setting

In the not-too-distant future, humanity has cracked the secrets of the stars. After the comparatively small steps of landing a man on the Moon, then on another planet, science exploded as humanity's focus turned from infighting to exploration, colonization, and (naturally) commercialization. In a scant few hundred years the entire Solar System is rife with colonies, industry, tourism (the Ice Caves of Ganymede are particularly attractive in the current year), and the like.

One hundred and one years ago, humanity took its first step outside its home. Thanks to the Stephenson-Aramaki Spatial Compression Drive--or, in common parlance, the STAR Drive or, even more simply, the Twist Drive--the speed of light is no longer a barrier; physicists discovered a loophole that allowed them to tap Einstein on the shoulder and sneak past as he looked the other way. With the first forays to the nearest interstellar neighbors, such as Tau Ceti and Alpha Centauri, we discovered that we are indeed not alone in the universe--that, in fact, nearly a dozen other species lived in our corner of the Milky Way, pretty much waiting for the day that that lightspeed barrier ceased to matter.

Most of the rapid development comes thanks to another accidental discovery, as so many scientific breakthroughs turn out to be: that of the planetary Roethic Field. Named for the sensationalist writer who first described the effects, the Roethic Field is a sort of natural suppressive effect. Occupying a thin shell approximately the same distance as Earth's outer Van Allen belt, penetration of the Roethic Field causes a sort of mutation in all known living beings. Interestingly, returning to a planetary surface--ANY planetary surface--and piercing the same field causes the reverse effect, resulting in a sort of genetic "trigger" that remains ill-understood to this day.

Regardless of how well or how poorly the mechanism operates, the results are spectacular, as varied from person to person as their specific genome: to a one, every living thing to penetrate the Roethic Field exhibits what could be colloquially described as powerful psionic abilities. Roethe, the author, posited in his writings that it took someone with extraordinary imagination to unlock the knowledge of what had happened; the reason that, say, the Apollo missions had not noticed such an effect is that they had had no need to sit there daydreaming what-if scenarios.

Some people have manifested great creative abilities, forming intricate scultptures from space dust and asteroids. Others have shown equally destructive powers, effortlessly crushing the aforementioned asteroids to the even more aforementioned space dust. Still others have developed abilities akin to being able to hurtle their ships through the endless voids without the power of a Twist Drive behind them; however, the lack of inherent targeting knowledge makes this a dangerous proposition for all but the shortest megadistances traveled.

The other sentient races had all previously discovered this same effect; humanity, as one of the more recent species to join the interstellar ranks, nevertheless made up for the tardiness with enthusiasm. Nearly every human alive today has escaped Terran orbit at least once, discovering that ability that only functions outside the grip of a planetary surface.

Interestingly, the effect *only* seems to propagate from planetary bodies; moons, comets, large meteors, and other assorted detritus in space do not produce a Roethic Field.

Unfortunately, this also means that moons have become favored battlegrounds for settling military disputes, when the battles are not also fought between titanic space fleets. Retreating into the boundary of a Roethic Field is a common defensive tactic, and powerful defensive forts often reside in the same territory, shielded from normal radiation effects and armed enough to halt even the strongest indirect attack--as kinetic strikes using asteroids or shards of broken celestial bodies are sadly more commonplace than not.

Humanity wasted no time in joining their neighbors in forming a sort of League of the Arm; they are one of the more uncommon areas in the Milky Way, a relatively small sector of galactic space nevertheless filled with life. Immediately outside the arm of the galaxy containing the League is a series of so-called Badlands, millions of stars with planets incapable of supporting life...or having that life stripped away, the planetary surfaces now scarred and pocked with the remains of ancient warring.

The strongest galactic faction is simply known as the Stellar Empire, as the official name preferred by its natives is unpronounceable by any human tongue. A military and economic behemoth, the SE is crumbling at the edges--the true cost of attempting to directly rule its vast territory. The SE measures untold parsecs to a side, laying claim to nearly a quarter of the Milky Way directly opposite the galactic core from the League of the Arm.

Approximating the directions of galactic northeast and galactic southwest are a pair of smaller stellar territories, neither of which want anything to do with each other--or anyone else, for that matter. Both are comically xenophobic and insular, and various xenologists have concluded that the two great societies have more in common than they do in conflict...which may very well explain their reticence in dealing with each other. It is truly their presence, and their own heavy armadas massed along each border, huddling in paranoid groups both in star systems and in deep space, that prevent the Leage of the Arm or the Stellar Empire from becoming any more expansionist than they already are.