5th Fringe Dragoons- Prologue
#1 of The 5th Fringe Dragoons
I wrote this as a summary of the universe I'm working on, as a kind of opening prologue for the story series. Please, by all means, skip it if you want to get to the story, or the juicy sex.
Where to begin describing who and what I am. I'm not human, for one, though I understand my existence is due to human intervention.
It's far too hard to explain, so the basics shall be applied- at one point in the Solar system, around the 23rd century AD, on a backwater planet we now call Terra, were human organizations looking for ways to make their animals more sentient, better able to understand the language and rules of humans. A lasting peace had been achieved among the planet's people, and a scientific renaissance was well underway, providing humans with the first glimpses of a longer life expectancy.
Yet the prospect of creating genetically engineered companions from animals, with heightened senses or other such qualities that humans lacked, was too promising a venture to not explore all the same. Not to mention the fact that space travel was a reality at this point, and inhabitable star systems had already been discovered, prime spots for raising a new sentient race of beings- beings that were not only on-par with humans in terms of intelligence, but with a flexible genetic code that allowed cross breeding, and a lifespan comparable to humans at the time. On reflection, they really did fuck us up from what we used to be- on the other hand, most of us are grateful for them, despite whatever human flaws the possessed, and besides, the fuckups weren't fully detrimental.
Planets were terraformed, providing a means for people and sentient beings to live- whatever else humans were, they were resourceful, a trait they passed along to us. There, they worked to create a race of beings from the many thousands of examples of wildlife they'd brought from their planet, all endowed with the intelligence that humans possessed. And though it took many hundreds of years for them to accept us as their equals, it was not with the long, bloody struggle that they had fought among themselves to gain equality.
We made peace with them- mostly. Advocates against us would sometimes speak out, but they were a minority. Many years later, to acknowledge our existence as sentient beings, and to promote peace between ourselves and humans, the terraformed planets of the Biotah system were freely given to us- 'Therians', a name we'd been given, and a name we'd accepted, a name based on the shape shifters of old tales.
We never fancied humans our gods, but certainly as our creators, and maintained isolated peace, spending several hundred years without significant contact from humans - except for a few incidents in which we lent aid to a downed craft. In that time, taking examples from our human creators, we established our own form of government, while overcoming our own personal obstacles of specieism. When the dust settled, and when enough blood was spilled among ourselves, we were able to continue to build our own civilization.
And at this point, you're probably thinking "a race of sentient, anthropomorphic earth-based animals, creating a civilization? For soothe!" Or however the hell you say it, whatever it means.
Sufficient to say that, yes, we're walking talking animals with relatively peaceful ties to humans- mostly. Even though we never encountered another alien species, that wasn't to say that we had our own form of intergalatic war. With terraforming allowing the opening of new territories on previously uninhabited planets and moons, those factions of governments not favored by the majority would break off, claim a planet, and establish their own territory.
You have to expect it when you can cross one end of the galaxy to the other in a matter of hours. Much is the nature of humans to claim as much for himself, and the nature of animals to use force to attain territory- and with the proper technology allowing people to move quickly over large distances, it became general thinking among dictators that a few planets was not enough for them. These drives alone propagated much of the system's first wars among other systems and planets.
I recall playing an old video game - I love video games - where a badass man named Ron Perlman opens the title sequence stating "War- war never changes." And those words continued to ring true. Where one would wage war based on religion, now were being waged on the idea of politics. Some might say it was the same difference, and one could argue on either point, but there was no denying there were similar lasting effects on either end.
The Biotah system rooted itself in a lasting democratic government- perhaps not the best choice, but it lasted longer than most. And it's technology, on par with humans, allowed us a substantial standing armed force throughout it's 7-planet system. At the time of this writing, there are over 60 billion sentient beings throughout the system, including space stations and bio-domes located on planetary satellites- not all of them necessarily Therian, with about 10% of the system comprised of humans. About 5 billion of us, at any given time, served in the Biotah Armed Forces, with light allegiances to the Sol Armed Services. The rest consisted of your Average Joe with average job.
And war never did change- just the weapons used to conduct it, and where it was conducted. Space travel gave way to space battles. The navies of the sea territory were replaced with the navies of space territory. Newer forms of energy to fuel travel and technology were sued to fill the clips of guns, forcing the construction of special material to combat such power. A simple suit of kevlar won't protect you from a shot of concentrated light and heat.
...Shamefully, we did call them "lasers". Pew pew.
The BAF Navy had several branches of airforce working under them- your standard planetary standing airforce, with a standing of anywhere between 120-240 pilots; orbital bases with a standing force of 48 pilots; mobile in-system cruisers that patrolled the core systems with a standing force, anywhere between 24 to 72 pilots; and Rangers, fringe-patrolling units with a minimal staff of 8 to 12 pilots.
Rangers, in particular, were tasked with the protection of the borders of our system. Peaceful times were marked with infrequent clashes with criminal groups and pirates- and in times of war, we were the first to detect and respond to external threats to the system itself.
Speaking as a member of the Rangers, I can tell you that our job was no less important than the jobs of those within the system. I would never be enough of an asshole to instigate that we were more important, but our history saw enough of us not being taken seriously.
You may remark that it is a love story, or a political story, or - most likely - a sex story, or an action story- but it's important to that I make clear that it's mostly a story of the lives that Rangers lived.
Most people forget that even as members of the armed forces, we're still people, with needs, emotions, and stories to tell. Mine will be among the ones told.