In the year 2164, Jonathon Gamow, a native of Mars who traveled extensively throughout the solar system invented the first jump drive. The Gamow drive was in ingenious device, piercing the fabric of spacetime itself to enable -- given certain strict constraints -- long-distance travel. Actually, as Jonathon Gamow himself used to say, the fabric of spacetime isn't really much like fabric at all, it's more like a lump of viscous gelatin. Certain objects (like black holes) made more or less permanent holes in the gelatin, because they stayed where they were, so their effects on the spacetime "gel" remained. However, if one could poke a gelatin with a pin, it would make a hole through which one could travel, and the hole would then close itself as the spacetime gel came back together again. Spacetime could also be pricked in such a way, as theorized in the late twentieth century by Thorne and Morris, and Thorne-Morris gateways could be constructed.

Gamow, using this theoretical construct, was able to construct a spacetime "tunneller", later called a Gamow drive or a jump drive. Although some aspects of short-cutting through spacetime were constrained, it was possible. Time itself, while navigable in theory, was beyond the wildest dreams of the technology available, but relatively short distances could be traveled without mishap. These "jumps" as they were called, were fairly invariable in length -- it always took about 175 hours to travel through the spacetime tunnel, and at this point, it was not possible to travel even to the next nearest star. However, it enabled much easier travel throughout the solar system.

It wasn't long, however, before Gamow drives improved, and the distance they were able to travel increased to something that would be useful and enable colonization of the stars. The second generation jump drives took colonists from the Alliance to the Alpha Centauri system.

It was here that the Earthlings (or Terrans, as they were calling themselves soon) came upon the most surprising thing they encountered in their entire history of interstellar travel. The Centauri system has three stars, all of them relatively far away from each other. Both Alpha Centauri A and B are relatively Sol-like stars, and both had Terra-like planets. What was even more surprising is that both also had populations of humans! These humans were different racially from any known Terran stock, yet they were true humans nonetheless, and were completely cross-fertile with Terrans. As Terrans continued to explore the stars, they came across other humans as well, including some that had evolved on their homeworlds into something that was not completely compatible with Terran humans anymore.

The Grays

After examining both historical records, archeological and paleontological records, and genetic evidence, a theory was soon proposed to explain the presence of apparently unconnected yet genetically identical humans across several star systems. An old myth of the Grays was revived -- a race of small, humanoid gray aliens with large black eyes which supposedly abducted humans for nefarious yet unknown purposes. When archeological evidence actually uncovered Gray sites on several human worlds, the idea that they were somehow involved leapt from being a quiet joke to a generally accepted theory. Shortly after the appearance of true Homo sapiens sapiens on Terra, the Gray aliens took many individuals and spread them on numerous worlds throughout the galaxy (or at least our portion of the galaxy.) The theory did not explain what the purpose was. Wherever humans went, they found no grays. Occasionally ruins or artifacts remained indicating they had previously been on certain worlds, but the grays were apparently extinct.

However, the really staggering discovery -- which wasn't really made until later although all the evidence was right there in front of the same scientists who proposed the initial Gray Theory -- didn't come until Terrans came across non-human aliens.

One of the major human races contacted by Terra was the Ubrai, and they had, earlier in their own explorations, encountered a race known as the Irbuddum and made alliances with them. The Irbuddum (or Hulks, as the Terrans called them) were non-human, but amazingly human-like. It was discovered that the Hulks knew of a fossil creature that was almost identical to one known on Terra as the earliest, most basal animal to crawl up from the sea hundreds of millions of years ago. The Gray Theory then had to incorporate a correllary -- that either the Grays or some earlier race had spread extremely primitive creatures throughout the galaxy, thus leading to faunas that were hauntingly similar, even though they had different evolutionary histories, for they had the same ancestor. Why they all evolved later into bipeds with human proportions is another mystery, again best explained by some kind of tampering by alien scientists for unknown purposes.

This theory was also born out by paleontology and genetics, and no race of intelligent (or even complex) life has been found to date that are not based on this same primal ancestor. The mystery of the Grays, what their purpose could possibly have been and where they went to is the greatest mystery known to man. There are some who live in terror that the Grays will return some day and demand a reckoning from the races that they created and seeded across the galaxy. To most, however, it is little more than a scientific curiousity and has little to do with their daily lives.

Growth and Consolidation

By the year 2600, Terrans found themselves at an equilibrium with about six other major nations, all composed of either human or demi-human races (demi-human is the designation for races that are descended from humans, but are no longer cross-fertile with Terran humans, which are the standard.) They had earlier gone to war with the Altairans, clashed sporadically with the Ubrai and entered into relatively peaceful relationships with the other races they had found, both major and minor (a major race was one that had discovered jump drives on its own and begun its own exploration of the stars. For this reason, major races were the most prominent and populous.) It was not long after this at a very charismatic man -- a real diplomatic genius named Josiah Simpson -- was appointed to be the Chancellor of the Alliance. Looking back through history, he had always been impressed by the cooperative nature of the European Union of the early twenty-first century -- several nations coming together in a loose Federation with open borders, shared currency and even joint security forces. Of course, the European Union was later dissolved as NATO became a more important body and eventually a nation unto itself, but afire with passion for the dream of the European Union, he embarked on a several-year tour of his neighbors and quietly began gathering support for a similar undertaking.

Surprisingly (to later historians) he was able to muster an incredible amount of support from the other leaders of human and demi-human nations, and in the Terran year 2697 the Federation was born. At first, it was as Simpson envisioned it, but over the next few hundred years the power and authority of the Federation grew until the client states that originally made it up handled little more than regional affairs and the only body that could reasonably be called a nation anymore was the Federation itself.

Although the capital of the Federation was not located on Terra, Terran humans dominated Federation politics and spread throughout the Federation. The following list has all the major races who entered into the Federation:

Recent History

The joining of the Vahennea to the Federation marked the period known as the Modern Federation; which started developing in the year 2971 and has persisted to the present (year 3072.) Borders with three large, major states existed in the mid-2900s, the Deneb Confederation, the Shanariu Khanate, and the Ksaadu Empire. After lengthy negotiations and the cesation of a prior war, the Deneb Confederation joined the Federation as an autonomous region. This sparked the Ksaado-Federation War, which blazed hotly until 2971, at which point the borders between the major nation-states settled down. With both the Khanate and the Empire, the Federation shares an uneasy peace, or perhaps a muted cold war.

A Note on Races

In the Federation, each race has two classifications -- two axes of comparison, so to speak. Along the first axis is genetic similarity to Terran humans. Races can be classified as Human, Demi-Human or Non-human. Along the other axis, races can either be Major or Minor.

• Human: Human races are those that are cross-fertile with Terran humans. Although appearances may vary considerably due to build or coloration, all the races that are cross-fertile are considered to be human. These races include Terrans, Altairans, Ubrai, Ksaadu, etc.
• Demi-human: Demi-humans are races that are evolved from transplanted humans, but are no longer cross-fertile with humans. In general (although not necessarily) they are physically differentiated even more from Terrans than other human races. Examples include the Vahennea, the Tamaruz, etc.
• Non-human: Races that are not evolved from humans. Oddly enough, however, all sentient races follow very closely the human body-plan, and all currently known are evolved from the same primal tetrapod stock that is the ultimate ancestor of humans. Most scientists suspect genetic tampering by the Grays or some other alien race to produce such remarkable convergence. Non-human races include the Tannaetha, the Irbuddum, the Shanariu, etc.
• Major: Races that developed jumpships independently and began their own colonization of the stars are called major races. In general, the major races are much more populous and widespread than the minor races because of their independent colonization of other worlds. Examples include Terrans, Vahennea, Altairans, Ubrai, Tamaruz, Ksaadu, Shanariu, etc.
• Minor: Races that did not independently develop jumpships are classed as minor races. Usually they are initially confined to one world or system, and have spread little from their planet of origin, although there are marked exceptions. Examples include Centaurans, Tannaetha, etc.