Awful Ideas In Progress

Timeline

Prehistory

~2 billion years ago: Prior civilization seeds various worlds with artifacts of varying power and purpose. Prior civilization soon is extinct, leaving only artifacts and

~40,000 BC: First humans start emigrating into the mythic world. The harsh conditions keep human numbers on the mythic low even with a constant trickle of immigrants falling through the rifts.

~1,000 BC: Various human societies formalize magical education and create schooling programs for sorcerers.

Middle Ages

~0-200 AD: Dark Ages. Destruction of cultural records shatter

~800 AD: Estimated date of Ragnarok. Most of the supermen the Norse worshipped as gods were destroyed in battles against "giants". Archaeological evidence later points to these giants being mechanical exoskeletons used by alien conquistadors. The survivors of this conflict lay low for nearly 1,000 years.

1000-1400: Middle Ages. Superhuman champions fight bygones and adventure into mythic realms, ending with a sorcerous ritual that largely (but not completely) seals the mythic and the material from each other until the 1900s.

18th Century

1776: American Revolution. A minority of posthuman leaders and champions fight for the American side. British victory looks assured, until increasing tensions in the

19th Century

1850: The industrial revolution's polluting conditions and miserable factories start a process which eventually leads to the explosion of superhumans and posthumans. Urbanization puts people into ever-closer exposure to 'extraordinary individuals', causing a resonance effect which leads to

1861-1865: The American Civil War's bloody course leads to another burst of posthuman manifestations. Supermen fight on both sides of the war, the most famous of which is General "Stonewall" Jackson, with flesh and skin as hard and dense as rock and magma in his veins. The Union's urbanization and population advantage give it a slight edge in the number of empowered individuals it fields, eventually grinding the Confederacy down and forcing it to surrender. John Wilkes Booth assassinates President Abraham Lincoln.

1882: The writings of Gregor Mendel are studied in depth by metahuman scientist Robert Gray. Using his superhuman sensory abilities and innate biomanipulation capability, he discovers DNA and proceeds to start experimenting with genetic engineering.

1890: First Wells-Effect antigravity ship, using Cavorite thrust systems, is unveiled by the British Interplanetary Society, the brainchild of posthuman futurist H.G. Wells. This ship, the HMS Victoria, is capable of in-atmosphere flight and travel to Lunar orbit. The plans for Cavorite antigravity thrusters are stolen by French, German, and American spies, kicking off a new arms race.

1892: With Mars's water and oxygen resources critically low and Mars suffering uncontrollable desertification, a dying Martian civilization launches an invasion against Earth. This invasion is repulsed by biological warfare when Robert Grey engineers a hyper-virulent influenza strain to target only Martian cells.

1893-1894: Counterinvasion of Mars occurs. The Great Powers create a temporary detente to assault Mars and destroy the civilization which lived there. Heavily outnumbered and with much of its military equipment expended from its desperation attack, the Martian race surrenders after only a year. Mars is subjugated and divided among the Great Powers.

1898: Eugenics movement starts in force. The effectiveness of the Gray Miracle kicks off an extensive project to alter the human genome to ensure "survival of the fittest".

20th Century

1908: HMS Dreadnought is commissioned and launched. The spacefaring battleship uses a number of experimental technologies, including Wave-Force Artillery Cannons reverse-engineered from Martian walkers and primitive screen fields. Obsoleting all then-current warships via its superior armament, speed, and protection, "Dreadnoughts" become the standard for many fleets.

1908: Tunguska impact-crashed alien assault frigate is captured by Russians, its crew subdued after intense fighting against Russian superhumans. The Tunguska Files provide Russian scientists with significant insights into interplanetary and interstellar travel.

1910: Boxer Rebellion-British forces in China stalemated by Chinese monks and mystics after fierce fighting. Peace treaty grants the British the administration of Hong Kong but keeps the Chinese empress on the throne and in power.

1911: British lunar explorers find a chancel that allows travel between the Moon and its mythic shadow, a world populated by humanoids with rabbit-like features such as ears. British economic conquest of the shadow moon and these 'Moon Rabbits' proceeds rapidly, a combination of economic dominance and military shows-of-force provided via the Maxim Gun.

1912: Industrialization's effects are being felt more significantly, as the number of superhumans starts ballooning. As many as 10,000 superhumans of various forms exist in a population of 1 billion. The effects of these on science and technology is significant. Industrial, medical, and combat technology starts to rapidly advance with the technological boons of Mega-Intelligent supermen bootstrapping humanity upwards.

1914-1920: First Great War. The British space fleet is nearly destroyed annihilating the German Stellar Navy, putting British interplanetary colonial ambitions on hold. Outside of a relative handful of super-science gadgets and miracles such as the space fleet and Martian energy weapons, though, the war still looks largely mundane. By the end of the war, both sides are fielding single-gun tanks with sloped armor and 50-100mm cannon, semi-automatic infantry weapons, and air-cooled machine guns, including electrically powered multibarrel "Gatling" weapons.

1916: Vladmir Lenin leads a Communist revolution in Russia, overthrowing the Tsar. The Soviet Union forms in the aftermath.

1919: The Martian-target influenza strain mutates. Now called the "Gray Death", after its creator, the strain first bypasses the Martian vaccine that countered it, then moves on to attack humans. The Martian race is wiped out, and millions of humans throughout the world die before the virus burns itself out. Interestingly, a significant proportion of the people infected who survive manifest some level of superhuman ability. Data on the Gray Death creates the basis for many later bio-augmentation projects.

19??: Vladmir Lenin is succeeded by Josef Stalin.

1929: The Great Depression begins, but is soon stopped in 1931 and turned around by economic advice from Mega-Intellects.

1931-1940: Chang Kai-Shek and Mao Zedong join forces to form the Chinese Liberation Movement, seeking to remove the empress from her throne. They soon end up creating a temporary alliance with the empress to stymie Japanese invasion.

1936: Nazi eugenicists crack the Gray Death and proceed to experimentally subject concentration camp prisoners and SS volunteers to experiments. Thousands die. A handful of Jewish prisoners survive the trials and manage to escape, warning the Allies of Nazi "ubermensch" projects. Other projects include enhancing the powers of natural "ubermensch", breeding programs for scions, and various gadget-based wonder weapons.

1938: Imperial Japanese forces invade and subjugate British lunar holdings, including their outposts in the shadow Moon.

1939: British military intelligence recovers Nazi supersoldier data at great loss of life.

1939-1946: World War II. Both Allies and Axis, without any real precision, create the first artificial superhumans. Without extensive safety controls, many of the subjects die or are rendered horribly damaged in body or mind. The survivors are quickly sent onto the front lines, with no understanding of mutagenic feedback trauma or any of the problems the augmented face. The Nazis successfully take Stalingrad via their SS Ubermensch Korps but do not manage to hold it against Russian superhumans, harsh conditions, and the bravery of the populace. The war is ended by the use of multiple atomic bombs, three American ones on Japan and two Russian ones on Germany. World War II greatly speeds the development of technologies, and before its end both sides are mass-producing supersonic jet fighter and bomber aircraft with fire-and-forget guided missiles, equipping infantry with ceramic body armor and assault rifles, and fielding tanks with armor-piercing discarding sabot ammunition. Medical technology advances significantly, especially in the art of trauma medicine.

1946: The revelations of the atrocities in Nazi and Imperial Japanese transhuman research projects cause a significant backlash against human augmentation technologies, especially when whistleblowers in similar organizations such as the United States Eugenics Research department publish similar horror stories. Most Allied countries start restricting human enhancement technologies. An international non-proliferation agreement on superhumans is signed, which will last until the 1960s.

1949: The Communists and Nationalists who make up the Chinese Liberation Movement successfully eject the last Chinese dynasty, which flees to Taiwan. China starts playing catchup to the first world, industrializing and modernizing without regard to short-term pain. However, fraying relations between the Nationalists and Communists lead to violence and deadlock, delaying dreams of becoming a world player by multiple decades.

1953: Josef Stalin dies of mysterious causes. Posthuman intervention is suspected, but no intelligence agency has admitted to taking actions against him. More likely, it was part of an internal power struggle or just an individual who had a personal grudge.

1954: Biologists Watson and Crick successfully clone a frog. Within a decade, cloned human parts start making it to market.

1954: Korean War. Soldiers in the Korean War on both sides were equipped by either the Soviet or Western bloc, with ceramic-tiled body armor, caseless assault rifles with integral grenade launchers, tanks using composite armor, and drones. The Soviet Union makes its first combat deployment of the "Stalin" powered armor, a 3 meter tall, one-ton behemoth capable of shrugging off heavy machine gun fire. The Korean War ends in stalemate and a signed armistice.

1960: Anti-colonialist, pro-socialist elements in the Martian colonies gain mass support, kicking off the Martian war. French forces are rapidly overwhelmed, and France requests military and financial aid from America. The Martian War will lead to more than 50,000 Americans dead, several times that wounded, and many more Martians suffering the same fate before Mars wins its freedom.

1964: With the Martian revolution in full swing, Vietnam seeks its fortunes in independence. With no forces to spare, America does not militarily intervene in Vietnam, and the South Vietnamese government quickly topples. US Army starts Project SALVO. The Remington SPIW is adopted as the standard American assault rifle, replacing conventional caseless firearms with a flechette-firing electronically enhanced assault rifle and multishot grenade launcher. Project Hardiman successfully completes, fielding the West's first suit of non-gadget power armor. Smaller (at a mere 2m tall) and lighter (at only 150 kg) than the Soviet Union's "Stalin" power armor, the Hardiman is much more practical for mass use in close combat in the tunnel warrens of Mars.

1965: Experiments by Bell Labs and General Electric seek to combine media such as fax, television, telephone, and radio. This integrated communications network, or 'internet', is joined by some extent with ARPANET, creating the first integrated communications network in America. Experimental forms of communication such as 'electronic mail' are soon integrated into the internet, designed from the ground up to deliver audiovisual information to consumers. The Hardiman control schematic is declassified and civilian-use loading exoskeletons start showing up on the market.

1968: Bell Labs releases the first commercial internet terminal, combining a phone, color television, fax machine, and radio into one electronic device. Government research grants fund research and development on nanotechnology.

1970: Deng Xiaoping rises to power in China, driving his opposition either into exile or into death. Consolidating his power over the squabbling inner circle of the Chinese leadership, he starts a sweeping program of trade and economic reforms.

1978: Xerox and Bell Labs both release the first portable telephone, a terminal that integrates on an ad-hoc basis with the local internet. These all-in-one phone terminals take off in popularity. Nanotechnology research starts bearing fruit.

21st Century

1991: Saddam Hussein, his forces swelled with the end of the Iran-Iraq War and in possession of several human enhancement technologies and a number of naturally occuring posthumans, invades Kuwait. A coalition is formed to repulse him. American soldiers defeat Iraqi superhumans and ex-Russian equipment with negligible losses.