#branch people are hardy and they stick around for a while but one bad storm or one bad cut they fall off

[savage-rhi]

Cue the pink!

[impassive-aggressive]

it is still ZOIDS HEADCANON TIME

PART 2 because i’m ridiculous

I'm operating on the assumption that by the time humans colonized Zi they'd spread out pretty well across the rest of the galaxy and p...ossibly made contact with extraterrestrials, mainly because I like to imagine there's intelligent life out there somewhere.  (Intelligent life hat does not look Exactly Like Humans with extra bits stuck on.)

When the Human Federation or w/e discovered Zi and decided it would be feasible to colonize it, there were a lot of engineers/science-y types who really wanted to tinker with robot animals that ended up volunteering and being chosen for the initial expedition, along with various other types you'd want along to build a civilization on a distant planet.  The mechanical organisms were initially dubbed Zi-oids, which over time became corrupted into the simpler name Zoids.  After being tamed, they proved useful as pack animals, modes of transport, farm hands and companions.  Contact with organoids started off pretty hostile but became more relaxed as time went on, per the other post. Eventually, the colonists developed quite advanced (though still very small) Zoids with respectable combat capabilities, designed primarily to protect them from attack by wild Zoids.

At this point only a small portion of the Western Continent had been settled, and while the rest of it still needed to be explored some of the settlers were eager to see what the planet's other continents were like; exploration of these was hindered by savage magnetic storms that made aerial or ocean travel a potentially deadly prospect.  These people observed how organoids could seemingly defy the laws of physics by converting themselves into a pure energy state to teleport from place to place, etc. and started thinking "what if we did that, BUT WITH HUGE TRANSPORT ZOIDS" and began experimenting with smooshing together Organoid Physics-Defying Bullshit with what bits of Spacefaring Technology they'd managed to salvage from the ships that had brought them to Zi.  The result was something that was eventually known as the Zoidcore Overload System, and while it was being tested one day, something went horrifyingly wrong and - to all outside observers, of which there were admittedly very few - the entire settlement vanished without a trace.

IN REALITY it had been transported back in time thousands upon thousands of years, which is blatant Time Travel Bullshit but o well.  (Also Legacy gave us canon time fuckery so god dammit, I'm gonna use it.)  The colonists were disoriented, frightened and cut off from any further contact with their homeworld, but since the entire settlement with all of its farms, greenhouses and other resources had been displaced together, nobody was quite as badly off as they could have been.  Shaken but determined, most of the colony pulled themselves together to push onward with their lives.

Some of the colonists were pretty mad about being temporally displaced and wanted someone to fix it, which of course was impossible, but they attempted to use force to make it happen and got booted out of the colony for being asshats.  Taking their Zoids, organoids and whatever supplies they could carry with them, they wandered off and eventually started another settlement elsewhere.  Both settlements continued developing Zoids, albeit now with more of an eye toward combat practicality now that they knew they had enemies out there.  

As this went on, organoids started evolving too - originally small, drab creatures who oversaw whole swarms of wild Zoids as their charges, their species eventually started selecting for individuals who bonded with the human settlers and their Zoids; these specimens grew larger, displayed higher intelligence due to the mental bond they shared with other sapients, and thrived in comparison to their wilder counterparts. They also led less stressful lives as they tended to a single, relatively sedate Zoid rather than having to protect and heal numerous creatures that were constantly being preyed upon by each other.  (They also happened to evolve in a variety of bright colors, due to their human companions’ natural preference for such things.)  Eventually, wild organoids were all but extinct on Zi.

Before too long the colonists discovered the thing they wound up calling Zoid Eve and built the city of Eveopolis around it.  As their population grew and prospered, they made great technological advances and started improving themselves using computerized implants that allowed them to bond more closely with their Zoids, utilize remote "drone" units, and grant some of them seemingly supernatural powers.  They ceased to think of themselves as humans any longer and began calling themselves Zoidians.

Then everyone started fighting over Zoid Eve, the Death Saurer happened, the Zoidian race was decimated after thousands of years of prosperity, and the last handful of survivors went into stasis.

MEANWHILE, ON EARTH

The governments of the world are wary of Zi.  Something bad happened there; they’ve never gotten to the bottom of what caused that first colony to disappear decades ago.  It also seemed to have undergone intense environmental changes - huge swathes of the planet’s western continent are barren desert. It’s basically everyone’s last choice of planet to try and settle.

The fifth son of a royal family has become deeply dissatisfied with his station in life.  Young and ambitious, he’s hungry enough for power that his elders can see he poses a problem, and devise a means of getting rid of him: they charge him with taking a group of imperial citizens to Zi to establish a branch of the royal family there.  The prince knows what they’re trying to do but can’t reasonably defy the order, so he goes.

Thus, Zi is claimed (reluctantly) for the Guylos Empire.

The settlers find the planet tolerable, if not exactly welcoming.  They’re hardy folk from having survived on an increasingly inhospitable Earth, and are willing to work hard to make this new world their home.  They have great success adapting the planet’s native life forms to their uses, and soon have a stable, vibrant civilization living and working alongside Zoids.  Their emperor, too, is pleased with the success of this venture; it wasn’t the kingdom he’d dreamed of, but it is his, and his people are prospering under his rule.

The settlers are curious, of course, about the remnants of a past civilization that they eventually find - ruined structures here and there, the ossified remains of what are definitely Zoids but quite unlike either the wild specimens or anything human engineers have yet come up with.  But much of their lives are taken up by simply living; they focus on the present in order to build themselves a stable future, and have no time to dwell on what happened in the past.  

Within a handful of generations, some of the Guylos citizens grow restless and crave freedom from their Imperial masters.  They break off and form the Helic Republic.  The Empire does not suffer this gladly, and war breaks out, raging for several years before an uneasy truce is reached to allow the battered forces of both sides to recover.

The arms race triggered by the outbreak of war drives both the Empire and the Republic to excavate countless ruins of the civilization that called themselves Zoidians.  They make amazing discoveries - advanced technology whose workings they can barely comprehend; Zoids of incredible complexity, though their operating systems and user interfaces render them all but unusable to humans; and capsules.  Rows and rows of capsules, in some places - always a large one accompanied by a much smaller one.  Very few of the small capsules prove useful - the rooms in which they are found are often partially destroyed, the capsules breached by falling debris or the ravages of time - but the larger ones often bear fruit in the form of small, startlingly intelligent Zoids with incredible abilities.

By incorporating elements of ancient Zoidian technology into their designs, the humans of Zi quickly develop more effective weapons - more efficient ways of killing each other.  By the time the truce is reached, Zi’s inhabitants are bone-weary of conflict, many living in worse conditions than their ancestors of centuries past.  While several large cities remain standing - most notably the capitals of the Republic and Empire - most of Zi’s inhabitants are reduced to small settlements, relying on subsistence farming or trade to support themselves, and constantly under threat of attack by bandits or other troublemakers.  It’s a difficult life, but the Zians determinedly struggle on.  Giving up is not in their nature.

THEN CC/GF HAPPENS

Afterward, a small handful of people (mostly military) are aware of the existence of Ancient Zoidians, Organoids and Zoid Eve.  The Death Saurer and Death Stinger are eventually relegated to "wew lad good thing we weren't around for that shit"-style legend.  Helic and Guylos remain on mostly good terms in the ensuing decades, both bonded and scared shitless by the whole Death Zoid mess.  People start using Zoids in happy pretendy funtime battles, and the world at large is a pretty swell place to live.

And then the Backdraft starts digging up Ultimate X Zoids and some other fuckfaces stick Ancient Zoidian AIs into Raynoses that end up being sold to the general public.

Something something Gilvader.