Skunk:FTL

Overview

In the early 29th century, space travel is ubiquitous as the air travel of the 20th, for similar prices. Any but the gravely poor can afford at least an orbital hop across the planet, and interstellar travel is the vacation of the upper-middle class. Civilized space is connected via the titanic stations of the LAB network, providing the faster-than-light travel that allows modern society to function.

General Technology

The exact technologies and designs for ships are as varied as the dozens of species that interact together on the galactic stage, but many eventually settle on the raw power of fusion drives and the perfect efficiency of antimatter. The development of gravity manipulation by the Rokhandan Directorate and its subsequent sharing with newly contacted races caused a dramatic shift in ship design. Artificial gravity allows far easier and comfortable survival in space without the constant acceleration of an engine. Careful manipulation of gravity also works as an 'inertial dampener', negating a portion of the g-forces of harsh maneuvers- upping engine power further.

While the overwhelming majority of space colonies are centrifugal cylinders that rely on spin for gravity, artificial gravity allows minor orbital stations to be built quick and relatively cheap, and even frontier systems can have dozens and dozens of these.

Time

It's the thing they never really show you in the holo-movies. How boring space travel is. While a manned warship, with their trained crew, antimatter drive and powerful inertial negators, can traverse from the edge to the center of a G-Type star system (such as Sol) in two to three days, your average freighter with their aging fusion rockets and budget dampeners might take over a week.

The majority of travel time over interstellar distances, is getting to and from your FTL station. While dependent on vessel mass and the station's power, expect to take a week to cross an entire ten lightyears and another week to cross that last four billion miles.

Faster-Than-Light Travel

It's a surprise to most schoolchildren when they learn that the FTL technology used to join the galaxy together today is merely a modification of the STL tech used to crawl across the stars for centuries before. The linear-accelerated-bounding station, or LAB- more commonly known as jump stations or FTL stations, with a dozen terms for the act itself

Universally recognized as the greatest achievement of the last millenium, the Rokhandans developed near-lightspeed travel in the 22nd century and Humanity in the 24th. Considered a fundamental leap in the understanding of physics and the deepest look into the very fabric of reality itself.

Placed at the outer limits of a system and aligned over the calmest and emptiest path to the next star, jump terminals take a ship placed within its gaping ring and subject it to forces operating at the lowest levels of spacetime itself. The ship and the spacetime it occupies is quantized and compressed and leaves the frame of our universe, existing only as an absolute abstract. Calculating distance and mass and the interstellar medium, the ship's existence is transmitted towards its destination.

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To this day the Cepheus effect and its implications are still being studied, with Rokhandan physicists proclaiming to be on the verge of a "fundamental breakthrough" for the past century.

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Before the discovery of W-1 and its use in FTL travel, this journey was effectively the speed of light. Due to the time scales, heavy calculation was required to ensure the ship would interact with its destination at the right time, and waiting to jump was a lengthy process.

The open-ended field of a recieving station at the destination captures the probability of the transmitted ship, and it now exists. Over interstellar distances, entropy and quantum effects means the ship's exact location cannot be defined, and it can vary widely in the recieving station's area. With the scale involved, collision between an existing ship and one being recieved has been noted a mere handful of times over the centuries. This entropy means there is a maximum distance between stations, with stations at their limit requiring multiple recievers to ensure a ship is captured by one of them.

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In the point of view of the ship despite years of transit no time has passed. No extra food or air is required for a years-long journey, no entertainment. If the crew is highly unlucky, they will never know the difference. While regarded as extremely safe, the mere fact that it must be blindly assumed a recieving station exists and is operating has earned FTL jumps since the war the moniker 'stepping outside'. If there is no recieving station, the ship cannot return. The recieving station must also shed the velocity difference between the ship's origin and destination. If it cannot, no material known can withstand the sudden strain. This velocity shedding is most noticable as heat and with larger deltas, this heat can be fatal to a crew- some neighbouring systems require roundabout jumps to further stars to more closely match velocities. The mere act of realizing the ship into existence puts strain on its frame, and repeated jumps without maintennance can cause a conventional failure.

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The discovery of W-1 opened up the galaxy to its fullest. While there is still heavy, heated debated in the scientific communities of its origin, in its composition was a long-theorized element that was the key for superluminal travel.

The laymen call W-1 'fuel', but as engines are not used in FTL it is a misnomer. W-1 in its highly-refined and purified state, is a catalyst used to convert baryonic matter into tachyonic, enabling the transmission of information faster than light. A four lightyear journey that used to take four years, now takes a week. (For a cross-referenced list of recorded causality violations due to FTL in the past century, consult the linked Causality Calamities of the 28th Century (Rokhandan Science Directorate, 2798) at the bottom of the page).

Teleportation? Like turning a ship into information and just beaming the whole thing like some kind of old holo program? That's ridiculous. And impossible. We simply tricked the universe into believing it was there the whole time. Make an evil clone? Are you making fun of our work?

— Katherina Licinus, Barrowan Professor of Physics-University of Marineris, assistant on Hermes Project

I've heard it cost the Republic over four hundred billion denaris, the transmitter and reciever were each the size of a town dome, and we could only send a kilogram of pure copper halfway to Phobos. But by the gods, seeing that brick move from one screen to the other like that, with nothing between? I knew we'd all just won a Nobel and Hawking prize each. I was wrong. We each got five.

— L. Cepheus Abercius, Director of Mawrth Vallis Laboratory and head of the Hermes Project

Exploration

Despite the galaxy itself being crossable in months, exploration must still be done the old-fashioned way. Dubbed almost-faster-than-light, the trailblazing of new systems is done by lighthuggers, automated ships ramped up to the edge of c with a jump reciever strapped to their back, aimed at their origin.

Exploration ships do not decelerate, but coast through systems on a carefully-chosen route, with automated ships transmitted to be recieved at the appropriate times, decelerate, and construct a set of jump stations to form a bridgehead for exploration and the construction of a full-scale FTL station. Before W-1 this was a delicate act on par with the earliest days of any civilization's space program, with ships transmitted years before the lighthugger will be in position.

This process, from the launch of a new lighthugger to the first manned explorator setting eyes on a new star, could take decades. After W-1, it merely takes years. Before, the massive investment in material and time meant that post-networking exploration of a new system was the realm of government departments under naval protection. After, the exploration of uninhabited systems is frequently contracted out to private companies. The opening of a new star with multiple rocky planets invites dozens of independent ships with only a nominal military escort. The risk and reward can be great- with rescue or protection frequently days away, the risk of death is higher than prospecting companies advertise.

With years between systems, interesting stars can be skipped altogether for more intruiging destinations beyond, leaving dark spots on star maps that might not be filled for decades longer. It is not unheard of to discover sentient species in the midst of already well-established territory as low-priority missions are finally launched.