• What Do We Know – Slipspace Communication and UTs

    Throughout the Galactic Republic, Slipspace is rudimentary to the government’s power, the lifeblood to the Milky Way galaxy. But the technology is not a permanent stream; this universe is bound to its limitations. Being simple in design, an artificially grown crystal with a specific ion matrix is used as a fuel source and the true representation of hybrid tech. It is hard to manufacture but incredibly self-reliant for all communications.

    But what is Slipspace?

    This alternate dimension does not mimic our dimension as one would theorize and what not scientists and wizards could explain. It is a dimension made entirely of energy—chaotic, limitless energy—much stronger than solar fusion and as a speck to human nuclear energy. It can literally make human physicists forget they wear underwear before workout out the mathematical formulas. It was discovered long before the Galactic Republic was formed. How or why it was discovered generates conflicted stories. The Archives don’t have the original story, not even the oldest of gods. An accident? A cosmic event found at the right time? A mad titan’s ambition? Economics? Who knows. Understand that others tried refining it as ship fuel and weaponry, but tried and failed like the energy-hungry Sygren people, the energy cannot survive in our universe. So much for the primal need to have limitless energy to power our cities.

    Yet it exists. It has purpose.

    The Goru Slipspace Drive is the machine to make the connection possible. This device is built as three electromagnetic rings encased in a glass globe rotating a crystal. One rear door allows access to install crystals or perform repairs, while two clamps on either side keep the globe tight to a control base. Using a small enough voltage to the rings and rotate at high velocity, the crystal shatters a little to rip a portal between our world and Slipspace. It is then linked with another Drive to create a stable wormhole. And like any fuel, crystals are diminished. Looking through the event horizon, Slipspace is literally “chewing” at the shards until the device shuts down or diminishes the crystal supply, closing the rift.

    Humans would believe the drive designs are from an alien corporation. It could be mistaken for a Vyroken invention. No. The designs are shared to the citizens by the Galactic Republic, by decree as a life right. Businesses and military can build them. Even younglings in science class can build them. The designs date before the formation of the Republic by an extinct species that remain nameless to this day.

    For communications using Slipspace, there is no real form of Slipspace comms like radio or subspace. The nature of the dimension is that of thick sludge. The energy does not generate or carry sine waves. Shoot radio signals into it and they dissipate. But shoot radio waves through a wormhole and are energized by the dimension to reach the other end almost instantly, without loss, static, or latency. This alone is proof to establish a Slipspace mesh network of wormholes that allows all radio technologies, vital for video conferences, remote robotics, live RNN broadcasts, entertainment, military strategy, and much more.

    This network is built upon Slipspace Drive Towers designed to handle vast amounts of information. These are installed in systems, orbiting or on capital worlds. A cylindrical tower houses the antennas covering 360° of coverage, controlled by a server and router network to code, decode, translate, and re-translate the mathematics. Then they are sent down toward the Drive chamber where all communications are transmitted and received in yottahertz(human measure) through the Slipspace rift. A separate computer monitors the Drive from mechanics to energy levels. So for refilling it after a crystal is depleted, three more Drives are in standby mode: the next drive activates, the computer switches them, and the process continues with only a five-second delay, working around the clock. tower crystals are grown large enough to last a hundred years until restocked.

    Of course, every tower is guarded by autonomous sentries capable of ripping enchantments and ship fleets to pieces. Nothing and nobody, not even an iron meteorite, can come close to the towers.

    Now if a system doesn’t need the towers, they can use subspace. It still falls under our universe’s physics so it’s limited to cluster systems and relay stations.

    The Slipspace comm network, or SCN, is impressive, but that doesn’t help with language barriers.

    Also decreed by the Galactic Republic as a life right and spread to all major electronic guilds and corporations specializing in hybrid tech, universal translators are created, or UTs for short.

    They are built as collars, most used design, for users with extendable earpieces that don’t obstruct the user’s natural hearing. Other designs like pins, helmets, or wrist devices with wireless earpieces are built; it’s up to the person or species will.

    One computer, installed with the user’s dictionary, reads off the inscribed glyphs on the casing or band that handle in-air phonetic translation. Whatever the person says, the user hears them through the glyph’s translation in their language. The other way, the user speaks his own language, and the person hears him/her in their language through the device. Two UTs can lower the computer’s processing power but doesn’t cure bad lip sync.

    If personal UTs are not readily available, special techno-enchanted strips and poles networked to language libraries are placed in ships and cities, including hawker markets and government buildings with the most language barriers to hurdle over. There is software available for translating words and glyphs for all mechanical and magical computer systems.

    But the main goal for these two feats of communication from the Council is that they must lower misunderstanding across multiple species. They want everybody to talk, without restrictions or boundaries, and not alienate each other. Take that away, and there will be war.

    Now we could go on about communication technologies, but that will need to be discussed some other time.

  • Ghost Factor’s Future

    So this is important to say.

    It’s been six years since Mana Pool was released, and since that year, the sequel has been worked on. Like…worked on, for reasons. There was that year during Nanowrimo I wrote half of the book, but the plot back then was not up to par. They are notes, and I wonder why I reference it. So the plot was reworked several times. Over the years, having a single writing day was difficult.

    Real life took all the attention. And YouTube. And Netflix.

    My life’s story is known to the older readers, but again, I got to say it, in this simple, bulleted list:

    • Lost four family members to death, including my father
    • First IT job, and the humiliation afterwards
    • Finding a job outside my mountain hometown
    • The work schedule
    • More family issues
    • A hacked website
    • Depression

    A lot of stress and sucked out motivation. Not easy to crawl out of.

    But there were things released, such as the Snippet stories, the originals and rewrites. Rewriting the Tyler Ingert stories for From the Den. Then I joined Podiobooks.com as an online intern. Yet, nothing really new, such as the next book.

    I still feel new to writing. Just that second novel, writing it, is difficult. I feel there is a invisible bar I must meet. Like movie sequels: you cringe if it’s bad or good. coughTransformerscough. I don’t see Ghost Factor in that bubble, but those imaginary critics are around, shutting me down before I’m on a roll, or write the first word of the day. So now, with family stable, job stable somewhat, slowly the creativity is coming back. Not fast enough, though.

    So here’s where Ghost Factor’s future lies.

    Here’s the real problem I’m facing: I lost my editor. I haven’t heard from her for a long time, so it’s a nervous train for quality work. And certainly not a lot of beta readers. I’m sort of protective of my stories.

    But leaving Ghost Factor because of that will not stand.

    I thought about this for a while, how to push Ghost Factor out, while feeling good about it. I somehow thought back over and over of my days on DeviantART writing the Tyler stories. That weekly push to write, edit, and publish until the story is done. Then looking over YouTubers and webcomic artists/writers, and the communities they built.

    So…why not?

    Why not serialize Ghost Factor next year and get this anticipation off my back?

    This all spells like I’m regressing from being a “real” writer or professional writer, but it’s just me finding what I love about writing. I want that spark back years ago.

    My idea is to serialize it on my website, DeviantART, and Wattpad next year. If you are interested, please comment, whether do what makes me happy or keep writing until the entire book is finished and released on one day. If there’s enough interest I’ll share how I will release the chapters.

  • What Do We Know – The Galactic Republic

    The Milky Way galaxy; quiet from afar but busy from within.

    Humans on Terra Firma still conflict with each other whether life exists outside the Sol system, or their planet is the universe’s center to be that naive, while fighting over who’s religion is right or wrong.

    But it’s no secret. The galaxy is full of life, and far more established than what humans could comprehend.

    Multitudes of species, races, cultures, technology, and magic, among seventeen billion worlds. Many forms of flesh, elemental, energy, cosmic, autonomous, and synthetic. Species that want to explore, trade, communicate, conquer, and perhaps kill, all in the name of surviving in this universe.

    So the Galactic Republic was established eons ago to serve as the galaxy’s identity for all free species. At the center of the Republic’s laws is the Galactic Council, homeworld-elect members of each species and sworn in for their seven-year term to debate, ratify and mandate laws and trials over diplomacy, security, economics, technology, magic theory and practice, while keeping a half-step back from specie politics. A daunting task to watch over so many worlds and their inhabitants, yet they must follow three doctrines to keep it going, in absolute reason why: life preservation, communication, and prosperity.

    What all council members must realize is that life is precious and sacred. They foremost want to keep life going and prevent extinction-like occurrences. Records from the census A.I. Thergeos, there are over a thousand registered species in the Republic. A few dominant species have their own governments such as the Synth Dominion, The Order, the Halcunac Empire, and others within or outside the Republic’s domain, but the Council lets those governments operate in feuds or partnership unless there is a life threatening situation upon the Republic. This also applies to primitive species.

    Species that haven’t advanced themselves—culturally, technologically, or extraterrestrial tolerant—they are kept under watchful eye of the Primitive Culture Protection Act; protection from outside threats while promoting natural evolution without extraterrestrial influence. A formal First Contact ritual is conducted once a primitive species is recognized as evolved, but in more ways selective of why joins the Republic on many factors. The last ritual was with Kyta, homeworld of the Kytalthans over seven hundred years ago and Councilmember Tress Ki is the lead support of drought relief on ill-terraformed planets.

    But some protected species are hostile, both themselves and/or others, and present a real danger to the Republic’s values are marked as Red Flagged, planet and system included. Like Terra Firma, one of twenty known worlds at this status.

    Humans are not magical, evolved, not agreeable with each other, disputed as extremely hostile to extraterrestrials, but their cognitive thinking of destructive scenarios while perversely building nuclear weapons without regard of all life, even themselves, is a major threat to the Republic. Imagine if they realize extraterrestrials exist?

    Their system, including the oort cloud, is blocked from all incoming transmissions from neighboring systems so to make them they are alone in the universe, while under constant observation. Anyone who enters the system is, sadly, a lost cause. No hope for Red Flagged worlds to ever join the Republic, for any reason.

    With communication between species, the Galactic Republic standardizes magic and technology to everybody.

    Every Republic civilization has magic-enhanced computers called Universal Translators, or UTs, deeply integrated within locations and as small device in remote areas. Species can speak their language without even learning the other’s (their choice to want to), but the hybrid tech can live translate speech without delay or echo. This is especially important to limit miscommunication and misunderstanding. They are installed as towers, tubes for ships, or worn as collars, or anything; the designs are open to anybody without corporate restrictions.

    Transmitting information is also standardized. The technology behind it can be discussed in length, but Slipspace is dominant to carry all transmissions in almost real time. Array towers are scattered across known systems and planets in a broadcast network, with enough Slipspace crystals to last a hundred years before restock. Ships do have Slipspace Drives for encrypted transmission, integrated or portable. This network is vital for trade routes, news outlets, military, personal use, and civilian entertainment.

    The technology can be discussed in depth later.

    As of government prosperity, the Republic does not conquer worlds as others assume. They grow by nature, by First Contact species, and never go beyond what they can’t cover. Even advanced civilizations have their limits and borders. Yet being as big as the Republic, it doesn’t forget its citizens and where they come from. The ancient lawmakers instilled a practice even today is ambitious and daring.

    Other governments have static capitol planets; the Galactic Republic is symbiotic to chosen planets.

    The entire government operates on platforms and motherships. The Galactic Council is housed in the Ark Mothership, built as the size of a small moon, and joined with several motherships as sub-capitols, or districts, that hold everything from the entertainment, business, economy, ship harbors, industry, agriculture, markets, village life, housing, to military power such as the Royal Navy. The districts are independent from the Ark and hover over the host planet with a highly advanced public transportation system. Platforms and space stations orbit the planet, some have more than what the districts could offer.

    Currently, the host planet is the Class-M planet Creos, homeworld of the Creosians and their Councilmember Trygo “The Hammer” Denverbay, in it’s 321st year.

    So as being a symbiotic capitol, there is bound to be issues with the planet’s inhabitants. Not so. There are strict guidelines to prevent melding of species. No wars are made against the host planet. No destruction of the inhabitant’s economy or way of life. It is left as is before and after the motherships and stations teleport to a new host planet every five-hundred years by popular vote.

    So for one Councilmember, Trygo, a battleship captain, his crew and another ship’s crew, an unlucky Halcunac mercenary, and a RNN investigative reporter, there is little known of what is happening on Terra Firma, and what it might cause to the Galactic Republic.

  • Update on My Writing

    Another long time away from this blog, but I can’t get away from sharing updates now that the day job settled down.

    Yeah, the day job was taking my focus from writing this fall, like every time. I had to do data entry for one client and became a temp assignment auditor as the company developed immense growth, and growing pains in departments. So my interest in writing fiction went down in the dumps, and that annoyed me a lot. The kind of feelings when going home after work and do nothing else. Helpdesk is taxing on creativity. I gained weight.

    Things are really calming down and my schedule is what I wanted and it’s leaving me to take a breath and fo…Oh a cat video!

    It’s gonna take a while to get back in a routine. Here’s what I have going for the rest of the year.

    Ghost Factor took the most beating. I had to delete one chapter that never worked and rewrite that portion of the plot, and this was before my day job got insane. The draft will get done by the way. Also I hoped you did read the first chapter I released weeks ago so if you haven’t yet, check it out here or DeviantART. The release date is still out of my control, so I have another post about that next week. This is kind of big for me and the support is needed to get this book off the ground. I have the two remaining Snippet stories, Keystone and Her Discovery, left to edit and clean up. When they will be released is still tentative and that will coincide with the post next week.

    The “What Do We Know” posts are still being worked on. Currently I have the biggest to write which is the Galactic Republic. I think it’s the hardest one to do besides flushing out characters. What the government does, who’s part of it, what does it value, what are the goals as a whole – I get lost in it sometimes. Be on the lookout for that this month.

    Lastly, I was building a list of stories I want to write not relating to Mana Pool or Tyler Ingert. These stories are geared toward formal submission like Asimov Magazine, except one fan fiction story of a video game I like so much that I have to write it, yet I’m still toying with the plot of how to best approach it.

    So that’s all I got for now. I’m still reading fiction, still writing in my notebook, still reading about screenwriting, and still limiting my distractions. I just wish the routine and changes start sooner.

    Later.