History of the Orion Cluster

Origin with the Noremok:
The name "Orion Cluster" comes from a region of the Orion Arm that is host to several sentient species, as well as several star systems with ancient ruins of a civilization that had supposedly come from another galaxy. This region was of great observational interest to the Noremok, and there was already a spacefaring species in the area; the Zetans, whom had no idea they were being watched. There were several other promising species, Humans, Sirians, Erulon, Rigelians, Pleiadeans, and more, but none had reached the technological level of even being able to find the Noremok.

While searching the ruins of what the Noremok call the "Andromedan" civilization, they discovered the means of easy, long-distance FTL travel; Quantum Tunneling. Prior to this discovery, the Nor' had been relying on Warp Drives for travel, but even with this technology, voyages to other star systems still took decades. This technological boom prompted the species to colonize the outer reaches of the "Andromedan Reserve", there were several planets that had been previously terraformed and many that were naturally habitable. It was the largest mass migration of the Nor' species in history, and this massive amount of intragalactic travel caught the attention of the slowly evolving Zetans.

Zetan Empire Conflict:
A serious expedition was put together, a generation colony ship was built and families were found to make the trip, not long after it's departure however, the Zetan homeworld became consumed by the fires of war. Their mission was simple, keep the colony ship alive and reach the closest, high-traffic star system, but  it would take several thouand years for the ship to reach it's destination and the technology they wanted. Before making contact the voyagers had evolved with their new environment, and built a new culture that was vastly different from their planet born cousins. Survival of the fittest had become the norm for the ship bound speciese, social structures broke down and were rebuilt in time. The first Zetan ambassadors were not the same ones that set out so many generations ago, they were starved to see land and proper civilization. They integrated and learned from the Noremok, and eventually earned the right to take the technology their people wanted.

Returning home, the now diversified Dropa brought with them the means to easily travel amongst the stars, and being the first civilization to spread through the region, thought they were entitled to all the usable land. As the empire began expanding outwards, to the dismay of the Noremok, several smaller species were wiped from existence as the Zetans moved in. Determined to protect the Reserve, the Nor' set up a blockade around every system Zetans had claimed, angered by this impedence, the weaker Zetan Navy lashed out, leading to a one-sided conflict that left their fleet almost completely destroyed. Wanting peace, the Nor' offered to form an alliance with the defeated Zetans, with the shift of political favor in the hands of the less aggressive Dropa lead the way to helping forge the Allied Orion Navy.

Saric'Tau Union:
On the opposite side of the Reserve, the Saric'Tau were just starting to find their first Andromedan ruins, if the Nor' had not stopped the Zetan expansion when it did, these two empires would have turned the region into a war zone. Left to their own devices, the Sar' were able to uncover research for quantum tunneling, their first successful use of the technology sent them deep within the Reserve, and into the middle of the highest traffic systems used by Nor' and Zetans. Welcoming the new arrivals with open arms, the Sar' agreed to join the Orion Navy, doing their best to fit in with the established and more advanced empires.

The Sar' presence was fundamental to actually unifiying the Orion Navy for the first time, the Zetan navy was still not even half the strength it used to be prior to the conflict with the Nor'. Despite the fact that the cultural differences between the Sar' and Zetans was problomatic, the two helped each other expand their territorial claims outside of the Reserve. New Zetan colony ships were built by the Sar', while their own fleets were upgraded with advanced Zetan technology, coordinating all the efforts were the Noremok who did their best to keep the two empires from open conflict. Having already scouted a large potion of the surrounding space, the older empire guided and kept tabs on the fledgling colonists. After a while, the two species began to drift apart, even from tolerating each other, the increasing pure blooded Zetan population became almost xenophobic of the Sar', treating them as an underevolved civilization.

Expansion into the Unknown:
It was impossible to tell what lay beyond the known space that was patrolled and protected by the growing Orion Navy, but the desire to build strong empires drove colonists out into the unknown. Many worlds were inhabited with monsterous forms of life, these creatures didn't seem to scare anybody though, it was the voids of space that spawned the most horrific ghost stories. Tales of parasitic machines that invaded the flesh became common, for a long time they were only regarded as children's stories to prepare them for potential horrors. When whole colonies started to disappear however, that's when people started to take the stories seriously, one-by-one, whole planets went silent in the Norma Arm.

Each time it was the same, badly damaged refugee ships would land on the closest friendly colony, chaos, and then nothing. More refugees would limp to the next colony in line and so too would that world fall. As painful as it was, refugee ships from lost colonies became the targets of planetary defenses, an unknown number of lives were lost for sake of protection of even more. AON forces and even reinforcements from the empires rallied to try and reclaim the lost colonies, working backwards and further into the void. However, when the scouting parties reported the horrific situations the best they could, before being consumed themselves, it was apparent that it might be impossible to retake all the planets lost.

The Centauri Federation:
Ship graveyards drifted in orbit around the first target planet, terrifying traps that sprung to life  and consumed anybody who came too close, those that made it planetside wished that they hadn't made it so far. The landing parties headed straight for the population centers, only to behold destruction beyond their worst nightmares. It had only been about a week, but the parasitic machines had consumed most forms of life, twisting and altering flesh and bone to break their host and serve their purpose. Planetary flora withered as the atmosphere became toxic, rapid surface mining left the landscape in ruin, and the buildings in rubble. There were no bodies, lumps of unuseable flesh, pools of blood, and limbs were everywhere, but the bits of colonists that were of use to the machines had been turned into slaves, some fought, but most toiled away looking for materials to consume.

Any technology that was connected via wifi became the their tools, soldiers with implants and cybernetics were the first victims, being forced to turn on their friends. The live feed to the command ships hit the navies harder than most conventional weapons, the order came down to bombard the colony with EMP strikes and make another landing attempt. Many of the machines were rendered useless and the second strike was much more successful, but the machines had warped and corrupted enough of their hosts that they did their best to fight off the rescuing forces. Taking prisoners was difficult and cost more AON lives than was acceptable, but the few that weren't able to kill themselves, when interrogated were found to be technically insane, they all professed loyalty to the Centauri Federation, a collective of machine life that spread to other planets.

With such a large AON losses against a smaller foe, it was unanimously decided that a quarantine be set up around infestation, however it was unknown just where all the machines had claimed. Over the course of several months, the Orion empires worked together to scout and chart the Southern Crux and Norma arms of the galaxy, the range of which the Centauri Federation had spread was quite frightening to the Noremok and Zetan governments. Operations began to purge the Centauri fom the Crux Arm and create a several thousand light year zone between the empires and the infestation, planets that were already consumed were subject to a scorched earth policy, those that had yet to fall but were within the quarantine zone were evacuated and then destroyed. It was an unpopular choice to destroy several usable planets, but the Centauri had only spread to planets with abundant life, perhaps the lack there of being a deterrant to try and expand their borders...and it seemed to work.

Sirian Sesession:
The status quo continued for a few hundred years, the Centauri were kept at bay with the quarantine, only once or twice every decade would a random ship try to cross the void, only to be bombarded by AON patrols soon after leaving the infestation zone. Deep within the Andromedan Reserve though, one of the star systems under the jurisdiction of the Zetan empire was demanding the right to form their own multi-system empire, having successfully colonized their home system of Sirius. One of the planetary neighbors, the Erulon, had already abandoned their dying planet to join the predomiant Sirians, and then became a nomadic group when the system became over crowded. Not wanting to yield their already settled systems, the Zetan governmet refused new land to the Sirians, sparking a vast migration towards the Southern regions of the Reserve.

Leaving only a small population in their home system, the displaced Sirians began reaching into systems not yet settled by the Zetans, they had been charted and scouted by the Noremok, and there were even small colonies on planets and stations, the Saric'Tau also had small claims, but the predominant species became the Sirians. Building began at jaw dropping rates, turning their colony ships into planetside cities. Integration was assisted by the AON, as they reached further out into the Orion arm, new civilizations were either welcoming of the Sirians or not ready to begin intragalactic travel. It was a very impressive display of their defiance of the Zetan empire, but also their ability to establish themselves as a powerful nation, so much so that the Zetans took this as a threat, especially when the Sirian population began to out number the Zetans in some systems.

The Orion War:
Even though the Zetan empire had built a powerful empire, they still felt threatened by the technically superior Sirian species, small conflicts broke out on planets settled by both civilizations, instigated by pure bloods from both sides. Past Zetan contempt and abusive behavior towards the Sirians had created a void between the two species, the planet side riots quickly escalated into all out war, the bulk of which was fought between the two navies. Abstaining from involvment with the conflict, the Noremok effectively broke the standing AON fleet with their uninvolvement, letting the Zetan ships leave to aide their cause, the Saric'Tau however, sided with the Sirians, whom were in desperate need of assistance against the more powerful Zetan space navy.

Both the Sar' and Sirians worked hard to claim a number of systems in the Southern regions of the Andromedan Reserve, forcing several Zetan colonies to either submit to their new rulers, or be deported. In the end, most pure blood Zetan colonists chose to be deported back to their home space.