The First Page

 

Clash at Grettier’s World

Book 1 of: Against the Tide, the Saga of the new Commonwealth

By Stephen W. Houghton II

“By the beginning of the ninth century of the Human Diaspora to the stars, the expansion of the Teran Union had reached a crisis point. Over the previous thousand years those who wanted to live apart from the mainstream of human society, either to continue to practice old ways or to try radical new ones, had fled earth to space where nearly unlimited mater and energy could be used to build new living space for their new or new-old societies.”

“For the first two hundred years this was confined to the Solar System. However, in the year 2251 in the Christian reckoning, the inventor Jules Hamond invented the first practical FTL drive marking the first year of the diaspora. This accelerated the exodus as those apart from the mainstream could move their existing habitats to new systems or settle whole new worlds. The out flow of dissidents first from earth and then from the solar system accelerated the growing conformism of those left behind. That made the long-held dream of first a one-world government and then in Year of the Diaspora 85, a system wide government, the Terran Union, a reality.”

“An ideology of resource limits and a belief in human political unity led to a Terran Union policy of expansion. Some of the fleeing dissidents had settled in nearby systems and the Union’s expansion lead many of these to flee once more. However, others either of a more pioneering spirit or from a conviction that the Union would soon follow them had traveled far from the home system. Their numbers rose rapidly by natural increase and by reinforcements from those who had settled closer to earth only to be driven forth by the Union.”

“By Y.D. 500 some of these systems had populations rivalling that of the solar system and had become their own centers for expansion sending out daughter colonies. Over the next few hundred years, as the frontier of the ever-expanding Terran Union approached, some of these began forming alliances or multisystem governments in response. More importantly they had begun to arm, developing new weapons and tactics for space warfare. In response the Union had formed its own navy and continued its policy of expansion.”

“However, by the beginning if the nineth century the Union’s fronter was starting to run up against four larger and six lesser multi system states and 13 independent but wealthy and armed worlds. While there was still room for continued Union expansion, it was clear that sooner or later this would be choked off as the Union became surrounded by other states strong enough to resist. Only if it was willing to risk war could the Union policy of expansion continue.”

    from the introduction to William Schmid’s “Diaspora and Crisis, 

    a History of the Terran Union in the Ninth Century” 

   Commonwealth University Press, Oxford, Wessex Y. D. 973