When the Union of Allied Planets declared their intentions to fully unify the 34 Tauri
star cluster and extend their authority to the whole of what had come to be known as
“The Verse”, their eventual victory was certain.
Since the earliest days of colonization, all political, economic, and military power had
been consolidated across the core worlds, while those living in the frontier were limited
to the poor, the desperate, or the restless.
These Independent Planets never stood a chance.
While every survivor of the Earth that was could have made a life for themselves on one
of the core worlds, the frontier spirit of humanity could not be confined.
Pioneers abandoned the crowded cities of Sihnon or Londinium in search of greener pastures,
or to simply live their lives in a place free of the overriding hand of civilization.
In the newly terraformed worlds of the rim, these settlers had been given that opportunity.
They converted whatever spaceships they had been able to afford into homes and then towns.
They worked the land and claimed it for their own.
It was not an easy existence.
Many of the outer planets had developed unique “quirks” due to the substandard methods
of their terraforming, and disease and hardship were rampant.
Whether it was the brutal conditions across the rim that moved the Alliance to intervene,
or their simple desire to exert control across the whole of humanity, the resulting conflict
was devastating.
The Alliance had anticipated the Outer Rim would welcome their regime with open arms,
as had been the case across the central planets, but the frontier had been built on the principle
of self-reliance and self governance.
Every world had its own set of laws that met their unique needs while their people had
come to regard the Union of Allied Planets as unnecessary, undesirable, and harmful.
Together the frontier worlds united under a loose Confederacy.
Within the Independent High Council and Independent High Command, planets whose cooperation had
once been limited to the delivery of mail now attempted to coordinate an entire war
effort against the superpower that was the Alliance.
The heart of this effort was centered on Persephone, one of the most powerful worlds outside of
Alliance control.
Together with Shadow, Hera, and a scattered few other moons and planets, the outer rim
assembled a volunteer army and attempted to resist annexation by the Alliance.
For five years the Independent Planets fought across the Outer Rim.
Their soldiers acquired a tenacious reputation, resisting with a fanatic devotion even against
hopeless odds.
Terrible fighting in Du-Khang, Sturges, and New Kashmir tested the resolve of the Alliance,
but their manpower and resources could not be overcome.
The Independents held their final stand in the Battle of Serenity Valley on Hera.
They lasted almost two months before Independent High Command surrendered, though many soldiers
refused to yield for weeks after that.
The lost cause that was the Independent Planets has been dismissed as a historical footnote
across the core worlds of the Alliance, but on the rim, its memory lingers still.
Scarred remnants of the war can still be found across the frontier, while the world of Shadow
remains uninhabitable to this day.
No one has forgotten what the Alliance did during the war, and few have forgiven.
Many await a day when those who resisted the spread of civilization might once more wear
the brown overcoats of the Independent Army, and the cry of freedom will roar across the
stars.
The Templin Institute investigates alternate worlds and realities.
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