2060: The Earth is ruined through Climate Change and Warfare

2070: The first ever FTL jump station is created.

2080: The UN with majority approval initiates the Exodus Protocols, a Initiative of singular ambition: save humanity.

2090: 7 Ark Flotillas are built. Each is given the means & know-how on how to construct a jump station. They all prepare for Exodus.

2100: Exodus Arks finalize load up, the Flotillas pass through the jump station and enter.

The Frontier Era Begins

Chapter One

First Day of the Rest of My Life.

“Today is going to be the first day of your lives” The drill instructor said.

I was with a crowd of people, we were standing up at a parade rest stance listening to the drill instructor speak to us. All the while the assistants to the head drill instructor were marching up and down the crowd shouting at us to straighten our posture.

“The next coming days are going to be long. We will forge you into defenders of democracy and of this Union. If you feel like you are not ready for this way of life please save us the time and effort and simply walk away now.” He said.

I heard the foot shuffles of a couple of people walking away from the crowd.

“Good. They knew their limits and stepped away. Many of you “civilians” are the most pathetic excuse of a human that i’ve ever seen. Many of you have picked up plenty of bad habits from your cushy lives. Rest assured I will be breaking you from these bad habits.” He said.

I began to get very nervous hearing all of this and began thinking about what I was doing here. Without even continuing the main instructors assistants came out across the crowd. All of them began shouting in our face and grilling us for the smallest of infractions.

“Stand up straight!” I heard one say. “If you can’t stand up straight, how in the hell do you think you’re gonna make it past boot camp! You should just drop out now!” I heard them continue.

“Do you have a problem with my face worm!” I heard another one say. “Say something to me, do it now! I’m itching to see you do something to me” I heard them say.

That’s when one of the drill instructors came up to me.

“Why is your uniform loose!” she shouted at me.

“Ma’am i-” I muttered but was immediately cut off by them.

“Did I give you permission to speak! If you speak to me one more time without me giving you any permission you will suffer, am I making myself clear!” The woman screeched at me. Her face was a bright red shouting at me.

“I asked you, did you understand what I said Vickers?!” She asked.

“Ye-” I said but was cut off.

“What did I say about speaking without permission to speak! Drop now, you’re gonna do push-ups until you puke!” She shouted back at me.

I immediately dropped down and began doing a pushup. I hardly ever did push-ups in my normal life so doing one was hard enough. What made it even harder was the drill instructor critiquing me and yelling at me for everything.

“Jesus Christ if you can’t pick yourself up from the ground how do you expect to pick up a downed comrade on the battlefield?!” She asked.

“You are the most sorry excuse of a recruit i’ve ever seen, out of all my years being here I’ve never seen one person do push ups as bad as you” She continued.

My muscles and body were burning extremely. Worse than anything I've ever felt in my life. That and coupled with the barrage of words being yelled at me I felt the urge to just break down and begin crying. Eventually this barrage would end with a whistle filling the air. Almost immediately the assistants stopped and stood on the ends of us and stood at parade rest. The same assistant that was yelling at me helped me up and helped me stand up.

“Now, if you thought that was hard. You haven’t even started bootcamp. Now that you know what you’re expecting, anyone with lingering doubts about being here better leave now.” He said.

I thought about it long and hard. However this thought immediately dissipated from my system when I thought about my Grandpa. How he’d laugh at the fact I flunked out of Boot. I reinforced myself mentally and powered through the burn that filled my chest.

“I see here that a couple of people left.” The main drill instructor said. “The rest of you are too stubborn to know when to quit.” He said. “We will begin training by a PT run. Everyone line up, double file!” He shouted.

Quickly we all got into two lines, The Assistants corrected our lines as well. The main drill instructor stood in the front and began the march with a cadence. We all followed him and began jogging.

After jogging what felt like an hour, people began to stumble and slow down or go too fast. The assistants got them back in line and set them back into place. As we ran my legs began to burn something fierce, and I was running out of breath fast. As I began to pay attention to the marching I noticed that we were marching around the entirety of Fort Nunez.

Which meant we still had a long way to go. Many people simply tumbled on the side of the road. I kept up with the crew a couple minutes further until I too just took the fall on the side of the road. I thought that this was it for my training and they were going to wash me out and began crying.

One of the assistants came over to me.

“On your feet.” He said.

I was still sobbing.

“Stop crying, and get on your feet.” He said.

“I-I’m sorry I can still make it through b-b-boot please don’t wash me out.” I stumbled out through the sobbing.

“You’re not getting washed out, get on your feet. We’re going to get you back to camp.” he said.

The assistant stretched out an arm to me and helped me back up on my feet. I rubbed the tears from my eyes and the snot from my nose.

“You’re not going to make it through boot if you don’t toughen up and get used to this all. We will only wash you out if you wash yourself out.” He said.

This filled me up with some confidence and I saw the military truck come. We got into the back of the truck and rode back to where the rest of the recruits were. We got out of the truck and got into line with the rest of the recruits.

“Those of you who couldn’t finish the run PT don’t worry. You still have laziness in you that we’re going to get rid of real quick.” he said.

The drill instructor was just about to continue with something, when he was interrupted. One of the assistants came up to him and whispered something to him. The Drill instructor looked stoic and it was hard to read from his face what he had been told.

“You are lucky we’re headed back to the Barracks early.” He said.

Quickly they chaperoned us to the Barracks that we were designated to stay at and the assistants rapidly shuffled us to a bunk.

“I need everyone to sit down, and get comfortable.” He said in a calming voice, which I thought was not even possible.

There was a bit of a shuffle as people sat down and finally relaxed for the first time today.

“Is everyone comfortable?” He asked calmly.

Everyone responded with yes. The Drill instructor took his hat off and began speaking to us.

“I just got word just now, that the Union is under attack. The colony of Bounty was hit about an hour ago.” He said.

There was an audible gasp from people in the barracks. The news sent shivers down my spine.

“The attack came from a Commonwealth Invasion Force. Our space stations were hit as well. The planet is under contested control, but with the way it’s looking the planet is going to be theirs.” He said.

“Who here has family in Bounty, stand up.” He asked.

A handful of recruits stood up.

“If you need a minute to deal with this you can step out.” He said.

They all stepped outside.

“The rest of you, I'm giving you time to relax and process what's happening. You have permission to use your datapads to call home, send messages home. You can talk quietly to each other as well.” He said.

“It would be in your best interest to take what we are teaching you here to heart. Make no mistake about this. The Union is now at war with the Commonwealth.”