EM: Electromagnetic. Usually short for the term “electromagnetic radiation,” meaning visible light, radio waves, ultraviolet, infrared, and similar forms of energy forming a part of the familiar electromagnetic spectrum. Often used to distinguish sensors that detect EM radiation from those that detect other phenomena such as gravitational effects or neutrinos.
EMCOM: Emissions Control. A security and deception measure in which a warship not only operates under what 21st Century readers would call “radio silence” but also without navigation beacons, active sensor beams, and any other emissions that could be used to track the ship. When a ship is under EMCON, active measures are taken to ensure that there are no unauthorized transmissions: transmitters are deactivated and placed under high level security lockouts, portable transmitters are inventoried and placed in high security areas, and equipment that could if used improperly accidentally give off a signal is powered down and, in some cases, physically disconnected from its power source or operational components needed to transmit (such as meta-spacial emitter coils) removed from the device. Except when actively engaged in offensive operations, it is very unusual for a modern warship to operate under EMCOM for anything more than a few hours.
Emeka Moro: Union Space Navy Frigate, Edward Jenner Class, registry number FLE 2372, commissioned December 8, 2295. Currently (as of February 20, 2315) undergoing extensive repairs and refit at James Lovell Station to repair damage sustained in battle against a Krag Barsoom Class Battlecruiser on 11 November 2314. For the person, see Moro, Emeka.
Enlisted Ratings: the ranks of enlisted men in the Union Navy are listed below, in order of increasing rank. Within each rank, not separately listed here, are three classes—First, Second, and Third. So, within the ranks of Able Spacer, one can rise through the ranks of Able Spacer Third Class, Able Spacer Second Class, and Able Spacer First Class.
Recruit
Ordinary
Able
Petty Officer
Chief Petty Officer.
ENTJ: one of the 16 personality types defined by the Myers-Briggs Personality Test. The letters represent Extroversion, iNtuition, Thinking, Judgment (as opposed to Introversion, Sensing, Feeling, and Perceiving). The ENTJ personality type is the one most associated with leadership, particularly with military or political leadership. ENTJ’s are outgoing, have a preference for the big picture over details, are oriented toward objective facts rather than subjective feelings and experience, and have a structured and organized approach to problem-solving. Approximately 55% of all warship commanding officers are of the ENTJ type. Roughly half of the rest are ISTJs who are only weakly introverted.
envie: (Cajun French) a craving or hankering, particularly for a specific food item. Pregnant women are famous for having an envie for some item that is not in the house. Some non-French speakers find this word hard to pronounce: the “en” has the same sound as the “aw” in “fawn” and the second syllable is pronounced “vee.”
Epsilon Indi: as viewed from Earth, the fifth brightest star in the Constellation Indus (the Indian). A main sequence star, class K, orbited by two brown dwarf stars and seven planets, located approximately twelve light years from Earth. The name is also used to refer to the third planet of this system, Epsilon Indi III (sometimes referred to as “Bravo” for the letter “B” as it was the second Earth colony outside the Sol system, coming after “Alpha” or Alpha Centauri) which is the home of the Clara Barton Military Hospital, the largest and most advanced hospital for military casualties in the Union. The term “Indians” for residents of that world is regarded as a slur and should be avoided by persons who do not want to start a fight with one of that world’s notoriously pugnacious inhabitants.
Esperanto: a constructed artificial auxiliary language invented in 1887 by L. L. Zamenhof, designed to be an easy to learn international tongue that could be used as a medium of international communication and cooperation, thereby fostering world peace and universal human understanding. Dream on. It failed to achieve any of the lofty goals for which it was invented and was never widely spoken until the year 2112 when Solomon Ghift made it the primary language of the colony he founded on Gliese 581 g, which the inhabitants named Ghiftha Prima. As of the early Twenty-fourth Century, Esperanto was still the cradle tongue of the Ghifthee.
FabriFax: the brand name of an industrial grade computerized machine fabricator that uses advanced numeric microrobotic manufacturing techniques to construct machine parts rapidly from a set of digital specifications. Among other advantages of this technology, having at least one FabriFax on board allows a warship to operate unsupported for longer periods of time because it does not have to carry spares for every tiny switch, gear, bracket, and fitting on board, but can manufacture them as needed. The name is thought to be derived from the words “Fabrication” and “Factory.” FabriFax is a brand name of Fabrikorp, GmBH. Although the key patents on the device have expired and other companies now make microrobotic fabricators, FabriFax has become a generic name for all such devices, much in the way all phonographs were once called Victrolas and all robotic baby changing machines are known as Diaper Kwiks.
Faget, Maxime: (known as Max) aerospace engineer and administrator born on Earth on August 26, 1921 and died October 9, 2004. Faget is best known as the lead designer for the United States Mercury Spacecraft and for his seminal contributions to the design of the Gemini Spacecraft, the Apollo Command Module, and the Space Shuttle. Faget was born in British Honduras of Louisiana Cajun parents, graduated from Louisiana State University in 1943, and served in submarines during World War II. He was arguably the most influential designer of space vehicles who ever lived. Faget was one of the forty-five members of the original “Space Task Group” formed at the headquarters of the National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics (the precursor to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration) at Langley, Virginia, on November 5, 1958 to put an American into earth orbit. Faget was known, not only for his brilliance, but also for his stubbornness and his many eccentricities. Max Robichaux is named for Max Faget.
FEBA: Forward Edge of Battle Area. The “front line” or, in three dimensional space, a plane or other two dimensional surface, marking the boundary between space controlled by friendly forces and space controlled by enemy forces. Alternately, the surface marking the forward-most friendly forces. Sometimes referred to as FLOF or Forward Line of Own Forces (from Forward Line of Own Troops in pre-starflight Earth ground combat).
fils de putain: (Cajun French) Son, or sons, of a whore. Used as an insult when an English speaker would say “son of a bitch” or “bastard.” It is not, however, appropriate to use this expression in those places where an English speaker uses “son of a bitch” as an impersonal expletive as in, “son of a bitch, I left my wallet at home.”
finum nuntiante: (Terranovan Latin) end of message, terminate communications.
Flagship: The ship from which a Commodore or Admiral exercises command of a Task Force, Fleet, or other group of vessels. The Flagship of a major Task Force is typically a Command Carrier or a Fleet Carrier. The flagship of a smaller task force may be a Battleship, a Battlecruiser, or even a Cruiser.
flamer: a particularly scathing Report of Disciplinary Action which becomes a part of a man’s Comprehensive Disciplinary Record.
frame: a vertical cross section of a warship, numbered from bow to stern for the purpose of describing the location of damage the ship’s structure or to large areas. A Destroyer might have a few as eight frames, while a Carrier has hundreds.
Frigate: a type of Warship with a slightly higher displacement range than Destroyers (Frigates typically mass between 18,000 and 26,000 metric tons; note, the largest classes of Destroyer are heavier than the smallest classes of Frigate), but usually somewhat slower and less maneuverable, more heavily armed (particularly in the matter of the number of missile tubes—most Destroyers have only two forward firing missile tubes while most Frigates have at least four and many have six or eight) and armored, an
d carrying a larger supply of consumables and weapons reloads to give them significantly higher endurance on station without resupply. Frigates are most commonly used in detached service. Frigates are typically skippered by a full Commander.
FTL: Faster Than Light. Superluminal.
FUBAR: Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition.
Gash duty: the assignment or duty of performing menial chores, especially those involving cleaning up accidental spills, leaks, overflows, and human bodily fluids. While the term is of Salt Water Navy vintage, its origin is otherwise obscure.
Gates: the traditional naval nickname for a respected and highly able Computer and Information Systems Officer. The name is taken from that of William Gates (born October 28, 1955; died August 23, 2044) the founder of the Microsoft Corporation and one of the architects of “the Personal Computer Revolution” which in the 1980’s transformed computers into common tools used every day by ordinary people at home and at work where they had previously been either expensive but essentially useless toys or expensive pieces of bulky capital equipment that could be afforded only by large corporations or governmental agencies. The term was first applied to Computer officers upon the formation of the U.E.S.F. (see) in 2034.
genau: (German) Exactly, precisely. Often used to express agreement.
Gott im Himmel: (German) God in heaven! An exclamation of shock and dismay.
Gynophage: an extremely virulent generically engineered viral disease launched by the Krag against the Union in 2295. The disease organism is highly infectious to all humans but a gene sequence unique to the human “Y” chromosome prevents disease symptoms from manifesting in all but a tiny fraction of males thereby keeping infected males contagious but asymptomatic. It is 99%+ fatal to human females. It is believed that, left to itself, the disease would have killed all but a few of the human females in the galaxy and resulted in the virtual extinction of the human race. It was disseminated by thousands of stealthed compression drive drones launched by the Krag in the early days of the war, each of which launched thousands of submunitions that exploded in the atmosphere of human inhabited planets. The disease functions in a manner similar to Ebola, by breaking down the tissues of the internal organs, but kills much more rapidly. Once the disease begins to manifest, the subject is dead within minutes. The disease is currently treated/prevented by the Moro Treatment, a combination vaccine and antibody devised by a team led by the brilliant Dr. Emeka Moro (see).
General Patton’s Birthday: A Union Holiday celebrated on the anniversary of the birth of General George S. Patton, Jr., on November 11, 1885, the former holiday of “Veteran’s Day” having been merged with “Memorial Day” sometime in the late 21st Century. The Union began in the early years of the Krag War to celebrate this holiday to commemorate and revive the “fighting spirit” of General “Blood and Guts” Patton and instill it in Union forces and the citizens of the Union at large. Along with Admiral William Halsey, General Patton is regarded as a sort of “patron saint” of the Union forces—his aphorisms are widely quoted, his writings studied in detail, and his philosophy of leadership and military campaigns the subjects of intense study.
Go: the starting square on the Parker Brothers board game “Monopoly.” On passing “Go,” a player is entitled to collect $200. Occasionally, a player will land on a “Chance” square and will draw a card that reads “Go to Jail. Go directly to Jail. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.”
Goat: informal name for the Chief of the Boat (see).
Grey, Earl: (see Earl Grey).
Greenie: Colloquial term for a Recruit Spacer. So called because the Working Uniform for that grade is light green in color.
Hamilton, Ian (Sir) [full name: General Sir Ian Standish Monteith Hamilton GCB GCMG DSO TD.] Born January 16, 1853; died October 12, 1947. General in the British Army and Commander of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force at the disastrous Battle of Gallipoli. Among the multitude of acts for which he has received severe (and well-deserved) criticism is his disparate treatment of troops under his command of different nationalities, favoring British troops at the expense of troops from the British colonies, particularly those from Australia and New Zealand.
hardly ever: a reference to the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta HMS Pinafore. There are several points in the operetta in which a character will claim to be “never, never sick at sea,” or “never use the Big, Big ‘D’,” or ascribe to himself a similar virtue, in which case another character or the chorus will respond in song, “What, never?” to be answered “well, hardly ever.”
HASG: see M-22.
Hotel: Union Forces Voicecom Alphabet (see) designator for the letter “H.” Sensors and Tactical designation for a hostile contact or target.
hottie Scotty: a particularly industrious or capable member of the Engineering crew, sometimes used disparagingly regarding a person who, for the moment, is the favorite of the Chief Engineer for reasons unconnected with merit (see Scotty).
Hypergolic: two substances which, when combined, will ignite and combust without need of an ignition source, a term used in the Navy primarily to describe fuels for missiles and thrusters. Rocket motors employing hypergolic fuels are mechanically simpler and inherently more reliable than those which do not because no ignition source need be provided in the design. On the other hand, hypergolic fuels provide a lower specific impulse (essentially the amount of thrust developed per unit of fuel and oxidizer) than cryogenic fuel/oxidizer combinations such as hydrogen/oxygen.
IDSSC: Interstellar Data Systems Standardization Convention (pronounced “id sick”). An informal agreement among the major computer and data systems manufacturers of the Union, most human worlds, and several alien races providing for standardization of data formats, transfer protocols, design of cables and connectors, and other matters to allow interchangeability and transferability of data and computer equipment from one star system to another. Because of IDSSC, a Pfelung printer can be attached to a computer made on Alphacen, and used to print a documents written and saved to datachip on Ghifta Prime.
IFF: Identification Friend or Foe. A general descriptive term for any system that allows vessels to identify each other as being friendly or hostile. Most such systems operate by the transmission of a coded signal by one vessel which is received by the other, triggering a coded response, known as “Bilateral IFF or BIFF.” Some forces employ a system in which each vessel transmits a signal encoded in a complex manner whenever it wants to identify itself, which signal is simply recognized by other forces on the same side as being indicative of being friendly, akin to an electronic flag. This procedure is known as “Flag IFF” or FIFF. The Union employs both BIFF and FIFF, depending on the circumstances.
Inertial Compensator: the system on a space vessel that negates the inertial effect of acceleration on the crew and vessel contents (known as “G Forces”) enabling the ship to accelerate, turn, and decelerate rapidly without killing the crew and ripping the fixtures from the deck. On most ships the inertial compensator is set to eliminate approximately 99.5% of all inertial effects so that ship motions are still apparent to the crew but are not destructive.
ja vohl: (German) Yes, indeed; emphatically yes. In the Prussian and later German military services on Earth, ja vohl was traditionally the correct acknowledgement to an order from a superior. The expression became less common in civilian speech after the Second World War because of its associations with Nazism, but came back into favor on many Earth colonies settled predominantly by Germans who used it, even when speaking Standard, to emphasize their cultural heritage.
Je concours (Cajun French): I agree.
Jeffries tube: any of the narrow crawlways and personnel conduits that provide crew access to equipment and systems that cannot be reached from compartments, workspaces, or corridors. When the U.E.S.F. (see) was formed in 2034, it is believed that the term was appropriated from the one used for similar structures on the fictional vessels featured in the Star Trek (see) franchise. Those tubes, in turn,
were named in honor of Matt Jeffries the Art Director for the first Star Trek television series who designed the first fictional USS Enterprise.
Jellicoe, Sir John: [full name: Admiral of the Fleet John Rushworth Jellicoe, 1st Earl Jellicoe, GCB, OM, GCVO SGM] Born 5 December 1859; died, 20 November 1935. Commander of the British Grand Fleet at the Battle of Jutland fought on May 31 through June 1, 1916 during Earth’s First World War. During the war it was said of him that he was the one man in the Empire who could lose the war in an afternoon.
JIVDCS: Joint Intersystem Voice and Data Communication System. The civilian interstellar communications network providing interconnectivity among the planetary communications and data networks of all human worlds, both Union and independent (except for a handful of deliberately low-tech and no-tech worlds), as well as a limited number of alien species whose space is adjacent human-occupied systems. The primary infrastructure of the JIVDCS consists of a series of interstellar relay buoys placed approximately every 0.78 light years between nearby systems and, in each participating system, at least one Out-System Communications Relay and Exchange (OSCoRE) which receives the interstellar data stream from the nearest relay buoy, amplifies it, and ties it into the system’s internal communications network. With properly configured accounts, at some expense, and with considerable transmission delays, a person can transmit a message from one ordinary FlipCom to another more than 2,500 light years away. Alien species consider the JIVDCS to be mankind’s greatest achievement and humanity’s most meaningful contribution to the galaxy. That and Musical Theater.
jump drive: one of the two systems that allows a space vessel to cross interstellar distances in less time than it would take to travel at sublight speed (the other being compression drive, see). The jump drive transfers the vessel in a single Planck Interval from one point in space, known as a jump point, to another jump point, in a nearby star system, and never less than 3.4 nor more than 12.7 light years away. Jump points are generally located between 20 to 30 AU from a star, and almost always lie at least 45 degrees away from the star’s equator. For some unknown reason, systems either have no jump points, three, or a multiple of three, most commonly three, usually located several dozen AU from each other. Jumping is always more energy efficient and much faster than traversing the same distance with compression drive. However, it is almost impossible to jump into an enemy held system, because the enemy will almost always have weapons trained and ranged on the jump points and the process of jumping requires that the jumping ship power down all sublight drives, weapons, shielding, and point defense systems, making it virtually helpless when emerging from a jump. Accordingly, in order to take a system, it is usually necessary to send in ships from a system within ten light years or so under compression drive, and take the jump points, thereby allowing heavier ships, troop carriers, and supply vessels to jump in.
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