"All this technology and we still can't get to the nearest star." Was Victoria's favorite crack every time a new mission did not achieve the required speeds.
From 2040, the Empire began recording improvements in Earth’s weather. Temperatures were moderating, as the glaciers began to retreat. In 2045, a program was instituted to explore and reopen territories where possible since more than fifty-five million were now crammed into a small band along the southern end of the former United States. Similar densities existed over the entire globe. The program required a region to be fully rehabilitated before another was taken on.
Black’s lab presented a plan to WEASA in early 2045 for a system, based on Casimir research, that would open a directed wormhole for a craft to use as a conduit for travel. A ship traveling at twenty percent light-speed within it would reach a destination in one two-thousandths of the time a ship going, to the same destination outside the vortex at the same speed, would do it. Travel time to Alpha Centauri and back would be reduced to under two days, plus exploration time. In June, a vessel with the AAMP engines was fitted with the device. It opened one of these Minkowski Space-Time conduits and directed it to Alpha Centauri, entering its aperture at point two of C. The crew shut down the device to close the wormhole when they were nearly torn apart a few seconds later. In that time, they'd traveled so far that it took almost twelve days to return in normal space.
The Casimir Emitter was a major accomplishment itself - easily as complex as the gravity generator or the Anti-Matter Pulse Engine. The final version employs two curved plates, like dish antenna, with a smaller one mounted ahead of a larger one. Both of these thin covers are attached to substantial bowls that incorporate radio frequency heating to maintain terphenyl-based heat transfer fluid to above its optimum pumping point of eleven degrees Celsius. The rear saucer emitting surface is mounted on its inside face while its inner bowl overlay is on the rear exterior. When the emitter is activated, the heating radio frequency is increased along with the fluid pump rate to promptly elevate the plates to six hundred seventy-five degrees Celsius as servos bring the bowl faces to within one nanometer of each other, producing a substantial buildup of exotic particles. Since the inner dish has a smaller diameter than the outer one, spill-over occurs into a magnetic field that keeps these tachyons from dissipating or evaporating into space. An RF generator, sequences coils along the central pole to accelerate and direct the focused particles to the desired point in space.
After analysis, the Black team came up with a sounder structural design for the ship, employing their tri-layer shielding to protect the vessel from the turbulence of the phenomena and other forces. Along with the plan, they presented a timeline for assembly of two ships and the construction of orbital assembly docks in the preliminary steps before building them. The new designs incorporated a large enough footprint for a full field strength gravity generator and all the infrastructure for extended interstellar flights. Three years later, the two ships were a reality.
Both ships could be seen in orbit, like bright stars, from on the ground at night. At three hundred nineteen meters by one hundred eighty-five meters and four decks high, they were truly massive. They contained all the technological advantages developed by Black’s teams, using CCIA, over the last few decades. The lower deck included gravity generator, both fission and fusion reactors and power generators, both IPE and AAMP engines, water recycling, waste recycling, power distribution, ventilation and air recycling, shield generator power and magnetics. A web of magnetically shielded conduits conducting particles from the accelerator to other areas requiring them originated in this space.
Deck two was all storage. The bow section held hundreds of upright twenty-meter-long cylinders of oxygen, nitrogen, hydrogen, argon, and methane gas, and the distribution systems to pump them where needed. The mid-section held banks and banks of freezers filled with frozen foods and rows of racking containing boxed and canned foods of all descriptions. The aft section carried supplies for crew and ship, like clothing and spare parts.
The deck above that one included a mess hall and galley for two hundred. Aft of that was a gymnasium and pool facility. The mid-section bore a sizable sickbay. The aft section had three sub-sections of living quarters.
Deck four was divided between more living quarters, offices, and the main navigation bridge. The deck plating above that was enclosed in transparent aluminum and held rows and rows of upright racks with plant boxes full of soil growing fresh foods they would need for lengthy journeys. Portions of its surface were planted with fruit trees and grass, and in the aft portion an apiary, supported by two beekeepers, provided the technical knowledge to keep the plant life fertile and productive.
The outer hull was constructed of carbon fiber coated one-hundred-millimeter-thick 7039 - T6 aluminum armor plate, which maintains tensile strength at cryogenic temperatures, laminated to fifty millimeters of 3033 aluminum sheeting. Thermal heat exchangers from the power generation, water reactor units, and recycling machinery in the lowest deck warmed the inside of this plating and the outer surface of the inner hull. Part of the tri-layer shielding, a powerful magnetic field aligned by a core through the mid-ship was focused between the two hulls as a guard against penetration by cosmic rays and solar particles. The exterior of the inner shell was a fifty-millimeter-thick layer of 3033 aluminum laminated to a seventy-five-millimeter-thick plate of Grade 38 armor plate titanium. Small ion generators would produce charged particles held in place between the magnetic field in the hull and one generated outside the ship. The magnetic - ionic - magnetic layering acts as shielding against all sorts of solid and directed energy sources. Each ship was crewed by four hundred thirty officers and enlisted personnel.
Those two FTL vessels were christened at their dry docks in space on February 25, 2051. Training and trials took another six months. There was a short shake-down cruise to ensure the ships could function as expected. Most of the concepts used in the design of these vessels are still in use.
On September 1, 2051, the two ships designated PT-1 and PT-2 departed for Alpha Centauri.
Once in FTL mode, they could no longer communicate with WEASA. Communications sent through the vortex would only be disrupted. So, WEASA would not know the status of the mission until the return of the vessels, estimated to be sometime about September 22.
The exploratory portion ended with the safe return of PT-1 and PT-2 on September 21, 2051, but the actual heavy lifting literally began the day after.
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Over the next two years, WEASA first selected and assigned two thousand to move to a planet orbiting Alpha Centauri A that, they renamed Rigil in to honor Rigil Kentaurus the ancient Arabic name for the system. About six hundred were actually dispatched to it, while the balance remained detached on Earth to conduct work needed to inhabit it. The group on Rigil elected a governing council which formally requested membership into the Empire. A new constitution was drafted, based on the original planetary one, creating a Government that would rule associated worlds within a space born Empire within a fifty light-years radius of Earth. This new Empire was named Orion - the name of the arm the two systems inhabit in the Milky Way. Both Earth and Rigil formally requested membership in the Empire, signing onto the new Constitution.
The Orion Empire Constitution guaranteed representation to all member planets on the basis of ten Assembly Members from each world, with final legislative assent resting in the Imperial Throne as it did on Earth. The Earth Assembly sent ten of its members and Rigil elected ten and sent them to the new Orion Empire Legislative Assembly to ratify the Constitution and begin working on legislation. Earth’s government transferred WEASA to the Orion Empire. In marathon sittings, the Orion Assembly enacted legislation establishing the means to raise revenues through taxation and granted charters to both Earth and Rigil as members of the new Empire. They wrote and adopted a criminal code, enacted Business Law, a
nd changed WEASA’s name to the OESA. The Government passed a measure chartering the OESA as a military body responsible for defending the Constitution, safeguarding the citizens of the Empire, protecting territory within its borders, and exploring and expanding its boundaries. Then, they embedded The Rules and Regulation of the OESA into a statute law, appointed its Command & Control and all senior officers, and approved its five-year budget and fifteen-year plan.
In the meantime, Black’s team designed a drone that could employ the Casimir Emitter to open a wormhole and carry messages, thus establishing long distance communications, in space. A message could now be sent across the Empire’s entire one hundred light-year breadth in less than fourteen days.
The OESA grew rapidly under C&C, Fleet Admiral Robert Simmons’ direction, meeting many of its goals and objectives within projected timelines. In twelve years, twenty-four fleets, each consisting of a Carrier Class Vessel supported by a flotilla of six warships, patrolled its space. Each Carrier sported over a hundred Raptor Class one-man fighters and carried fifteen-hundred Marine troops and their leadership. Each Fleet was commanded by a Vice Admiral. Groups of six Fleets fell under the direction of a Quadrant Command managing all the territory within a ninety-degree wedge of the fifty light-year orb that was the Empire. They had only enough capacity to actually defend a radius of twenty-six light-years, a region that added six advanced intelligent humanoid species to the Empire in that period, growing the Legislative Assembly to eighty members.
The Tau Ceti system, just under twelve light years from home, was the first system where humanoid life was discovered. Tau Ceti F is an earth sized world orbiting its star at a fifty-two-million-mile radius. This would have been a close orbit in the Sol system, but the planet had low levels of carbon dioxide and hydrocarbons in its atmosphere, and the star has less than sixty percent of the luminosity of Sol. So though it was a little warmer than Earth, this planet was by no means arid. The population closely resembled humans, was technologically advanced, enjoyed a rich culture, and valued a long heritage. Though wary at first, they welcomed the Empire representatives with opened arms. Things rolled along for ten days. Then, several Ceti Fleet members showed signs of illness, as did a host of planetary residents. It turned out, they had exchanged bacteria and viruses neither side had immunity to. By 2081, all initial contacts were made in full environmental suits, until medical studies were completed and immunity could be established for conflicting contagions. At any rate, all five of these worlds joined the Empire, giving it more strength than had been imagined in the planning days.
With Orion Empire Space Agency expansion, came the problem of actually managing the space and its members. The OESA was always stretched to its limits. In 2065, Simmons filed a proposal, with the Secretary of Defense, to grow and restructure the whole organization, over five years. The OESA statute was amended so each Fleet would contain two Tactical Groups, each with its own Carrier supported by a Cruiser, Three Frigates, and two Supply Ships. In addition, two more Fleets would be added within each Quadrant Command. Fleet Command structure was modified to include a Commodore to run each Carrier Group and a Brigadier General to command the Marine Contingent.
Over the next one hundred and twenty-five years, the Empire continued to follow pretty much the same pattern. By 2206, its reach had extended to fit the one hundred light-year description in the now revised Constitution of the Orion Empire. In the middle of that year, the forty-fifth member planet was chartered by the Empire. It's Legislative Assembly now seated four hundred fifty members, all enjoying the great benefits of a symbiotic relationship. Andrew the First had come and gone, after the death of Victoria I in 2085. Edward II reigned until 2135. He was followed by Steven I, who passed away in 2190. Stephen II reigned until 2216. By 2216 it was Edward III who was the Emperor. All the Delnikov rulers had lived up to everything Edward I and Old Tom had envisioned.
By that time, an additional twenty-five percent of the former United States had recovered and was inhabited, under the Empire. The Empire now actually occupied the territory to, north thirty-seven degrees, across nearly the entire planet. More area had returned to a temperate climate, but it took a lot of resources to clean up and rebuild regions devastated by the weather and changing shorelines. Though badly scarred in some zones, and wiped clean in others, Earth’s policies were promoting its recovery to a parkland, with significant population centers positioned away from waterways and valuable farmland.
The OESA continued to grow during the two century period. By 2216, each Quadrant Command consisted of sixteen Fleets, managed in groups of eight by two subordinate Theatre Commands. The service’s one and three-quarter million personnel manned its headquarters on Rigil, and the sub-commands directing over a thousand warships. The OFSA also boasted over two hundred thousand Marines, fourteen thousand fighter craft, two hundred seventy supply vessels, eight Theatre Command stations, eight Mobile Hospital Commands. Assembly and construction facilities orbited three different planetary systems.
On the civilian side of things, Rigil boasted robust and burgeoning industrial, agricultural, and economic sectors that made it almost completely self-sufficient. In fact, the need to import basic necessities, building materials, and supplies had dwindled to nothing by around 2145.
The OESA’s new headquarters, still at the original location on Rigil, had nearly three square kilometers of floor space to support its thousands of staff members. It sits on fifty acres of parkland beside the city of Rigil New York, inhabited by more than a hundred thousand citizens supporting the OESA and the massive ship-building fabrication facility ten kilometers to its east. A new OESA Academy was under construction to the north end of the city.
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Six Commanders succeeded Simons over the years. In 2216, thirty-six-year-old Admiral David Williamson was promoted to Fleet Admiral and confirmed to the position of Command and Control of the OESA.
As a Quadrant Commander, it had been readily apparent that the service was stretched to meet its obligations. It sounded big, and seemed even bigger when you analyzed its personnel needs, assets, and budgetary requirements on paper. In fact, it seemed mammoth when you were in the position of running it. But, there was over four million cubic light years of space and more than four hundred and fifty systems to patrol. And, the Empire now had enemies. There had been several small border skirmishes and two small wars since reaching the hundred light-year boundary. FTL flight had exploded in the nearly two centuries since its inception, which led to a corresponding growth in first shipping, then piracy. Williamson spent a lot of time traveling between Earth and Rigil to discuss it with his superiors. But, he wasn't sure how to achieve an increase in strength without breaking the bank. He had created a special task force of fifty people to study the problem.
What they finally came up with was a program with some trade-offs. Two Cruiser-class vessels and two Frigates would be added to each Fleet. This would give each Tactical Carrier Group two Cruisers four Frigates and two Supply Ships with the objective of creating the ability to break up each Group into two squadrons to increase their reach. The problem was that these squadrons would be unbalanced. One would be attached to a Carrier and one would not, since each Group would still only have one Carrier. It was the best possible compromise at the time. It required the construction and purchase of two hundred fifty-six warships and an increase of nearly three hundred thousand personnel. Capital expenditures would reach nearly fifteen billion Sovereigns per year, while the operating budget would exceed ninety-one billion annually, during the period. The OESA financial plan did not include the money for the off-campus development except for the Academy itself. The Empire was spending nearly one hundred billion sovereigns on planetary development, at the same time as the OESA expansion would take place.
A proposal to do the expansion over a two-year period was prepared along with revised budgets for the next five years. All receive
d legislative approval with a great sigh of relief. Any larger expansion, at this time, would have created a need for deficit spending, which was contrary to standard Empire policies.
It was on May 15, 2247, that, Williamson became aware of Commodore George T. Bryant. He was acquainted with the man, since he'd placed his name in nomination, when Bryant was promoted to Commodore and Assigned as Commander of the Canada Group in the Borealis Fleet, under Vice Admiral Blackman. The latest report seemed to indicate the thirty-one-year-old was a real up-and-comer.
An incident drew Bryant and his Canada Group to Rho Corona Borealis. This is a beautiful system nearly fifty-eight light years from Rigil. It restructured its planetary government to conform with Empire requirements when it joined the Empire thirty-five years earlier. The old religious and political hatreds from before entry in the Empire had now resurfaced. A group was espousing replacing the planetary government and separating from the Empire.
Vice Admiral Blackman was on leave on Earth, so Bryant had no immediate superior to turn to. He evaluated the situation and determined that it was urgent. Thousands had died. Vast areas were devastated, and an enemy column was five miles to the south of the Capital City. He deemed he didn't have the twenty-days it would take communications drones to exchange messages regarding orders on the situation. Two hundred Marines were dispatched to the planet to break into squads of ten and get on-the-ground, up-to-the-minute intelligence on the situation. A day later, reports piled in. There were essentially fifteen large enemy formations fighting on three fronts, including the one outside the Capital. All were heavily armed, making good use of the armor captured from government forces in a series of blitz attacks. Several formerly picturesque regions of the planet bore the terrible scars of vicious battles, some evident from orbit. At the same time, this rebellious group had dispatched small cells of terrorists to the most populous regions wreaking havoc and terror with lightning attacks on civilians, and bombing heavily frequented retail businesses, restaurants, and underground transportation systems. Two full divisions of the planetary army, totaling over sixteen thousand troops, had been completely annihilated. Commodore Bryant formulated a plan with the Planetary Defense Ministry to move troops away from targeted sites without giving them new objectives, got last minute intelligence, advised his teams, then issued orders to his Group. From orbit, each Cruiser and a Frigate bombarded remote sites with their high powered kinetic rods, while two Frigates took on the Capital City formation. The Raptor-class fighters in Canada's hangars capable of atmospheric and space operations were dispatched - thirty to each of the three fronts to support the twelve hundred Marines the Regimental Colonel sent in after the bombardment to fight alongside ten thousand government ground forces. Ten fighters were deployed to patrol the space around the Canada Group, in an abundance of caution, though the rebels were not space capable. Remnants of enemy ground forces resisted fiercely, but their depleted numbers were no match for Government troops. By May 4, 2245, the rebellion was all but dead, along with thirty-seven thousand enemy combatants. Ten rebel leaders were quickly captured and summarily executed, by the Planetary Government, to reinforce the notion that this type of rebellion would not be tolerated.
Righteous Reign The Series: E-version Boxed Set Edition Page 6
