Hive Wars

"What was first seen as a another war in the galaxy culminated into the extinction of several races and changed the political landscape of the Southern Milkyway forever."-Imperial Historian HaxaziThe HIve Wars were a series of wars caused by the aggresive expansion of the Falmitan Hive into its neighbors in the South-West corner of the Milky Way Galaxy. These wars change the physical and political map the south forever and caused the extinction of several species. The wars also caused the 2nd Great Flight, displacing natives and those who were apart of the 1st Great Flight, escaping the Atuan and Resurgent Pirate Horde.

Opening Act
Already hostile and breeding like rabbits due to eons of evolution, the Falmitan spread across their world with relative ease. They would remain masters of Falmirog and live in content for several centuries. This would go on until the natural formation of the Falmitan Overmind. This new mind quickly overwhelmed the collective consciousness’s of the Falmitan and consolidated it’s control over its new found puppets. A few decades later, the Overmind came to realization that its resources was running thin and food was becoming scarce. It would then turn its gazes towards the stars as it’s only solution.

2207-2209
After several recon missions to surrounding and nearby systems, the Falmitan began a massive colonization effort, terraforming surroundings worlds to better suit their needs and fast growing drone population. As the Hive expanded, they found more and more inhabited worlds either too primitive to notice them or advance enough to fear their technological might. In the end though mostly all would fall under and be consumed by the ravenous hive.

Falmitan-Waer War
However not every species shared this fate, such as the

Waer of Aquad IV. Before contact with the Falmitan, they were an early space age species who had already colonized their moon. Sometime before 2209, the Falmitan entered their system and immediately attack them. The fighting outside their home world would last for two years and in that span, their moon colony, Hastav, was completely nuked and uninhabitable with survivors being eaten and their largest space station being destroyed. When the Horde landed on Aquad IV they met heavy resistance but made some head way. However they were eventually beaten back and eventually forced off world. Something had grab the Overmind‘s attention at the time preventing any reinforcements from arriving. This allowed surviving Waer to leave the planet and finding new place to live. This respite was short live as the Horde onslaught continued its wave of devastation on the Waer home world and eventually, with new reinforcements, captured it in late June 2208. The Falmitan then immediately set up culling pins to feast on the surviving population. However, a good number of survivors were able to make off world and escape the star system undetected using captured falmitan jump tech later on that year. After a year in space they would soon make contact with Zed’drath and Sullustan explorers in 2209.

2209-2215
When the Waer met the Zed'drathi and Sullustan explorers, they were wary at first, but eventually opened up to talks. When they talked, however, it shooked the two powers to the core as the thought of a race hellbent on feasting on any living thing and multipling like ants in their backyard worried their governments back home. Yet the two powers were too focus on their own respective conflicts as the Imperium was in their final but significant battles against the Horta in the Hortan-Zed'drathi War and UST and its allies were busy in a protracted war against the Pact and Rodians to truly worry about some far distant threat. However, the UST did put aside some resources and ships in case something were to come out of this threat but not enough for a war. This careless decision by the two races would soon bite them in the back. Even though the Waer's only hope disregarded their warning, the refugees decided to settle within the two nation's planets. Most went on colonize Waerys (Zed'drathi word for "Waer Land), a warm tropical planet on the edge of known Imperium space. The rest stayed on various Narn and Sullustan worlds in small isolated enclaves, trying to preserve their way of live and gain a sense of what they lost. These Waer would be the only surviving members of their race after the Hive Wars.

2212-2215
The Falmitan wasted no time after the destruction and conversion of Aquad IV. More viable planets were turned into new spawning worlds for the production of new drones and soldiers. Any pre-ftls encountered such as the Khyne, Velotan, and the Abrosians were devoured by the ever hungry hive. The Falmitan at this time never really thought of the possibility of a ftl capable species and thus kept their fleets, technologically fearsome, to a minimum. This was the case until they had stumbled upon the ruined planets of the ancient Tino’eysh, a long extinct race known to experiment on primitive races before clashing in a terrible war with the Animus creators. Its never known if the Overmind knew of the real possibility of races capable of faster than light travel or not but it could no longer ignore the fact that other races with this technology could become a serious threat to itself and the Hive. Mass industrialization within the Hive began with more and more outlying spawn worlds turning into fortresses and stations being retrofitted to produce warships. Back in known space, The Zed'drath Imperium had won its first major war in its new galaxy and was ready to begin rebuilding and expanding. The Horta, now slaves provided the Imperium with much needed resources to build up a steady imperial economy. Once the Imperium found itself back into economic position better than its pre-war estimates, they began to expand northwards and southwards founding new colonies on the way and peacefully incorporating new species such as the Humans, Denobulans and the Trun'chro. The Andorians were forced to accept Imperium rule after a brief war against the Corpusians. This war brought much of the active navy and serious ground forces to the south to secure the area. Both races would be unaware that they are in the opening act of one of the greatest series of wars that will ever rocked the southern area of the Milky Way.

The First Hive War
As the Zeddrathi expedition force began to return to its home port in the perseverance sector, they had to take a detour due to a Leviathan threat, taking the wayward fleet towards the Huaggss sector, a star cluster the Falmitan were developing for colonization. If almost by chance, the two powers met in the sector’s outermost star system, Huot, as the Zeddrath fleet made contact with a lone Hive construction ship. The ship refused all hailing attempts and per protocol the fleet was ordered to fire upon it. Upon its swift destruction a hive colonizer was spotted in the adjacent system and was pursued by the fleet. Unbeknowst to the Zed'drath admiral was that the colonization ship was a decoy to lure the fleet into heavier defenses and buy time for a suitable size falmitan fleet to respond. The First Battle of Fijoggis had begun as the two fleets battled against one another, equally matched. The battle lasted for a several hour until the Zed'drath fleet emergency jumped out the system, beaten and losing several newly classed destroyers in the process of retreating.

Imperium at its breaking point
Gleaming over leftover wrekage, the Falmitan were able to acquire Imperial maps and information which would help them in the ensuing war. The Zed'drath were horrified and shocked that an advance race was living under their noses the entire time and mobilized for war. The still unidentified species fleets began their advance into border sectors and began bombardment of unprotected worlds and invading others. Hesteos, Naloy and Fatorix were the first to fall and would never be recovered until after the last war. These worlds were harvested and terraformed to suit the Hive's needs. It scared many in the Imperium as they had come to believe that they could bounce back and win any thing the universe had thrown at them. Yet the Falmitan's cold, beast-like attitude towards war quickly changed the populace mindset. The delay in the Zed'drath naval response didn't help ease the pain and frustration of the people as worlds such as Perserverance once thought safe was now in the direct line of fire. However the Imperium were able to get back on its feet by mid 2216, and sent three fleets to stop the Falmitan encroachment. Large scale battles broke out along the Andor and perseverance sector as the Imperium naval forces tried to force them back. Battles such as Kodor, Halox and Fex would be remain legendary. Yet, the line was breaking. Ships that were need to reinforce battle fleets had to be diverted to patrol choke points used by Hive raiding fleets therefore preventing badly damaged ships from leaving the front lines which severely affected the defensive campaign in the southern territories.

Miracle at Perseverance
Though, the Miracle at Perseverance help stem the tide towards the Imperium favor. For months, the Zed'drath and Persevi Humans knew that an invasion of Perseverance would be inevitable and that if it falls then New Xyon would be next, so the two species greatest minds began developing a large defensive platform that would orbit the star and be interconnected with several layers of smaller defense platforms to form a system-wide "defense shield". All the while any ships that could be spared were directed to the system to creat a new large defense fleet. The Falmitan took notice and sent its largest armada of ships ever recorded during the three main wars, Almost a hundred ships broke through the Zed'drath's meager defenses protecting the opening to the sector and began its assault on the system. Heavy fighting occured almost immediately with the large Falmitan fleet overwhelming the new defense fleet and shield. Despite the Imperium's hopes, the "shield" and the fleet were broken and the Admiral, Zenox was forced to jump out system. The Falmitan then turn its attention the planet itself and began heavy bombardment to allow its hungry troops easy access to its newly aquired feeding grounds. Even with the heavy bombardment, the Falmitan troops and warforms were unable to severely weaken the Humans and the Zed'drath. The colony governor then issued a counter-offensive which slowed the Falmitan force long enough for a newly repaired fleet to jump in and catch the fleet by surprise. Dozens of enemy warships fell crashing on the planet, weakening the falmitan already staggered retreat. Zed'drath reinforcements push out the remaining hive troops and secured the planet. The Falmitan fleet was mostly destroyed and forced to flee the system. The Falmitan's Overmind, seeing an unfavorable outcome should the war continue, quickly studied this new spacefaring species data and eventually decifered the Zed'drath language in order to initiate a cease fire. During this time the Hive forces lines broke around the Andor sector and allowed imperial forces to move on the Huaggss sector and fully occupy and annex it by the time the cease fire was in full effect. The First War had ended but it was only the begining of the end for the Falmitan.