The Great Terror

The Great Terror
Date	1933 - 1944
Location	Earth, Sol System

The Great Terror is a term used to describe the initial Scinfaxi outbreak on Earth immediately prior to the First Scinfaxi War. It is generally agreed that the Great Terror began with the 1933 discovery of the Scinfaxi Virus in the Philippines by American researchers, and that it ended with the emergence of Scinfaxi machines in 1944. One of the most significant events in human history, the Great Terror had far-reaching population, economic, cultural, environmental, and political impacts, leaving a profound and lasting legacy on every aspect of human life and society.

History

Although first observed in the Philippine Islands, by 1935 Scinfaxi outgrowths had been discovered all across the globe - flourishing most virulently in areas with hot and moist climates. While the smallest and most insubstantial of these outgrowths were possible to eradicate, larger outgrowths proved resistant to chemicals, explosives, or the use of fire. By this time, as the first communities were overtaken, the Great Powers began to take more direct action as global evacuation efforts began to manifest. It would be the largest mass migration in human history prior to the Early Interstellar Age and the Evacuation of Earth.

It was around 1938 that the term "Great Terror" first began to be applied to this time period by those experiencing its horrors. By then, the mass migrations of the evacuation effort had become a global crisis. As outgrowth spread accelerated, tens of millions of human beings made arduous journeys to "protected ports", fortified airstrips or harbors, from which they'd be relocated to increasingly massive refugee and labor camps located in areas less threatened by the encroaching outgrowths. Feelings of resentment toward these displaced populations began to take root and fester in the recipient nations as entire nations strained under the exhaustive effort.

By 1939, entire nations had collapsed into civil war or dissolved as city after city became enveloped by the tendrils of spreading outgrowths. Protected ports were increasingly overwhelmed, or even ransacked by desperate refugees. Material shortages and rationing became widespread, escalating already-existing tensions. This tension was exploited by governments and populist movements alike, most notably with the initial 1939 German invasion of Poland, followed by the subsequent Soviet parallel invasion. Copycat efforts erupted across Europe and Asia, with fascist regimes overtaking many nations - annexing territories from weakened neighbors. With the European democracies preoccupied and consumed with the evacuation efforts of their colonial empires, and the United States of America struggling to contain the a massive outgrowth tendril centered on the Mississippi River, these conquests went unchallenged. All the while, protected ports fell one by one as the outgrowths advanced.

In 1942, the quarantine of Europe was breached in depth as outgrowth tendrils spread outward from the Mediterranean basin deep into the continent. Panic and chaos erupted. National governments faltered under the strain. Martial law was enacted. Civil wars and coup d'états broke out as European nations faced the impossible demand of evacuation and the reality that there was nowhere left to evacuate to. In the great plains of the United States, Canada, Soviet Union, Africa, China, and Australia, sprawling labor and refugee camps dwarfed cities in their size. Equal parts sanctuary and prison, millions of human beings found themselves residing in these massive facilities without legal agency or recourse.

Considered an option of last resort, the discussion of "doomsday colonies" began in earnest by the start of 1943.

References

1. "The Great Terror, Part One", Champlain Group