History Main / InvadingRefugees

* ''[[Fanfic/StarWarsVsWarhammer40K Star Wars vs Warhammer 40K]]'': What the Imperials essentially are. The Xek-Tek Sector they hail from was about to come under siege from a [[SwarmOfAlienLocusts Tyranid Hive Fleet]] tendril, and, after Roboute Guilliman discovered that the Dark Eldar were lying in wait and had arranged for a large number of Imperial forces to gather in one place so that the two enemies could destroy each other and leave the Imperial civilian populations virtually undefended and ripe for harvesting, he gave the order for them to evacuate. All of the people and resources in the Sector that could be withdrawn were loaded onto the ships, the planets were razed to deny the enemy what resources remained, and the combined armada of Battlefleet Xek-Tek, the three Astartes chapter fleets, and the other assorted military and civilian craft attempted to escape before the Tyranids and Drukhari could arrive, but were caught in a Warp Storm and were forced to make a risky jump into the [[NegativeSpaceWedgie Cicatrix Maledictum]]; thus being hurled through time and space to the ''Franchise/StarWars'' galaxy.
* ''FanFic/ThyGoodNeighbor'': Lord Fairchild, when talking history with Maester Luwin, asks if the Andal incursion into Westeros had anything to do with the rise of the Valyrian Freehold in Essos. While the Maester laughs and comments the Faith of the Seven teaches that it was only in response to the locals' poor reception of their missionaries, it's made clear this is thinly veiled sarcasm, and fully agrees with Lord Fairchild, noting his education is well beyond that of a Maester, and in fact is much closer to an Archmaester.

* Displaced by European encroachment and incessant warfare with rival tribes, the allied Ngāti Mutunga and Ngāti Tama Maori invaded the Chatham Islands. They murdered hundreds of the native Moriori (who were pacifists and infamously refused to fight back) and enslaved the survivors. After decades of enslavement, the Moriori were so assimilated into the Maoris, that they nearly ceased to be an independent ethnicity altogether. Fortunately, Moriori culture has since experience a renaissance, and they were formally recognized by New Zealand's government in 2021.

* Displaced by European encroachment and incessant warfare with rival tribes, the allied Ngāti Mutunga and Ngāti Tama Maori invaded the Chatham Islands. There, they murdered hundreds of the native Moriori (who were pacifists and infamously refused to fight back) and enslaved the survivors. After decades of enslavement, the Moriori were so assimilated into the Maoris, that they nearly ceased to be an independent ethnicity altogether. Fortunately, Moriori culture has since experience a renaissance, and they were formally recognized by New Zealand's government in 2021.

* ''Fanfic/StarWarsVsWarhammer40K'': What the Imperials essentially are. The Xek-Tek Sector they hail from was about to come under siege from a [[SwarmOfAlienLocusts Tyranid Hive Fleet]] tendril, and, after Roboute Guilliman discovered that the Dark Eldar were lying in wait and had arranged for a large number of Imperial forces to gather in one place so that the two enemies could destroy each other and leave the Imperial civilian populations virtually undefended and ripe for harvesting, he gave the order for them to evacuate. All of the people and resources in the Sector that could be withdrawn were loaded onto the ships, the planets were razed to deny the enemy what resources remained, and the combined armada of Battlefleet Xek-Tek, the three Astartes chapter fleets, and the other assorted military and civilian craft attempted to escape before the Tyranids and Drukhari could arrive, but were caught in a Warp Storm and were forced to make a risky jump into the [[NegativeSpaceWedgie Cicatrix Maledictum]]; thus being hurled through time and space to the ''Franchise/StarWars'' galaxy.

* ''Fanfic/MutantsAndMonsters'': The Millenian managed to flee the destruction of its world and entire species, then crash-landed on Earth millions of years ago. After waking up, it judges that the Earth is a suitable planet to settle, [[spoiler and mankind can be used, repurposed and/or molded to rebuild its species, even if he finds them aesthetically unpleasant. Attempts to communicate and negotiate with it failed in either the first or both accounts. Not surprising when the military also happened to [[HumansAreBastards fire it first unprovoked]]]].

* Displaced by European encroachment and incessant warfare with rival tribes, the allied Ngāti Mutunga and Ngāti Tama Maori invaded the Chatham Islands. There, they murdered hundreds of the native Moriori (who were pacifists and infamously refused to fight back), and enslaved the survivors. After decades of enslavement, the Moriori were so assimilated into the Maoris, that they ceased to be an independent ethnicity altogether.

* ''Videogame/TheBannerSaga'': The humans and Varl are shocked when they discover [[spoiler:a dead female Dredge and her newly orphaned baby]]. As they ponder why [[spoiler:women and children]] are part of the invasion, they [[OhCrap realize]] that the Dredge ''aren't'' invading -- they're ''fleeing''.

* ''VideoGame/{{Touhou}}'': In ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'', Gensokyo is beset by Lunarians, who begin "purifying" the land; the process of which involves destroying all life in it (if the land has no life, it has no death either). When the heroines start tracking the motives of the invasion, they are informed by the invading general that the Lunarians, normally a race of SpaceElves with fearsome tech, have been backed against a wall by the appearance of lifeforce in the Moon, which has introduced the alien concept of death into the satellite. As the invaders are [[NatureSpirit fairies]] composed of pure lifeforce, their purifying weaponry is worse than useless -- forcing them to begin preparations to evacuate to Gensokyo -- which they at the time consider ''[[GodzillaThreshold enemy territory]]''.

* ''Videogame/XenobladeChronicles2'': [[TheEmpire Mor Ardain]] is an unusual example. They seem to be at the top of their game, with a thriving economy, a sprawling capital city, and the world's largest and most technologically advanced army. But in reality, the [[GeniusLoci Titan]] they live on is dying of old age, and everyone knows it. This drives them to conquer other Titans in the hopes of finding somewhere to live after the coming ecological catastrophe.

* ''Videogame/TheBannerSaga'': The humans and Varl are shocked when they discover [[spoiler:a dead female Dredge and her newly orphaned baby]]. As they ponder why [[spoiler:women and children]] are part of the invasion, they [[OhCrap realize]] that the Dredge ''aren't'' invading -- they're ''fleeing''.

* ''VideoGame/{{Touhou}}'': In ''Legacy of Lunatic Kingdom'', Gensokyo is beset by Lunarians, who begin "purifying" the land; the process of which involves destroying all life in it (if the land has no life, it has no death either). When the heroines start tracking the motives of the invasion, they are informed by the invading general that the Lunarians, normally a race of SpaceElves with fearsome tech, have been backed against a wall by the appearance of lifeforce in the Moon, which has introduced the alien concept of death into the satellite. As the invaders are [[NatureSpirit fairies]] composed of pure lifeforce, their purifying weaponry is worse than useless -- forcing them to begin preparations to evacuate to Gensokyo -- which they at the time consider ''[[GodzillaThreshold enemy territory]]''.

* ''Videogame/XenobladeChronicles2'': [[TheEmpire Mor Ardain]] is an unusual example. They seem to be at the top of their game, with a thriving economy, a sprawling capital city, and the world's largest and most technologically advanced army. But in reality, the [[GeniusLoci Titan]] they live on is dying of old age, and everyone knows it. This drives them to conquer other Titans in the hopes of finding somewhere to live after the coming ecological catastrophe.

* ''Literature/TheCityWhoFought'': Simeon, the titular city-SpaceStation, notices an ancient ColonyShip barreling ''directly at him''. The ship is able to make a few very minor course adjustments but is in truly terrible condition and is unable to stop or turn aside. Station personnel have to scramble to prevent a catastrophic collision, and when the ship stops they have to tug it away before it detonates, in the meantime going through and rescuing the {{Human Popsicle}}s on board, those who haven't [[CryonicsFailure already died]]. Just from the condition of the ship, which had been converted to an orbital station long ago, and the fact that its ramshackle crew fled in it, Simeon and company quickly deduce that they're fleeing something bad.

* In the final issue of First Comics' ''ComicBook/DynamoJoe'', the heroes manage to communicate with the Mellenares, huge StarfishAliens which to that point have been believed to be mindless killing machines, and they are revealed to be fleeing in panic from an unknown enemy. The story ends with the allied civilizations of the galaxy, now including the Mellenares, preparing for the arrival of the new enemies.

[[folder:Films — Animated]]
* Humans are this in ''WesternAnimation/BattleForTerra''. The general in charge thinks that the primitive Terrians will be easy pickings for human space-age tech, not realizing that the Terrians are an AfterTheEnd civilization with a cache of advanced tech left over from the old days.
* In ''WesternAnimation/Home2015'', the Boov take over Earth because the Gorg destroyed their homeworld.

** The titular alien race from ''Film/TheMysterians'' are desperate to conquer the Earth because they destroyed their original homeworld in a nuclear war and their Martian colonies are running out of resources.
** The Simeons from ''Film/GodzillaVsMechagodzilla'' and ''Film/TerrorOfMechagodzilla'' are motivated by the fact their own world is gradually being sucked into a black hole.
** The Space Hunter Nebula M aliens of ''Film/GodzillaVsGigan'' are giant alien cockroaches which want to take over the Earth because their own planet is being [[GaiasLament polluted beyond habitation]], even for cockroach people, and Earth is similar enough to their original planet before the over-pollution.

* The Baltans from ''Film/UltramanCosmosTheFirstContact'', having lost their home planet as result of a nuclear war, now targets our planet. Besides making Earth their new home, the Baltanian leader, Dark Baltan, is also a WellIntentionedExtremist who believe humans will destroy Earth with their own weapons, therefore having Earth suffer the same fate as Planet Baltan, and intends to prevent humanity from doing further damage -via saving the Earth by conquering it.

* Hilariously parodied in the Dr Seuss book ''A Fly Went By'', by Mike McClintock. It starts with a young boy enjoying his solitude when a fly passes by. He asks where it's going, and it replies that it's fleeing the frog that's chasing it. So begins a conga-line of (t)error in which increasingly large animals that are the natural predators of their predecessors tell the boy they're not chasing anything but rather running from something they (justifiably) perceive as a threat, concluding with a man with a gun who himself is fleeing a nameless, clanking beast. This turns out to be [[spoiler: a sheep with its leg trapped in a tin can which had initially approached the man wanting help, but he got spooked by the noise]].
* [[GreaterScopeVillain Crayak]] of ''Literature/{{Animorphs}}'' is said to be fleeing something even worse than him (or at least much more powerful. We don't know all the details). However, he did not achieve the [[SufficientlyAdvancedAlien godlike power]] that enables him to rival the [[BigGood Ellimist]] until after arriving.

* The Canim of the ''Literature/CodexAlera'' are eventually shown to be this, and the protagonists actually ''go'' to Canea and see what chased them away.

* The Insects From Shaggai (AKA Shan) in Ramsey Campbell's Franchise/CthulhuMythos stories. When their home planet was destroyed by a Mythos abomination, some of them fled to a succession of other planets, finally ending up on Earth. They're still pretty evil by human standards.
* In the backstory of the ''Literature/{{Deverry}}'' novels, the Gel Da'Thae hordes that destroyed the Seven Cities of the Elves back in the first century had been driven out of their homelands into the Elven Kingdoms by the onslaught of the Gaulish tribes who later became the Deverrians. They in turn had fled to what would become Deverry to escape the legions of Rome.
* The Honored Matres in the ''Franchise/{{Dune}}'' universe (who appear in the last two Frank Herbert novels of the series, ''Literature/HereticsOfDune'' and ''Literature/ChapterhouseDune'') are aggressors who attack many worlds and wreak havok in the old Empire — but it is stated they are fleeing an even more powerful and terrible mysterious enemy, which according to the ([[FanonDiscontinuity much-maligned]]) [[Literature/HuntersOfDune sequel by Brian Herbert]] is The Thinking Machines.

** The Wildlings — a tribal society living beyond the Wall that marks the realm's Northern border — have been raiding the southern lands for as long as anyone can remember, and the Night's Watch has all-but forgotten its original mission as they focus all their resources on fighting back Wildling raiding parties. As the books begin, the Watch is getting worrying reports that the wildlings are massing together into a single horde intent on smashing their way through the Wall. What the Watch and the Seven Kingdoms are slower to come to terms with is that the reason for this sudden determination to move south is [[spoiler:the re-emergence of the old enemy the Watch was created to hold back: the zombie-raising, icy {{Humanoid Abomination}}s known only as "the Others"]].
** In backstory history, both Andals and the Rhoynar came to Westeros fleeing Valyrian conquest. The Andals retreated across eastern Essos in front of the advancing Valyrian empire until they were driven to sea, at which point they fled en masse to the western continent. The Rhoynar instead tried to fight the dragonlords, and succeeded for a time, but were ultimately defeated; their last queen, Nymeria, fled from the destruction of her kingdom with a refugee fleet that eventually made its way to Dorne.

* The dystopian [[AuthorTract far-right propaganda piece]] ''Literature/{{Victoria}}'' describes large-scale breakdowns in government services and public order as part of an economic doomsday scenario. When food disappears in the big cities, great hordes of gangsters, looters and simple people just trying to survive migrate out into the countryside to plunder farmers and small towns. They in turn are met by local police, militias and ad-hoc self-defense groups that shoot to kill with extreme prejudice, and the near-urban regions become savage battlefields before the swarming locusts exhaust themselves, succumbing to hunger and plagues.
* ''Literature/TheThreeBodyProblem'': This is ultimate fate of [[spoiler:the Trisolarans, who must conquer Earth because their own planet is doomed to fall into a star and Earth is the only habitable planet they have found. Thus begins a centuries-long proxy war to prevent humans from developing technology powerful enough to fight off the invasion force]].

* In ''Literature/TheFutureOfSupervillainy'' volume of ''Literature/TheSupervillainySaga'', Gary is a bit worried about the inhabitants from [[Literature/CthulhuArmageddon John and Mercury's world]] becoming this. They're hardened survivors of a post-apocalypse DeathWorld that have nothing to lose. [[spoiler: In the end, they just settle on the land already devastated by P.H.A.N.T.O.M.]]
* All the time in ''Literature/GreenAntarctica''. The Tsalal live in a CrapsackWorld, so when things get slightly worse, they usually respond by migrating to a different part of Antarctica and making war on the people there.
** The Zhu's ethnogenesis was their invasion by the Qys, who forced them to flee in boats on and become the Sea Peoples/Vikings of Antarctica. The "Suffering Path" became an integral part of their religion, and the Qys (by then extinct) were [[{{Demonization}} mythologized into demons]] [[GodIsEvil sent by god to destroy the Zhu]].
** Iskr, the King in Yellow, united hordes of refugees fleeing the Zhu to overthrow the settled Hali and found the kingdom of Carcosa.
** The Starvation Army was formed by an alliance of Dragon Islanders fleeing famine in their home islands, and laid waste to pretty much everyone else, all while constantly starving and culling their own forces. The combination of wars, famine, and societal collapse eventually led to the death of at least 75% of the population of Antarctica.
** After learning about the outside world, the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_Without_a_Summer 1816 eruption of Mount Tambora]] disrupted Tsalal society profoundly, as they felt like the world was ending a second time -- but this time they had somewhere to flee to. The refugees ended up conquering Chile and Argentina, the Southern Island of New Zealand, and part of Western Australia (and settling in large numbers in South Africa).
* In ''[[Literature/TheShipWho The City Who Fought]]'' Simeon, the titular city-SpaceStation, notices an ancient ColonyShip barreling ''directly at him''. The ship is able to make a few very minor course adjustments but is in truly terrible condition and is unable to stop or turn aside. Station personnel have to scramble to prevent a catastrophic collision, and when the ship stops they have to tug it away before it detonates, in the meantime going through and rescuing the {{Human Popsicle}}s on board, those who haven't [[CryonicsFailure already died]]. Just from the condition of the ship, which had been converted to an orbital station long ago, and the fact that its ramshackle crew fled in it, Simeon and company quickly deduce that they're fleeing something bad.

* In Season Three of ''Series/{{Colony}}'' [[spoiler: a captured Host reveals that its people are colonizing Earth because they were driven from their original homeworld by a second, even more vicious alien species. The Hosts shared this information with the governments of the world during FirstContact in the late 1960s, which is why they formed the Authority and became LesCollaborateurs for the incoming Hosts to help lay the groundwork for their Arrival and subsequent occupation of Earth.]]
* In ''Series/{{Defiance}}'', the Votans came to Earth after the sun in their solar system went nova, with plans to terraform the planet when they got hear. Unfortunately, they left sixty-five million years ago and spent the entire trip in stasis, so they were surprised to learn that their desired planet had evolved an entire sapient, technologically advanced species in the time it took them to get here. There were attempts at peaceful settlement, but hardliners on both the alien and human sides eventually pushed it into an open war.

* In later episodes of ''Series/TheEvent'', it's revealed that the HumanAliens' own planet is dying, so their plan is to transport their entire 2-billion-strong population to Earth.
* The BigBad Espehni of ''Series/FallingSkies'' invade planets, including Earth, because they were forced to flee from their original galaxy by a "great enemy" and chose to enslaving other aliens as [[WellIntentionedExtremist the means to fighting against this threat]]. Said "great enemy" never appears in the story and [[spoiler:the queen later gives an entirely different reason for coming to Earth]], so either that plotline was simply dropped or it was a lie.

* In ''Videogame/TheBannerSaga'', the humans and Varl are shocked when they discover [[spoiler:a dead female Dredge and her newly orphaned baby]]. As they ponder why [[spoiler:women and children]] are part of the invasion, they [[OhCrap realize]] that the Dredge ''aren't'' invading — they're ''fleeing''.
* In ''VideoGame/ChronoCross'', this is how the dwarves' invasion of Water Dragon Isle is portrayed. Enraged at humans driving their sacred hydras to extinction (even if Serge only killed the last one to harvest a life-saving medicine), the demihumans of the Hydra Marshes decide to make a new home for themselves on a nearby island… by killing all the native fairies. It's supposed to be a HumansAreBastards GreenAesop, but when the dwarves spout lines like "You do not cherish the treasures of nature as we do" while committing genocide with SteamPunk tanks, ''and'' you might have finished the hydra quest in a way that ensured that the beast's young survived, it instead becomes an annoying BrokenAesop.
* In the ''VideoGame/{{Disciples}}'' backstory, the conflict between the [[OurElvesAreDifferent elves]] and the [[OurDwarvesAreAllTheSame dwarves]] started when the [[TheLegionsOfHell Legions of the Damned]] started appearing in the elven forests, setting them on fire. Fleeing, the elves happen to rush into the mountains, the land of the dwarves. The dwarves assume it's an invasion and strike back at the refugees. The misunderstanding is further exacerbated by the respective races' gods. Gallean and Solonielle go to the dwarves' god Wotan and demand that he discipline his "children" for this act. Wotan gets angry and kills Gallean by ripping out his heart and throwing it into the sun. Solonielle manages to catch it, but is horribly burned by the sun, eventually becoming the fleshless goddess of death called Mortis. Things only go downhill from there.
* In ''Franchise/DragonAge'', this is one in-universe theory regarding the Qunari (or the race of horned humanoids who make up most of the Qun's followers). Not even they know why they left their homeland — all they know is that they ''had'' to.
* The Fallen in the ''VideoGame/{{Destiny}}'' games are not simply fleeing the cataclysm that destroyed their homeworld, but also chasing after the Traveler, the BigDumbObject that guided them into a golden age and then fled when the apocalypse hit. When, centuries later, they found (the remnants of) humanity being sheltered by the Traveler, they assumed the humans had somehow ''stolen'' it from them and launched a campaign of extermination to reclaim it.
* In ''VideoGame/GearsOfWar'', the Locust Horde only emerged from their underground lairs and fought humanity because their homes were overrun by another, even more dangerous entity.
* The Vortigaunts and other Nihilanth's soldiers in the first ''VideoGame/HalfLife''. Turns out, they were fleeing from [[TheEmpire the Combine]].
* In the backstory for ''{{VideoGame/Halo 4}}'', we find out that ''Franchise/{{Halo}}''[='s=] [[{{Precursors}} Forerunners]] have had a history of conflict with humans, leading to the Didact's current hatred of them. In reality, humanity was just trying to wipe out [[TheVirus the Flood]], and were fleeing from infected planets to inhabited ones which happened to be in Forerunner-controlled space.
* In ''VideoGame/HorizonForbiddenWest'', Aloy and the others are led to believe that [[spoiler: [[Characters/HorizonZeroDawnFarZenith Far Zenith]] -- a group of wealthy elites who, after escaping the Faro Plague and using technology to become immortal -- intended on using GAIA to wipe out the Earth's biosphere and make it anew for their liking because their original colony had been destroyed in a natural disaster]]. By the very end of the game however, the real reason is given: [[spoiler: Far Zenith were stealing GAIA so that they could terraform a far-off planet, their original colony destroyed by a DigitalAbomination of their own making. This same DigitalAbomination attempted to scour the Earth by granting self-awareness to the [[VideoGame/HorizonZeroDawn first game's]] antagonist -- HADES -- and will most likely try again once it makes it to the Earth, so with or without GAIA chances of the Earth remaining habitable are slim]].
* The original ''VideoGame/{{Homeworld}}'' plays with this trope: ''your Mothership'' is the refugees, escaping the destruction of their second homeworld of Kharak, and the place they're invading is TheEmpire that destroyed Kharak and happens to be in control of your ancestral homeworld of Hiigara. ''And'' to reach the place you have to transit through the Great Nebula, where the locals treat you as an invader in spite of being just passing through and willing to leave without damaging anything.

** The other reason they're hostile to you is [[spoiler: that the Kadeshi are ''also'' refugees from Hiigara who were driven into the nebula by the aforementioned Empire, and are [[HeKnowsTooMuch worried you'll draw the Empire's attention to them.]]]]
** Just to take it full circle, the Taiidan were this, the ancient Hiigarans having devastated their homeworld and their fleet only to have their entire fleet annihilated by the Bentusi, at which point the still powerful remnants of the Taiidan fleet attacked with the express purpose to claim Higaara as their new homeworld and annihilate the Hiigarans, and letting the Hiigarans leave for Kharak without much of their technology only when the rest of the galaxy begged them for mercy.
* The Tasen from ''VideoGame/{{Iji}}'' bombarded Earth to make place for them running away from Komato that want to annihilate them completely.
* In ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'', this happens with the batarians, who begin fleeing their home systems ''en masse'' when the Reapers invade. They did so in such numbers that at first the human-majority Systems Alliance, which has a history of conflict with the batarians over their practice of slavery, thought the batarians were launching an invasion, but they fortunately figured out the batarians were just refugees quickly enough.

* The orcs in ''VideoGame/{{Sacred}}'' aren't launching an invasion of the human kingdoms, they've been displaced from their homeland by the arrival of a horde of undead.

* In ''VideoGame/SinsOfASolarEmpire'' the Vasari have been running across space from "something" that enveloped their empire for several centuries. And now they've reached the TEC's territory.
* The Octarians in ''Franchise/{{Splatoon}}'' lost the Great Turf War one hundred years ago against the Inklings and were forced to retreat into underground cities one hundred years ago. In the present day, the Octarians have been covertly attacking the surface cities to steal Zap Fish, the energy source of the Inklings, to power their own cities due to a growing energy crisis.
* This is the overarching plot of ''VideoGame/{{Starflight}}'', as sung by the Minstrels. ''Something'' is causing stars to flare from core to rimward and sterilizing life across the galaxy, and as that "something" reaches each area of the galaxy, the strongest races in the region can make alliances, bug out and settle rimward, usually attempting to eliminate the races already there. The Old Empire of Earth managed to defeat the First Wave of this (the Numlox and Phlegmak), [[spoiler: but Sol flared while they were fighting the Second Wave. They managed to send a few ark ships out, however. Arth is one such world, but averts this trope by refusing to colonize inhabited worlds, and the Arth civilization is the one to solve the flares and end the cycle - but this won't fix their enmity with the Uhlek and Gazurtoid of the Second Wave]].
* In ''VideoGame/StarRuler2'''s ExpansionPack, the Heralds are fleeing ''something'' that is devouring their civilization in a nearby galaxy, [[EternalRecurrence and they have done so for eons]]. Their method of colonization frequently puts them in conflict with other empires, as they have no control over the refugee ships that BlindJump into the galaxy and pick random worlds to land on.

* In ''VideoGame/UltimaVI'', the Gargoyles are presented as [[LegionsOfHell demonic invaders at first]] but are eventually revealed to be fleeing to Britannia from the collapse of their homeworld, [[spoiler:inadvertently caused by the Avatar's own actions in the two previous games]].

** ''VideoGame/WarcraftIII'': The night elves of Northern Kalimdor initially take a dim view of the orcs and humans who have arrived on their continent and despoiled their forests, even when it becomes clear that they are refugees fleeing from [[TheUndead The Scourge]] and [[TheLegionsOfHell The Burning Legion]]. But they eventually join an EnemyMine alliance once it becomes clear that The Legion poses a much bigger threat to them and their beloved forests than the refugees. This alliance breaks in two by ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft''--the Night Elves remain on good terms with the few human settlers on Kalimdor, but are hostile to the new orcish nation of Orgrimmar right on their border.
* Zeikfried's main motivation in ''VideoGame/WildArms''. [[spoiler: He believes the Demon Race are originally from the planet Hiades, which was destroyed long ago, and he needs to conquer Filgaia as a new home for them. Unfortunately, it turns out his own mother was the one who destroyed Hiades and she intends to do the same to Filgaia so he forms a temporary alliance with the heroes (albeit disguised) in order to destroy her. Once she's defeated, he goes right back to conquest.]]
* In ''Videogame/XenobladeChronicles2'', [[TheEmpire Mor Ardain]] is an unusual example. They seem to be at the top of their game, with a thriving economy, a sprawling capital city, and the world's largest and most technologically advanced army. But in reality, the [[GeniusLoci Titan]] they live on is dying of old age, and everyone knows it. This drives them to conquer other Titans in the hopes of finding somewhere to live after the coming ecological catastrophe.

* The second season of ''WesternAnimation/TheAvengersEarthsMightiestHeroes'' features an invasion by the [[VoluntaryShapeshifting shapeshifting]] Skrulls seeking to make the Earth their new homeworld. Galactus ate their old homeworld and a prophecy proclaims that Earth will be their new home.
* In ''WesternAnimation/CareBearsNutcrackerSuite'', the train ends up besieged by what turn out to be [[LaResistance a small army of badly-injured toys]]: having failed to overthrow the [[BigBad Evil Vizier]] responsible for [[BigGood the Prince]]'s disappearance, they were trying to commandeer the train in order to flee the [[SugarApocalypse soon-to-be-ruined]] [[SugarBowl Toyland]].
* An episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfTarzan'' had the gorillas' home invaded by the rhinos. It turns out that they've been displaced by a trading post. [[spoiler: The owner of the trading post gives Tarzan a line of credit for some dynamite, which he uses to blast out a new home for the rhinos to live in.]]