Timeline Completed!

I've just finished the first draft of the world timeline. This has been useful for a number of reasons, notably because it's helped resolve one of my main concerns: how to create a consistent, reasonably plausible timeline of events for the 21st century that doesn't descend into incoherent sci-fi woo-woo. I've uploaded an infographic of the timeline for your viewing pleasure, and the introduction is posted below. Enjoy and here's to 2022 not turning out the way it does in the game!

Humanity didn’t listen. Despite the wildfires, floods, tsunamis and cries of protest at the start of the 21st century, we put ourselves before everything and everyone else. Even a global pandemic that saw a cessation in international travel, and a brief pause in our selfishness, wasn’t enough. Once mass vaccination had succeeded in bringing humanity back from the brink, we continued our toxic behaviour: burning the Earth’s resources, tearing society asunder, and ignoring the signs. Now we have to pay the price.

Earth isn’t quite a dustbowl, but previously temperate environments are more than likely now arid, lifeless deserts. By 2050, the mean global temperature across the planet had increased by over 5 degrees Celsius, thanks to continuous industrialisation and greenhouse gas emissions, pollution and mass farming of biomass. Ocean temperatures have risen, and oxygen levels dropped, resulting in an estimated 85% of remaining ocean life becoming extinct. The seas themselves are now a cesspool of pollutants, plastics and other waste.

The population of the Earth is a fraction of what it was  (accurate census data went out of the window in the mid-2030s), and the remaining populace is concentrated around major cities and urban sprawls such as old Los Angeles, Istanbul and the corporate Prosperity Zones. The Indents that live inside the gravity wells of Mars and Earth work to provide for the citizens that live in orbital habitats and the two vast O’Neill Cylinders positioned at the Earth-Sol Lagrange points. Manufacture is Earth’s primary role now: robotics, biomass (food), electronics, raw materials and parts, produced by stripping what remains of the planet’s resources to support intra-Solar System travel and living. A lottery system dangles the carrot of Citizenship in front of the workers, promising a new life in the Orbitals and off-world colonies.

Since the discovery of fusion technology, the reaction mass needed to launch and land rockets from Earth and Mars has become trivial when compared to early 21st-century chemical engines. Furthermore, travel between Earth, Luna, Mars and beyond has become insignificant compared to what we initially thought. Constant acceleration burns of 0.4g or even 1g mean travel between Earth and Mars is now measured in days, not weeks or months.

Mars has been colonised and maintains independence as a “new frontier”. Whilst scientists and engineers initially settled there, the UDC and corporations have established a foothold by constructing the major spaceports and a skyhook above the main settlement at Arsia Mons. For the most part, larger corporations and organisations have left Mars alone, instead focusing their energies on the asteroid belt. Of those that have settled on the planet, numerous independent factions and freelancers vie for control over regions of its surface and in the hope of locating rich deposits of ore amongst the Martian regolith.

Mars isn’t the only frontier; other areas within the inner solar system have also been colonised. Humanity’s first foray into space was made, reasonably, by engineers, technicians, scientists and explorers. Even with the corporate race to stake a claim to the trillions of tons of rare Earth metals located in the asteroid belt, the first people to step out into the inky void were workers and builders. 

Many of this first wave hailed from Earth’s Middle East and the Indian subcontinent, and, taking inspiration from the master boat makers of Kerala, they named themselves the Khalasi. Irrespective of the billions of dollars of corporate funding and government subsidies, humanity would have died with our planet if it weren’t for the Khalasi and their ingenuity. First settling in Earth’s orbit and then setting out into the darkness beyond, these tight-knit families of workers paved the way for other spacers and eventually the wealthy Elite to make their way beyond the confines of our scorched Earth.

The largest asteroids in the belt between Mars and Jupiter have been colonised, with significant populations located on stations at 4 Vesta, 1 Ceres, 2 Pallas and 10 Hygiea. Other smaller habitats can be found throughout the asteroid belt, from corporate research laboratories through refinery and processing facilities to hidden Khalasi ports. Most mining is performed by robots, overseen by humans who deal with the logistics of transporting minerals, ore and ice to where it’s needed most, often back to Luna or Earth. Despite the localised human settlements scattered throughout the asteroid belt, relatively few people live there permanently compared to the numbers on Earth or Mars. Life in space is fragile and only truly appreciated by the native people that live in the void. Beyond the belt, there is very little, save a few scientific habitats in Jovian space and robotic deep system miners. So far, humanity has kept itself to the inner solar system.