On February 1st of the year 2030, U.S. scientists had launched the first in a series of interplanetary colony missions. The goal was to set up a colony on Mars. However, the crew of these missions would not be human beings, but rather genetically modified animals.
This project was started out of growing concerns around climate change, overpopulation, and civil unrest. Though no doubt a level of ego, pride, and megalomaniac ambition also drove the project.
The rest of the world’s nations would follow in sending out their own animal representatives. By the time a decade had passed on by, most animals known to man had been sent out to these new Martian colonies.
After about 50 years from the date of the projects beginning, the Martian colonies had been completed. But tragically, when the animals returned, they found that earth was no longer hospitable, and the humans themselves were nowhere to be found and thus…presumably destroyed themselves.
It was decided that the animals would continue to sustain their livelihoods on the Martian planet and for a couple decades, things seemed to go well.
After those two decades however, various factors led some to travel to other planets such as Venus and Jupiter to set up colonies on those planets. The conditions of both were harrowing. But eventually, after half a century, they were successful in establishing new colonies on the surface of Venus, and on the various moons of Jupiter.
Meanwhile, the scientists at mars had found a way to create the first series of warp drives using newfound materials found on mars. This opened the pathway for exploration beyond the solar system.
It wasn’t very long for the colonies to start branching out into other solar systems. Methods of terraforming and inhabiting planets became refined alongside warp and space travel technologies. And for the next couple hundred years, what started as a small colony on mars, became a huge intergalactic ecosystem.