It all started when the Terrans released their first military seafaring vessel on our planet. Like their homeworld, ours was covered in mostly water, (though only around 59% compared to the Terran's 71% coverage)

We had used, and still do, a combination of hardened wood and carbon fibers to build ships. Some might be surprised by the use of carbon fiber in the construction, but we did not venture out into the ocean as a species until well into our industrial revolution, on account of the vast amounts of food that could be gathered to supply our starving people. It not only saved us from a species-wide famine, it sparked a new golden age of discovery and innovation.

Then later, we took to the stars and met other species, and life was good. When the Terrans arrived on the galactic scene, they surprised everyone by being as old as the earliest space farers. However, they had been caught in a bubble when their planet was formed. This bubble, formed of gas and 1000 lightyears wide in all directions, prevented them from contact with the outside universe until they invented engines that could push past it in a reasonable timeframe.

They joined the galactic community as brothers and sisters of peace, and life was still good. They eventually reached our planet, and despite the differences in appearance and culture, they saw our seafaring traditions as something that deserved respect, and requested permission to set up a fledgling colony meant for the exchange of culture and "nautical science", I think they call it.

It all went well, for the first Terran generation. Our people approached each other cautiously and timidly, but friendships were formed and after the first 10 years, they revealed what that "nautical science" was. We learned that they had sailed the oceans of their planet since the beginning of time, on nothing more than the wood of their homeworld. The historical designs they revealed to us were mind-boggling in their ingenuity and genius in their simplicity. No space was wasted, no rigging was unneeded, and every sail was placed with specific intent.

And the craftsmanship, oh the craftmanship. We marveled at their techniques for conserving wood in salinated waters, using a variety of natural and artificial elements and substances to improve longevity and resistance to outside influence.

Then came the biggest reveal of them all. In the first 6 years, they had been on our planet, they had studied our people's ships, taken the designs, and mixed them with their own, taking the best aspects of each and merging them into a single, radiant vessel that was as perfect as it was alien. And this, they told us, would be a gift, along with the designs. And we wept collectively over the gesture of kindness extended in the name of friendship.

But as with all things, some took offense to this. There were "purists" among us, members of our species that harbored resentment and hatred over these guest colonists, despite their adherence to the designated number of people allowed on our planet. They used this gesture to spread seeds of mistrust, citing a disregard for our proud traditions and spouting nonsense about them wanting to eradicate all we stood for, in favor of the Terran ways.

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2 more Terran generations down the line and the prospect had become war. And of course, we had used our ships for war in the past, so we readied our fleets to prove to the Terrans that we owned the oceans across the galaxy, now and forever. The Terrans had been delivered industrial supplies in the forms of carbonated steel, tungsten, and many other things that, we assumed, would be useless for anything other than reinforcing land structures.

We were wrong.

They used them to build... Monstrosities. Hundreds of feet long... I won't call them ships! Those abominations do not deserve such a glorious name! But these vessels defied everything we knew about sailing. Creations of steel, carving their way through the waves like a knife would cut through flesh, armed with cannons only used on the heaviest of fortifications, and dozens of lesser weapons emplacements. Able to fill the sky with anti-air fire, bombard the coast or ships from out of visual range, launch motor-powered bombs that move underwater, and launch aircraft for long-range reconnaissance, the Terrans sent out a hopelessly outnumbered fleet to face the collective might of our planet's seas.

We fired the first shots. They came barreling out of their port at speeds that were deemed dangerously unsafe by our military tactics analysts, and we opened fire. The direct energy weapons we used were more than capable of punching holes in our wooden and carbon fiber ships. But punching a hole in 8mm of carbonated steel plating is another story.

1 of the vessels disappeared under the waves due to the collective firepower leveled on it, but the rest shrugged off the massive barrage with only dented hull plating and broken windows to show for it. Then they returned fire. We saw the metal tubes drop from their ships, but we never made the connection that they would continue moving underwater. We saw the flashes from their decks and realized they had mounted kinetic weapons on their ships. In hindsight, it makes sense when you have such a stable material to mount it to, but given the circumstances, it took us by complete surprise.

We always avoided engaging ground targets with ships, since kinetic rounds would rip through them at an astonishing pace, even small arms fire, and this situation was no different. Our ships started sinking rapidly, hundreds of small holes unable to be plugged at once allowing for both displacement of air and entrance of water.

But they were not done. enormous tarps and scaffolding rigging fell apart inside the harbor, revealing another fleet. Larger vessels surrounded a single platform of destruction, planes parked on the enormous deck, and fortress guns bristling from every angle. A truly moving fortress across the sea, protected by 6 vessels, like an armored combat group being protected by infantry battalions.

We had picked a fight, and we got what we asked for. The panic that set in when the individual ships realized what we were facing, didn't help. We lost thousands of ships that day. Hundreds of thousands of sailors were condemned to death in the dark waters.

We won in the end, but it cost us over half of our entire navy to pull off that victory.

The Terrans rule the seas. We accept that now, and bow our head in respect, in exchange for the chance to serve upon such vessels.