Intergalactic Canadian Federation / ICF

Year: 2373

Space is now on the forefront of humanities ambitions. It took long enough! We were all waiting for the destruction of the human race during the second Cold War with Russia and the first with China… Each of the three nations had their missiles pointed at each other for God knows how long. After a bit of back story, what makes us think the nations of Earth are going to miraculously hold hands and unite under space exploration?

A little closer to home; Canada, unfortunately and ironically, broke down into a civil war. Looking back at it now, it was a rather unintelligent move by the Canadian citizens. There were the members that sided with United Nations of Earth and those who opposed it, the Nationalists.

Year: 2379

The civil war has gone on for six long and bloody years. The superpowers decide not to interfere with this civil war because they found it best to just let it play out; however, there has been much public debate regarding the halt to fighting within the country. Heavy causalities are due to the advancement of weaponry and guerilla warfare. The Nationalists knew from the beginning that weren’t going to win, but with free National Healthcare there were plenty of jobs to go around for doctors and nurses. The Canadian government is well aware that they are winning, and are actually taking advantage of the slight economic boom that coincides with the civil war.

Year: 2380

Once the United Nations got involved, the Nationalists were overwhelmed. Supplies and troops were sent in to aid the Canadian government. The surviving Nationalists hid underground in bunkers that were constructed halfway through the civil war. These bunkers are outfitted with the most advanced communication disrupters so as not to be detected by anyone that happened to be surveying the Rocky Mountain peaks of Northern British Columbia.

The United Nation’s involvement in the civil war was soon followed by the World Summit talks of 2380. They felt Canada should be involved in the peace talks to unify the nations of Earth under a common goal of exploring the stars. The superpowers felt that Canada was a bit underappreciated for all the support they lent to the science research programs in the United States.

Year: 2402

Surprisingly enough, the Nationalists survived a long twenty years thus far in an underground city that the locals are calling Lethe. The residents felt as if the over-world had forgotten that the remainder of the Nationalists after the war went into exile. The civilization sent out scouts and small convoys to gather supplies from nearby towns. These towns didn’t grow suspicious as they are frequented by traders and the occasional passerby looking for supplies on their long treks through the snow. Lucky for Lethe, there were abundant gold and coal ore veins to use as fuel and currency.

Delving deeper into the societal issues of Lethe, thieves were abundant, murder rates were on the rise, and there was no government in place to enforce unwritten laws. It seems to be every man for themselves in an underground civilization.

A group of Nationalists hosted private conferences to figure out how to maintain an underground society for as long as they possibly can. After a codec of laws was written out and a band of militia was transformed into a police force, the underground civilization came together to form the Canadian Rocky Mountain Society (CRMS). The first president, Fredrick Zoro II, was elected from the private group of Nationalists to start off the CRMS on a strong foot. The rest of the private group formed Zoro II’s council. From here on out, the president would be elected by Lethe’s citizens.

Year: 2442

It isn’t easy surviving underground, let alone the fact that if anyone steps outside for too long they’ll freeze to death. Residential areas are already overcrowded and expanding the underground city any further only increases the risk of detection. Since we have no other place to go but down, a group of radicalists started a peaceful protest arguing why we don’t go up instead?

One of the largest downsides of living in seclusion is the lack of up-to-date technology. With limited resources, self-sufficient research is very slow. The only information we receive is from our scouts twice a month. They are limited by what they can carry and the data they can retrieve. A bit of useful information came down though – humanity has made contact with another lifeform: the Banu – a highly mercantile species. Maybe with the overworld preoccupied with another species, the CRMS can make a secret escape to a nearby planet…

There are two groups of scouts, one that reports to nearby towns frequently for somewhat crucial supplies and the long distant scouts who report to the closest city in an attempt to free the underground residents. Of course the data sent to the mayor is a bit skewed and classified, but the messages we get back convey fear that the world government might grow suspicious of a population increase of eighty-thousand essentially overnight. The city’s local government offered a some land on the outskirts of the city, hanger space at the airport, and their silence of the CRMS’s existence as long as they are supplied with a quota of gold and coal.

Year: 2523

How the CRMS managed to remain undetected for this long remains a mystery. It was in everyone’s thoughts, maybe they knew of our existence the whole time but ignored us because we didn’t seem to be a good source of trade, who knows?

Due to overpopulation, we have to release a certain number of our citizens every year. They leave the underground society to make a new life in the nearby towns and cities. Most of them come back to visit relatives and keep CRMS informed of the overworld’s endeavors.

The terraforming industry exploded as technology expanded. A jump-point hotspot, Terra, led to the expansion of over a dozen planets for the UNE. As planets were terraformed and the population on each planet grew exponentially, a governmental reform was put in place and the United Nations of Earth became the United Planets of Earth (UPE) so each planet could have equal representation in the court system.

Year: 2535-2572

CRMS has been discovered… A new series of planetary scan drones were tested across Earth and they picked up a peculiar hot spot beneath the hundreds of meters of cold, hard rock.

An official of Earth and his personal guard came down to meet the CRMS representatives. She was a bit surprised at first, and then laughed as she remembered the Canadian history she learned back in high school. She told us, “It’s a new universe! No sense in hiding. You seem to be well off down there, I’m sure you can buy some real estate in a nearby system.”

CRMS didn’t hesitate. The citizens of Lethe (yes, we still called it that) came out into the surrounding area to meet convoy after convoy to populate the temporary residential complexes we built in the nearby city. Gold was still a precious metal which gave the CRMS a huge revenue stream. Instead of finding a new plot of land and abandoning the underground city, Lethe expanded upward and outward from the Rocky Mountain peaks. Lethe was renamed Khione, after the Greek goddess of the snow.

Trade routes were quickly established, visitors and tourists came fromall over the galaxy to gaze upon the forgotten society – Khione hit the ground running and nobody seemed to mind the cold. The CRMS officials were already talking about dissolving the company and starting something bigger, much bigger. We were a society of miners and the vote was decided. Off to the capitol we went to officialize the Canadian Mining Corporation (CMC).

Year: 2590-2734

Time seemed to pass by rather quickly, possibly correlated to not being stuck underground. By this time the UPE has encountered the Xi’An, not on good terms with them since we’re already in a cold war, the Tevarin, already had two wars with them over territory, and the Vanduul, an entirely hostile, unforgiving race.

During the first Tevarin war the UPE looked at the CMC for resources. As a result, the city and corporation had yet another huge expansion in mining, refining, and now small parts manufacturing. As all this was going on, a note-worthy leader took office, Ivar Messer. The United Planets of Earth became the United Empire of Earth (UEE). The political turmoil that took place during the Messer Era had some effect on the CMC, which was limited to a few protests trying to get the corporation to stop selling to the UEE. Citizens needed jobs and we provided those jobs, so it was difficult to negotiate lesser terms with Messer bloodline.

With the end of the Tevarin wars, a new threat came about – the Vanduul. Their attacks on the outer systems’ residents are an annoyance but are not enough to call on an abnormal shift in the shipment of resources.

Year: 2784-2869

Slowly but surely the CMC grew to own additional factories and shipping routes across most of UEE space. Investors saw us as a safe, long-term investment and smaller startup organizations looked to us for a helping hand. Renowned across the known universe, CMC was the backbone to the UEE economy.

Year: 2872-2902

Talks about the SynthWorld project were hitting the CMC constantly. When the plans were finally approved, CMC put ninety percent of their resources into fulfilling the UEE’s shipments of materials.

The mining operations slowly fell behind as previously resource rich plants and asteroid belts were harvested clean. Surveyors were scrambling to find new mining zones but all attempts were for naught. Employees clocked long hours, over-worked machinery fell into disrepair, and worker unions went on strike for better wages and better working conditions. CMC was losing its grasp on all its shareholders and real estate.

Year: 2923

Shareholders left, money was all but gone, and employees quit. Mining and manufacturing facilities were bought out by larger corporations such as Musashi Industrial and Starflight Concern, Anvil Aerospace, Roberts Space Industries, Shubin Interstellar, and ArcCorp. CMC was doing all it could to keep its remaining stakes and real estate, but the debt accrued from the SynthWorld project overwhelmed the company.

Year: 2942

With most of the CMC’s facilities sold, there was little left but a few warehouses on Earth and Terra. The last CEO of the Canadian Mining Corporation knew a reform in the company had to be set in place. Gathering the remaining funds of CMC, the CEO and remaining advisors banded together to create the Intergalactic Canadian Federation. With ambitious goals for the future, the ICF set out to rebuild a mining and manufacturing empire and build a formidable fleet to bring peace and security across the known ‘verse. Conferences within the company include discovering and owning a system named after its birth city, Khione.