Mars

Mars is the fourth planet in the Sol system, residing between Earth in the third position and the gas giant Jupiter in the fifth position. It was slowly terraformed over the course of centuries beginning with the founding of the joint American-Russian Hellas Colony in 2042. It currently sets the standard for a successful colony world, and is the economic backbone of the spinward side of the Orion Confederation.
== Description ==
Mars is known for being the first human colony on a planetary body other than Earth, for being the first planet Humans ever terraformed, and for being a founding member of the Orion Confederation alongside Revant, Venus, Ares, and Aphrodite. Marshes and forests have spread across the lowlands while cold deserts and brush dominate areas far from bodies of water due to Mars' surface forming a natural supercontinent, which is divided into two regions. 
The first is Tharsis in the western hemisphere, which is dominated by the Tharsis Mountains, Mount Alba and Mount Olympus, and Mariner Valley. The second was Syrtis, composed of the Hellas impact basin, the ejecta from the impact that created it, and Mount Elysium, which is now a large island off of the northeastern coast of Syrtis.
Its distance from the sun makes its natural surface brightness only half that of Earth, so a number of engineered and natural changes to modern Martian plant life have taken place, including greater concentrations of chlorophyll and broader leaves. This allows plants to absorb greater amounts of sunlight to survive in a cooler, dimmer environment. These plants were taken from Mars and further modified for the colonization of Temno, a planet that receives only one fifth the solar energy that Mars does, and is almost thirty degrees Celsius cooler. 
== Government ==
=== Commonwealths ===
Mars' surface is divided into eighteen administrative commonwealths, with one neutral area surrounding the planet's south pole. These commonwealths each have two presidents who run in pairs to form a senate of thirty-six primary members. The governors of large cities make up the secondary senators, who outnumber the presidential senate with a ratio of slightly more than five to one. 
The total volume of the senate is two hundred and fifty members, though not all can attend every meeting. Presiding over them all is the planet's representative for the Orion Confederation, who is elected from a separate pool of individuals. 
The capital city of each commonwealth is typically, but not always, the largest or most populated city in the commonwealth. The most notable exceptions are the cross-commonwealth cities of Moryakigrad and Saidaiteien, which are the capitals of the Solis and Arabia Minor commonwealths respectively, but also have districts in the Xanthe and Arabia Major commonwealths. This technically makes them the "largest" city in the commonwealth, but are the capitals of different commonwealths. 
The most populated commonwealth is Arabia Major, while the least populated commonwealth is Noachis. 
=== Leaders ===
Mayoral elections occur every Martian year, voted upon by the citizens of the city or city district, if large enough. When cities reach a population of 200,000, it is divided into two districts, each with a mayor while the city as a whole gains a governor, who is often, but not always, also the mayor of one of the city's districts. At each milestone of 100,000 citizens up to a million, a new district is created. Once one million is reached, the ten districts are consolidated into five, and the process repeats itself each time the population doubles. 
Presidential elections occur every three years, during which the population of the commonwealth votes upon the new president. Unlike mayors, presidents can only serve in office for two terms of every four, requiring them to either alternate running for election, or serve two consecutive terms and refrain from running for any Martian office for the next six years. Citizens abroad may still vote for the president of their home commonwealth as long as they have lived on Mars for at least six months of the last 24.
Planetary representatives are elected every six years, and are responsible for participating in the Orion Confederation's council, ensuring the cooperation of member worlds and working to maintain peace both between interior rivalries and exterior interstellar states. 
=== Legislation ===
Any political figure from city mayors to the planetary representative may write and propose legislation to the governors of each of the planet's commonwealths, where they are either become law with a 65% majority if not vetoed by the planet's representative within the Confederation. If the majority is over 90%, it cannot be vetoed. 
This process is repeated at all scales, with city governors and mayors serving as primary and secondary senators, within each commonwealth, whose president oversees them all. Within cities, the mayors and councils of individual districts form smaller senates with governors overseeing them all. 
Legislation is often written specifically to apply to one or two commonwealths of specific specialties, such as which pesticides will be allowed for use in the Arabia commonwealths and Northeastern Tharsis, as those are regions specialized in agriculture. 
=== Martian Calendar ===
Local commerce is kept coordinated using the Darian calendar, which was created in 1985 for, at the time, theoretical Martian colonists. It features twenty-four months, with twenty having 28 days, and four having only 27 days, adding up to a total of either 668 or 669 days. Its epoch is in the Gregorian year 1609, when the planet was first observed through telescopes. (See Timekeeping)
Important dates in Martian history include...
Event 	Earth Year	Martian Year
First human exploration. 	2030 	223
First human colony. 	2042 	230
First human born on Mars. 	2045 	232
Mars' atmosphere breathable. 	2143 	284
Mars declares independence from Earth. 	2157 	291
Invention of FTL warp drive on Mars. 	2171 	299
Phobos destroyed, second interplanetary civil war.	2229 	329
Third interplanetary civil war begins. 	2323 	379
Orion Confederation founded. 	2572 	512
Lunar impact event nearly occurs on Mars 	2802 	634
In addition to its use for scientific measurements, interplanetary commerce is coordinated using the Solar Standard Calendar. 
== History ==
=== Formation ===
Mars formed as a part of the Sol system over 4 billion years ago, and later captured its moons Phobos and Deimos, both small asteroids, from the nearby asteroid belt. Its small size and low mass meant it cooled quickly, causing the cessation of its planetary dynamo and tectonic activity, and the eventual weakening of its natural magnetic field. 
With the loss of its magnetic field came the loss of its atmosphere, and later the loss of its oceans. As the planet cooled and dried, its native plant life and simple aquatic planktons died off and were buried under layers of sand over three billion years ago. These processes led to the planet's fossil fuel reserves, which would remain untapped until humans came to the planet in the mid 21st century. 
=== Authiik Control ===
In the 25600s BCE, the authiik species discovered the Sol system and humanity. They had begun formulating plans to terraform Mars, intending to add a breathable atmosphere and surface moisture for their own habitation, but these plans could not be completed before their downfall and withdrawal from the system as a whole. 
=== Human Interaction ===
In the ancient past, Mars was almost always associated with war, death, fire, and judgment by a large number of primitive cultures on Earth, a connotation driven by its red-orange hue. 
Early telescopic observations revealed its seasonal dark patches and ice caps, leading to centuries of misconceptions about life on the red planet until more direct observations could be made in the mid 20th century, which revealed it to be the cold desert world it truly was. 
This did not end humanity's fascination with the planet, even over their own world's moon. 
In the mid 21st century, beginning in the 2030s and following a half decade of success with lunar colonies, the first humans set foot on Mars. The first permanent colony was founded with the express purpose of beginning the terraforming process by both constructing the first of many geothermal-powered magnetic field generators, and beginning the process of producing greenhouse gases to thicken the atmosphere and trap heat. 
The first human Mars native was born in 2045, after localized soil purification ensured crops could eventually be grown outside of the controlled habitats.
A number of probes retrieved ice from the asteroid belt and sent them on collision courses with Mars, adding both water and heat to the planet. By 2083, the surface pressure and temperature had risen enough that breathing equipment and winter gear would suffice for surface activities, and by the 2150s they were self sufficient enough to demand independence from Earth. 
The first human FTL Drive technology would be invented on Mars in 2171, giving them the upper hand in the war against an Earth struggling with an energy crisis that they required Martian fossil fuels to stave off. The war ended in the same year, but Mars continued exercising their military dominance in the outer solar system, with a large military presence on Jupiter's moons especially, in hopes of maintaining control of stores of exotic matter in the magnetic fields of the system's gas giants. This drove the United Earth Government to innovate, and create a drive system that required much less of it, or none at all. 
The planet would enter a second war with Earth in the 2220s, during which Earth FTL-enabled vessels would malfunction and destroy Phobos before a number of Mars' magnetic field generators were bombed from orbit causing a significant portion of its atmosphere to begin escaping, plunging the planet into an ice age. Several thousand Martians would abandon the planet for the initiative to colonize the Apsu system in 2272, a colony that would go on to form the Apsic Empire. 
Mars would have their revenge in the third interplanetary civil war, when they unleashed massive bombs powered by jump drives that transported mass quantities of atmosphere away from Earth, and a large amount of surface materials into orbit. This created dark rings, tsunamis, and sent the planet into an ice age. Earth has never recovered from this incident. Instead, most of its population moved to the recently terraformed Venus, the Lunar colonies, or went on to colonize Revant in the Kyandor system. 
Ever since, Mars has been an industrial powerhouse. Only Revant can match the sway it holds in the Orion Confederation, which it was a founding member of in 2572, and no planet had been able to match its output until contact with the Rangel system and the Monile colony was made in 2699. 
In 2802, the superluminal impact that reversed Luna's orbit direction hardly missed Mars, instead passing within 200 kilometers of its surface and destroying a number of starships, one of its eight space elevators, and a section of its orbital hyperloop before continuing on to hit Earth's moon. The delay from when it arrived at Mars to when it struck the moon was only two minutes. 
Category:Planets