Chronicles of Sol: The Fall

EFS Enterprise October 21st, 001 SDE:

Williams leaned back a bit, as chewed on what she had just heard. Her friend was getting up, and heading off. It seemed the number three engine had developed a problem with its crystal core. Worse Greyman was now looking into things for signs of sabotage. He wasn’t going to find anything, because she wasn’t stupid enough to have one of those invaluable crystals sabotaged in the first place. No this was perhaps a sign that she had been moving too quickly. Just in case, she was having her own people look into members of her group. Just in case one of them happened to have come down with a case of extreme stupidity and sabotaged a vital system. At least the problem was caught without incident and Richards had the good sense to look down the engine. Unfortunately now they were down an engine. A main engine at that.

Williams had studied the ship, and knew that losing one engine wasn’t crippling, but it would affect their maneuvering capabilities. The Enterprise had five primary engines, and each engine was paired with two secondary engines. That was in the main hull. The outboard nacelles each contained twenty sublight maneuvering engines and two warp engines. Not counting the warp engines that gave the Enterprise fifty-five sublight engines. The power of those engines wasn’t equal, however. The massive main engines provided the majority of the ship’s thrust. As Williams recalled it was about sixty percent or was it seventy percent of the ship’s overall thrust? She wasn’t entirely sure. She knew the secondary engines provided a good chunk as well. Although Williams not being an engineer was unsure of their exact specs.

She did know a few things, like that each main engine had three cores. Each core would contain a single crystal each, and the cores were designed to work in concert to produce the spatial pulse waves that were responsible for thrust. However, it was technically possible for the engine to function without all three cores. It was not by any means recommended to operate the engine without all three cores. The exact particulars of why, eluded her, but she knew enough to know that until that was replaced they were down an engine. Worse she knew that was going to take awhile. Manufacturing a propulsion crystal was no simple task. It was a slow exacting process that took months. Thankfully once produced a crystal typically lasted fifty years before it had to be replaced.

Queitly she muttered, “I really hope Greyman is wrong about this being sabotage, but I can’t discount it.”

Finally, she got up and headed off to do her usual duties. Internally she was hoping this was just a rare case of a manufacturing defect escaping quality control, and not some moron doing unsanctioned sabotage.

Sali stepped out of the shower and was greeted with a blast of warm air. On her bare wet flesh, it felt rather cold, but it dried her body quickly. Honestly, she would have preferred a towel or something. Anything else, but at least she had access to a shower. When she had first gotten here, they would bring her a bucket and a rag. This was better, and while the water wasn’t hot, it wasn’t cold either.

She stood there for a moment longer than perhaps needed. Just long enough for the air to start feeling warm on her naked skin. Then she stepped out of the jet. Nearby was a specially designed locker. She palmed the palm pad on it, and it dropped a shift into a small bucket at her feet. Sali picked it up, and slipped it on. Like every other one it was too short, but by this point she barely minded that. Not that she cared to admit it, but she was getting used to wearing what basically amounted to nothing. As these shifts didn’t exactly do the best job of keeping her covered.

Sali didn’t let her mind dwell on her outfit. There wasn’t anything she could do about her clothing anyway. Not right now anyway. Instead of worrying about what she was forced to wear, she made her way out of the showers. Her eyes were greeted with a few other prisoners, mostly young women moving around the cell blocks. There weren’t any men in sight, but that was because this was a girls-only section of the brig. Not that it meant much given what they were all wearing. She put that out of mind, and turned left towards the checkpoint that would lead her out of the brig. While she didn’t have a clock, she had other means to keep track of time. Sali knew she was expected there. It was time to head down for more work in those dark factories. Most likely simply moving things around with no idea why.

Her trip out of the brig went much the same as it always did, and before she knew it Sali found herself on the lift heading to the factories. A lift that all too soon delivered her to the dark lower levels of the ship. Not that the brig was any brighter, or anywhere else she had been on this ship.

As she stepped off the lift, she was greeted by a familiar young man. He smiled, “Glad to see made it on time. Things are going to be getting interesting soon.”

He gestured for her to follow, and she did. “Interesting? Something going on?”

“Something, alright. We had a rather unexpected production order come in. You and I are going to be transporting a lot of Rydium to bay nine over the next few weeks.”

“Rydium? What is that?”

“A very special material. You’ll get to see some later when we start loading carts up with the stuff.”

“I see.”

“Care to tell me what all that Rydium is going to be for?”

“Not really. All I’ve heard is something about making a Rydium crystal. That would explain why the order is expected to take four and a half months though”

This was sounding interesting, and no one had come over to break up their chat. Sali decided to press her luck. Maybe learn something interesting. “What would such a crystal be used for anyway?”

The young man was quick to reply, “Rydium Crystals are mainly used in propulsion, but they do have other applications.”

She blinked, “Did I hear that right? That wasn’t a translator malfunction or something? Did you say propulsion?”

He nodded, “That sounds right.”

That just didn’t make any sense to her. “How the..” she stopped herself took a breath, and in a lower tone of voice asked, “How exactly would that work? I’ve never heard of crystals being used in propulsion.”

He chuckled, “I guess you wouldn’t have. We don’t use traditional reaction control systems though. We use a reactionless drive system. I’m not an engineer so I can’t really tell you how it works. Only what I’ve picked up over the years.”

“I see.”

He led the way through a door into a room, she had previously never been allowed in. The gaurd simply let her follow him in however without a word. Regardless she felt a little uneasy here. As she looked around, she noted it was a full factory floor. Technicians were monitoring the machinery, and moving things about. It was a rather odd floor though. She saw no signs of the typical conveyor lines. Instead the place was filled with large transparent cubes filled with some kind of liquid and surrounded by much strange machinery. Inside she could see objects forming. Most often a simple cube, that after a few moments would be moved into a short tube that led to a dishcarge port by unseen force. Once in the discharge port the object would be removed from the liquad by robotic arms, and placed onto a collection tray. Where it would be gone over by technicians before being loaded onto one of the grav carts moving around the floor.

She missed a step, and just starred at the work.

“Never seen a Nano-Fabricator before?”

“Nano-Fabricator? What is that?” What she was seeing, and the name gave her an idea, but it just seemed so fantastical.

“Exactly what it sounds like. The controlled application of nano-technology for the manufacture of just about anything. Anyway, we need to head this way” he said point towards a door. She followed a long, and even picked up her step as she remembered that she had a job to do. They couldn’t spend too long talking.

They fell silent for a moment, as he led her through the factory deck. Before she knew they were entering a room filled with strange machinery, a collection tray, and a docking port for a grav cart. Waiting for them was an older woman, the boss. Sali felt a lump form in her throught. This didn’t seem good.

The boss smiled when she spotted them come in, “Ah good. You are one time. Sali I have some news for you.”

She blinked, “You do?”

“I do indeed.”

Sali had no idea what this could be about. What she was told next was quite surprising. “Your request to learn our langauge was approved. Although the requested teacher was denied. Instead you will be reporting to Samantha Greyman after your shift here. She will be teaching you.”

Sali frowned. She never made such a request. Although it wasn’t entirely unwelcome news. It was rather annoying having to talk to everyone with a translator. The boss left before she could really question what was going on.

She didn’t even realized she had asked until it was answered. “Who is Samanta Greyman?”

There was an odd tone in his voice that she couldn’t quite place, and frankly was too distracted to really notice, “She’s the first officer’s wife, and she is in charge of the ship’s schools.”

Countryman slipped into the door. Ruri had asked for him to meet her in her lab. She had said that she had something to discuss with him.

He found her leaned over a console, and for once her outfit was actually intact. That was one worry off his mind. You would think that at her age she would be more aware of socially acceptable dress, but she wasn’t. As such he always had to look out for her.

She looked up, as he entered, “Ah, glad you could come see me so quickly”

“I was free, so I figured I might see what this was about.”

She gestured at the console, “I was given a rather interesting demonstration on orbital mining dynamics.”

“Orbital mining?” he frowned, “I’ve seen a few proposals for that sort of thing before. What makes this one special?”

Ruri tapped a few buttons, and a monitor lit up. Its display filled with complicated data, and an orbital dynamic. “This one doesn’t require any hardware we don’t have. Aside from a few minor modifications. Although it might be more accurate to call it aerial mining, with an orbital hub.”

As he started looking it over, he replied, “Interesting, might be worth testing it here. Depends on the requirements and specifics though.”

“These techniques could also be applied to asteroid mining. The idea is that we outfit our mining shuttles with mining lasers. They can fly over the area, and use the mining lasers to dig into the surface. Mining lasers have limited range and aren’t able to strike the ground effectively from orbit, but with recent advancements, they have a range of around two or three kilometers depending on the design. That is more than enough for low-altitude mining flights to do some work in the air.

“The next part does require something more involved than upscaled shuttle mounted mining lasers.” she tapped a few keys and brought up a schematic, “My source of this proposal ambitiously marked this as the Mag Tractor Mark II. She modified it using a specially modified Rydium crystal to produce a far stronger beam. Allowing it limited use against objects that previously would have required a mag plate to grab.”

Countryman looked it over. He could see that it was a significantly stronger beam alright. Still not powerful enough to ensnare a starship without the beam stabilizing effect of an attached mag plate, but an improvement nonetheless. If he had to guess based on the specs here it could probably ensnare a light fighter or shuttle without assistance. Heavier craft with the stronger engines could likely escape the beam, but might be slowed for a moment or two. “This does seem to have certain applications alright. I do have to ask though. How easily can we produce the required crystals for the modified beam?”

“Thankfully the crystals are fairly small and don’t have the strenuous requirements of propulsion crystals. It should take a week for each crystal to be shaped, and another to test. Like every other type, barring defect they should last decades once produced.”

Countryman nodded. That meant that it would only take a couple of weeks to produce all the crystals they needed. “Get these specs sent down, and have them make a test batch of fifty modified mag tractor projectors. That should be more than enough for a first stage trial.”

She nodded, “Of course. I’ll have them sent down.”

Countryman knew that with current extraction rates they were still going to be here in a few weeks. They needed a fair amount of certain materials, especially since he wanted them to stock spare Rydium crystals for the engines just in case. Something they had launched without. Given how deep the main engines were inside the hull, it was beyond rare to need a spare. It used to be that ships never needed to carry a spare. Afterall even in the worst case scenario, which was already an extremely unlikely possibility, a friendly port was a single distress call away. Where they could soon be fitted with replacement crystals. Their new situation in the depths of space changed that, and now that they had a chance it was time to have some on hand just in case. This incident was a good example towards why, since a single failure meant they were now down an engine. Thankfully they had plenty of extra engines to pick up the slack, so they if they needed to they could still leave the system. It was fortunate the incident happened now when it was easy to fix and not at an inconvenient moment.