The Odysseus project was meant to expand the Rim for the benefits of the market economy and stability of nations. Corporations joined in because of profit. Leading nations joined in because of expansion. Emerging nations joined in for their very survival. All of them thought that the Odysseus project would secure their future.

It didn’t.

Corporations merged into megacorporations or vanished entirely; very few corporations were able to remain as they were after the Odysseus project. Nations found that the trade necessary to build the Odysseus probes as well as spin-off technologies such as teleportation caused the ethnic borders to fade away. Some nations had already disappeared in the Age of Storms; their cultural heritage absorbed into other cultures or disappeared altogether. The Odysseus project erased the barriers that were still in place.

The Odysseus probes were not an immediate success. Years passed without any reply from the probes; the resources spent on building them had put an enormous strain on the market economy and escalated the problems of the Rim to the point of war. Megacorporations fought for the distant resources in the Asteroid belt and the Kuiper belt, and gradually, the wars crept closer.

As the conflict reached the Mars colony, there were demands for a new leadership. A new power was needed, something stronger than the Global Alliance that could keep the megacorporations in check. The Global Alliance reformed itself into a new unified government, with the power to rule the Earth and its colonies. It would also stretch out into the future colonies around distant stars.

From the ashes of the Global Alliance and the corporations, the Federal Empire was born.

The Federal Empire quickly consolidated its power in the solar system. Using political power and mobile military force, the corporation wars were contained to space and the warring corporations realized that if they wanted to stay in the market and not remain isolated in space, either the armed conflicts had to end or the new Federal Empire had to fall.

As the corporations contemplated the latter option, the first signals from the Odysseus probes reached Earth.