=========================
UCHUUJIN TAISEN: FOREWORD
=========================
Disclaimer:
Neither X-Com nor Sakura Wars/Taisen belong to me. If either of them did, I'd be filthy rich, and I ain't. 'Nuff said.
Continuity and Nomenclature:
This fic adheres to the Sakura Wars timeline through the first 3 games (and TV series, etc) and the movie. The events of 4, since they were really "open-ended", have been more or less retconned. I may integrate 5 into the timeline somehow (when it appears), but don't count on it.
As for X-Com, I've pretty much played merry hell with the universe and continuity. For info, see below. (A side note: While I personally disapprove of the use of the name "Kiryu-Kai", as it cannot be satisfactorily translated into anything appropriate in Japanese AFAICS, the continuity stands.)
The phrase "Ryoushi Katchuu" is rendered here as "psycheon armour" rather than "spirit armour", in line with Kayama's excellent translations of the ST games. IMO this is a better translation, and lends itself well to the kind of pseudoscientific technobabble I'm unfortunately fond of.
If you're familiar with Sakura Wars/Taisen, you can probably skip most of this intro without missing much. It's kind of dry.
A Short Intro:
While this is technically a crossover fic, the characters are all from Sakura Wars. I realise that not everyone will be familiar with the original works I am borrowing from, so here's a quick intro to the technology and chronology of this crossover universe. Not all of the elements are plausible, of course, and thus I must humbly request a certain suspension of disbelief!
THE POWER OF STEAM (original)
In 1875, renowned scientist Nikolaus A. Otto was killed in a freak accident when his prototype internal combustion engine exploded. It is not known whether he was sabotaged by some rival, but his untimely death set the development of the internal combustion engine back many years. Engineers and scientists alike turned their minds towards perfecting the steam turbine as a power source, and made incredible progress. Steam-powered vehicles became commonplace, and a steam-powered version of Babbage's Difference Engine was even constructed and made practical.
PSYCHEONS AND PSYCHEON ARMOUR (extrapolated from Sakura Wars)
In the years between 1902 and 1927, several major cities in the world came under attack from various splinter groups using supernatural abilities and weaponry; among these weapons were the strange and terrifying monsters known as the Kouma. The first battles against these creatures were fought by psychically-gifted soldiers armed with little more than swords: cannon were too slow and ponderous to target the agile Kouma, while their incredible healing abilities made small-bore weapons nearly ineffectual. Casualties among the Anti-Kouma forces were horrendous.
In response to this, the Council of Europe developed a defense plan based upon a recently-perfected technology: the psycheon reactor. It had been discovered that water in gaseous form reacted to and amplified the psychic emanations of the human brain, thus making phenomena such as telekinesis a possibility. Scientists of the time theorized that the water molecules were somehow influenced by a new elementary particle, dubbed the psycheon. A steam engine could have its water conduits arranged to form focusing "lenses" for psychic power, amplifying such power to a level where it could move objects even heavier than the wielder.
The weapon developed to take advantage of this was known as the psycheon armour. Essentially this was a massive suit of armour in a vaguely humanoid shape, standing about eight metres tall. Psycheon armour was equipped with a variety of weapons, ranging from edged melee weapons to large-bore cannon and even primitive rockets. However, one issue remained: the psycheon reactor required an extraordinary level of psychic energy to even become active. Few, if any, known psychics were capable of operating these massive machines.
THE STAR DIVISION (extrapolated from Sakura Wars)
Nevertheless, the first class of psycheon armour, the German-made Eisenkleid, was quickly pressed into service. Only 4 pilots were found for these machines; all were female. It was theorized at the time that men were incapable of operating the psycheon armour; in spite of this, the world's militaries still began covert screening procedures to try and isolate more individuals with the necessary level of power.
These 4 pilots formed the first psycheon armour unit, the Star Division. For undisclosed reasons, Star Division was disbanded a year or two after its formation.
THE FLOWER DIVISION (Sakura Wars 1 and 2)
At this point in time, Tokyo was coming under paranormal attack from mysterious groups with unknown motives. In response, the Imperial Assault Troop was formed in Japan. This was a secret organization under the Japanese government, formed for the purpose of battling supernatural threats. At the core of this organization was the Flower Division, or Hanagumi, a combat unit armed with the Japanese first-generation psycheon armour, the Koubu. The Hanagumi maintained a cover identity as a theatrical troupe, performing in the Imperial Theatre in the Ginza district of Tokyo, and proved to be a successful force in battling the Kouma in subsequent years.
THE PARIS ASSAULT TROOP (Sakura Wars 3)
In 1926, the city of Paris was attacked by forces employing supernatural abilities. Lieutenant Ichirou Oogami, commander of the Hanagumi and one of the only men capable of operating the psycheon armour, was transferred to Paris to lead the newly-formed Paris Assault Troop. The Paris Defense Plan was a success.
END OF AN ERA (ST:TM and original material)
At the same time, noted American industrialist and philanthropist Brent Furlong, owner of the Douglas-Stewart Corporation, travelled to Tokyo to demonstrate Douglas-Stewart's latest anti-Kouma weapon, the unmanned psycheon armour Japhkiel. In hindsight, it is almost certain that Furlong was under the influence of one of his aides, an individual known only as Patrick. Through political maneuvering, Furlong had the Hanagumi disbanded and held the city to ransom with his Japhkiels, which turned out to be mechanized shells driven by Kouma. His underestimation of the Hanagumi was his downfall, though, as they regrouped and destroyed the combined Japhkiel and Kouma forces.
This incident became widely known in the American press as the "Tokyo Incident". The U.S. government, recognising the threat of psycheon weaponry in the hands of a foreign power, had the 1930 Boston Convention signed. This treaty dictated the disarmament of psycheon-based weaponry, and effectively ended the Hanagumi's existence as a fighting force. Steam technology, moreover, was beginning to be outpaced by the development of advanced internal-combustion engines.
The various Assault Troops had historically acted as checks and balances upon the nations they defended. In an ironic twist, the power vacuum created by their disarmament allowed nationalistic forces to arise in Germany and Japan and begin a war of aggression. The First World War began in 1939, and proceeded much as the Second World War had in our world.
Psycheon weaponry was not deployed in the Great War, as it proved to be incompatible with internal-combustion engines (water-cooled types did not have a sufficient mass of contact medium to support a psycheon reaction) and the older steam-powered units were less than effective against modern weapons. The Nazis may have conducted experiments into the development of large-scale "Advanced Psycheon Armour", but their research died with the fall of Germany. Otherwise, history progressed much as we know it.
A THREAT AND A RETURN (X-Com)
By the year 2010, an increasing number of incursions by Unidentified Flying Objects was occurring in various parts of the world, although this was kept from the general public by a highly-effective "hush campaign" on the part of the world's governments. Witnesses spoke of the aliens possessing strange powers which could only be classified as paranormal, as well as what appeared to be advanced weaponry. It was this that prompted the reopening of research into psycheon-based technology should open hostilities emerge, as terrestrial weaponry was conjectured to be less than effective against the aliens.
(Note: the definitive X-Com timeline places the alien invasion at January 1999. I've taken the liberty of pushing it back.)
In November 2016, things came to a head. The ever-increasing rate of alien incursion was a worrying phenomenon, and already alien units had engaged the French GIGN, the U.S. Navy SEALS and the newly formed Japanese Kiryu-Kai in separate incidents, all of which resulted in alien victory. In a closed-door session, the UN Security Council approved the creation of a multinational defence force known as the Extraterrestrial Combat Unit, or X-Com for short.
This is, more or less, where our story begins.
UCHUUJIN TAISEN: FOREWORD
=========================
Disclaimer:
Neither X-Com nor Sakura Wars/Taisen belong to me. If either of them did, I'd be filthy rich, and I ain't. 'Nuff said.
Continuity and Nomenclature:
This fic adheres to the Sakura Wars timeline through the first 3 games (and TV series, etc) and the movie. The events of 4, since they were really "open-ended", have been more or less retconned. I may integrate 5 into the timeline somehow (when it appears), but don't count on it.
As for X-Com, I've pretty much played merry hell with the universe and continuity. For info, see below. (A side note: While I personally disapprove of the use of the name "Kiryu-Kai", as it cannot be satisfactorily translated into anything appropriate in Japanese AFAICS, the continuity stands.)
The phrase "Ryoushi Katchuu" is rendered here as "psycheon armour" rather than "spirit armour", in line with Kayama's excellent translations of the ST games. IMO this is a better translation, and lends itself well to the kind of pseudoscientific technobabble I'm unfortunately fond of.
If you're familiar with Sakura Wars/Taisen, you can probably skip most of this intro without missing much. It's kind of dry.
A Short Intro:
While this is technically a crossover fic, the characters are all from Sakura Wars. I realise that not everyone will be familiar with the original works I am borrowing from, so here's a quick intro to the technology and chronology of this crossover universe. Not all of the elements are plausible, of course, and thus I must humbly request a certain suspension of disbelief!
THE POWER OF STEAM (original)
In 1875, renowned scientist Nikolaus A. Otto was killed in a freak accident when his prototype internal combustion engine exploded. It is not known whether he was sabotaged by some rival, but his untimely death set the development of the internal combustion engine back many years. Engineers and scientists alike turned their minds towards perfecting the steam turbine as a power source, and made incredible progress. Steam-powered vehicles became commonplace, and a steam-powered version of Babbage's Difference Engine was even constructed and made practical.
PSYCHEONS AND PSYCHEON ARMOUR (extrapolated from Sakura Wars)
In the years between 1902 and 1927, several major cities in the world came under attack from various splinter groups using supernatural abilities and weaponry; among these weapons were the strange and terrifying monsters known as the Kouma. The first battles against these creatures were fought by psychically-gifted soldiers armed with little more than swords: cannon were too slow and ponderous to target the agile Kouma, while their incredible healing abilities made small-bore weapons nearly ineffectual. Casualties among the Anti-Kouma forces were horrendous.
In response to this, the Council of Europe developed a defense plan based upon a recently-perfected technology: the psycheon reactor. It had been discovered that water in gaseous form reacted to and amplified the psychic emanations of the human brain, thus making phenomena such as telekinesis a possibility. Scientists of the time theorized that the water molecules were somehow influenced by a new elementary particle, dubbed the psycheon. A steam engine could have its water conduits arranged to form focusing "lenses" for psychic power, amplifying such power to a level where it could move objects even heavier than the wielder.
The weapon developed to take advantage of this was known as the psycheon armour. Essentially this was a massive suit of armour in a vaguely humanoid shape, standing about eight metres tall. Psycheon armour was equipped with a variety of weapons, ranging from edged melee weapons to large-bore cannon and even primitive rockets. However, one issue remained: the psycheon reactor required an extraordinary level of psychic energy to even become active. Few, if any, known psychics were capable of operating these massive machines.
THE STAR DIVISION (extrapolated from Sakura Wars)
Nevertheless, the first class of psycheon armour, the German-made Eisenkleid, was quickly pressed into service. Only 4 pilots were found for these machines; all were female. It was theorized at the time that men were incapable of operating the psycheon armour; in spite of this, the world's militaries still began covert screening procedures to try and isolate more individuals with the necessary level of power.
These 4 pilots formed the first psycheon armour unit, the Star Division. For undisclosed reasons, Star Division was disbanded a year or two after its formation.
THE FLOWER DIVISION (Sakura Wars 1 and 2)
At this point in time, Tokyo was coming under paranormal attack from mysterious groups with unknown motives. In response, the Imperial Assault Troop was formed in Japan. This was a secret organization under the Japanese government, formed for the purpose of battling supernatural threats. At the core of this organization was the Flower Division, or Hanagumi, a combat unit armed with the Japanese first-generation psycheon armour, the Koubu. The Hanagumi maintained a cover identity as a theatrical troupe, performing in the Imperial Theatre in the Ginza district of Tokyo, and proved to be a successful force in battling the Kouma in subsequent years.
THE PARIS ASSAULT TROOP (Sakura Wars 3)
In 1926, the city of Paris was attacked by forces employing supernatural abilities. Lieutenant Ichirou Oogami, commander of the Hanagumi and one of the only men capable of operating the psycheon armour, was transferred to Paris to lead the newly-formed Paris Assault Troop. The Paris Defense Plan was a success.
END OF AN ERA (ST:TM and original material)
At the same time, noted American industrialist and philanthropist Brent Furlong, owner of the Douglas-Stewart Corporation, travelled to Tokyo to demonstrate Douglas-Stewart's latest anti-Kouma weapon, the unmanned psycheon armour Japhkiel. In hindsight, it is almost certain that Furlong was under the influence of one of his aides, an individual known only as Patrick. Through political maneuvering, Furlong had the Hanagumi disbanded and held the city to ransom with his Japhkiels, which turned out to be mechanized shells driven by Kouma. His underestimation of the Hanagumi was his downfall, though, as they regrouped and destroyed the combined Japhkiel and Kouma forces.
This incident became widely known in the American press as the "Tokyo Incident". The U.S. government, recognising the threat of psycheon weaponry in the hands of a foreign power, had the 1930 Boston Convention signed. This treaty dictated the disarmament of psycheon-based weaponry, and effectively ended the Hanagumi's existence as a fighting force. Steam technology, moreover, was beginning to be outpaced by the development of advanced internal-combustion engines.
The various Assault Troops had historically acted as checks and balances upon the nations they defended. In an ironic twist, the power vacuum created by their disarmament allowed nationalistic forces to arise in Germany and Japan and begin a war of aggression. The First World War began in 1939, and proceeded much as the Second World War had in our world.
Psycheon weaponry was not deployed in the Great War, as it proved to be incompatible with internal-combustion engines (water-cooled types did not have a sufficient mass of contact medium to support a psycheon reaction) and the older steam-powered units were less than effective against modern weapons. The Nazis may have conducted experiments into the development of large-scale "Advanced Psycheon Armour", but their research died with the fall of Germany. Otherwise, history progressed much as we know it.
A THREAT AND A RETURN (X-Com)
By the year 2010, an increasing number of incursions by Unidentified Flying Objects was occurring in various parts of the world, although this was kept from the general public by a highly-effective "hush campaign" on the part of the world's governments. Witnesses spoke of the aliens possessing strange powers which could only be classified as paranormal, as well as what appeared to be advanced weaponry. It was this that prompted the reopening of research into psycheon-based technology should open hostilities emerge, as terrestrial weaponry was conjectured to be less than effective against the aliens.
(Note: the definitive X-Com timeline places the alien invasion at January 1999. I've taken the liberty of pushing it back.)
In November 2016, things came to a head. The ever-increasing rate of alien incursion was a worrying phenomenon, and already alien units had engaged the French GIGN, the U.S. Navy SEALS and the newly formed Japanese Kiryu-Kai in separate incidents, all of which resulted in alien victory. In a closed-door session, the UN Security Council approved the creation of a multinational defence force known as the Extraterrestrial Combat Unit, or X-Com for short.
This is, more or less, where our story begins.