Luna

Luna (Sol IIIa) is a Class D Planetoid in the Sol System and the largest natural satellite of Earth. The first stellar body explored by mankind, Luna has a unique place in the history of humanity.

Luna was first explored by unmanned probes, launched by the Soviet Union, beginning in 1959. Despite their early lead, the Soviet Union soon fell behind in their exploration of Luna, and it was the United States that conducted the first manned landing, occurring on the 20th July 1969. A further five successful landings were made between 1969 and 1972, but the rate of progress in the field of space travel slowed dramatically with the Soviet Union cancelling their manned Luna exploration programmes, and the United States also choosing to focus on unmanned exploration and the development of space stations and reusable orbiters. The Soviets did launch an unmanned lunar rover, Lunokhod, in 1973.

Further Luna exploration was relatively slow, with Japan and the United States sending further probes to Lunar Orbit in the 1990s. India and the European Space Agency also launched lunar probes towards the end of the decade, with further American, Japanese and Russian missions occurring in the 2000s. By 2013, China had also launched an unmanned rover to explore the lunar surface.

Shortly afterwards, with global resources waning, a new concerted effort to explore and colonise space began. The United States, later with United Nations support, began the colonisation of Luna in 2020 with the Apollonius Mission, leading to the first lunar colony, Apollonius. Luna was never going to be a very viable candidate for large scale off-world colonisation however, with no atmosphere and low gravity impeding most efforts. Still, Luna did provide a useful staging ground for further missions.

In 2040, contact was re-established between Earth and the Enterprise Colony on Mars. This lead to a politically charged situation however; The Enterprise Expedition was launched under the auspices of the United Nations, which due to the political upheaval of the Eugenics Wars was disbanded in 2038. The Enterprise Colony refused to report to a single sovereign government on Earth, and rapidly declared independence.

Despite the closer links between Luna and Earth, the people of Apollonius soon reached a similar conclusion, and also declared independence from Earth. With a new Cold War setting in between the North American Alliance and the Eastern Coalition, a minor colony on a rocky planetoid declaring independence was of little concern, and the issue of sovereignty over Luna was never challenged.

This independence however did mark the end of contact between Luna and Earth, although there were semi-regular communications between Apollonius and the Enterprise Colony on Mars. The history of the Lunar and Martian colonies from this point is largely lost. Similarly, the events on Earth from this time onward were all but unknown to the people of her colonies. It is reasonably certain however that even though the people of the Enterprise Colony were too distant to see them, the population of Apollonius would most certainly have been able to directly observe the atomic warheads of The Collapse ravaging the surface of Earth on the 31st July 2056.

The next contact between Earth and Luna occurred in 2114 with the launch and maiden voyage of the pioneering warp starship S.S Valiant. Traversing the distance between Earth and Luna in a matter of hours, her crew attempted to contact the Apollonius Colony on all known pre-collapse frequencies. Using remote landers to investigate, the Valiant instead discovered a tomb. It was ascertained that a virulent plague, rather than violence, starvation or other environmental disaster, had swept through the colony some years before, estimated to be some time in the mid 2080s. Continuing on to Mars, a similar fate was discovered to have befallen the Enterprise Colony, although the two contagions were believed to be entirely separate.

Despite this sad loss, the optimism of the people of the reborn Earth was unshaken, and the following year two modified DY-100 Class Freighters were launched to re-establish colonies on the surface of Luna and Mars. The Luna-bound DY-100 founded the colony (later city) of New Berlin. Rapid expansion soon followed, with vast domed cities being constructed in the mid-2130s. During the Earth-Romulan War, Luna became the site of a new series of orbital shipyards, churning out new warships for the United Earth Star Navy. Whilst gradually losing their prime position as the main shipyards outside of Earth orbit to the yards at Utopia Planitia on Mars, the Luna Shipyards were still a vital facility for the construction and repair of starships during the Organian Conflict and beyond.

## Notable Cities & Points of Interest

Apollonius (Lost Circa 2085)

New Berlin

Copernicus City

Lunaport

Tycho City

Lake Armstrong