User:NewOriginalSchwann/Sandbox

The flag of the Sovereign Solarian Republic of San Colette.

In what is now the Northern Wildlands and was once the northern half of the Middle and Outer Rings of the Solarian Alliance lies a system located auspiciously on the border between the Outer and Middle Rings, directly at the conflux of the warp gates that allow easy transition between the two. This system, Patria Nueva, contains one inhabitable world, and this world is known as San Colette. The Sovereign Solarian Republic of San Colette is a (now formerly) Solarian nation where many things meet: the Middle and Outer Ring, the Coalition and Alliance, and — now — the forces vying for control of the Northern Wildlands. But the Republic — which was long intended by the Alliance to be a fallback point and redoubt in a theoretical Second Interstellar War — is not without its defenses or, thanks to its still-intact phoron facilities and stockpile, protectors. But with the system now caught between the Solarian Restoration Front and the League, many in the Republic ask themselves a simple question: can San Colette weather the storm which approaches her shores, or will she be swept away like so many others?

History

“To understand the history of the Alliance, one must first understand the history of our Republic,” - President (2405-2413) Valentia Carabello, 2352 - 2454.

Discovery and Interstellar War History

The system of San Colette was first discovered by astronomers from France in 2272, in the years immediately preceding the devastating Interstellar War. Its original discoverers named it after Saint Colette of Corbie, in the hopes that the system would bring about a peaceful future for the then-struggling Alliance. The system was quite desirable for the Alliance as it contained one readily habitable world, San Colette, and a small planet, D’Anzin, with Helium-3 deposits sufficient enough to justify the expensive task of colonization. The Alliance, desperate for money in the midst of the Second Great Depression, sold off the system’s colonization rights in 2274. The rights were purchased by an unexpected source: rather than a nation-state or corporation purchasing the system’s colonization rights an alliance of Spanish and Portuguese business magnates secured the winning bid with seconds on the clock. The magnates – perhaps out of patriotism or perhaps out of a desire to win the economic goodwill of the government while avoiding the true cost of colonization – gifted the rights of colonization to the governments of Spain and Portugal. Before a colonization plan could be created the Interstellar War (2278 - 2287) broke out, effectively dashing the hopes of many of the prospective settlers.

While the initial hope of an Iberian colony faded in the chaos of the Interstellar War and its economic impact, the desire of many in the region was not extinguished. By the 2330s the worst of the economic crisis had faded into the background and Iberia once again prepared to journey to the stars and in 2338 they launched the first colony ships to San Colette, and towards a new future.

The Early Colonial Era

The journey to San Colette took almost two years due to the distance traversed from Earth and the ad-hoc nature of many of the Alliance’s transportation networks, which had been ravaged by both the Interstellar War and the Second Great Depression. As the five colony ships sent to San Colette traveled across the breadth of the Alliance one of the scientists aboard the lead ship, Doctor Ernesto Castrejon, observed the sorry state of the Alliance’s warp network. Doctor Castejon was, at the time, a scientist of little importance simply sent to assist in the construction of a theoretical warp gate for San Colette which would connect it to the broader Alliance. But as the journey dragged on and Ernesto became increasingly irate, he began to form a greater idea which would transform the broader Alliance. At long last, in 2340, the first colonists arrived in the system of San Colette, ready to begin the immense undertaking of colonizing a new world for the Alliance.

These colonists who landed on San Colette found, as the reports had suggested, an Earthlike world with a pleasant, if somewhat dry, climate. The first colonists to land found themselves on the coast of the largest of San Colette’s three major continents, overlooking a vast blue sea on one side and kilometer after kilometer of grassy, fertile flatlands on the other. The colonists, ecstatic at the good fortune, decided upon a historical name for what would become their capital city: Nueva Isabela. Over time Nueva Isabela would grow and become the primary agricultural and political hub of the fledgling colony as the other four colony ships formed similar settlements. In the far north of its largest continent the settlement of Montblanc was formed, which would become its technological hub. Across the sea from Nueva Isabela the settlement of Porto de Ouro was established, later becoming a major hub for off-world travel. The settlements of Vila Nova de Norte – the most northern major settlement on the planet and one of the few able to function year-round despite the poles’ snowstorms – and Nuevo Villaviciosa – an industrial center located at the mouth of a major river – were both founded on the same continent, the smallest of the three. The five original cities of San Colette would go on to become its hubs, and still dominate its economy today.

Within a decade San Colette had established itself as a young, though quite productive, colony. Helium-3 mining on D’Anzin kept its budget in check and a warp gate, first completed in 2344, ensured shipments of materials were never long in reaching the new colony. But for one man, who had now been promoted to the lead scientist in charge of the Coletter warp gate, it was not enough. What Doctor Castejon had in mind was far greater than one planet, one warp gate, and Helium-3 mining. The doctor had turned his mind towards the future and realized something: with San Colette’s position, which straddled the line between the Middle and Outer Rings, it had a unique opportunity to establish itself as the main point of transit between both rings. Doctor Castejon intended to turn San Colette into a transportation hub, and to transform its economy in the process.

The Warp Gate Project

Doctor Castejon took his idea for a warp gate network in the northern section of the Alliance to the then-governor of San Colette, Beatriz Rada, in 2449. What happened behind the closed doors of the governor’s residence may never be truly known, but both Governor Rada and Doctor Castejon left the meeting with a drive to see the project realized. Following six years of debate, backroom dealings, and extensive political maneuverings the Warp Gate Project – the largest project undertaken by the Alliance – was approved by the Solarian government, and the majority of the construction contracts were awarded to Einstein Engines. Governor Rada and Doctor Castejon had achieved their dream: to make San Colette the largest point of transit between the Middle and Outer Rings, and to bring immense wealth to it in the process.

But there was a catch to this deal. Despite the efforts of Rada and Castejon they were unable to proceed without the support of one of the Alliance’s most significant forces: the Navy, which had become even more powerful in the aftermath of the Interstellar War. The Navy demanded oversight of the project in San Colette’s system itself and the ability to take “reasonable precautions,” in designing a defense for San Colette. The Coletter delegation attempted to protest but rapidly found themselves shut down by the Naval delegation and, surprisingly, the Alliance’s central government. With its economy and prestige battered and bruised by the Interstellar War the civilian government of the Alliance was, at best, unwilling to argue with the Navy and often deferred to it – a trend which would continue into the 25th century, with devastating consequences.

The Navy’s demands for its support were deceptively simple on paper, and only contained one requirement: that San Colette be designated a “fallback point,” for any future conflict with the Coalition. This simple requirement would go on to define San Colette due to the factors required to meet the Navy’s standards for its fallback point. First: A large stockpile – fuel, weaponry, and assorted equipment – would have to be assembled, designated, and placed in the system. Second: Fortifications would have to be constructed to hold off the Coalition for an extended period and the Navy, rather than San Colette, would be the final judge of what constituted enough fortifications to hold off the Coalition from San Colette. Third: A local military, which San Colette had nothing resembling, would have to be formed to man the defenses and secure the system. The gravity of what would have to be done to fulfill this demand, and the impact it would have on the system’s budget, almost immediately caused a crisis in the government which only ended when the Alliance, along with the Navy, promised to subsidize much of the work. But despite the Alliance and Navy’s funding the project remained daunting and would date years, if not decades. Further negotiations ensured San Colette would not have to finish the defenses before the warp gates were built, but they were required to start as soon as possible.

In 2356, following a short period of internal debate regarding the practicality of the Navy’s demands, the warp gate project began in San Colette in earnest. By 2457 the first gate – which connected San Colette to Callisto, another Alliance member state chosen for the Warp Gate Project – opened, and equipment for the creation of additional gates began to flow from the Sol System to San Colette. Gate after gate opened over the following years, bringing more materials and more wealth to San Colette. The gate network brought new industries to San Colette beyond its previous exports, which had mostly consisted of foodstuffs from San Colette itself and Helium-3 mined on D’Anzin. This economic diversification was also driven in part by desperation, as the Navy now required much of the system’s He3 production to be stored for a theoretical emergency. A local shipbuilding industry which specialized in ships designed to work in San Colette itself, rather than traveling abroad, formed as a result of the influx of trade goods. Most importantly for San Colette’s future a local artificial intelligence industry began to grow in the late 2360s. While Colettish AI would never reach the level of sophistication of IPCs on Konyang due to being based upon indigenous AI designs instead of Glorsh-derived designs, it would become very effective at carrying out the tasks needed to run dozens of warp gates in a singular system. One of the tasks commonly assigned to Colettish AI was the identifying of ships in the system and determining their destinations, which would later prove itself to be of stunning importance.

But the demands of the Navy never left the mind of the inhabitants of the system and, in 2362, work began on the first of what would eventually become four lines of defense of San Colette. The “Rock of San Colette,” as it would become known, was designed to fulfill the Navy’s demands while not destroying San Colette’s budget. At the time of its completion in 2398 the Rock consisted of a series of armed space installations. But this was not enough for the Navy and the government of San Colette was sent back to the drawing board. To the Rock was added the Tools and Field of San Collette, which would become the second and first layers of San Colette’s defensive lines. The Field itself was self-explanatory: a large section of space on the edge of the system was designated as a stellar minefield and filled with a variety of anti-vessel mines. Built from 2375 to 2405, the Tools consist of a ring of automated defenses built using Colettish AI.

While the Navy was relatively content with San Colette’s defenses there remained the matter of training and equipping a local military arm to defend San Colette in the event of a dire emergency. In 2356 the Civil Guard of the Sovereign Solarian Republic of San Colette, or simply the Civil Guard, was founded in response to the Navy’s demands. The Civil Guard, over the next few decades, proved to be a competent and relatively well-equipped force. Its size remained relatively small due to the Guard’s focus on defensive readiness and automated weapons, but constant funding ensured it was never free of willing volunteers. A sense of patriotic duty related to the Civil Guard also began to slowly develop and many Coletters began to view service in it as a way to seize some of their military autonomy back from the Solarian Navy, which had become increasingly unpopular due to its demands.

The Discovery of Phoron

By the early 2400s San Colette had become a beacon of economic stability in the outer Alliance, and served as a hub for trade flowing from much of the northern Spur into the Alliance. In 2402 it was officially declared to be the Sovereign Solarian Republic of San Colette, finally shedding its colonial roots and ascending as a full Solarian member state. As the first decade of the 25th century came to a close the Republic had one of the highest standards of living in the Middle and Outer Rings thanks to its status as a trade hub. But the relationship between the Navy and Republic remained poor and efforts by the Civil Guard to further expand their capabilities were often frustrated by the Navy. In 2415 the Navy-Guard relationship reached a new low when the Guard’s ships were banned from possessing warp engines capable of traveling without a gate, despite the protests of the Republic.

But these protests were soon drowned out in 2417 by the discovery of phoron in the system of Biesel. Coletters, ever poised to increase the prominence of their Republic, rapidly managed to carve out a niche in the growing phoronics industry by establishing processing facilities for the fuel on the surface of D’Anzin. Unused and neglected Einstein facilities were rapidly bought up by the government and converted into facilities which turned inert phoron crystals into a usable form, which was then sold to actors across the Orion Spur. Colettish facilities, while they would not reach the output of Tau Ceti, became an important link in the phoron economy between Tau Ceti and much of the outer Alliance and inner Coalition. Trade to the Coalition was initially severely protested by the Navy, and required the addition of phoron to the Colettish strategic reserve in order to appease them.

The addition of a phoronics industry to the system brought the wealth of the Republic to new levels as the 25th century progressed. The Civil Guard was equipped with domestic ship designs for the first time, another layer — the Spears of the Saint, a series of fifteen massive orbital railguns — was added to the Republic’s defenses at the Navy’s insistence, and a local arms industry began to develop in response to growing fears concerning the Solarian government’s seeming unwillingness to assist more distance colonies such as the Republic. Perhaps most importantly the AI industry of San Colette continued to develop, with more and more deadly semi-autonomous drones being created for the defense of San Colette. While skrellian dignitaries were sometimes quick to point out the dangers of such weapons, Republic officials dissuaded them by noting their semi-autonomous nature required a human hand to guide them and make final decisions, and explaining the designs — unlike typical IPCs — were based on human algorithms and technology.

The phoronics boom lasted until the early 2460s. By 2461 the flow of phoron gradually began to slow and many facilities opted to limit their production or entirely cease their operations. Some blamed it on NanoTrasen, which had long had a poor relationship with the Republic, while others claimed the decreasing flow was due to Elyran isolationism. Throughout 2461 and into 2462 the Republic stockpiled more and more phoron, hoping it would be able to slowly release fuel from its strategic reserve in order to preserve their economy during what many viewed as an incoming fuel crisis.

Unfortunately, few could anticipate how grim the crisis would become as 2462 neared its end and many families in the Republic prepared for Christmas.

The Solarian Collapse

Coletters often argue over when the Solarian Collapse truly became unavoidable. Some argue that the Clandestine Incident of 24 October, 2462 — which many in the Republic believe was carried out deliberately by Biesel — marked the start of the end. Others believe the end truly began on 07 November, 2462, when Mars ceased responding to interstellar communications. Or perhaps it was on 11 November, 2462, when the Prime Minister was found dead in his suite. But most argue the Collapse was truly, irreversibly set to happen on 17 November, 2462, when forces from the 58th Fleet opened fire on fellow Solarians. This, to most in the Republic, marked the decisive turning point.

Mere days after this, on 20 November, 2462, the Collapse came to the Republic. The garrison fleet stationed in San Colette, the 67th Fleet, attempted to seize the system for itself. The 67th Fleet, much like its Konyanger counterpart — the 58th — was a smaller fleet loyal more to its admiral, Frederich Müller, than the Solarian government. Admiral Müller demanded the civilian government surrender and hand over the phoron stockpile to him. They refused, and the Battle of San Colette began between the Civil Guard and the 67th Fleet. The Civil Guard and San Colette’s defenses, aided by deserters from the 67th and a home field advantage, eventually routed the 67th and chased them from the system at little cost to themselves. But, due to their inability to pursue them, the 67th was eventually able to find its way to New Atlantica, where its remnants formed the basis of the Anti-Corporate League.

With the defeat of the 67th Fleet the immediate danger had passed for the Republic. However, the chaos of the Solarian Collapse was far from over and during the final two months of 2462 chaos reigned throughout the region San Colette called home. To its galactic west Konyang seceded and the Anti-Corporate League filled the vacuum left by the collapse of Solarian authority in the region. To its east Lycoris, which had at one point helped build the Colettish warp gate network, fell to the Solarian Restoration Front, which began to brutally purge all non-humans from its territory. Solarian fleets collapsed entirely, defected, resorted to piracy, and sometimes became roaming mercenary bands. Refugees began to flow into the Republic from both sides, and the systems around San Colette — many of them too small or otherwise unable to maintain their own fleets — looked to it for aid and some form of protection in this desperate time.

In January 2463 the Republic answered the call of its neighbors by forming a defensive Alliance known as the Middle Ring Shield Pact. The Pact, unfortunately, quickly ran into problems. Many of its systems, while wealthy, were reliant on the Solarian Navy for protection prior to the Collapse and had no appreciable navies of their own. Most, aside from San Colette, additionally suffered from high degrees of megacorporate domination in their local economies. None had the defenses of San Colette and the Civil Guard was unable to patrol every system vying for membership due to its small size and lack of independent warp engines. Even worse was the economic situation: many gates into Sol itself had been damaged or otherwise closed during the months of the Collapse and the businesses of the Republic now had a desperate need to find new markets before an economic meltdown began.

Salvation would arrive later in January in an unusual form: the former 5th Middle Ring Battlegroup, now better known as the Free Solarian Fleets, under the command of Fleet Admiral van der Rensburg. The mercenaries of the Fleets were tempted by the Republic with a rare prize: phoron from its stockpile and a port to call home. The current President of the Republic, Maribel Sarmiento, and van der Rensburg have a very amiable relationship but many in the Republic — particularly in its Civil Guard — know the loyalty of the Fleets, despite the privileges granted to them, only goes as deep as the Republic’s pockets. Whether they will stand and fight against the enemies of the Pact remains a matter of great concern, particularly for those beyond the reach of San Colette’s defenses.

Resolving the economic crisis caused by the Collapse was simpler than many in the Pact and Republic originally expected. With the collapse of Solarian authority in what became the Corporate Reconstruction Zone, much of the food supply line was interrupted and a new need for weaponry emerged. San Colette, stripped of many of its more high-end export routes, has fallen back onto exporting two mainstays of humanity to the CRZ via Tau Ceti in the meantime: foodstuffs and weaponry. By summer 2463 the economic crisis was resolved. However the necessity to maintain good trade relations with Biesel has led to the SRF and League becoming more vitriolic in their rhetoric towards the Pact, but what can one do? To trade with the Alliance means trade must go through the SRF, and to trade with the Coalition one must go through the League. Coletters have thus been forced into an awkward, perhaps temporary, economic relationship with Biesel.

As the Republic looks forwards towards what many in its view as an inevitable, existential war against its regional rivals in the Northern Wildlands, many in it dread what the future may hold. While it maintains a better standard of living than most of the Wildlands — and a significant amount of the frontier — it remains teetering on a knife’s edge, pressed between two warlord states which despise it and forced to trade with a corporate state which desires to dominate it. The Republic and its people must chart a steady course through the waves of the Collapse, or be swamped and drown in it.

Environment

“Oh, San Colette! My homeland so fair! The land of our own, and no others compare!” - Excerpt from the Anthem of the Sovereign Solarian Republic of San Colette (2408)

The System of San Colette

The system of San Colette consists of four major stellar bodies including its star, Nueva Hispaniola. The nearest stellar body to Nuevo Hispaniola is a small and barren planet known as San Felipe. Due to its closeness to the star San Felipe is entirely uninhabitable and its only man-made features are a neglected series of solar power facilities built by Einstein Engines during the Warp Gate Project which exist both in the orbit of San Felipe and on its surface. The rusting hulks of these facilities are occasionally used for target practice by the Civil Guard but otherwise rarely receive visitors due to their proximity to Nuevo Hispaniola and the presence of unexploded firing range munitions aboard them.

Further out from Nuevo Hispaniola lies the temperate world of San Colette, where the vast majority of the system’s population can be found. San Colette’s surface is defined by its three large continents and large ice cape at its poles. The planet is remarkably hospitable and relatively Earthlike, with no major meteorological phenomena occurring on its surface. It has one natural satellite, San Colette Minor. The moon of San Colette is a barren rock without any major settlements. Scattered Civil Guard facilities and private mining platforms can be seen across its surface. But no reasonable Coletter would describe San Colette Minor as their home.

Thousands of miles beyond San Colette, towards the edge of its system, lies the frozen planet of D’Anzin. The thick layers of ice and rock which cover the surface of D’Anzin are rich in deposits of Helium-3, the fuel which powers the warp gates of the Republic. For nearly as long as humans have called the system home there have been mining operations on the surface of D’Anzin and the planet is covered in a variety of mines, in various states of repair and functionality, as a result. Recently D’Anzin had become home to a new form of energy production: phoronics. The planet’s remote location and lack of large settlements has made it the ideal location to process raw phoron into usable fuel, and all of the Republic’s processing facilities can be found on D’Anzin itself or in its orbit.

Beyond the orbit of D’Anzin and the massive warp gates near it lies the Colettish Belt, a sizable ring of asteroids which surrounds the system. Asteroids and comets found in the Belt contain little of value and much of the Belt itself is designated as a restricted military zone due to the presence of the Republic’s second layer of defense: the Tools of the Saint. Automated defenses are scattered throughout the Belt and wandering into it, or deliberately tampering with the defenses, often results in injury, death, or time in a prison on San Colette. The extent to which the Belt is fortified remains a secret of the Republic few are aware of.

The Planet of San Colette

The climate of San Colette is temperate and relatively Earthlike, which helped ease its colonization. Its surface is defined by three continents — Maria, Nueva Norte, and Morro — separated by large seas and covered in a variety of climates. The planet’s poles are covered in ice caps which have shrunk following colonization by an insignificant amount, and San Colette Minor provides enough of a gravitational pull to create a system of tides. San Colette is relatively free of freak meteorological phenomena and has four seasons which roughly correspond to their earthbound counterparts.

Regions

The continent of Maria is the largest of the three and is home to the capital of Nueva Isabela and the industrial center of Montblanc, which is in its more northern regions. Maria is easily divided into two major regions: a large, grassy flatland called the Colettish Plains known for its rich soil which has long been the agricultural heartland of San Colette and the more northern forests of Cristobal. The Colettish Plains are home to Nueva Isabela and are dotted by many smaller towns, ranging from cities of thousands to villages of mere hundreds. It is separated from Cristobal by the uncreatively named Northern Range, a old and quite short mountain range which bisects the continent and is home to many mining operations. Cristobal is colder and criss-crossed by various rivers, eventually transitioning into taiga and then polar ice in its north. Montblanc, a Colettish industrial center, sits at the mouth of one of these rivers, which allows it to easily receive minerals from the Range and lumber from further inside Cristobal.

Across the sea from Maria, to its west, lies the mostly unpopulated continent of Morro. The continent is dominated by a large, arid scrubland known as the Hinterlands which often suffers from droughts and fires. It is home to the settlement of Porto de Ouro, which is unique among San Colette’s major settlements as it mostly lies off of the shore of Morro on a series of island chains — some natural and some artificial. The flat planes near it have been mostly cleared of plant life by Coletters and now serve as a major offworld hub. Much of Morro is poorly explored aside from satellite photography and rumors of mineral wealth have long motivated expeditions into it — though few return with much of value.

The third, and smallest, of the continents is Nuevo Norte, a highly-populous region home to two major settlements. Nuevo Norte is the furthest north of the three continents and is mostly defined by taiga and tundra, though some regions in its south are more hospitable. In its far north lies Vila Nova de Norte, a scientific hub which is known for its freezing temperatures and frequent snowstorms. Vila Nova stands on the edge of a large, flat tundra known as the Guard’s Tundra due to its use as a proving ground for Civil Guard weaponry. To the south of the continent in one of its few temperate regions is Nuevo Villaviciosa, the planet’s major shipbuilding center. Nuevo Villaviciosa is one of the few locations in the Middle Ring to feature a functional space elevator, which lies slightly offshore and is visible from almost anywhere on Nuevo Norte.

Life on San Colette

“I swear to defend the Republic, its people, and its values at any cost. I will uphold the values of freedom enshrined in our constitution, even if it costs me my life.” - Except from the Colettish Oath taken by Civil Guard personnel prior to beginning training.

The culture and daily life of a typical Coletter is informed by both the planet’s past as a planet settled by the nations of Iberia and its more recent history as a trade hub for the broader Alliance. Coletters value familial bonds, duty to the Republic, and are often seen as friendly and outgoing people by the broader Alliance. Coletters are known to be very talkative abroad and often stand very close to their conversation partners, which can result in some awkward encounters for those unused to Colettish conversation customs.

To a typical Coletter familial bonds are very important, and several generations of the same family will often live very close to one another — occasionally even in the same house! Holidays are viewed as a chance to catch up with one’s family and, prior to the Collapse, Coletters abroad would often return home for major holidays even as the cost of travel increased due to the phoron crisis. These holiday celebrations are often accompanied by the traditional dance of San Colette: the flamenco.

One of the key cultural tenets of Colettish life is a sense of duty to the Republic which has been ingrained in Colettish culture for several generations. Initially starting as a reaction to the anger many felt at the Solarian Navy, this feeling has helped cement the Civil Guard as a key cultural pillar of the Republic. Enlistment, particularly enrolling as an officer, is seen as a prestigious duty and many middle class Coletter families will try to enroll at least one child into the Civil Guard. In many Colettish households it is a common sight to see a photo of a relative in the uniform of the Civil Guard placed prominently on a wall or above a fireplace.