stickmaker | Timeline, Part Three

Third part of a timeline I created as part of the background for some science fiction stories I'm writing.

Timeline

Part Three

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3.2 BYBP Chronometric Research Station #2453 emerges from stasis and frees itself from the Moon, excavating Eratosthenes Crater in the process, to the endless confusion of future lunologists. These last of the Demmit S'Tee look at the vast, empty, silent universe around them and despair. For about a day. Then they begin altering Earth and Mars and building space habitats to contain their soon rapidly-increasing population. They rename their station Patience Base, due to its long period in stasis and the philosophy of the leading contingent among them.

Venus is close to the right size for Demi S'Tee habitation but seen as already requiring too much effort to make livable, due to the thick atmosphere, rising temperatures and too little water. With their technology, the Demmit S'Tee could alter it to suit them, but why bother when there are two better candidates handy? Earth should have been worse - at least in terms of atmospheric thickness - but the collision which created the Earth-Moon system removed much of the planet's atmosphere while its strong magnetic field and greater distance from the Sun allow it to retain long-term what is left. However, Earth is large for a habitable planet. Mars is closer to what the Demmit S'tee need in terms of size, but it is too small. Its magnetic field is already failing as its core cools, its air and water are evaporating or freezing. The Demmit S'Tee generally thought long-term, those from Patience Base typically moreso. They all realize that if they want to live in this system for more than a few million years they need both room and a stable planetary environment.

They have much work ahead of them. Mars is nearly dead while the Earth is barely born. Mars receives the bulk of their attention early on, but the Earth shows the most promise for long-term habitability. One unusual advantage is that its large satellite greatly reduces its axial wobble, moderating climate changes. This is considered an adequate compensation for the unusually high gravity.

There is some argument about interfering with the primitive living things already present on these two planets and at a few other locations in this system. When someone points out that the natural changes of these environments will render most of those organisms extinct in a few million years anyway the dissent ends. For then. Earth is seeded and the oxygen content of the atmosphere begins to rise. One result is thick layers of iron oxide deposited in sediments.

Mars has its rotational rate and axial tilt adjusted and its magnetic field reinforced. These tasks are accomplished by inserting a large device deep into the planet's mantle through the Tharsis Plume. Work begins on increasing both the total density of the atmosphere and the oxygen and water content.

Less than 10,000 years later the few million Demmit S'Tee in Sol System are wiped out in a civil war, sparked by a disagreement over plans for their expansion into the universe. The results of this activity are later mistaken by human planetologists as evidence of a very brief period of unusually heavy bombardment.

For a while, though, things go well. Proper long-term habitats are built, both in space and on Mars, Earth, the Moon and a few other bodies, including asteroids. In addition to newly constructed defense facilities, Patience Base is heavily modified. Originally an important research station with integrated defensive capability, it is converted into a powerful fortress. There is little sign of advanced technological activity outside Sol System for as far as they can determine without doing something to draw attention to themselves. However, these surviving Demmit S'Tee are understandably very cautious. They are almost certainly the only ones of their kind left and they intend to change that fact. As they learn more from additional research and exploration, they constantly improve Patience Base.

Later actual, physical expeditions outside Sol System are made covertly by the Demmit S'Tee. These voyages are primarily intended to uncover what happened to their culture, and secondarily to catch up on the rest of the universe. Determined to keep their presence secret for the foreseeable future, they quietly explore dead worlds in dead systems, long-unoccupied habitats and scattered other constructs. Discovering the fate of their own civilization and subsequent ones - especially the Four-Part Alliance - sobers even the normally optimistic Demmit S'Tee.

The more enduring chronostasis methodology developed at Patience Base was recreated later by other Demmit S'Tee, helping increase what these expeditions recover. (They are so thorough in their scavenging they greatly reduce what is left for later searchers to find.) Particularly valued is a handful of data caches from well after their own period. Two of these are each part of large collections of Demmit S'Tee artifacts - including memory archives - from not long before the species' initial disappearance. Additionally, they find a Demmit S'Tee non-fugitive automatic archival backup from a civilization-wide communications system. This was created millions of years after Patience Base entered stasis. It continued working long after their species vanished, with the last actual backup made shortly before the network finally collapsed from neglect. These items and other stores of information help those from Patience Base upgrade to the level of technology later members of their culture reached before the mysterious collapse of their civilization. Some of the technological developments described in these records are so extraordinary they alarm the Patience Base leaders. They also serve to further polarize the three primary factions among the Demmit S'Tee in Sol System.

The smallest faction - the Rapid Advancement Proponents - wish to use the advantages of these technologies to quickly build a huge power base and conquer by force; the second smallest - the Let Nature Take Its Course group - advise abandoning the dangerous rediscovered technologies and erasing all record of them, and giving up the terraforming projects and migrating to several other systems with already habitable worlds but no intelligent life; the third faction - the dominant one - intends to stay in Sol System and increase their numbers and power base for a few millennia, then begin spreading outwards through immigration and peaceful assimilation. Due to the war none of these factions wins, and the Demmit S'Tee are soon truly extinct.

In one of the last acts of the the war, the Rapid Advancement proponents attempt to destroy the device deep in the martian mantle which is used to control the rotational rate and axial tilt of the planet and reinforce its magnetic field. Their attack is deflected and diffused, instead vaporizing much of the surface of Mars' northern hemisphere. The device is damaged, however, and its self repair capacity cannot completely correct this. The loss of function allows the continued deterioration of the natural core dynamo. Radiation from the Sun begins to slowly blast away the atmosphere, effectively undoing the environmental engineering previously performed on the planet. The device continues to function but incompletely, so that the planet's axis wobbles far more than desired. Also, the waste heat from its operation is no longer properly disposed of. This accelerates the formation of the Tharsis Bulge. Today the device is almost completely nonfunctional. However, that is mostly due to waiting for directions to help it deal with a situation which is now far outside its intended operational parameters.

Another result of the attack is radioactive contamination of the entire planet. To this day, the surface and atmosphere - especially certain small areas - of Mars contain anomalously high levels of uranium, thorium and potassium, churned out from deep in the lithosphere by the blast.

None of the far less sophisticated starfaring species native to this era notice either the arrival of the Demmit S'Tee or their departure. Neither do any of these societies encompass more than two million stars before failing. Soon, they are also gone, and this portion of the universe is again quiet.

Most of the effects of the terraforming projects quickly fade, leaving little trace. The impact on Terran native oxygen producers is sufficient that the element begins to decline in the air and oceans of Earth. Mars resumes its long, slow death, though for the next billion years there are intermittent periods which are warm and wet, at least in some areas. Life declines, resurges and declines again, until finally all but the most robust organisms on Mars die out. All that remain today are various species of cave slime.

While the progress of life on Earth continues, it is profoundly affected. Due to the initial changes, the original life forms were largely wiped out, while the lack of deliberate continuation of the terraforming means that most of the introduced life forms also die. An uneasy balance is maintained for millions of years before the descendants of the surviving original strains achieve ascendance, completely replacing the intruders. Today only a few odd fossil traces remain of the introduced organisms.

Many of the Demmit S'Tee artifacts in Sol System which survive the war are destroyed by impacts with planets or other bodies or by environmental forces present on these bodies, or simply by long exposure to radiation and micrometeoroid impacts in space. A few survive intact, mostly on Mars.

Later civilizations which explore Sol System quickly notice the signs of planeforming, and piece together the basics of the story behind the system's strange history. However, the details remain elusive for hundreds of million of years. Slowly, the efforts of various cultures uncover much of what happened in Sol system. Currently, the Archives have a fairly thorough timeline from the emergence of Patience Base and the actions of its inhabitants until just before their end. They even have records of the traces left by some of the searches the Demmit S'Tee from Patience Base performed in several parts of the Local Great Cluster. However, the majority of the story from the beginning of the final war until its end is only very sketchily known. This seems partially due to the passage of time, partially due to the understandable collateral and even deliberate damage of war, and partially due to another factor. The hints remaining of what this last factor was are so worrying that all evidence and analysis of same are ordered hidden by The Management.

Of Patience Base there is no sign. Those who have studied these events almost uniformly believe the installation was destroyed by the rebels. Yet some still search for it. The South Pole-Aitken basin on the Moon is repeatedly targeted for examination as the hiding place for the base, due to its anomalous metallic mass concentration. However, each new survey quickly eliminates the area as being much too old to be a feature of the war which saw the end of the last of the Demmit S'Tee.

One of the most lasting geophysical features of this last civil war is the creation of the Medusae Fossae Formation, the largest known explosive volcanic deposit in the solar system. This becomes the source of the majority of dust on Mars to current times.

3.08 BYBP Just over a hundred million years after the Demmit S'Tee vanish the Dolran leave several cubic kilometers of their own equipment and personal belongings and recovered Demmit S'tee artifacts in a repurposed Demmit S'Tee habitat. This is preserved with a second-stage chronostasis enclosure not far from Tharsis. This is soon buried by the eruptions which form Olympus Mons. Why the facility and finds were abandoned is unknown. Presumably they expected to return and access the installation or they wouldn't have used a Demmit S'Tee stasis unit to preserve it. By the time later cultures discover Sol System and its treasures the huge stasis bubble is beyond easy reach. Worry over the cache containing living Demmit S'Tee discourages many of those who otherwise might undertake the effort to reach the object.

One result of the thorough scavenging by the Dolran is that later cultures acquire fewer examples of Demmit S'Tee technology and records. Most of these are from that culture's first period of activity.

3.0 BYBP The Third Quiet Interval ends with the advancement of the Napit into a galactic level society. They soon fill their own galaxy and spread to those closest to it, less conquerors than missionaries for their way of life. They recruit through persuasion and example, enticing other societies to join theirs by offering technology, trade and mutual protection pacts. They are, however, definitely able to defend themselves against those who use aggression to promote their own cultures. Within a hundred million years theirs is the primary governing entity in the Local Great Cluster by a considerable margin.

They create a bureaucracy which - while it does not actually survive their rule - serves as the model for great cultures into the present time.

Amazonian Period begins on Mars. Olympus Mons begins to form. The results of these events temporarily create a warmer, wetter climate.

A prolonged burst of star formation lasting roughly a billion years begins sometime during this period. No records from the earliest part of this event survive which note this beginning. Attempts to attribute it to one particular cause - including some event connected with one or more starfaring civilizations - have not been successful. Most likely the peak was due to a combination of factors, such as the Milky Way ingesting several smaller galaxies in a short time.

2.9 BYBP Tides on Earth decline below 300 meters as the Moon continues to increase its distance.

Kenorland supercontinent forms.

Oxygen-producing photosynthetic cyanobacteria begin to flourish in what will eventually become South Africa. Atmospheric oxygen levels begin to increase, though they will not reach a tipping point for nearly another half a billion years.

2.8 BYBP Neoarchean Eon begins. Valbaara supercontinent breaks up.

2.66 BYP A rapid oxygenation event occurs on Earth. The higher oxygen level lasts less than fifty million years. Analysis of deep rock layers reveals the activity of certain marine microorganisms which use oxygen to form nitrate compounds, and other microorganisms which use this nitrate for energy. (The data collected from nitrogen isotopes sample the surface of the ocean, while the deep ocean was likely anoxic, or without oxygen, at the time.) The presence of selenium suggests there was free oxygen in the air of ancient Earth. Analyses of sulfur isotopes from Archean rocks confirm the event.

There are multiple increases in the oxygen level over the next 360 million years, sometimes followed by declines.

2.5 BYBP Distinct tectonic plate movement begins on Earth. Sulfur-oxidizing bacteria leave fossils in a layer of chert located within the Kaapvaal craton of South Africa. Shale deposits form which show thorough oxygenation of oceans.

2.48 BYBP Oldest evidence of oxygen breathing land organisms on Earth.

2.4 BYBP Huronian glaciation starts. First snowball Earth period.

The Earth's atmosphere begins a rapid rise in atmospheric oxygen as native oxygen generators become more abundant.

The Earth experiences the Great Oxygenation Event.

2.3 BYBP The Grand Coalition is formed, largely by the Napit, bringing about the highest peak in technical and social development since the fall of the Demmit S'Tee. This is also one of the most peaceful eras in the records. The Napit are strong believers in the philosophy of not starting fights, but definitively finishing them.

2.229 BYBP Ancient asteroid impact in Australia creates what is now known as Yarrabubba crater and ends the glacial Proterozoic eon.

2.2 BYBP Oxygen content of Earth's atmosphere reaches 1%. Ozone layer forms.

First continent - later named Columbia - begins to form on Earth.

2.15 BYBP Huronian glaciation ends.

Oxygen levels approach half the current value.

2.1 BYBP Mid-Proterozoic era. Oxygen levels on Earth continue to rise. First evidence of multi-cellular organisms and their locomotion on Earth. This is followed by a deoxygenation event 2.083 billion years before present.

A multi-species investigation of the odd biological developments on Earth uncovers incongruously young Demmit S'Tee artifacts in Sol System. Their age and technological advancement alarm the Napit and others. Eventually, a thorough search and analysis of the records about the Demmit S'Tee left by previous cultures convince the current masters of the Local Great Cluster that all members of that mythic species are indeed long gone. Still, concerns persist over what happened to some of the more significant constructs mentioned in the records found in Sol System, including Patience Base itself. Is it still out there, somewhere, again in stasis? If so, it would - by itself - be more powerful than anything short of the combined resources of the entire Napit culture... if even that would be enough.

This realization generates a search - conducted intermittently over hundreds of millions of years by members of thousands of societies - for Patience Base. Some want its power for themselves; some for their culture; some to keep it from being used by their enemies; others from being used by anyone. Following this initial surge, interest gradually fades. However, off and on for nearly a billion years someone will find mention of Patience Base in the records of some ancient culture and spark another search for it. Patience Base remains elusive, and even most of those who seek it eventually decide it is long destroyed in the civil war which killed the last of its builders.

Though the main prize is never found, these efforts are far from fruitless. Many surviving Demmit S'Tee artifacts are uncovered, both in Sol System and in the vaults of earlier researchers and scavengers, as well as a few items and caches remaining from the first era of the species. Mars is given particular attention and thoroughly scanned for stasis bubbles. Most of those remaining on or near the surface of the planet are recovered and opened. Some are deemed not worth the trouble, including the largest inclusion, which is already buried deep under Olympus Mons. (A large part of the reason it is left unopened is fear it may contain living Demmit S'Tee.) The vast majority of the items recovered are unique and cannot be duplicated by current technology.

However, even supposedly innocuous items can cause major disruptions far out of proportion to their size and intended use. This is only partly due to their sophistication. After all this time of unsupervised existence their situation is outside any parameters their builders foresaw. When a test of a damaged power generation unit causes a vast dieoff of life on the young Earth the policy is adopted for the current dominant culture in the Milky Way to strictly regulate access to Sol System (something later made official and overseen by The Management); for its own protection, if no other reason.