OOC: Feel free to jump in and say hello to the varied powers of the Sector. Don't feel free to jump in with a doomfleet. Please note the Sector is strictly accessible through the wormholes described and FTL does not work within it - you can get around sublight just fine, however.
---------------------
"That's strange..."
Those were the words that would change the Sector forever.
Shiu Lazaro was one of the New Realm's wormhole prospectors.
And he'd just found a new one.
This was not unthinkable. There were thirty-eight known stars, and two of them had been prospected less than a century ago. A major find, of course, but nothing too concerning. Each star was the same - a massive ball of burning gas, various planetary objects, and then the great void. The endless, empty blackness that made up the sky. Between them were the wormholes - tears in the fabric of space ships could pass through and enter other star systems.
Shiu knew that their ancestors when they came to the Sector had brought designs for "faster than light" drives, but ever since the battle at the aptly-named Final System and the consequent detonation of the fleet's reality bomb, none of them worked. One passed from system to system via wormhole - some open permanently, others periodically open, or open only to vessels of certain mass or dimensions. The Ripples, those peculiar folds in reality that ate all matter and energy, allowing pirates to proliferate in even more civilized systems. This was just how the world was.
He was an explorer, though. He still had an old, old picture - from Marris, before the world was cleaned by the Maker-Mind in the Eternal War. It was a shot of the night sky, and in it were hundreds and thousands of tiny pinpoints. Sometimes he wasn't sure if he believed it, but that shot was one of the reasons he had joined the Ahipasa Prospectors - to find something new, something amazing.
He tapped his console. The first probe returned through the wormhole. He tapped again, loading all the records onto the probe. It was time to see this himself.
His scoutship moved easily through the wormhole, and...
He looked out into a sea of stars.
--------------
High Orbit over Tenebrae, Aurus station
"Impossible. Everything outside the Sector was destroyed when our forebears triggered the reality bomb."
A Talythian woman - almost nondescript with military-cut brown hair, brown eyes, and a missing tooth - spoke to three others seated around a small table. The Conciliators of the New Realm - the most powerful men and women in the Sector.
"Libra, we don't know that. We don't even know what happened after they did. But it may be more accurate to say it detached us from reality."
A man replied to her. He was dark-skinned and had his hair dyed a flamboyant blue.
"Jolen... if we detonated the reality bomb and it didn't end the Eternal War, what was it even for? We didn't even win a victory, we just ran. Like cowards. Abandoning our fellows to death and worse, and all for nothing. Wiping out our fleet, wiping out most of our people, all for what? Killing a single sphere-fleet of the Maker-Mind?"
"We survived, Libra. Is that not something? Who knows what depredations our people suffered in the interim."
For those who were to come, the Sector was a peculiar place. A detonated reality bomb during the Realm's Thousand-Year War had left it detached from reality - unreached by normal means. Only certain tears in the fabric of reality itself would allow one transit, and for nearly a millennium the Sector had existed in total isolation from the universe.
"Well. We can tell the story we choose later. For now, we'd best secure the system with access to the remainder of the universe. If Vesterlev or Alah-Arif got their hands on it, it'd be a disaster for us. As it stands, we may just unify the Sector after all..."
--------------
Two Weeks Later, Gateway System
The star of Gateway was an unremarkable red giant with no orbital masses - the sort of star that nobody from the outside would bother to come to, let alone leave a permanent presence at.
Space distorted for a moment, and a fleet emerged, ship by ship.
Aboard the lead ship, the Tanamah, a Talythian stood, chomping on a cigar.
"Commodore, we've arrived. BatRon 1 is battle-ready and standing at high alert."
He harrumphed.
"Thank you, Lieutenant. Return to your station - let me know if anything arises I need to deal with. I'll be thinking over our strategic deployment in the meantime. Once I've "
Commodore Altin Skyrzie looked around to check if he was alone again in the viewing chamber, and took a deep puff of his cigar.
"Damn, they send me out here because I'm 'not a fighter'. Don't know who the Admiralty are trying to piss off, me, or the idiots like Carnavon who dive into every fight headfirst. Drag me out of bed six hours ago to lead an expedition to the goddamn *outside universe! Still..."
He looked down at his hands.
"Primary objective is to secure the wormhole. Wormhole forts are useless against other species with FTL drives - R&D are saying they've got old specs from the Eternal War they're prepping to fit onto tenders so we can move to nearby stars, but anyone can just FTL in and fire at the wormhole until any static forts collapse. Better to set up a cordon on both sides, ensure no civilians get out until we're good and ready for them to do so. Claim the whole damn thing as sovereign space - if you're inside my Oort Cloud you're goddamn well leaving it, and drop probes to ensure we can warn people off. Hmm..."
A knock came at the door.
"Come in."
Another lieutenant, panting for breath.
"Sir, sir! They've..."
"They've what, son?"
The young Talythian panted a few times and spoke.
"The Old Realm probe network, sir."
"That self-replicating boondoggle? Damn thing cost nearly three battlefleets and didn't help us zip in the Eternal War!"
"Yessir. It's... replicated."
Altin frowned.
"How replicated?"
"We.. actually don't know. We pinged them on the ansible and we got... more replies than the computer could initially handle. Massive datadumps. At least a hundred million of the things from what we can tell, maybe billions. The old datafile says they kept replicating until they hit their limit in a local area, and over a thousand years..."
"Yes, I see. Get the fleet's data teams working on this. I want a workup of galactic history as soon as possible. Hopefully one of our probes picked up a handy history book being transmitted at some point and stored it somewhere."
- - - - - - - -
Three Months Later, Gateway System
Civilian craft had moved en masse to the Gateway system - even Vesterlev and Alah-Arif had managed to move ships through. This was more out of strategic pressure than anything else, of course - with two battle squadrons of seven in Gateway, the New Realm's ability to police privateers or probing strikes would be sharply reduced. Better to share some of the find with their neighbours until they could build up an unassailable position over them with foreign allies.
It had been three months of hard work for the data analysis teams, both military and civilian, but a picture had started to come together.
Firstly, of sad Talyth, falling further and further from grace, and eventually conquered by another power. The rise of powers nobody had ever heard of, like the Viprans and Huerdaen.
A presentation was currently underway, Altin being briefed alongside several of the Conciliators.
"The Vascilians left Mars? They're calling themselves the Aumanii now? Huh. The Extrasolar Union of Systems, defunct. The galaxy divided into quadrants? Quadrants Why? It makes no sense! We're in Delta because someone drew two lines on a map and everyone just agreed to go along with it?"
Altin shook his head.
"Conciliators, I recommend reaching out to several powers at once. I'd weigh the New Realm Void Fleet against any other power once we're in the Sector, but any enterprising power could easily use their FTL superiority to simply take Gateway, bottle us up, and gain a stranglehold over trade with two hundred billion Talythians or so. Just playing off the other powers against us could win any greedy power a native market - and fortifying wormholes from the exit end is far too easy. We're incredibly defensible, but this has its own strategic disadvantages. From my reading of the situation the Huerdaen and the Aumanii are in some sort of low-lying conflict - inviting ambassadors from both should ensure if one attacks the other will assist us."
"The Viprans?"
Altin grimaced.
"Strategically, yes - snubbing them makes no sense diplomatically. They're not the biggest local power, but more counterweights can only be useful. Personally... there's only one legitimate ruler of all Talythians, Conciliators. That's the New Realm. But that's not my decision to make. Invite them if you want."
"The varied Solarian powers?"
Altin shook his head.
"Not worth inviting. If they turn up, they turn up, but they exert their political pull in and around Sol. Their strategic interests this far north aren't sufficient to lure them into fighting for us. I suggest personalising our invites to the major powers, and sending out a general ping for interest across the galaxy. Forty powers are unlikely to invade. Two might agree on something and horse-trade Gateway away before we have a chance to bring our fleet up to speed."
The Conciliator nodded.
"I have thought similarly. We'll have something written up and sent by the end of the week. You'll have three days grace to rearm and repair any ships that need it and switch crews out."
'Thank you, Conciliator Libra. I appreciate it."
----------------------------------------
To the wider galaxy. The New Realm welcomes you to Gateway - our reconnection to the wider galaxy after nearly a millennia of isolation. Co-ordinates are as follows [Co-ordinate datafile attached]. Feel free to bring an escort within range of the system, but be aware a cordon of 30 AU applies to any military vessels from the star itself. Interested diplomatic parties will be hosted for talks on embassy exchange, trade, and other topics of interest. We await your arrival.
----------------------------------------
