Preservation Campaign
Author?s note:
Although the British Empire of the late nineteenth century used the imperial system for weights and measures and used the Fahrenheit scale for temperatures, Aurora defaults to the metric system so I will convert everything as required.
1st January 1891
It is over a year now since the Transference. Whether it was a miracle or the devil?s work, no one knows but we have come to accept our new fate and now we will spread the peace and justice of Britannia to the stars. Queen Victoria has asked me, as Royal Historian, to provide an official chronicle of these strange events. To ensure a complete record, I am being given unrestricted access to both Admiralty House and Government House and the Astronomer Royal has begun giving me a crash course in astronomy; and may I just note here for the record that is he is an intolerant teacher.
In the course of a single night in the autumn of 1889, almost half the population of the Empire was swept up from the face of the Earth and deposited on this new world with its unfamiliar sky. Natives of the British Isles, Australians, Canadians, Sikhs, Gurkhas, New Zealanders, Baluchis, Pujabis, Marathas, Rajputs, South Africans and representatives of a myriad of islands across the globe, all woke up in this extraordinary land and all seemed to possess new knowledge, allowing them to operate the plethora of wondrous machines that covered the landscape. It took weeks for the various groups to link up and a census to be taken, although the communication devices discovered in our new home, that make the recently invented telephones appear no more than tin cans tied with string, assisted greatly in re-establishing the political structure of the Empire. A few small groups expressed their wish to remain apart from the Empire, violently in some cases, but all of them have been returned to the fold, both for their long term welfare and their protection.
Although Great Britain leads the world in industrial output, the innumerable factories of our sceptered isle pale into insignificance compared to the industrial marvels of this planet. Colossal mining complexes, several of them completely automated, that draw new minerals from the very heart of this new Earth, enormous factory complexes that can build all manner of new installations and munitions, including some for which we have yet to determine a purpose, shipyards that construct ships to sail in the heavens rather than the sea, refineries that convert one of the new minerals into fuel for those space-going ships and even an array of stupendously well-equipped research facilities to enable our scientists to develop even more astounding technologies.
With the drive and invention that built a world-spanning Empire, British scientists and engineers quickly grasped the purpose of almost all of these installations, albeit helped by the new knowledge that had somehow found its way into their memories, and our political leaders organized the necessary population to operate them. Many people fell back into their old occupations such as farming, shop-keeping or banking as even this new world requires food production and service industries, although the methods involved are a world away from what they once were.
The study of the new minerals by our geologists and physicists has revealed several startling properties that defy the physical laws set down by the world-renowned British scientist, Sir Isaac Newton, They will enable space-going ships to move far more quickly and with far more manoeuvrability than our scientists could ever have conceived before the Transference. Therefore they have become collectively known as Trans-Newtonian Elements or TNEs.
The Astronomer Royal, Sir William Christie, was as excited as a young child on Christmas morning when he found the extent and capabilities of the available astronomical equipment. Together with his team, he has mapped the new night sky and begun studying the solar system in which we are located. Our sun is similar to Sol and our new planet, now officially named Victoria, orbits at a distance only slightly greater than Earth. Victoria is the second planet from the sun, is larger than Earth, although with slightly lower gravity, and has a single tiny moon that is visible only as a small speck in the sky. The entire system, which has been named Britannia, has eight planets, including Victoria, two more rocky planets and five gas giants. The innermost planet is like our own Mercury, small and airless, while the third planet of the system is almost a twin of Victoria in terms of size and atmosphere. A man could breathe the air on Cerberus but would be frozen to death in seconds by a temperature of -100 degrees Celsius. Although the outermost Gas giant is at a little over five billion kilometers, a vast asteroid belt surrounds the rest of the system at distances ranging from twenty-six to thirty-nine billion kilometers. The various planets have a total of 123 moons between them.
Based on insights gained during the Transference and his own research, aided by the miraculous ?computers?, Sir William believes it may be possible to visit other solar systems by means of ?jump points?. According to Sir William, these are created by ?gravitational distortions of space-time?, whatever that means ? I sometimes think Sir William makes these phrases up ? and allow immediate passage from one star system to another, like gateways in the heavens.
Our four shipyard facilities have recently completed construction of five space-going vessels that are ready to leave orbit of Victoria. Two are Newton class survey ships, designed to travel the heavens in search of Sir William?s mythical gateways. A third, a Buckland class geological survey ship, named after the famous British geologist William Buckland, will visit Britannia?s other planet?s and moons to investigate the possibility that they too may possess the new minerals. The remaining vessels are freighters, standing ready to move the automated mining complexes to other worlds and to bring back the minerals they produce. Together they form the embryonic Royal Space Navy, usually referred to simply as the Royal Navy as there is little need for armed sea-going warships on Victoria.
With the shipyards now empty, construction begins on four new ships. A second Buckland, a third Newton, a third Victory class freighter and the first of the new Agincourt class, which is equipped with a ?Jump Drive? that should allow it to enter Sir William?s gateways, if they exist. The schematic for the Agincourt is presented below.
Agincourt class Jump Cruiser 5400 tons 465 Crew 784 BP Signature 108-420
3888 km/s JR 3-50 Armour 1 Shields 0-0 Sensors 4/0/0/0 Damage Control 0-0
Cargo 5000 Replacement Parts 10
J540 Jump Drive Max Ship Size 5400 tons Distance 50k km Squadron Size 3
E7 Ion Engine (7) Power 60 Engine Efficiency 0.7 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 100,000 Litres Range 114.3 billion km (340 days at full power)
High Resolution Thermal Sensor HRT2-4 (1) Strength 4 Detect Signature 10: 0.4m km Detect Signature 100: 4m km
17th January 1891
Buckland, the geological survey ship, has reported evidence of large quantities of several of the new minerals on Cerberus. However, all are very difficult to access so it will not be economically viable to begin mining.
18th May 1891
Buckland has discovered that the gaseous form of Sorium, one of the Trans-Newtonian minerals, is contained within the atmosphere of Britannia VI, a gas giant. Based on the knowledge gained during the Transference, our scientists believe it would be possible to construct a space-going ship capable of harvesting the gas from the atmosphere and converting it to fuel. This is not an immediate priority as Victoria has perhaps 40,000 tons of Sorium in its core, enough for 40 million litres of fuel, but at some point in the future this knowledge may come in useful. The only drawback is that the estimated 140,000 tons of Sorium in Britannia VI?s atmosphere is only 0.3 on the Bell Accessibility Scale, which ranges from 0.1 to 1.0 with 1.0 being the easiest to access. Mining of an accessibility 1.0 mineral will yield ten times as much as mining an accessibility 0.1 mineral.
21st June 1891
Buckland has made another discovery, this time the third moon of Britannia IV. According to her sensor reading, over one hundred and fifty million tons of accessibility 0.1 Duranium is located deep in the planet?s core. Duranium is probably the most important TNE as it is required as part of almost all planetary installations and ship components. However, the accessibility is a significant deterrent to exploitation of this mineral deposit.
20th July 1891
The two Newton class survey ships have completed their search for ?jump points? and claim their survey information shows the location of four within the Britannia system. As I am only recently becoming accustomed to the idea of space travel, it is difficult to explain their locations. I have found a useful analogy is to imagine yourself looking down on the system from above, excluding the asteroid belt, and think of it as the face of a clock. The innermost of the three jump points is at nine o?clock and close to the centre. The other three are near the outer edge at three, four and seven o?clock. In terms of distance, the closest is 440 million kilometers from the sun while the others range between 3.2 and 4.7 billion kilometers. Until the Agincourt is completed, there is no way to test Sir William?s theory and the data of the Newtons so they are ordered to return to Earth and refuel.
6th August 1891
The third Victory class freighter is completed on Victoria. As yet, there is nowhere for her and her two sisters to go.
11th August 1891
For the past seven months our construction factories have been working on increasing their number from 160 to 170. Now that task is complete, they will now start work on raising the number to 180.
21st October 1891
Construction of the third Newton class, Copernicus, and the second Buckland class, Clarke, is completed. Three shipyards are now empty while the fourth is still working on Agincourt. Clarke heads out of orbit to join Buckland while Copernicus joins her sister ships, Newton and Galileo, in orbit.
26th November 1891
Our scientists complete research into increasing the size of missile warheads. Although we can build very basic missiles at the moment, none of them are capable of penetrating the armour on any of our space-going ships, which renders them useless. As we have thirteen missile silos already in service on Victoria and missiles are the ideal weapon for protecting Victoria from any space-borne attack, the Prime Minister, the Marquess of Salisbury, has made them our first priority for research. We can now design and build missiles capable of inflicting at least minimal damage on any hostile force. A schematic of the first missile design is shown below. Our scientists will complete development of this missile before beginning work on larger launchers.
Congreve Missile
Missile Size: 2 Warhead: 2
Speed: 6,000 km/s Endurance: 30 seconds Range: 180k km
Manoeuvre Rating: 20
Cost Per Missile: 1.6
Chance to Hit: 1k km/s 120% 3k km/s 40% 5k km/s 24% 10k km/s 12%
Materials Required: 0.325x Duranium 0.975x Tritanium 0.3x Gallicite
1st January 1892
The Agincourt is completed. Together with the three Newton class survey ships, she leaves orbit and sets course for the point in space where our scientists believe the closest jump point is located.
2nd January 1892
As she reaches the location and activates her jump drive, the Agincourt vanishes. Tense minutes pass before she returns to Victoria and her commander, Captain Morris, announces that her mission was a success. I am as surprised as anyone else that Sir William?s theory has been vindicated but pleased to see Britain?s first interstellar expedition has been successful. The solar system at the far side of the jump point apparently has two stars, a G2-IV primary and an F3-V companion. As those designations may mean little to the reader, I will attempt to convey some of my recently gained astronomical knowledge. Stars are rated for their luminosity, or surface temperature. This rating consists of a letter, indicating the Spectral Class, which is a general measure of luminosity, and a number, indicating a more precise measurement within that Spectral Type. The letter codes for the main types of stars from hottest to coolest are O, B, A, F, G, K and M. I have no idea why astronomers chose such a strange arrangement of letters when it would have much easier to remember A, B, C, etc but Sir William tells me the classification system has evolved over time as new knowledge was gained, including several changes as a result of knowledge gained during the Transference. It still makes little sense to me. To add to the confusion there are some additional special classes, L and T which are Lithium dwarfs and Methane Dwarfs, known collectively as Brown Dwarfs, and DA, DB, DC, DO and DQ, all of which are types of White Dwarf. To be honest I think Sir William and his cohorts like to come up with these ridiculous naming conventions just so they appear to be smarter than they really are. The different classes of stars have colours ranging from blue for the hottest through white, yellow, orange and red to the cool brown dwarves,
Within a spectral classification, stars are rated from 0 to 9 in terms of ascending temperature so a G0 star is hotter than a G5. That at least seems logical for a change. The roman numeral after the hyphen indicates the size of a star with lower numbers indicating large stars. Sol was a G2-V star and Britannia is a G1-V star, both are which are known as ?main sequence stars? as the V size is the most common. The larger types are sub-giants (IV), Giants (III), Bright Giants (II) and Supergiants (I). VI and VII are used for dwarf stars.
Assuming you are still reading and did not turn to drink during the last couple of paragraphs, that returns us to the new star system discovered by Agincourt. The two stars are apparently quite close together in astronomical terms, about as far apart as Sol and Saturn, which has led to the number of planets in the system being restricted to four, two of which have moons. The planet closest to the sub-giant star has a dense, hot atmosphere similar to Venus in the Sol system. Sir William believes this type of planet will be quite common so I will refer to them as Venusian planets in the future. The rest are airless and quite hot. It sounds as if this new system is a thoroughly unpleasant place. Queen Victoria has decreed that new star systems should be named after cities from the British Isles so the first system to be found is named London.
When Agincourt enters a jump point, her jump engines hold the gateway open long enough for two more ships to follow her, although neither can be larger than Agincourt herself. Because of this phenomenon, Agincourt can escort ships without their own jump engines through a jump points, although they cannot return without her assistance. Using this technique, she ferries the three Newton class ships into London so they can begin a new search for jump points, or as Sir William calls it, a gravitational survey. Apparently a more massive primary star results in a larger area to be surveyed so this survey will take require more effort than the one for the Victoria system, although the addition of a third ship should compensate somewhat. Meanwhile, Agincourt heads for the next jump point.
11th January 1892
Agincourt returns from a journey through a second jump point and reports the discovery of a planetless system with a G5-V primary. The new system is named Manchester and, based on my own experiences of the delights of that northern city, giving its name to a planetless system seems surprisingly apt.
12th January 1892
Our scientists complete work on the Congreve Missile and begin development of a larger missile launcher. Our ordnance factories begin work on producing the first 100 Congreve Missiles.
27th January 1892
Agincourt returns from her third exploratory mission. Her latest discovery is a system with an yellow-white F5-V primary, four rocky planets, a gas giant and a multitude of asteroids. As with Britannia, the asteroids are outside the orbits of all the planets, although in this system they are still within four billion kilometers of the star, making them far more easy to survey and potentially exploit. The third planet of the system has an oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere that is a little too thin for humans to breathe and the temperature is too cold anyway at -39C. Sir William believes it may be possible to terraform (I am sure he just made that word up) the planet, adding more oxygen to make the atmosphere breathable and gases that would trap heat and warm up the planet. Personally I think it would be a lot easier to just find planets similar to Victoria as ?terraforming? sounds like a lot of work. The two Buckland class geological survey ships have recently completed their survey of Britannia, finding little else of interest, and were waiting at the jump point for Agincourt to return. As there are plentiful bodies for them to survey, Agincourt escorts them into the new system, designated as Liverpool, before leaving for Britannia?s remaining unexplored jump point.
4th February 1892
Agincourt completes her tour of Britannia?s jump points. Beyond the fourth jump point is a small, dim M6-V star with five planets and a dense asteroid belt huddled close to the primary, seeking what little warmth is available. Even the outermost planet orbits at only 400m kilometers. The system is named Stevenage. With nothing else to do until the various survey ships complete their missions, Agincourt heads back to Victoria to refuel before taking up a position on the London jump point, so she can monitor the progress of the gravitational survey by occasionally jumping into the system
11th March 1892
We now have 180 construction factories. All those factories now begin work on a new Research Facility that will take over a year to build.
6th April 1892
The Fourth Space Lord, who has responsibility for keeping the Royal Navy supplied, believes that as our survey ships operate further from home, returning to refuel will become impractical. Therefore he has issued a request for a new class of ship that will operate as a tanker and will be jump capable to ensure it can carry out independent operations. The First Lord of the Admiralty, Lord George Hamilton, agrees to the proposal and a new Wave Knight class tanker is laid down. The schematic is shown below.
Wave Knight class Tanker 5350 tons 595 Crew 909 BP Signature 107-300
2803 km/s JR 3-50 Armour 1 Shields 0-0 Sensors 4/0/0/0 Damage Control 0-0
Replacement Parts 10
J540 Jump Drive Max Ship Size 5400 tons Distance 50k km Squadron Size 3
E7 Ion Engine (5) Power 60 Engine Efficiency 0.7 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 1,000,000 Litres Range 1153.2 billion km (4761 days at full power)
High Resolution Thermal Sensor HRT2-4 (1) Strength 4 Detect Signature 10: 0.4m km Detect Signature 100: 4m km
5th June 1892
After one of Agincourt?s periodic visits to the London system, she reports that the survey is complete and three new jump points have been located. The First Space Lord orders Agincourt to begin exploration of the three new jump points and report back to the Admiralty once all three have been investigated. The three Newton class survey ships are also ordered to gather at the London- Britannia jump point so that Agincourt can ferry them into one of the other systems adjacent to our new home system. As communication is not possible through a jump point, we will not hear from Agincourt again until she returns to Britannia.
25th August 1892
Agincourt, accompanied by the three Newton class survey ships, enters Britannia and re-establishes communication with the Admiralty so that Captain Morris may report on his mission in London. Three new systems have been discovered, named Glasgow, Edinburgh and Cardiff. Glasgow is a planetless G7-V system, Edinburgh has a G8-V primary and four rocky planets while Cardiff is a trinary system, with a pair of close orbiting K6-V orange stars and a more distant lithium dwarf. Cardiff has a total of eight planets, none of which have any unusual features. I should note that Sir William is reading over my shoulder as I write and has commented that it almost sounds like I know what I am talking about. Considering he probably invents half of what he tells me, he has no room to talk. The four ships will head to Victoria to refuel before travelling to the Liverpool system to check the progress of the geological survey and begin a gravitational survey.
11th September 1892
Agincourt arrives at the Liverpool jump point and after vanishing for a few minutes reports that the geological survey is almost complete. Four planets and six asteroids have so far been discovered with mineral deposits, with the most notable being a moon of the fourth planet that has almost a million tons of Duranium at accessibility 0.7, along with a similarly accessible 80,000 tons of Tritanium. A second planet has over seven million tons of 0.7 Uridium and 500,000 tons of 0.8 Vendarite. The remaining deposits are all relatively small.
17th October 1892
Agincourt escorts the two Buckland class geological survey ships from Liverpool to Stevenage to begin a new geological survey. The Newtons remain in Liverpool to continue their gravitational survey and Agincourt will head back to Liverpool to awaits the results of that survey as soon as the Bucklands are safely in Stevenage.
8th December 1892
Development of the larger Missile Launcher is completed. Our scientists now turn their attention to increasing the speed of missiles to 10,000 km/s.
7th February 1893
Agincourt reports that the survey of Liverpool is complete and no additional jump points have been found. This means that Liverpool is a dead-end (I think most people in the home counties already knew that) and the only further use for the system will be exploitation of its mineral resources. The Newtons are en route to the Britannia jump point where Agincourt awaits their arrival. Their fuel situation is adequate so they will be escorted to Stevenage to begin their next survey.
23rd April 1893
Construction of our ninth Research Facility has been completed. Work begins on increasing our mining capacity. As the automated mining complexes can be transported to other worlds without the need for supporting population, they will be the priority, despite the fact they cost twice as much as the normal manned mines.
25th April 1893
Agincourt reports that the gravitational survey of Stevenage is complete, revealing two new jump points. She is ordered to investigate and report back.
4th May 1893
As both new jump points were relatively close to the star, Agincourt does not take long to complete her mission. The two new systems connected to Stevenage are named Belfast and Birmingham. The former has a G7-V primary, a single Venusian world and a small asteroid belt. The latter has an orange K9-V primary, six planets, two of them gas giants, and half a dozen large comets. Sir William has predicted that certain comets will contain the new minerals and their parameters have been programmed into the sensors of all our ships so that they may be identified. In this case, the comets are all at least ten billion kilometers from the system primary. Its been two years since I began this journal and am I still getting used to the concepts of programming and sensors, not to mention space travel, although it already seems difficult to remember a time when we relied mainly on steam ships and horse-drawn carriages. The younger generation in particular have taken to the new technology enthusiastically and it will not be many years before our old lives on Earth are little more than fading memories.
As the gravitational survey ships are already in Stevenage and the Belfast jump point is close to the Britannia jump point, Agincourt is ordered to escort the Newtons into that system to begin a new survey.
3rd June 1893
The Wave Knight class tanker is completed. Queen Victoria has decreed that is she is not prepared to name a ship with such a strange name so the class has been renamed the Minotaur class, with the first ship taking the class name. Minotaur?s first task is to load a million litres of fuel from Victoria, almost a third of our entire stockpile, then travel to the Stevenage and Belfast systems to refuel our ships.
26th June 1893
Minotaur transits the Britannia ? Stevenage jump point and returns a few minutes later with news that the geological survey of the system has been completed and the two Buckland class survey ships have joined their gravitational counterparts in the Belfast system. The survey revealed two rocky planets, three asteroids and a gas giant with mineral concentrations. The most notable are Stevenage III, a gas giant with twenty million tons of 0.7 Sorium, and the second moon of Stevenage-V, which has 350,000 tons of Boronide, 75,000 tons of Uridium, 315,000 tons of Corundium and 120,000 tons of Gallicite, all of which are accessibility 0.8 or higher. As the supplies of Boronide, Uridium and Corundium on Victoria are all 0.1 accessibility, the Third Space Lord, Sir Frederick Grey, who is in command of mineral production throughout the Empire, decides our automated mines should be transferred to this moon. In addition, he requests that one or more ships be built to harvest Sorium from Stevenage-III.
In response to Sir Frederick?s request, several possible designs are examined for fuel harvesters. The primary design considerations are that fuel harvesters gain efficiency with size and our maximum size jump ship is only 5400 tons. Presented below are three designs. The first shows a ship of 5400 tons, the second is a design with double the mining capacity of the first and the third has triple the mining capacity. As can be seen below, the average build cost per harvester module carried decreases as the ship size increases. If an gas giant with accessibility 1.0 Sorium could be found, the smallest ship will harvest enough fuel to keep two Newton or Buckland class survey ships or a single Agincourt class in continuous operation and boost our total fuel production by ten percent. However, Stevenage-III has only 0.7 accessibility Sorium so that yield would drop by thirty percent. The alternative is to construct a larger jump ship, which itself would consume resources. As Victoria?s existing supplies of Sorium will last for ten years at the current rate of mining, for now the decision on fuel harvester construction is delayed.
Stevenson class Fuel Harvester 5400 tons 480 Crew 622 BP Signature 108-60
555 km/s Armour 1 Shields 0-0 Sensors 0/0/0/0 Damage Control 0-0
Replacement Parts 10
Fuel Harvester: 7 modules producing 98000 litres per annum
E7 Ion Engine (1) Power 60 Engine Efficiency 0.7 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 500,000 Litres Range 570.9 billion km (11904 days at full power)
Stevenson II class Fuel Harvester 9600 tons 795 Crew 1018 BP Signature 192-120
625 km/s Armour 1 Shields 0-0 Sensors 0/0/0/0 Damage Control 0-0
Replacement Parts 10
Fuel Harvester: 14 modules producing 196000 litres per annum
E7 Ion Engine (2) Power 60 Engine Efficiency 0.7 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 500,000 Litres Range 321.4 billion km (5952 days at full power)
Stevenson III class Fuel Harvester 13800 tons 1135 Crew 1413 BP Signature 276-180
652 km/s Armour 1 Shields 0-0 Sensors 0/0/0/0 Damage Control 0-0
Replacement Parts 15
Fuel Harvester: 21 modules producing 294000 litres per annum
E7 Ion Engine (3) Power 60 Engine Efficiency 0.7 Armour 0 Exp 5%
Fuel Capacity 500,000 Litres Range 223.5 billion km (3968 days at full power)
10th August 1893
Agincourt is currently positioned at the Britannia ? Stevenage jump point, providing an escort for the three Victory class freighters when the pass through the jump point on their way to and from the new mining colony on the second moon of Stevenage-V. Minotaur is holding station on the Stevenage ? Belfast jump point. She has refuelled the two Buckland class geological survey ships, as they were easily reached in Belfast?s inner system, but is waiting at the jump point for the three Newtons to avoid a long trip around the outer reaches of Belfast, which would use up a lot of unnecessary fuel. Once they complete their gravitational survey they will have to come back to the jump point anyway and can be refuelled in one place. Her position allows a communication link from Belfast to Britannia, using Agincourt as another link in the chain, which allows her to report that the geological survey of Belfast has been concluded. Seven asteroids and one planet have minerals. One asteroid has between 10,000 and 25,000 tons of five different minerals, all at accessibility 0.9 or 1.0 while Belfast-I has 175,000,000 tons of Duranium at 0.7. Two very useful discoveries, although it is a pity the three other minerals on the planet are all at 0.1 accessibility. The two recently refuelled Bucklands will head for the Stevenage ? Birmingham jump point and await Agincourt, who will rendezvous after the freighters make their latest transit.