free Kunlun, is the technical capital of Mars and the planetside headquarters of the ASSN-PGM. Both arcologies were torn apart by civil unrest as a result of the Third Tajara Ban and placed under martial law in the days leading up to the Violet Dawn explosion. In a twisted way, this allowed the arcologies to weather the effects of the catastrophe better than perhaps any other arcology on Mars. Unified Kunlun, thanks to its location in the far north of Mars, has no overcrowding or refugee issues and is one of the few locations where shuttles travel freely between space and the Martian surface. If not for the large numbers of Solarian troops in the arcologies, or the fact that most tajara have disappeared to repatriation centers, life would seem almost normal here.