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Prologue: Dawn of the Interstellar Age

The fate of the Human Race changed with the 22/05/2022 midday crash of an Enthili shuttle into downtown Tehran. With the world watching the two 2m tall blue Enthili emerging out of the craft seemingly unharmed confirmed that the Earth was being visited by beings of extraterrestrial origins. As if it wasn’t enough a rescue party arrived shortly there after and then retrieved the 2 survivors.

Fortunately the Iranian military was slow to act in capturing the alien survivors thus avoiding the inevitable retribution of the Enthili. However the abandoned Enthili shuttle represented a technological boon for the Iranians; much to the annoyance of the United States and its allies. With the help of the BRICS Countries the Iranians were able to reap the fruits of the windfall that had landed on their lap.

Iran had become one of the few countries who had recovered an alien spacecraft, and the only one of these countries willing to sell the recovered technology to the rest of the world. The proliferation of advance Alien technology finally forced the United States to reveal that they had made contact with the Greys in 1957. The US admission triggered a wave of admissions by all the other major Nations.

It turned out that the Earth System is surrounded by the Anu (Greys), the Enthili (Blues), the Aope (Greens), the Varden (Reds), the Wocuk (Reptilians), the Nodos (Angels), the Kilhik (mer-folk) and others. Many of the species visiting earth were in conflict with each other, and so to avoid their animosity leading to conflicts involving Earth the United Nations Human Extraterrestrial Relations (UNHER) agency was formed and the UN Security Council mandated with protecting Humans from Hostile Extraterrestrials.

As if by agreement all the Sapient Sentient Species visiting Earth refused to give Humans advanced technology and the only tech they would share was variations of applications of existing human technology. However Human ambition could not be thwarted so easily; from the crashed Spacecrafts in Human possession Graviton Fields were discovered leading to the expansion of Field Theories.

Experimentation of Graviton Fields lead to Antigravity, Gravity Fields, Graviton Propulsion and Graviton Field Shields. The discoveries in the science of Graviton Fields lead to the development of the Gravimetric Drive propulsion systems and the Graviton Field Shields finally allowed sustainable Nuclear Fusion. Finally Humanity could abandon ecologically destructive Fossil Fuels.

Gravimetric Drive propulsion systems and sustainable Nuclear Fusion triggered a Golden Age for Humanity; Colonies throughout the Solar System, Population Boom and advancement into new and more exotic technologies. 200 years later Humanity still had not cracked the secret of Faster Than Light Space Travel; human scientists had already determined from crashed Alien Ships that the answer laid in the Jump Drive referenced in Alien Ship data stores.

The Jump Drive is what opens the wormhole to Hyperspace; a parallel dimension where the Relative Movement correlates to over a million times that of Normal Space. A kilometre in Hyperspace is equivalent to over a million kilometres in Normal Space. Ships powered by a Gravimetric Drive could safely move at 2% the speed of light and that meant that by moving through Hyperspace they could reach over 200 times the speed of light relative to moving in Normal Space. Depending on the Ship a LightYear can be reached in a little over 42 hours.

In 200 years the United Nations (UN) had become the United Earth Nations (UEN) a Federation Based on the European Union model; giving the constituent states sovereignty within UEN Laws. The Budget for the UEN amounted to 5% of all tax collected by the States. The UEN's primary role was Security and Development, and it is for this reason that the UEN desperately sought the Jump Drive technology.

The UEN was stuck with the aliens offering nothing in the area of Hyperspace and Jump Drive technology until space pirates showed up and the UEN negotiated with them the sale of one of their rickety Jump capable StarShips and technical support in 2217. Finally the humans got their first look at a Jump Drive and the associated Hyperspace Module; the research and analysis would be long, costly and secretive to avoid alien interference.

After an exhaustive design process conducted through Simulated Intelligences and Augmented Human Intelligence it was determined that given the materials available to Humans the smallest Jump Drive that the UEN could build was 150m in diameter, and would require a miniaturized 220m diameter Fusion Reactor. The visiting Aliens could manage a Jump Drive that is 80m in diameter and they had Exotic Energy sources that could be miniaturized to as little as 50m in diameter.

Sims as popularly known are Simulated Intelligences and they’re as close to True AI as Humans can get. Advances in technology quickly revealed that binary code could not produce sentience. 0 and 1 are essentially on and off and as such could not produce feels like on or feels like off today. Perfect in judgement and reason couldn’t reach the improbable conclusions necessary for sentience. A computational machine could not desire something.

Because of the size restrictions the UEN set the size of the smallest Jump Drive ship the Corvette at 2000m in length and 280m in width. The Frigate is 3000m in length and 350m in width, The Destroyer is 4000m in length and 4000m in width and the BattleCruiser is 5000m in length and 480m in width. Since the BattleCruiser was within the affordability limits of the UEN individual states it was agreed that the UEN be restricted to BattleCruiser and the larger StarCruiser. The StarCruiser is 10,000m in length and 800m in width. All of them shaped like Submarines and a lustrous Black in colour to enhance their stealth.

The StarCruiser is a by-product of the design of the Super Cargo Carrier (SCC) intended to bring resources from distant worlds back to Earth. The thick Oriculcum Steel Hull of the SCC class was meant to be sufficiently thick to survive raids by Corvettes and Frigates that Pirates seem to favour. And so the SCC design was modified to the Titan Class StarCruiser and the Explorer Class StarCruiser.

Military experts would proclaim the Titan Class StarCruiser a defence platform rather than a warship. The Titan Class doesn’t carry a complement of Drones, GunShips or Marines, and it has little in the way of storage for supply materials and focuses exclusively on Attack and Defence; meant to be more than a match for 10 BattleCruisers. As such the Titan Class StarCruiser cannot operate outside supply lines.

The Explorer Class StarCruiser on the other hand is essentially a large BattleCruiser; optimised for long-range deployment and carrying a full complement of Drones, GunShips, Marines and ample storage for supplies. The Explorer Class StarCruisers routinely conduct 5-10 year deployments thanks to HyperSleep Pods and Virtual Reality entertainment; the Explorer Class carries twice the necessary crew and rotates them periodically.

Once the designs were optimized and locked in steel factories all over the Earth system roared to life as Oriculcum Steel armour plates were produced by nearly every steel factory in every industrial centre. Oriculcum Steel is probably the most optimal alloy the humans are able to produce. Thanks to the discovery of Oriculcum on Venus and Mercury the UEN didn’t need to pay exorbitant prices to aliens for the rare mineral that could be used to produce Oriculcum Steel; an alloy 50 times stronger than Carbon Steel. Humans could now build 1000 story buildings thanks to Oriculcum Steel.

When the Human Warships were revealed in 2257 the Earth visiting Aliens were stunned. They had known that the increase in Oriculcum Steel production meant that the humans were assembling a StarNavy but they never imagined that humans would bypass the small StarNavy phase and jump ahead to the regional navy. The UEN had built 7 of every class of Jump Drive capable StarShip and the Constituent States and Blocks had built their own Corvettes, Frigates, Destroyers and BattleCruisers to pursue colonies outside the Earth system.

Armed with Missiles, RailGuns, Laser Cannons, Particle Beam Cannons and Plasma Beam Cannons the human ships were deliberately imposing. The UEN deliberately made a show of the display of military power with the intension to deter pirates, raiders and potentially hostile nations from military adventurism in human controlled space. It was clear to anyone looking that Humans were not a soft target, and the speed of their construction would pose a threat to even the more advanced Nations.

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By 2719 the UEN was a major Galactic power holding domain over 100 inhabited worlds and hundreds of mining instillations and observation posts. Earth was home to over 35 billion Humans and over 5 Billion whales; the advent of advanced technology allowed humans to finally communicate with the other sentient species on Earth. The Earth was essentially a planetary city thanks to the resources gathered from across the cosmos.

There are 2 billion humans on Earth’s moon and another 12 billion humans in the rest of the Earth System. Another 31 billion Humans and 7 billion Whales occupy the rest of the UEN affiliated colonies and stations. Thanks to antigravity technology Whales could freely move around outside the water and Dolphins in particular could be seen moving around on the streets of every major population centre.

But even after centuries of space exploration Earth was still the Heart of the UEN; the centre of commerce, technological development and culture. The colonies could never hope to compete with the infrastructure on Earth and every Earthborn Human or Whale enjoyed the best quality of life thanks to abundant energy and a carefully managed environment.

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The Explorer Class StarCruiser ENS Dauntless E317 was approaching the final stop of its 10 year exploration of the systems at the edge of the Galaxy and after this final stop it would be a 2 year non-stop jump to the UEN territories. The E317 Hull marking was its designation and the ‘E’ indicated that it’s an Explorer Class, the 3 indicates that it’s a 3rd generation Explorer Class and the 17 indicates that it’s the 17th Explorer Class in service.

The crew of the ENS Dauntless E317 was visibly excited because after this last stop most crew will go to HyperSleep and likely wake up in the Earth System. David Navi was amongst those in high spirits; eager to finally complete his first deployment. David Navi had joined the StarNavy at 16 years old and since on Earth everyone is equipped with a Neural Link at the age of 4 years there was no need for a public education system with the Sims taking care of all the teaching.

David Navi had chosen engineering at the Naval Academy because his hometown was near a shipbuilding facility and it was the most familiar. At the Naval Academy his unit leader was also named David so everyone used Navi to avoid confusion and it stuck and now everyone calls him Navi. When Navi was assigned to the ENS Dauntless E317 after the Naval Academy at age 20 he cursed his bad luck knowing that he’d spend 8 to 12 years on the ship and away from Civilization.

The StarNavy demanded a minimum of 8 years of deployed service from its Naval Academy Graduates and once the StarNavy discharges you the private sector will welcome you with open arms and lucrative remuneration. Navi decided to max out his contract with the StarNavy during his long deployment and find a nice job and at the Shipbuilding facility near his home upon his return.

Since naval engineers are critical the Captain of the ENS Dauntless E317 allowed Navi to spend 7 years active during the 8 years the Dauntless has been deployed. Navi decided to spend a year on watch during the trip home to complete his deployment. Navi had grown into a damn good Engineer during the 7 years of service earning the rank of Ensign and was now part of the core teen of Engineers aboard the ENS Dauntless E317.

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On the Bridge of the ENS Dauntless E317; the ship was approaching optimal Jump Point coordinates.

Capt-Moau : " Sound General Quarters"

Lt-Orlov : " Sound General Quarters aye; All hands to battle stations!"

It was standard operating procedure to enter Normal Space ready for a fight.

Capt- Moau : " Dauntless; stand by for Jump"

Sim-Dauntless : " Jump Drive charged and ready Captain. Weapon Systems Online. Sensor Array Active."

Capt- Moau : " Any signs of life?"

Sim-Dauntless : " None that I can detect Captain."

LtCdr-Brown : " It looks like another empty system sir."

Capt-Moau : " What do you think Colonel?"

The captain looks over to the commander of the embarked Marines.

Col-Benson : " We haven’t found anything in the past 14 systems; there’s nothing out here."

Capt-Moau : " Are you ready XO?"

Cdr-Valding : " Everything is buttoned up down here Captain."

On UEN ships the Executive officer is stationed at the auxiliary ship controls in Engineering so that if the Bridge is taken out the XO can take over immediately.

Capt- Moau : " Jump"

Sim-Dauntless : " Jump Sequence Activated"

A wormhole opened from Hyperspace to Normal Space.

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As is standard operating protocol the Jump point is set near the System’s local Star to avoid any potential debris that could not be detected from Hyperspace; only the gravity of large stellar bodies like planets and moons can be detected from Hyperspace. And so to avoid dangerous objects ships enter systems from the sun whose massive gravity would have cleaned up most of the debris.

Another standard operating protocol for Earth warships is that on deployment their speed is maintained at 2% of the speed of light. This is primarily to maintain the necessary momentum to make a quick exit should it be needed, and it also conserves fuel while making targeting difficult in combat situations. The momentum allows the massive Earth Ships to manoeuvre nimbly.

Unfortunately the ENS Dauntless E317 was on a collision course with a Massive cloaked ship and as the ship de-cloaked it became clear that a collision could not be avoided

Lt-Orlov : " Captain?"

Capt-Moau : " Brace for Impact!"

TSRUUUUUUUUUUUUU!

Navi : " Holy Shit!"

A massive Plasma Beam came out of the 500km diameter sphere that is unknown ship and destroyed the ENS Dauntless E317; penetrating the Shields and Armour like they weren’t there.

Thousands of Souls perished in an instant and Navi was among the less than 100 of the 10,000 crew to somewhat survive due to the reactor shielding.

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