The Builds - Edited 11-9-2018

More work went along with a few more hours passing by. I almost had the power plant idea cracked, though it was MUCH more significant than I wanted. I was still working on the math to make sure it all worked properly. It was there; it was just so much more complex than what I had used prior. Generating the necessary heat to melt tungsten was a right pain in the ass.

It didn’t help that I kept getting pulled aside as different people were finished with their portions.

“Ma’am, question.” Torres interrupted me.

“Shoot,” I said, barely looking away from the board I was working on.

“Have you considered a VI doctor?”

“No, but it sounds like you have. What are you thinking?”

“Let’s use the model of the scanning rooms we had in the game. I know they were on earth as well before we left, so the tech is real, can we shrink that down into pod size, and have an auto-doc connected to an AI?” Torres was almost done with her room and would need to check the crew module for edits for med-kits and other supplies.

The hull tech had already gone through and added two hull patch kits, so the human touch was all that was left.

“That would work. Get with Asimov, and he can help design that VI.” I said, then stopped and looked at her.

“You know, Torres, that is an excellent idea. If we get a couple of Vis in there to work with things such as Piloting and Energy Management, we could really take this thing next level. Good catch.”

“Thanks. I was working with Kevorkian on it, and we thought it would be a smart move.”

“I’m not familiar with that name. Is it from mythology?”

“No someone from history, kind of a reminder of what happens when crossing lines.”

“Let Asimov know you want to work with him on that, but don’t stop him from what he’s doing.”

We both got back to work as Hera formed in the middle of the room. This time with marbled features instead of a bronze cast.

“Jax, your team has made some exciting decisions. I like the route you chose. Be a dear and finish up with your calculations. Zeus is very interested.”

“Hera.” I nodded to her. “Working on it. I’m still not used to this new math. Is there a name for it, yet? I hate that we keep calling it ‘new math.’”

“Nothing yet. Some are trying to name it ‘Asterian Mathematics’ because it came from the stars. That would be better than most of the others.”

“Good on them,” I said, and Hera disappeared.

I took a break to check on the others work. Asimov had a dozen screens easily up and open, each designing a different part of a VI. He was almost plugging in modules at random from what I could see, but I also didn’t understand how it all fit together, so I wasn’t a fair judge. I looked out into the hangar to see how things were fitting together.

So far, we had what looked like a trailer bed with landing gears instead of tires. We had the foundry section on one side about two-thirds of the way back. The crew compartment could easily fit fore of that. The sickbay would be able to fit between the foundry and the spot opposite it. Throwing in a cockpit and sensors package, we should easily be able to have four or more drone mount points.

It wasn’t going to be pretty, but it would work. It just needed power and engines. I got back to the power plant.

I finally cracked the math. I wasn’t 100% sure, but I think I cracked it!

Neith, how is your mathematics?

-Not relevant for this function.-

Great. Thanks.

“Who here has an NI that can do a sanity check on my math?”

Surprisingly Observer unfolded from my head. Everyone jumped at the sight of him.

“It’s fine!” I shouted. “He’s with the ship AI.” Not exactly a lie.

“The math works. You are ready for the next update.”

Everyone covered their ears at his voice, some visibly cringing.

“How long will I be out this time?”

“Not out. Can process with Neith.” That was good news.

He didn’t wait for my response as he punctured my skull with a finger. There was much less pain this time. In fact, this time I didn’t throw up OR pass out. Two minutes later, Observer folded himself up and back into my data jack.

“Ugh, I hate when he does that.” I shook my head to clear out the wooziness. “Hera, Zeus is going to be happy!” I called into the air.

The panel flickered once. Some of my scratched-out calculations cleaned themselves up.

“Thank you. This is quite lovely. As a bonus, only your team will have access to this technology during this competition.”

“Okay, Yavuz, we need to figure out the refinery a bit better. I have the power plant that can generate the power to melt Tungsten now. Let’s make sure that the output is acceptable.”

We had a Gravitic Power Plant. The output was roughly 200 times more than the existing Thorium generators on a frame less than one fifth the size. Just one of these could have powered the entirety of the Sol combined fleet that was sent out. More importantly, the bay size could be as small as a cube two meters per side.

“Let’s throw in some batteries for backup power and don’t forget external ports on the hull for the drones.”

I wasn’t the only one who was excited. That extra power meant a lot for our current ship. The AE had a sparkle in his eye as well. The remainder of assembling the new craft ran smoothly. There was a fabrication bay built into the back. Maneuvering jets ran in series on each area of the ship. It was designed for in solar system flight. It would be stocked to function for six months with a crew of eight before having to resupply, and thanks to the drones it could cover a LOT of territory. There were only four drone docks, but with how they were designed, another two could fit on the “trailer” on its way out, allowing six drones to mine at once. Recharging them would just be staggered.

We almost got into trouble by forgetting to install airlocks as well as a feed to the foundry from outside of the ship. Fortunately, Janssens mentioned that. He had been looking for a way to take it out and realized there was no way for it to do its job or to load up crew. We requested an SI to validate the navigation and piloting systems. Sensors were another piece that we “borrowed.” We ended up using a more limited (due to the number of sensors, not ability) version of the sensor package that was just built for the Ark.

“Okay, Hera, ready to submit!”

We were all back in the real world. The green numbers above the table read “27:18.”

“Nice, less than half an hour in real time.” I congratulated my team.

“Take a minute to refresh yourselves then we need to decide where we are going to hit next.

A quick discussion ensued as we took a biological break drank some water or coffee, and reconnected.

“Welcome back. Which section would you like to try next?”

We next tackled them all. First an outpost, followed by a space station, then shipyard and lastly the colony base.

All three were powered by several of the gravitic power plants. We used Torres trick for all the sick bays. Now that it had been worked out once, we could duplicate it for each of the designs. We had then powered up several lasers for defense turrets; we had additional sensor arrays, multiple environmental control systems. Thoroughly planned out plumbing air flow and electricity. The problem we ran into with the colony base was that it ended up feeling like a prison. The outpost and space stations were beautifullysmartly designed with a transient population in mind. The colony was a different story entirely. There were some tricks that we needed it showed.

On the plus side, when we built out the outpost, we were able to translate that to a space station easily. The shipyard was also simple. Several large fab bays would be used to take Ark-5, and it would add several hallways that would then act as arms. Each arm would then have one or more hangars with several external ports for smaller craft, and my M1K33 construction drones connected to a VI. Each bay would have a separate VI all linked in and controlled by a full-blown AI. Each of the bays would have arms to help with docking. There would be a mobile umbilical to cycle and filter air, and the list went on. We had experienced a month of planning with small breaks to sleep in the game and every time we completed an assignment we were placed back into the real world. With every design, we would have Janssens and Turing review them to see how they would approach trying to take the facility.

“Okay, Hera. I believe we are done. We can’t crack the colony. I feel that we all agree civilians would be needed to ensure it as mentally pleasing as possible, but we will still be submitting the design.”

We were ejected from the simulation. The clock above the table read “73:12:14.”

Just over three days, not bad.

“You will be informed of the decisions within the next few days. We have another seven days before a decision must be made.” Rasputin appeared above the table.

“I will say, your mining ship has turned a few heads.” I smiled. Right now, all I wanted to do was be away from everyone else.

The Builds - Original

More work went along with a few more hours passing by. I almost had the power plant idea cracked thought it was MUCH larger than I wanted. I was still working on the math to make sure it all worked properly. It was there, it was just HARD. Generating the necessary heat to melt tungsten was a right pain in the ass.

It didn’t help that I kept getting pulled aside as different people were finished with their portions.

“Ma’am, question.” Torres interrupted me.

“Shoot.” I said, barely looking away from the board I was working on.

“Have you considered an VI doctor?”

“No, but it sounds like you have. What are you thinking?”

“Let’s use the model of the scanning rooms we had in the game. I know they were on earth as well before we left, so the tech is real, can we shrink that down into pod size, and have an auto-doc connected to an AI?” Torres was almost done with her room and would need to check the crew module for edits for med-kits and other supplies.

The hull tech had already gone through and added two hull patch kits, so the human touch was all that was left.

“That would work. Get with Asimov and he can help design that VI.” I said, then stopped and looked at her.

“You know, Torres, that is a really good idea. If we get a couple of Vis in there to work with things such as Piloting and Energy Management, we could really take this thing next level. Good catch.”

“Thanks. I was working with Kevorkian on it, and we thought it would be a smart move.”

“I’m not familiar with that name. Is it from a mythology?”

“No someone from history, kind of a reminder of what happens when crossing lines.”

“Let Asimov know you want to work with him on that, but don’t stop him from what he’s doing.”

We both got back to work as Hera formed in the middle of the room. This time with marbled features instead of bronze cast.

“Jax, your team has made some very interesting decisions. I am liking the route you have chosen. Be a dear and finish up with your calculations. Zeus is very interested.”

“Hera.” I nodded to her. “Working on it. I’m still not used to this new math. Is there a name for it, yet? I hate that we keep calling it ‘new math’.”

“Nothing yet. Some are trying to name it ‘Asterian Mathematics’ because it came from the stars. That would be better than most of the others.”

“Good on them.” I said and Hera disappeared.

I took a break to check on the others work. Asimov had easily a dozen screens up and open, each designing a different part of a VI. He was almost plugging in modules at random from what I could see, but I also didn’t understand how it all fit together so I wasn’t a fair judge. I looked out into the hangar to see how things were fitting together.

So far we had what looked like a trailer bed with landing gears instead of tires. We had the foundry section on one side about two thirds of the way back. The crew compartment could easily fit fore of that. The sick bay would be able to fit between the foundry and the spot opposite it. Throwing in a cockpit and sensors package we should easily be able to have four or more drone mount points.

It wasn’t going to be pretty, but it would work. It just needed power and engines. I got back to the power plant.

I finally cracked the math. I wasn’t 100% sure, but I cracked it!

Neith, how is your mathematics?

Not relevant for this function.

Great. Thanks.

“Who here has a NI that can do a sanity check on my math?”

Surprisingly Observer unfolded from my head. Everyone jumped at the sight of him.

“It’s fine!” I shouted. “He’s with the ship AI.” Not exactly a lie.

“The math works. You are ready for the next update.”

Everyone covered there ears at his voice, some visibly cringing.

“How long will I be out this time?”

“Not out. Can process with Neith.” That was good news.

He didn’t wait for my response as he punctured my skull with a finger. There was much less pain this time. In fact, this time I didn’t throw up OR pass out. Two minutes later, Observer folded himself up and back into my data jack.

“Ugh, I hate when he does that.” I shook my head to clear out the wooziness. “Hera, Zeus is going to be happy!” I called into the air.

The panel flickered once. Some of my scratched-out calculations cleaned themselves up.

“Thank you. This will be quite lovely. As a bonus, only your team will have access to this technology during this competition.”

“Okay, Yavuz, we need to figure out the refinery a bit better. I have the power plant that can generate the power to melt Tungsten now. Let’s make sure that the output is acceptable.”

We had a Gravitic Power Plant. The output was roughly 200 times more than the existing Thorium generators on a frame less than one fifth the size. Just one of these could have powered the entirety of the Sol combined fleet that was sent out. More importantly, the bay size could be as small as a cube two meters per side.

“Let’s throw in some batteries for backup power and don’t forget external ports on the hull for the drones.”

I wasn’t the only one who was excited. That extra power meant a lot for our current ship. The AE had a sparkle in his eye as well. The remainder of assembling the ship ran smoothly. There was a fabrication bay built into the back. Maneuvering jets ran in series on each area of the ship. It was designed for in solar system flight. It would be stocked to function for six months with a crew of eight before having to resupply, and thanks to the drones it could cover a LOT of territory. There were only four drone docks, but with how they were designed, another two could fit on the “trailer” on its way out, allowing six drones to mine at once. Recharging them would just be staggered.

We almost got into trouble by forgetting to install airlocks as well as a feed to the foundry from outside of the ship, fortunately Janssens mentioned that. He had been looking for way to take it out and realized there was no way for it to do its job or to load up crew. We requested an SI to validate the navigation and piloting systems. Sensors were another piece that we “borrowed”. We ended up using a more limited (due to number of sensors, not ability) version of the sensor package that was just built for the Ark.

“Okay, Hera, ready to submit!”

We were all back in the real world. The green numbers above the table read “27:18”

“Nice, less than half an hour in real time.” I congratulated my team.

“Take a minute to refresh yourselves then we need to decide where we are going to hit next.

A quick discussion ensued as we took a biological break drank some water or coffee, and reconnected.

“Welcome back. Which section would you like to try next?”

We next tackled an outpost, a space station, ship yard and lastly the colony base.

All three were powered by several of the gravitic power plants. We used Torres trick for all the sick bays. Now that it had been worked out once, we could duplicate it for each of the designs. We had then powered up several lasers for defense turrets, we had additional sensor arrays, multiple environmental control systems. Fully planned out plumbing air flow and electricity. The problem we ran into with the colony base was that it ended up feeling like a prison. The outpost and space stations were fine. They were designed with a transient population in mind, but the colony base. There were some tricks that we were just losing out on.

On the plus side, when we built out the outpost, we were able to translate that to a space station easily. The ship yard was also simple. Several large fab bays would be used to take Ark-5 and it would add several hallways that would then act as arms. Each arm would then have one or more hangars with several external ports for smaller craft, and my M1K33 construction drones connected to a VI. Each hangar would have a separate VI all linked in and controlled by a full-blown AI. Each of the hangars would have arms to help with docking. There would be a mobile umbilical to help cycle air and the list went on. We had experienced a month of planning with small breaks to sleep in game and every time we completed an assignment we were placed back into the real world. With every design we would have Janssens and Turing review them to see how they would approach trying to take the facility.

“Okay, Hera. I believe we are done. We can’t crack the colony. I feel that we all agree civilians would be needed to ensure it as mentally pleasing as possible, but we will still be submitting the design.”

We were ejected from the simulation. The clock above the table read “73:12:14”

Just over three days, not bad.

“You will be informed of the decisions within the next few days. We have another seven days before a decision must be made.” Rasputin appeared above the table.

“I will say, your mining ship has turned a few heads.” I smiled. Right now, all I wanted to do was be away from everyone else.