Disclaimer: Any material that could potentially be considered infringement of copyrights and trademarks should be considered the property of their respective creators or owners and you are reading this of your own freewill, so please refrain from doing so if you don't like graphic violence, explicit sexuality, pop culture references, vulgar language, polygamous relationships, random plot twists, character deaths, snakes, arranged marriages, or usage of drugs. Of course, some of those things may not even end up in the story, but I'd rather be better safe than sorry. Also, I tend to give cannon the proverbial finger.
Story Notes: This is a work-in-progress plot blurb without a definite direction for the plot as of now, so I'm perfectly open to suggestions. Reviews containing constructive criticism and praise will certainly speed up the updating; flames make my ego spontaneously implode with my muse following close behind, so try and refrain from that if you can. I'm writing this to flex my creative side and refine my writing, so don't be surprised if entire chapters get completely changed after they're initially uploaded. There are many clichés and stereotypes in fanfiction because it's been around for so long; I try for originality in my own way, and will likely give a shout-out to whatever other story gave me a basic idea or concept, though I've been reading for a long time and will likely forget where something came from.
Side Notes: This chapter is entirely comprised of a timeline, codex entries, and author notes. The actual narrative will begin on the next chapter.
1961 CE: Captain Carl Bell of the United States Space Agency became the first human in space. This claim is disputed by both the Soviet Union and China. Captain Bell's flight in Space Capsule Defiance 7 lasted twelve minutes and seven seconds, and made a full revolution around the Earth. Bell died when the capsule crashed on its return to Earth.
1965 CE: By this year, the United States is divided into thirteen commonwealths; each of which encompasses several states. The national flag is changed to reflect this and depicts fourteen stars - thirteen in a circle to represent the commonwealths and one in the middle to represent the federal government and the nation as a whole.
1969 CE: The Virgo II Lunar Lander Valiant 11 with USA astronauts Captain Richard Wade, Captain Mark Garris, and Captain Michael Hagen lands on Luna. The astronauts become the first humans to walk on a celestial body other than Earth.
2037 CE: The Mister Handy series of robots is first brought to market as a general construction and maintenance unit by General Atomics International.
2052 CE: The socially transmitted 'New Plague' arises, killing tens of thousands. The United States closes its borders and the first-ever national quarantine is declared. The source of the plague is unknown, but rumors persist that it is a genetically engineered weapon. West Tek starts working on a new virus to kill the New Plague, using information provided by their parent company, Tricell.
2055 CE: In light of the European-Middle Eastern War and the plague scare, the United States officially sets Project Safehouse in motion. The project, financed by junk bonds, is designed to create shelters, called Vaults, for the populace in the event of a nuclear war or deadly plague. Construction begins late in 2054 and proceeds rapidly due to advances in construction technology.
2057 CE: The first artificial intelligence is born. Limited by memory constraints, its expansion is rapidly halted. The discovery paves the way for future A.I. research in laboratories throughout the United States.
2059 CE: The Anchorage Front Line is established, as the United States increases its military presence in Alaska to protect its oil interests. The Anchorage Front Line causes tensions between the United States and Canada, as the United States attempts to pressure Canada into allowing American military units to guard the Alaskan pipeline.
2060 CE: Traffic on the streets of the world stops moving. Fuel becomes too precious to waste on automobiles, so alternatives are explored - electric and fusion cars begin to be manufactured, but factories can only make limited amounts while conserving fuel. The US economy teeters on bankruptcy. Pressure on fusion research increases.
2063 CE: The construction of most Vaults is completed, except for Vault 13, whose construction finally gets off the ground heralding a development cycle that seems plagued with problems. Drills begin in the other cities with completed Vaults, but the increasing frequency of the drills has a 'cry wolf' effect, and the turnouts for drills trickle off as the years go on.
2065 CE: Shortages of food occur around the world, and riots for this precious commodity begin breaking out in major cities all across the world. With the world's resources getting dangerously close to depletion, many governments and corporations begin scrambling to explore and colonize space. The National Guard makes use of Sentry Bots to quell the riots.
2066 CE: Increasing need for mobility in the United States mechanized cavalry leads the military to focus the efforts on creating a man-based tank; essentially, a two-legged walking armored unit: power armor. Several prototypes are developed, many of which prove to be unworkable in the field. These prototypes pave the way for future advances in military, construction, and fusion technology.
Spring: As the oil resources dry up across the globe, China's fossil fuel dependency causes an energy crisis in the nation. China, bordering on collapse, becomes more aggressive in its trade talks with the United States. The United States' unwillingness to export oil to China leads to a breakdown in talks between the two countries.
Summer: Adding further insult to the Sino-American relations, the first crude fusion cell is unveiled, one of the results of the power armor project. Devices designed for the fusion cell begin to be manufactured. Incorporating fusion power into the general US infrastructure begins, but the process is too slow to supply power to the regions that need it. Nearly eleven years later, few sections of the United States were supplied with fusion power.
Winter: China invades Alaska. The Anchorage Front Line becomes a true battleground. As a sign of increasing tension between the two countries, Canada proves reluctant to allow American troops on Canadian soil or allow American planes to fly over Canadian airspace. American and Canadian tensions rise, but Canada eventually backs down, and US troops pass through Canada.
2067 CE: The first suit of T-45d power armor is deployed in Alaska. While lacking the full mobility of future versions, this power armor is incredibly effective against Chinese tanks and infantry. Its ability to carry heavy ordnance becomes key in various localized conflicts, and it has the power to destroy entire towns without endangering the wearer. China rushes to create its own versions, but they are many years behind the United States.
2069 CE: Canada begins to feel the pressure from the United States military as the US draws upon Canadian resources for the war effort. Vast stretches of timberland are destroyed, and other resources in Canada are stretched to the breaking point. Many Americans refer to Canada as Little America, and Canadian protests are unheard.
2070 CE: Billionaire Victor Manswell of Ultor Incorporated, frustrated with the pace of official human space exploration, begins funding his own private spaceflight expedition.
2072 CE: The United States' increasing demand for Canadian resources causes protests and riots in several Canadian cities. An attempted sabotage of the Alaskan pipeline is all the military needs as an excuse to finalize its annexation of Canada.
2073 CE: As China becomes increasingly aggressive with their use of biological weapons, the United States government felt that a countermeasure was needed. The Pan-Immunity Virion Project is officially formed and plans are made to begin experiments at the West Tek Research Facility in Southern California, before being moved to the Mariposa Military Base.
2074 CE: Negotiations between the US and other world powers come to a dramatic end, with the president walking out of oil talks with the other world powers. After a much heated debate, the president stormed out of the meeting and declared that the last known supply of petroleum will be used exclusively by the US and the US will not sell or trade any oil to outside parties.
2075 CE: The Manswell Expedition successfully launches from Earth en route to the Alpha Centari system with 300 colonists aboard in cryogenic stasis. It also boasts multiple GECK's and numerous robots to help with colonization. Contact is lost soon after.
2077 CE: FEV Research is leaked to the world through an unknown source. Protests arise in many major cities and governments around the world, as well as accusations that the US was responsible for the New Plague. FEV is seen as the threat, and serves only to fuel tensions. The governments of the world fear what the US is up to. Speculating anything from trying to make a breed of super soldier, to trying to make Hitler's master race, they begin to panic.
2078 CE: The Nuclear Apocalypse occurs. The first effects of radiation are seen in the survivors. Widespread mutations occur with animals and humans alike. Those that survive the effects of the mutations are permanently changed. New species are created almost overnight.
2102 CE: Richard Grey's expedition finds the Mariposa Military Base and is summarily scattered and defeated by the mutant inhabitants. Grey is knocked into one of the vats of FEV by a robotic arm. Richard Grey, now horribly mutated by the virus, crawls from the vat, covered with FEV and in terrible pain. Richard Grey begins to acclimate to his condition, and begins his first tests of animals by exposing them to FEV. These experiments and his growing awareness lay the foundation for his plans for the Unity and the master race. He takes the name 'the Master'.
2141 CE: The Vault Dweller is born. He is most famous for defeating the Master and his super mutant army, helping Shady Sands grow into the New California Republic, founding the small village of Arroyo.
2189 CE: The New California Republic (NCR) is voted into existence as a sprawling federation of five states: Shady Sands, Los Angeles, John Maxson, Hub and Dayglow. The Enclave resumes work on various Prewar technologies, including power armor variations. None of these are much of an improvement over the conventional old power armor, and some are actually worse.
2221 CE: The Chosen One is born. He is most famous for repairing the AI Skynet in the Sierra Army Depot, defeated the New Khans gang and struck a deal with the freed locals to bolster the NCR, thwarted the plans of the Enclave to rid the wasteland of 'impure' humanity, and formed the settlement of New Arroyo with the help of the old Arroyo tribals and Vault 13 dwellers. New Arroyo joins the NCR eventually.
2235 CE: The Enclave experiments on Deathclaws, attempting to create special fighting units for waging war in hostile environments. Enclave scientists and chemical corps scour the remains of Mariposa, while assault squads comb the desert for slaves they can use to excavate the military base and get to the FEV vats.
2240 CE: An Enclave team of researchers, physicists, and mathematicians working in secret developed the Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine, a practical means of propelling spacecraft across vast interstellar distances. This new engine allowed ships to tunnel into 'Slipspace'. Slipspace is a domain with alternate physical laws, allowing faster-than-light travel without relativistic side-effects. Faster-than-light travel is not instantaneous; 'short' jumps routinely take up to two months, and 'long' jumps can last six months or more.
2255 CE: The Warrior, a tribal initiate into the Midwestern splinter group of the Brotherhood of Steel, infiltrates Vault 0 into the Cheyenne Mountain Complex in Colorado. There, he battles a supercomputer connected to several human brains that is controlling an army of robots hellbent on erasing all forms of life on the planet. After crushing one of the brains, the Warrior offers up his own, and ends up taking over the supercomputer and robot army for the good of the Brotherhood.
2256 CE: The Unified Central Republic (UCR) sees new laws that are strictly enforced by the newly bolstered Brotherhood; laws that ease humanity back into civilized life through total unification. Discrimination is outlawed and many prejudices are eliminated and soon forgotten as the task at hand becomes apparent; humans, ghouls, super mutants and deathclaws all work together to begin transforming the wastelands into a post nuclear utopia. The combined knowledge of the Brotherhood and Calculator's databases are a powerful tool for reshaping the world and no time is wasted. Technology is slowly re-introduced into the land; irrigation systems are established bringing water to the barren soils for the first time in decades.
2277 CE: The Wanderer activates Project Purity and brings clean and free water to the people of the Capital Wasteland. He also comes across a mutant tree and increases its rate of germination, saves the slaves of the Pitt and increases their resistance to radiation, and writes the Wasteland Survival Guide with the help of Moira Brown. With the help of an East Coast contingent of the Brotherhood of Steel, forms the Capital Trade Federation (CTF) and sweeps over the Capital Wasteland, the Commonwealth, Point Lookout, Ronto, and the Pitt.
2281 CE: The Courier, fair and even-handed in her dealings throughout the Wasteland, was honored by the NCR for her support of the military at Hoover Dam. she was presented with the Golden Branch, the highest civilian decoration given by the Republic. She discovered the Sierra Madre casino and used its incredible wealth to help the NCR war effort, saved the New Canaanites of Zion and got them to pledge allegiance to NCR, and saves the Big Mountain Think Tank and gets them working for the NCR.
2285 CE: The NCR, UCR, and CTF finally discover each other when their rapidly expanding borders meet. After a skirmish between the Courier and Wanderer, all three nations agree to form a peaceful trade alliance with each other, and all adopt the UCR's policies on mutated beings.
2287 CE: A joint task force of people from both the NCR and CTF infiltrate Enclave remnants in Topeka, Kansas. They discovered intelligent Deathclaws beyond the hairy variety and Super Mutants capable of sexual reproduction, as well as schematics for the Vertibird and Hellfire Armor. They also came across a spacecraft equipped with the Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine, several Garden of Eden Creation Kits (GECK's), a nuclear fusion reactor capable of fueling the craft, and a veritable army of robots as a source of cheap labor.
2289 CE: The American nations are contacted by various other nations that have risen up after the Nuclear Apocalypse such as the Holy Brittannian Empire, The Fourth Reich, the New Soviet Republic, the People's Republic of China, which survived the Nuclear Apocalypse due to their enormous population, and the Empire of Japan. All of these new countries join together into the United Earth Nations. Policies on intelligent Deathclaws and Super Mutants are assimilated into all the nations of the world.
2290 CE: The Wanderer and Courier get married, and the nuptials are celebrated all over the world by anyone that ever met either important historical figure: they were clearly made for each other.
2292 CE: The United Earth Nations sends the spacecraft discovered in Kansas City to Mars, betting all their time and effort on the colony being a success. Upon arrival, the colonists and robots on board immediately began terraforming the planet with GECKs, creating an agrarian community that rivaled Prewar Earth in beauty. The city of Lowell is founded, and thrives under the supervision of the UEN.
2295 CE: Mothership Zeta is discovered floating just outside the atmosphere, and another of the Lone Wanderer's adventures are discovered and largely publicized. The technology of the ship is salvaged, leading to advances in cryogenic stasis, genetic engineering, automated manufacturing and production, energy weapon and shield technology, and computer systems. This also made it readily apparent that Humans weren't alone in the cosmos, allowing paranoia to spread amongst the colonists.
2300 CE: The Enclave ship makes trips between Mars and Earth once a month, for years, bringing more and more people to the largely red planet. More ships are created based on the technology of the Enclave, Think Tank, Calculator, and Mothership Zeta, allowing an even faster rate of transferal between the planets.
2307 CE: The first Artificial Intelligence after the Great War is created through unorthodox means: the AI matrix is actually created by sending electric bursts through the neural pathways of a Human brain which are then replicated in a superconducting nano-assemblage in a process known as Cognitive Impression Modeling. This destroys the original brain tissue however, and so the brain being used could only be obtained after the host had died.
2315 CE: A mysterious electrical surge occurs on Mars, granting all robots on the world sapience. The United Earth Nations decide to offer the robots citizenship to their member countries, and are graciously accepted in their offer. The robots begin taking control of their own production and maintenance, allowing future generations of automatons to also be granted sapience.
2350 CE: The population on Mars surpasses that of Earth, and the city of Lowell becomes the center of Human/Ghoul/Super Mutant/Deathclaw civilization. The United Earth Nations are re-purposed into the United Nations Space Command to honor the fact that Earth no longer plays a prominent role in Human affairs. (For reference, the Wanderer is 91 years old.)
2390 CE: The colonization of the Inner Colonies was fully underway. There were 21 human-occupied worlds in various stages of terraforming, and the population burden across human-controlled space was largely stabilized.
2468 CE: The outer colony of Harvest is founded, becoming the 17th UNSC colony and the farthest that colonists have been from Earth. The Tiara space station is constructed.
2490 CE: Expansion continued at a rapid pace, and human space encompassed more than 80 worlds throughout the Orion Arm of the Milky Way, all of which were fairly well-tamed planetary strongholds. Outward expansion continued, and the Inner Colonies become a political and economic stronghold, though they relied heavily on raw materials supplied by the Outer Colonies. During this period, the planet Reach (orbiting Epsilon Eridani, right on Earth's metaphorical doorstep) became the UNSC's primary Naval yard and training academy. Reach was a major producer of warships and colony vessels, as well as a training ground for covert operatives and Special Forces.
2525 CE: Contact with Harvest, an outer colony, is lost shortly after the colony itself had made contact with an unknown object. The Colonial Military Administration sends the scout ship Argo to investigate...
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CODEX Entries:
Calculator: A cybernetic-organic hybrid supercomputer utilizing pseudo-cryogenic stored brains maintained in an oxygenated tank fed specifically formulated nutrients to sustain suspended life. The neural network was also meant to assist in Vault 0's primary function: to initiate humanity's post-war rebirth. When the outside temperature, radiation levels and poison particle counts returned to acceptable levels, Vault 0 was to remotely activate the Exodus protocol, which would initialize the integration of all vault dwellers with the planet's surface.
Additionally, the Calculator was entrusted with an army of robots that it could use to assist in the protocol. However, it was a plan that never came true. The Calculator became corrupted due to fatal errors in its CPU and data storage systems (human brains). The cybernetic machine became a mad personality, whose goals turned rather homicidal. The eight brains it was linked to were of an Evangelist (the warrior killed this brain mercilessly and replaced it with his own), a pornstar, a lawyer, a doctor, a game designer, an artist, a scientist, and a politician.
Deathclaw: Bipedal oviparous reptilians that are diurnal carnivores. As bio-organic weapons designed to replace humans in close quarters combat by a pharmaceutical corporation sanctioned by a Prewar Human government centuries ago, they became apex predators after the Nuclear Apocalypse, standing nearly ten feet tall and possessing tough scaly hides, razor-sharp claws, venomous fangs, and powerful muscles. They are the successful results of cross-species genetic engineering: a combination of chameleon, Komodo dragon, Nile crocodile, and Human being. After exposure to Forced Evolutionary Virus over several generations, they gained human-like intelligence and speech capabilities before joining the citizenry.
Enclave: The Enclave is a secretive political and military organization who are descended directly from members of the Prewar United States government, and claim to be the legally-sanctioned continuation of the government while styling themselves as such. The Enclave comprises mostly descendants of government officials and military elite, and some others such as those with ties to powerful corporations who retreated to the Poseidon Energy Oil Rig during the Nuclear Apocalypse.
Forced Evolutionary Virus: Also known as FEV, this virus is the result of paranoia among Prewar governments prior to the Nuclear Apocalypse. Top brass thought the other side would use powerful, genetically engineered super-viruses that would decimate other armies and civilian populations without a single shot being fired. In response, the West Tek research facility began the Pan-Immunity Virion Project to bolster American immune systems. It was determined that altering the subject's DNA in such a way that its dual helical structure transformed into a quadruple helical structure would render the recipient immune to almost any known or engineered West Tek's testing phase of the PVP in 2075, abnormal side effects were observed developing in the test subjects. The test animals began to grow dramatically larger in size and muscular structure, and their brain activity increased. Seeing the potential military applications of these unexpected results, the U.S. Army sent its own military scientists into the facility to secure the project. And the rest is, as they say, history.
Komodo Dragons: Mutated giant lizards found commonly in the Midwest. As the komodo dragons are originally from the island of Komodo, Indonesia, and were not naturally found in the United States before the Nuclear Apocalypse, they likely originated from a zoological garden. Since then, their size has nearly doubled to twenty feet in length and weighing approximately four hundred pounds. They have septic pathogens in their saliva that are standalone killers. They also secrete a powerful toxin which causes blood clotting, lowering of blood pressure, muscle paralysis, and the induction of hypothermia, leading to shock and loss of consciousness in envenomated prey.
Mutated Crocodilia: In the swamplands of what used to be Florida, the Brotherhood of Steel discovered a primitive community of bipedal reptiles that were waging a war against giant mutated pythons. Only capable of communicating in frequencies too low for humans to understand without special equipment, the creatures were left alone in the swamps to face their problems, and largely forgotten. While not as fast as Deathclaws, these creatures more than made up for it with their raw power.
Nuclear Apocalypse: In 2077, tensions were high due to the Resource wars, but it all broke the first sentient Artificial Intelligence, codenamed Skynet, instigated a single day war, in which a considerable portion of the world's nuclear arsenal was used. The nuclear firestorms engulfed cities, the devastating payloads shifted fault-lines, the nuclear winter killed off some life that couldn't adapt, and the radiation mutated most that survived. New species appeared overnight, most of which began to dominate the new food chain.
Think Tank: They were responsible for the gestion, decision making and management of all experiments in Big MT, each in their respective domains under the direction of Klein. After the Great War, a new project started, with the purpose of preserving the Big MT executives by transforming them into a special brain bot called a Think Tank, allowing them to continue their work indefinitely. They were 'reprogrammed' to forget a part of their personality and their name, giving them a new one and enforcing a recursion loop in their perception programming. With that, the Think Tank was created and with nobody to stand in their way, their research continued in Big MT, becoming more sinister and debauched as the years went by.
United Nations Space Command: More commonly known as UNSC, it is the militaristic and scientific agency of the United Earth Nations. The UNSC has held Human territory together over the course of the Martian Rebellion, the Interplanetary War, and the Insurrection War. There are also rumors that they have extensive research into, and have begun experimentation with, powerful biological weapons from the Prewar era such as FEV.
A/N: There are some references to other series, but the main duo for now is Halo and Fallout. This story is inspired by From the Ashes by erttheking. Except this is with Halo, not Mass Effect. For now, anyway...