Age of Iridium Summary - Universe Background - 1/6

This is the background information to the Age of Iridium universe. If you
played in the game you've probably already read this; feel free to skip it. If
you haven't played in the game, well fell free to skip it anyway...

AGE OF IRIDIUM - Universe Background
copyright 1996 by Allan Goodall

By the latter part of the 25th century, mankind had all but used up the
resources of the Earth. The oceans were polluted pools of chemicals, the land
was overpopulated, and the schism between rich and poor was worse than
at any time in the planet's history. The rich lived -- due to life
extension
drugs -- for almost two centuries while the average life span of the
majority of humans had sunk to 37 years, little more than the life expectancy
of the neandrathal.

In spite of the colonization of the inner planets and outer moons, the hand
writing was on the wall. Terraforming Venus and Mars would take millennia; the
Earth had a century of life left, maybe two. The nations of the Earth banded
together to form "slow ships" to colonize other worlds. These ships, utilizing
Bussard ramjets to accelerate to near lightspeed, had no need for food or
other life support systesm as they carried no crew and no colonists. They were
operated by computers and robots, and their cargo consisted of genetic
material taken from the hardiest plants, the healthiest livestock, and the
most intelligent humans (as decided by those in power).

The first slow ships were multinational UN endeavours. They were programmed
for the nearest stars with the best chance of having a habitable planet. By
the 26th century, however, humanity had collapsed into a new round of
iconoclasm. UN missions gave way to "racially homogeneous" (i.e. ethnically
cleansed) colonization efforts. Most major nations launched at least one
"pure" mission. The last mission, launched by the Islamic Union in 2657, left
a world culling itself in an orgy of war.

Not every slow ship made it to its destination. The fact that so few were
destroyed on route is testimony to 27th century engineering. The biggest
problem, however, lay in finding a star system with a habitable planet. Many
ships had slowed down to approach their chosen planet only to reject it and
move out to the next system. Most of the planets that were colonized were on
the edge of the acceptable range. By the beginning of the 4th millenia, less
than two dozen slow ships had found a home.

Communication between colonies was all but non-existant. The early ships
only knew of the missions that came before or those that were on the drawing
board when they were launched. Even then, very few ships had landed at their
destinations. Those colonies that did manage to communicate found that
lightspeed radio communication was too laborious. Even when the colonies did
have a point of reference, it was often lost in the decades between return
messages. The later, ethnically pure missions actively ignored the missions of
other nations and pretended that they were alone in the universe.

By the 5th millenium, the leaner, more efficient human colonies had reinstated
humanity on more than 30 worlds. Human nature being what it was, there was
still conflict, bigotry, and hatred. Democracies were rare,
oligarchies were common, and out-and-out monarchies and dictatorships
were established on no less than 5 worlds. A handful of planets were settled
by the ships of more than one mission, resulting in natural competition for
scarce resources. However the colonists learned well the lessons of the Earth
(silent and forgotten for more than 1000 years) and took care of their new
home worlds. When wars broke out they were limited in scope and damage and
involved only a cadre of professional soldiers. Honour and chivalry in warfare
was rediscovered; a lesson that had only cost humanity it's birth world.

Science was pursued not for the sake of exploitation but for the lofty goals
of knowledge and the betterment of humanity. At least that was the motive
behind the most important scientific discovery in humanity's history.
Chronologically, it was a team of African descendants that first made the
discovery in 4122, but more than half a dozen colonies made the same discovery
within a century of each other. These scientists found a small,
localized tear in space-time. At first it was thought that the tear only
occured in the corona of a star in a binary star system, but they were later
found in a trinary system. These tears were found at the point of the star
closest to its binary partner; essentially the high tide mark of the star. It
wasn't long before scientists started dropping things into the tear, and at
that point the universe changed for all of humanity.

The tear leads to a quasi-dimension. It acts much like our own space,
but contains an almost liquid like gas (called the Ether) that never leaves
the
dimension. This dimension, known as Nullspace or N-space, is navigated
in a very weird way. A ship entering a rip will "see" (through mass detectors)
"dimples" in space. Each dimple is laid out on a two-dimensional plane
and is spaced so that each dimple is a unique distance away from every other
dimple. Say you drop into a tear at a binary star system. If you travel in
N-space for three shipboard hours towards a dimple and then drop through
that dimple into our universe, you may find yourself in a star system 30 light
years "north" of your starting star system. However, if you had instead
dropped into a dimple four hours away in the same direction in
N-space, you might pop out in a star system 40 light years "south" of
your
starting star system. In other words, distance and time in N-space
correspond to our universe, but direction does not!

At first it was thought that these rips only occurred in binary systems, but
they were later found in a trinary system. Some N-space dimples were
avoided entirely as the ships and probes that dropped into them never came
out. This led to speculation that these tears may also occur deep inside
single stars. No theory has emerged as to how these tears were created. In
fact, there is remarkably little commonality between tears. Some occur in the
smallest of the two stars of a binary system, some in the largest, and some in
both. The size of the tear is small (usually less than 1 km in diameter) but
even that fluctuates. The only thing they have in common is that they occur
where there are strong gravitational stresses and intense heat. This
disturbing lack of predictability has led scientists to speculate that the
rips are an artificial, rather than a natural, construct. No one knows who, or
what, might have built them.

The discovery of these tears opened up true interstellar transportation. For
the first time in almost 1500 years, the colonial star systems of humanity
were linked. At least, those in multiple star systems were linked. The
minority of colonies located in single star systems were completely ignored as
a new era of commerce and communication opened. Less than two centuries
after the discovery of N-space, metal rich star systems were trading
heavy metals for food from agrarian worlds. Exotic clothing and trinkets
became commodity items. Scientific information became an important tradable
resource.

This spirit of trade and co-operation didn't last, for no two colonies
were equal. Some colonies had incredibly harsh environments and coveted the
utopian worlds of other colonies. N-space led to a "land grab" as
exploration vessels dropped through N-space dimples in the hope of
claiming a new world. The old Earth iconoclasm and ethnic purity hid a deeper
racism that eventually erupted into conflict. Still, the destruction of Earth
was remembered by all, and no matter how vicious these conflicts became a
chivalrous code of conduct lay over all combatants.

Welcome to the late 43rd century, as gleaming starships burst forth from
stellar atmospheres to lay claim to distant planets. Welcome to the third
great age of naval warfare. The first was the age of wooden ships and iron
men. The second was the age of iron and steel warships.

Welcome to the age of the iridium-clad starship, an age of hellish
weapons used in chivalrous combat. Welcome to the Age of Iridium.