Into the Glorious Expanse Above

The year was 2010, and Earth had just made its first contact with alien intelligence. No one could have anticipated such an event, nor the way it played out, because if you had told someone with no initial knowledge of how it all went down, they would have immediately called you a liar.

What happened? Suffice it to say that a flying saucer crashed down in an isolated space in the State of Maryland, with the beings emerging from it resembling, no joke, little green men in ridiculous silvery outfits and antennae on their oversized heads. Already with First Contact on unshakably tenuous footing in the dignity department, it all came crashing down with the first words out of the alien commander’s mouth to the humans it encountered in the first ever communication between humans and aliens:

“Take us to your leader.”

And with those five deadly words, never before uttered with any hint of sincerity, humanity’s chance at a glorious and history-making meeting was rendered a borderline joke before it had barely gotten underway.

Still, a century-and-a-half later, the denizens of Earth can look back and laugh at how ridiculously seriously they took the whole situation. Plus, it seems like such a petty thing to complain about nowadays, when the air is clean, resources are abundant, the rest of the solar system and other star systems have thriving human populations, and Humanity, now an up-and-coming power within the Galactic Confederation of Species, has earned the all-important honour of Species Capitalisation.

Jumping back to 2010 for a bit; naturally, President Obama was a bit out of his depth when it came to dealing with actual, intelligent space aliens, and certainly not ones as, er, unexpected as these ones. The Eljiya (as humanity interpreted what the aliens referred to themselves as, owing to the fact that they seemingly had 5 tongues) explained that their ship had crashed as a result of its onboard AI malfunctioning and falling in love with the planet Earth, before attempting to violently make love to it. Naturally, this did not work out well for the ship or its crew, with the ship severely damaged and many of the crew injured. Nonetheless, the Eljiya apologised for the inconvenience, and offered to let Earth copy some of their tech in exchange for assistance in helping repair their rather large ship, as their signalling beacon was destroyed in the incident.

When asked why they had been in orbit around Earth to begin with, the Eljiya replied: “Why, for your livestock, of course.”

Sensing humanity’s collective bemusement, the Eljiya explained further. Apparently, aliens had long since known about Earth and its native populations, and cow meat, procured at some point in the distant past, has long been considered a delicacy across the Galactic Confederation. Naturally, technology has allowed such meat to be grown in vats, thus eliminating the need to kill any animals for it and greatly reducing energy consumption, but the Eljiya in particular refuse to consume vat-grown food, as they claim “they can taste the difference”. Thus, they had been regularly abducting cattle and seeding them on a virgin planet to feed and be harvested at the Eljiya’s whims.

Anyway, long story short, humanity managed to get them back online, in exchange for the secrets of technology straight out of a sci-fi novel; instant universal translators, fusion energy, advanced genetic engineering science, cybernetics and, biggest of all, faster-than-light engines [1]. Conspiracy theories began to pop up everywhere, people insisting that the whole setup seemed too good to be true. The aliens had to be screwing with us; that, or somehow softening us up to prepare to conquer us, or something. As it happened, none of it ended up as they expected; turned out that the aliens genuinely bore us no ill will or had any desire to conquer us or anything. There was no dark underbelly to be exposed at all.

Before the ship took off with its alien crew (with several thousand heads of cattle on board), the head of the Eljiya crew handed over a set of spatial coordinates to the collected world leaders who had gathered to send them off. Declaring it to be their closest inhabited star system to Earth, they implored humanity to “drop by and hang out for a bit, y’know, if you want to”. After that, they took off, and nobody was quite sure what to do anymore.

Nonetheless, the nations of Earth found themselves with a new resolve. The universe was open for business, a grand new vista for exploration. The sky, as it turned out, was no longer the limit.

In the years following First Contact, multiple fusion power plants were set up across the world, delivering the cleanest and most efficient energy source that the world had ever seen before, giving so much that people weren’t even sure what to do with it all. With energy no longer an issue, people could turn their attention skyward, seemingly driven to what lay beyond the clouds. Attempts by the Americans to keep a monopoly on the technology they had been provided failed miserably; the secrets had leaked out long before there was any chance of them containing them, and they were forced to provide their allies with the information in case they decided to turn to another major rival power who was offering said information to them freely. The New Space Race had begun.

Thanks to fusion-powered rocketry, attaining orbit became absurdly cheap, and from there the possibilities seemed endless, with America, Russia, China, Japan, the EU, Brazil, India, and many other nations taking to the void like a fish to water. Colonies were founded on the Moon, followed by Mars and the Jovian moons. Exploratory missions to Mercury and the Outer Solar System yielded incredible new discoveries and a slew of new information about the formation of our little corner of space. Asteroids were mined, with a bounty of mineral wealth raining down on the people of Sol. It appeared that the thirst for wealth and riches that humanity had craved for so long had at last been quenched. The question now on everyone’s mind was: what now?

Such a question was answered when a UN-sanctioned ship with an international crew (universal translators rendering any language barriers moot) made its way several star systems over to the spatial coordinates acquired from the Eljiya, and, lo and behold, there they were in all their alien-ness. This was humanity’s first encounter with an alien civilisation on their own turf, and it went, for the most part, fairly smoothly, although there were a few embarrassing incidents where human body language caused a few minor miscommunications (sadly, the aforementioned universal translators do not translate body language or cultural mores).

It was also at this point that humanity came face-to-face with the true breadth of the Galactic Confederation, upon meeting the wide variety of other species that were a part of it and had settled on this planet (that the humans had dubbed “Olympus”; all the other aliens had their own name for it, but, given its cosmopolitan nature, it was apparently a custom for each species to add its own name to the list). Here, humans met the Haltharus, who were the most powerful, widespread and populous of all the species spread across the Confederation, and were thus its de facto leaders.

The Haltharus, launching their own expedition to Earth in order to contact humanity directly, gave humanity a better explanation of how the Confederation operated, explaining that, through colonisation and exploration, the GC was currently expanding faster than it could maintain cohesion. Usually, it would take some more time for humanity to grow and expand as a spacefaring civilisation before they were ready for induction, but, given the unorthodox circumstances in which humanity had first made contact and forayed into the big black, and the Haltharus’ willingness to get as many sapient species into their orbit as possible, they were willing to fast-track humanity and induct them as members of the GC right then and there, subject to all the rules and regulations therein.

Today, in the year 2163, Humanity is barely recognisable. Spread across countless planets and moons, inhabiting space stations and asteroid settlements, all of the Earthkin (meaning “sapients whose origin is tied to Earth”) are a wild and weird bunch, of all shapes, sizes, creeds and colours, and things have never been better.

Earth itself has largely coalesced into a collection of superstates, advances in economic and sociological paradigms helping overcome logistical challenges to such an arrangement and the aforementioned universal translators helping bring down cultural barriers. Each superstate is run by a collection of AIs (who all work together to keep the others from going off the rails) tempered by an elected branch of sapients to maintain the emotional connections to the populace that are also necessary for governing alongside the pure logic of a computer program.

That isn’t to say that AIs don’t have their own distinct personalities. Some can get jealous, some can be irritable and short-tempered, some can become overly infatuated with certain home appliances; working with them is merely a matter of keeping their idiosyncrasies in check. They can be modified, but their neural networks don’t always take the changes in stride, so it’s generally considered better to just leave them as is; after all, it’s seen as worth it to have an incredibly sophisticated yet emotionally low-key sapient run things instead of an incredibly sophisticated idiot.

There have only been a couple of instances so far of AIs turning psychotic and attempting to wipe out all sapient life. Neither got very far before being stopped, and the GC statistics only have their occurrence at 1-in-20,000 odds.

Robots are now an integral part of society at all levels, with varying degrees of intelligence, from the drudge robots only slightly more intuitive than Roombas to the robots one encounters in corporate HR departments who, surprisingly enough, do a far better job of “Human Resources” than actual Humans, fulfilling their duties fast, effectively and without prejudice. Robotic servants are in, with virtually everyone, including those one wouldn’t normally consider well off, having one, and they can be customised to one’s satisfaction, from the Clearing-The-Uncanny-Valley Humanoid-types, capable of passing for Human sans the obvious details mandated by Galactic Law, to the ones owned by nostalgic types who make theirs look and sound like Rosie, Robbie, or (God forbid) Ro-Man.

The fights over whether or not robots can be considered “sentient” or not has long been settled (despite inevitable protests to the contrary), coming down firmly on the “it depends on the circumstances” side. The ones who err on the side of sapient have about the same rights as an organic sapient, with some minor provisions, while those who sit on the lower end of the spectrum of consciousness, such as the AIs that operate 3D printers in order prevent private citizens from getting their digits on things they shouldn’t, have fewer rights as animals, and, honestly, they really couldn’t care less. They understand their purpose for existence, and they don’t see themselves as needing any “rights”. Most of the more intelligent robots couldn’t give a data purge about how organics treat the less intelligent members of their “race”; suffice to say, with the exception of a few weirdos, there aren’t any robots fighting for more rights, though that doesn’t stop certain organics from engaging in such crusades on their behalf.

Catching a ride into outer space or to another planet nowadays is about as simple as organising a bus ride (and about as expensive too). Thanks to orbital construction facilities, interplanetary- and interstellar-travel-capable ships can be built to any specification imaginable, from the size of a submarine to as large as a city; it’s not like there’s air resistance in space to worry about, and, thanks to asteroid mining, supplies to build them are near-limitless. Their faster-than-light drives (despite the various governments insisting on the scientific term “Shift Drive”, people still insist on calling it either an “Alcubierre Drive”, “Warp Drive” or “Hyperdrive”) are capable of taking people from one star system to another in a matter of days, at optimal speed; it could do faster, but that would be pushing the drives’ limits, and slower would be wasting precious negative energy.

Warfare has become much rarer since the Independence Wars of the 2080s; the vast amounts of space afforded by interplanetary travel and colonisation, and near-post-scarcity economy rendering most reasons for large-scale war moot (plus, the fact that the GC has its own dedicated military, and is not particularly keen on keeping as many systems within its jurisdiction as possible). Most “wars” occur on developing planets, largely as efforts to maintain order as terraforming takes root and expansion becomes self-sustaining. Plus, there are various terrorist organisations operating throughout society, such as the Prometheans, who champion Human supremacy throughout the galaxy (quite ineffectually, though they did almost succeed in de-orbiting an asteroid onto a multi-species colony; that took a while to sort out). However, with the scale of space and the galaxy at large, the issues of one group of sapients fighting against another has come to seem fairly petty (and not really worth the effort) in the grand scheme of things.

Most open warfare nowadays is handled through sending in robot soldiers, but there are also elite corps of sapients colloquially referred to by Humans as “Space Marines” (not that the uniform would scream that name), who deal in matters beyond the reach of robots. The basic uniform for a “Space Marine” is a form-fitting spandex-esque jumpsuit that allows for maximum dexterity and agility, but is also equipped with multitudes of holographic forcefields that are capable of withstanding enormous force, allowing for seemingly intangible and near-indestructible armour.

Handheld lasers (powered by portable fusion cells) have become the weapon of choice for future soldiers; ballistic weapons are considered as quaint and old-fashioned as the bow-and-arrow is to someone of 2012.

The Herculean task of “uplifting” an Earthkin animal to the intelligence and functionality of a Human, thanks to advanced cybernetics and genetic engineering technology, was achieved in the 2090s during the Neo-Technocratic Era of Earth politics with a gorilla named Gerard, and since then “Uplifteds” have multiplied, been hazed by humanity at large, fought for recognition, won their right to citizenship and become integrated into galactic society at large. Uplifted gorillas, bears, dogs, cats, birds, dolphins, seals and others casually share positions and rub shoulders/flippers with Humans, and, to their chagrin, remain the new “token minority” in various Human-directed media throughout the GC.

Cloning (of the Human variety, natch) was another thing that came to prominence during said Era, though its presence is far less stated in the modern era, proving to be more of a legal and ethical hassle than Uplifteds, for the basic reason that there isn’t any real purpose for them. Few are grown for the purposes of harvesting organs since 3D bio-printing makes such a purpose a moot point, and the attempt by the Raelians to clone Hitler, along with other famous dictators from history, purely to put them on trial for the atrocities their genetic forebears committed has been laughed off as a ridiculous waste of time and effort, not to mention a violation of Human rights and common sense. Attempts at raising genetically engineered clone armies have generally ended badly, and the clones of celebrities that have been made are, in virtually every case, nothing like their genetic ancestors.

Plus, with the fact that genetic engineering and 3D bio-printing have reached advancement to the point that a full-grown organism can be created to spec over a few days in a tank makes the time-consuming process of growing a clone from scratch the old-fashioned way utterly redundant. However, this level of technology, combined with the know-how of another alien species in the galaxy, has allowed for a new paradigm in Human development: uploading.

The process of transferring one’s consciousness from one body to another (or, indeed, from one medium to another) has been in the civilian market for more than 3 decades now and the Earthkin have taken advantage of it in every way possible. In fact, the issue of “Designer Babies” has been largely rendered moot; sure, everyone now has access to medicine that can eliminate virtually anything including genetically inherited diseases (so much so that failing to correct something like Down Syndrome or MND early in life is considered akin to wilful endangerment), but the sapient in question has the option to modify their bodies to a nearly limitless extent. Tattoos can be put on in seconds (they are also painless, and can glow in the dark or even be animated) and plastic surgery is considered as common and easy as getting a haircut.

However, while altering one’s own body is nowadays considered commonplace and passé, people are still trying to find the limitations of uploading from one body to another. Using the aforementioned 3D bio-printing tech, people can envision an entirely new body for themselves, have it made, and then transfer their consciousness into it. The possibilities offered by this avenue still have not exhausted themselves, resulting in Humans and other sapients like Uplifteds and AIs transferring to virtually anything that takes their fancy: robot bodies, animal bodies, simulated bodies, anthropomorphic animal bodies, alien bodies, bodies of the opposite sex, you name it. Indeed, some of the more well-off Earthkin keep several bodies and transfer themselves to whichever one they feel like inhabiting at any given time, as if they was simply vehicles for their mind to travel around in.

Religion has taken a severe hit, with many monotheistic faiths becoming largely sidelined as a result of increased perspective. True, there are True Believers who remain convinced that there is only one true God and that He/She created the entire universe, but most of them have come to look a bit silly, Islam having given up debating about whether it’s necessary to directly face Mecca while praying on another planet, and Judaism having to get rid of childhood circumcision after Earthkin civilisation at large deemed it both objectively unnecessary and a violation of the Right to Choose. Catholicism in particular has struggled to stay relevant, continually updating its doctrine to the point where a person from 2010 would question if it was even Catholicism to begin with. Women, gays and Uplifteds have  been declared perfectly cool in the church’s books in an attempt to appeal to the progressives across the cosmos (though they refuse to budge from their claim that they spearheaded the sexual revolution, and supported the creation of Uplifteds as well as the drive to legalise euthanasia, despite how patently untrue those claims are).

Eastern religions, on the other hand, while still minor within the general aether (the word that has replaced “atmosphere” in popular discourse) of irreligiosity that permeates Earthkin society, have grown in prominence, though more with regards to the concepts themselves rather than the mythologies. Indeed, most religions nowadays have a definite pantheistic feel to them, and are generally less Human-centric in tone (contact with aliens and a sense of perspective with the universe at large will do that). Monotheistic religion has almost become a constant target of parody, particularly among Uplifteds, who know full well about how far they fall outside of “God”’s plan, and, in their culture, the trappings of religion, like a crucifix or a hijab, have become almost a variety of “hipster” fashion for them. In essence, if you see a grizzly bear walking around upright with a giant gold cross on a chain around his neck, it’s a safe bet to assume he’s not a genuine believer in the Divinity of Christ.

That’s not even getting into some of the religions that have come up in the intervening years, like the various alien religions Earthkin have encountered, or a religion started by an AI inspired by 2050’s Oceanic Science Fiction (a subgenre that didn’t last very long, but had some lasting effects on both the genre and society).

Media has evolved considerably. The film industry has taken a lot of influence from alien stylings, but Humanity has had an interesting run itself, such as with the surrealist era of CGI back in the 2030s. Practical effects have also been refined even further, with monster movies making a comeback for a period once uploading made placing an actor inside an actual monster body became practical (one famous incident involved an actor who played the role of the Beast in a live-action remake of Beauty and the Beast; he ended up buying the body of the Beast used for the shoot off the filmmakers for “personal use”).

The Internet, or “Aethernet” as it is now commonly referred to, has become a more civil place, with AIs competently regulating it in place of Earthkin moderators (Wikipedia is no longer around, and has been replaced by an entirely automated system).

Lifespan has been extended to the point where no one is sure anymore if there is such a thing as an upper limit on a lifetime. Thanks to medicine, organ replacement and uploading, there are still people who were born in the 1980s that are still alive today, and, depending on their bodies, tend not to look a day over 25 years. Sensors all throughout society can pick up cancer and other diseases and allowing them to be nipped in the bud, sometimes even before one knows that they have anything wrong with them. Euthanasia is not just the norm nowadays, it’s considered an Earthkin and Galactic right; it’s generally agreed that if one has the right to live as one sees fit, one has the right to die as one sees fit.

Human culture has branched out across the stars, and mutated and diverged into a fantastic tapestry of highbrow and lowbrow alike. A good deal of colonial planets tend to have a few major overriding cultures, those ones generally being the ones that primarily colonised them, and divisions generally only occurring across geographical lines (despite the Aethernet allowing for easy cross-cultural boundaries), with attachment to cultural institutions taking the place of outright nationalism. With a large number of terraformed planets coming into their own around this time, many societies have sprung up in a way that allow them to experiment with political and social systems, and the sheer number of strange and unusual civilisations is mind-boggling.

There’s a society where role-playing is a national sport, one where gambling is the main means of conflict resolution, an entire world where the Heads of State are cute cartoon animals (they serve the same purpose as a constitutional monarch: they bring in a lot of revenue, engage people in national discourse and provide a mascot for the nation, whilst having considerably fewer embarrassing gaffes than regular monarchs), a society intended to resemble a theme-park version of prehistoric Earth, and a planet custom-terraformed, along with the inhabitants themselves (taking new bodies in the process), to closely resemble the world of a certain 2010’s animated cartoon series, to name a few.

Then there are the aliens.

Heading up the Galactic Confederation are the Haltharus, who resemble incredibly muscular anthropomorphic warthogs, albeit with weird hemispheric concave ears and alligator-like fanged overbites underneath their inverse triangular snouts. Despite their appearances, they are, for the most part, peaceful and pacifistic, and they can be quite vocal about it sometimes, leading to their characterisation in the Earthkin consciousness as being mostly “painfully condescending”. However, despite their ostensible tendency towards non-confrontation, they also happen to be incredibly well-armed and defended, as several other alien species discovered when they decided to try and take advantage of them. After all, how else would you control a gargantuan entity like the Galactic Confederation?

While their colonies have branched off in terms of culture, much like Earth’s colonies have, there is still a very recognisable Haltharus-ness about it all, and the branching is much less pronounced, for the simple reason that most Haltharus cultures place a lot of importance on maintaining the body in its natural form, and as a result they have an intense suspicion towards any kind of trans-sapienism. Uploading, biological enhancement, even simple mechanical limbs are deeply discouraged if they are unnecessary. Instead, they partake in the forgotten ritual known as “diet and exercise” to hone their bodies to optimal capacity, as they consider this of the highest spiritual import.

They are omnivores, and happily consume meat, but have staunchly refused to consume any of it save for lab-grown stuff as an extension of their pacifism. Robes and *togas tend to be the primary fashions of the Haltharus, and indeed their cities do have a very “Crystal Spires” feel, with glass, gardens and fountains all mainstays of their architecture. That being said, they are also one of the most technologically advanced species, having invented AI and FTL travel before any other species in the galaxy (or so they claim) and scholarly pursuits and philosophy are looked upon quite favourably across the Haltharus domain (though debating them tends to be a pain in the ass, as they subscribe to different and fairly confusing methods of debate than us).

On top of that, despite being the leaders of the Galactic Confederation, they also apparently have bones to pick with every other species within the GC, and in many cases the feeling is mutual. In fact, given how many issues the aliens seem to have with one another, it’s a wonder the GC even functions at all.

For instance, the Eljiya. Basically deformed green anthropomorphic geckos with prehensile antennae, they are sick and tired of being lectured to by the Haltharus about how “meat eating is wrong”, and the Haltharus are sick and tired of being told by the Eljiya that they are sick and tired of being lectured that “meat eating is wrong”. The Eljiya have always skewed a bit *libertarian in their outlook on society, and this chafes with the Haltharus’ gentle conviction that they have the best interests of all species and all life at heart. However, given the seeming callousness with which Eljiya can interact with others (lying is considered by them to be an act only committed if absolutely necessary, and if one of their number dies or is injured, the basic response is to brush the body aside or tell them to metaphorically deal with it, respectively), one can kind of see where the Haltharus are coming from in trying to encourage some measure of social justice.

Fortunately, Humanity is on pretty good terms with almost all the member species of the Galactic Confederation, though it is thought by most astropolitical scholars that such a state of affairs is largely because most species haven’t known us for relatively long, and once the honeymoon is finally over, it’ll fall back into the familiar pattern they all know. For instance, the Ssilyni, who resemble dog-sized combinations of spiders and pillbugs, who bonded with Humanity over their representatives’ mutual enjoyment of cow’s milk. However, that’s not to say that the road to friendship has been easy, and it certainly didn’t help from first impressions. Having heard stories about their horrendous problem with overbreeding and the wars within the GC that had followed, first contact was tense, and it boiled over after one ambassador asked what the meal they were discussing foreign relations over was, and, when told that it was the Ssilyni ambassadors’ eggs, refused to eat any more, resulting in the Ssilyni delegation being horribly offended that the Humans refused to eat their offspring.

Fortunately, things were patched up in subsequent engagements, and cultural issues were ironed out, and they are now one of Humanity’s closest friends; hell, one of the largest trade treaties in GC history was when an interstellar fast food chain obtained the rights to sell Ssilyni eggs, and the Ssilyni were only too happy to supply them (Humanity had since moved past the whole “eating babies” scruple, now that one can legally buy any type of vat-grown meat you can name, up to and including long pork). They are generally quite sociable, and love consuming media in all its varieties (it’s best, however, not to get into a discussion with one regarding opinions on the quality of said media; given the opportunity, most Ssilyni will willingly defend their opinions on such matters for hours on end).

Also one of Humanity’s best buds are the Timarea. Evolving on a dusty, dry planet, almost counter-intuitively they resemble tall, bright blue-and-violet striped female humanoids, albeit having short, lustrous fur all over their bodies, digitigrade legs, lion-esque tails, pointed ears and long eyelashes (to keep the dust out of their eyes). Fortunately, this time, the First Contact team did their research properly, and managed to avoid any major issues, having learned ahead of time that the Timarae greet each other by squeezing each other’s breasts, and also that breast size was an indicator of social status (there is actually a reason: the Timarae evolved in a food-scarce environment, and their “breasts” are actually water and nutrient stores not unlike a camel’s hump; as a result, more prosperous individuals could consume more, and as a result larger *breasts came to indicate greater wealth and prosperity) [2].

However, new awkwardness came through with regards to differences in psychology (a running theme, it seemed). Put simply, if Humans had a mindset relatively close to chimpanzees’, Timarae have a mindset relatively close to bonobos. Sex is an all-pervasive part of their culture, being a far more tactile and touch-oriented species than most others, especially Humans. It is their main means of conflict resolution and a primary source of recreation, and they have considerably fewer taboos on it than most other species. Granted, they can’t naturally have children when engaging in sexual activities with another species, but, to them, that’s a bonus: one less thing to worry about. It also doesn’t help that, given their planet’s relatively hot climate, they are perfectly comfortable walking around with nothing on save for a collar with their name-symbol on the tag (their one piece of essential wear: a name tag).

It has not escaped notice by the sociologists and psychologists of the GC that the Timarae seem to be far happier and more liberated on a general basis; implications were easy to broach. For obvious reasons, alongside these, Timarae cultural mores have become pervasive throughout the GC, though full-blown nudism has yet to catch on in most circles, save for Uplifteds.

Less close to Humanity but closer to all the other species (save for the Timarae) by comparison are the Azara, who resemble Human-sized anthropomorphic bats, albeit with separate wings and tiny arms in front of their bodies. They evolved on a moon with a thick, dense atmosphere, allowing them the luxury of personal flight, but at the cost of a sense of comfort in confined spaces; most multiple-species spaceships have to be quite a bit larger in order to accommodate the Azara. Communicating with them was an unusual affair, given that the universal translators required an add-on in order to replicate the bioluminescent features that Azara use to supplement their communication. In Azara culture, hearing someone speak is only one quarter of the dialogue.

Their sexual politics are also fairly strange, in a way that places them diametrically opposite the Timarae. They place considerable weight on the ritual of sexual intercourse, for the not-particularly-simple reason that both participants die after sex, the *male immediately, and the *female after giving birth by having the multitudes of babies chew their way out of her body (with the babies using her body as a source of nourishment). As a result, courtship is treated as utterly sacred, given what is at stake, and there is a distinct sense of tribalism running through much of Azara society, given that raising one’s own offspring is an utterly alien concept.

Nowadays, the Azara exist under the banner of “Corporations”, oligarchic arrangements formed out of the tribalist entities of their prehistoric ancestors. The Corporations manage the affairs of their members, adopting and raising their children with the input and support by all, and form massive trade networks throughout the GC, with their unique and exquisite spices in particular sought after by virtually all.

Then there is the species that allowed Humanity the opportunity to perfect the process of uploading: well, they don’t really have any name that can be discerned, even through translation via universal translator. Instead, Humanity simply refers to them simply as “the Greys”.

The short bipedal stature, bizarre proportions and enigmatic demeanour are all seemingly right out of the pop-cultural Greys’ wheelhouse, but they are nothing like Humans biologically, closer to a starfish more than anything else. Having evolved on a large, dense planet orbiting a dwarf star in a tidally locked fashion, their civilisation exists in the region of perpetual twilight, and they have no concept of time in a “day” or “night” sense. On top of that, their brains are seemingly distributed throughout the entirety of their strange, boneless bodies, and they never actually sleep. Instead, the various regions of their brain turn off and recharge while others turn on and take over in the meantime, resulting in as much of the brain being recharged and active as possible at any given time.

This leads to some weird effects. Namely, that their personalities can radically shift depending on the time, making holding a long-term conversation with one a little tricky, given that the Grey you started with could be almost nothing like the Grey you end it with. For the Grey’s, multiple personalities aren’t a disorder or even a condition, they’re a simple fact of life. Then there is the fact that they communicate exclusively through magnetic fields, meaning they schedule their interactions around their sun’s solar activity (the bursts of magnetism can make it hard to interact without it getting drowned out. However, this unusual mental and neurological setup led them to formulate a Unified Theory of Consciousness even before they’d discovered relativity, and it is their skill in navigating the ins and out of consciousness and the brain that led them to the technique of uploading.

Brain transplantation is an art form for them, though they prefer to maintain their own bodies (or copies of them) and upload into things like construction equipment only when necessary, in a strictly utilitarian use of the technology. They consider the wanton use of the technology by Humanity to be utterly bemusing.

Finally, there are the closest allies of the Haltharus, and the ones renowned as the biggest badasses of the Galactic Confederation, the Kondoon. They are large (two heads taller than average humans-large) black and white muscular furry creatures that are sort of like a cross between a panda and a gorilla, but the twist being that they are not actually bipedal. Instead, they have six limbs, two being regular arms, and the other four used for locomotion, but the front two legs are also technically arms, having hands at the ends that they use to knuckle-walk on. It is for this reason that stairs never became popular within Kondoon society, with ladders instead taking that vaunted position.

They are a particularly martial species, with all members required by their governments to be skilled in combat training of some sort, and they don’t discriminate; those unable to serve in  full-on combat in some capacity are relegated to some support role. They are particularly hierarchical, but said hierarchy doesn’t really match anything Human. Mostly they serve in the Galactic Army alongside, working to maintain order and as a means of intimidation to tinpot politicians looking to stir up trouble.

They are also the main providers of the top-rated sport across the GC, a combat competition (of course) that functions as something like a cross between wrestling and a demolition derby, with multiple incredibly strong, incredibly-agile-for-their-sizes gorilla-panda-centaurs all trying to come out on top in an incredibly fast-paced and relatively brutal battle of wits and fists. It is basically dominated by the Kondoon, as few other species can match the level of athleticism required to come out on top, though there are a couple of Haltharus who compete, and, against all odds, a Timaraen who defies her species’ laid-back and peaceful stereotype and has become a serious competitor in the sport (the Timarae themselves are split on how they feel about her).

The Galactic Confederation itself is a gargantuan entity, sprawling across hundreds of colonised star systems and trillions of inhabitants. Despite oft-repeated claims of it being “overbearing” and “nothing more than a means for control”, it has had the stated effect of maintaining peace throughout its region of the galaxy. Wars are at an all-time low and average life satisfaction is at an all-time high. Humanity has gotten in a little bit late to the party, for sure; most other species were able to bring some astounding new revolution in technology or science to the table and spread it across the Confederation; the only new things Humanity could bring were chewing gum, slinkies and counting in base 10 (the other species find it incredibly weird that we count in base 10, as we are the only ones who actually do this).

However, Humanity, despite ostensibly being brought on board to give the GC some more weight and breadth, are having an overall larger effect on the society from within. For centuries now, the Haltharus have managed to impose their views regarding body/mind relationships, particularly those pertaining to the practice of uploading, on the larger populace, generally through their heading-up of the GC through history and breadth, only tolerating practices akin to the Greys’ because of their limited scale. In spite of that, Humanity’s use of the tech has been inspiring other species to try their hand at elevating the tech to the use on the same scale, and the Haltharus can do little but grumble. Already, plans are being made by the Haltharus higher-ups to try and introduce some form of regulation that could function as a compromise on both moral fronts.

However, that might have to wait, as right now they and the rest of the GCs’ upper echelon are attempting to integrate their newest addition on the species roster: the Rl’rtuk, an amphibious cephalopod-esque species. However, this is easier said than done, as the Rl’rtuk seem to have virtually no emotion whatsoever, making convincing them to of or to do anything a chore. Nonetheless, they seem to function as a society (albeit as a weird, passionless one) so there must be some way. Not even offers by the Timarae seem to sway them in any way, but they’ll keep trying.


[1] As it turns out, there is a scientific law that prevents time travel.

[2] Another difference with regards to Human mammaries? No nipples.