2307 Metric Drive Proof of Concept

Previously, scientists had successfully deformed spacetime artificially from the outside. However, for the first time, they achieved this from within the bubble. The experimental apparatus compresses spacetime in one direction and expands it in the other, resulting in an apparent movement without the object actually moving through space. It is the space itself that moves.

The space is not macroscopically deformed. Instead, fractal space distortions are used, creating high gravitational gradients across a network of infinitesimal folding surfaces. These surfaces have a fractal dimension close to 3. They are spatial in nature but theoretically have no volume where spacetime must be curved. In practice, the fractal folding surfaces are not strictly two-dimensional. However, the real total volume is so small that far less exotic matter is required than previously assumed. The negative energy of virtual particles at an artificial event horizon provides the necessary gravitational gradients on sub-nuclear scales. This event horizon for virtual particles is created by a quantum mirror that uses CP violation to separate D-mesons and their antiparticles.

The measurable effect is still small. The apparent movement is only a few micrometers per second. But never before has a human-made device propelled itself forward by curving space.

Many research groups are working on improvements. Soon, apparent speeds of several meters per second are achieved. Over time, many parameters are optimized. Some mechanisms are improved, while others are replaced with more efficient alternatives.

The actual size of the folding surfaces plays an important role. The higher the fractal dimension, the finer the folding surfaces and the greater the achievable gravitational gradient and speed.

The drive operates in pulses, each pulse generating a small spatial displacement. Therefore, the apparent speed is proportional to the pulse frequency. The cycle time soon drops from milliseconds to nanoseconds. To achieve this, the active cycle control is switched to a resonance effect. This paradigm shift requires many other components to be adapted.

Later, D-mesons are replaced by B-mesons due to their higher mass. This increases the energy requirement but also the speed, reaching up to kilometers per second.

Eventually, CP-based quantum mirrors are replaced by quantum black holes as event horizons. This opens up the possibility of using Weakly Interacting Massive Particles, a.k.a. WIMPs, or Bose-Einstein condensates instead of individual meson pairs. However, their production in relevant quantities is still far in the future and will only be made possible by advanced alien tech. Picosecond cycles will also only be feasible with extra-solar technology.

Each improvement brings gains in efficiency, higher speeds, lower energy consumption, increased reliability, or better maneuverability. True faster-than-light drives in interstellar spacecraft will have little in common with the first experimental devices. However, the basic principle will remain unchanged well into the faster-than-light era.

2312 Discovery of an Alien Spaceship

In 2311 Katana Aiko-Io, born on Mars but later relocated to Ganymede, embarks on a journey that would change human history. As an independent prospector, she scours the Jupiter Trojans controlling a swarm of mining drones, when she picks up the beacon of another vessel. This vessel identifies as a mining drone hub from Serenity Haven which recently had issued a provisional sovereignty claim (PSC) for parts of Jupiter's leading Trojans. While Aiko-Io's scouting is backed by a broadly declared so-called detached exclusive economic zone (DEEZ) of the Ganymede Directorate, she is aware that the Directorate has only a token presence in the vast region of the inner-middle leading Jupiter Trojans (the "Greeks") while Serenity Haven is operating a refining base and several drone hubs. Therefore, in 2312 she moves her operations to a neighboring unclaimed volume of the Trojans.

Although Aiko-Io is thus both outside the Directorate's DEEZ and Serenity's PSC, she is trying to evade detection to avoid problems. Aiko-Io runs a gray scouting operation without broadcasting her identification. She stays close to larger bodies and travels distances keeping asteroids between her and known positions of competitors as much as possible.

But ultimately Aiko-Io gets a long distance identification request from a Serenity PSC border beacon. Serenity's border surveillance network has obviously detected her and noticed the missing transponder signal. Flying without a transponder is illegal according to the Coalition Treaty of 2302, and the nearest volume or territorial sovereignty is obligated to prosecute the case. However, Serenity's jurisdiction is questionable, as their sovereignty claim is only self-declared and provisional. What is more, these beacons are basically just small cubesats without any enforcement power and the next Serenity drone hub with paramilitary capabilities is tens of millions of kilometers away. But still, Aiko-Io decides to pass on the interaction. She lets her scouting drones search for a spot in the shadow of her current rubble pile asteroid, a contact binary with cliffs and bulges perfectly suited for hide and seek.

Using only sector selective PHIDAR (Phased array LIDAR) her drones find a particularly dark cave, when a momentary glitch in Aiko-Io's visual feed reveals a strange shape against the asteroid. Driven by curiosity and the need for a safe hideout, she ventures closer – and stumbles upon an alien spaceship nestled in the shadows.

This roughly 100-meter cube-shaped vessel, abandoned and ancient, is partially covered by the usual rubble pile mix: rocks, pebbles, and dust. The vessel's remarkably dark broadband radiation absorbing hull seems to be visible only in the far infrared and even there it is almost undetectable from afar having the same temperature as the asteroid. However, the discovery raises questions about how it evaded detection by prospector drones that had – over the last 150 years – mapped all asteroids in the belt and all large bodies in the Trojans.

The alien ship quickly captures the Sol System's imagination. The press, abbreviating the discoverer's name, dubs it the Kaio ship. The Neo-Socialist government of the Earth Union imposes a strict information blackout. Using advanced communication control technologies, they manage to keep the planet's populace in the dark about the Kaio ship, revealing their ability to intercept even end-to-end encrypted private communication in Earth's networks.

The interplanetary scientific community is both thrilled and daunted by the discovery. The challenges they face are immense, primarily due to the fact that many of the ship's technologies are based on unknown physics principles, but also because of the ship's deteriorated condition, and the unknown information paradigms. The alien ship's technology features a fractally structured integrated hull and frame with nanotech-based self-healing capabilities, which appear to be passive due to a lack of energy. The reactor core is cold, emitting no radiation. The alien ship's information technology, however, seems rather primitive compared to its other advanced technologies making the technological principles of its information storage at least understandable.

Initially, the Ganymede Directorate claims the vessel and spearheads early explorations. However, interplanetary powers, wary of missing out on potential scientific breakthroughs, pressure the Directorate to cede control. After three years, the Solar Coalition assumes command, orchestrating a system-wide research and exploration effort using the Sol System's brightest minds and cutting-edge inference machines. The Coalition ensures that the knowledge gained is accessible to all humanity – except the peoples on Earth, who remain oblivious due to the information blackout. This is the first big project of the Solar Coalition, establishing the young organization as a major player.

Teams of computer scientists, cryptologists, xenologists, physicists, and technicians dedicate the next thirty years to decoding the alien ship's information system. This collaborative effort of thousands of scientists eventually leads to the partial decryption of the ship's memory banks, providing humanity with an unprecedented glimpse into the local interstellar environment, albeit one that is at least 30,000 years old. The scientists never manage to get any interfaces to work but they are able to scan what they believe are backup memory banks, identifying and extracting multilevel 3D images of technical gear, star maps, foreign planets, and more. The data found in the ship's memory banks also includes records of interstellar travel routes and information on extraterrestrial civilizations. This treasure trove of knowledge sends shockwaves through the scientific community and significantly advances human understanding of the interstellar neighborhood.

The ship's true marvel is revealed only after extensive study: it appears to possess a faster-than-light engine that is integrated with the hull. Analysis of the FTL drive components leads to a paradigm shift, revealing that the alien ship's FTL components do not compress and expand space in the direction of travel but rather perpendicular, iterating the vessel between folded spacetime. This discovery challenges existing human theories on metric drives, providing practical insights into manipulating space-time to achieve faster-than-light speeds. The insights gained from the Kaio artifact lead to a realignment of space modulation research, accelerating the development of humanity's own faster-than-light propulsion systems. In hindsight, the metric science of the time was about to enter a dead-end, but the discovery of the Kaio vessel pushes the technology in a new direction, drastically reducing the time required to build the first true metric drive.

This event is considered a turning point, not just in human technological advancement, but also in our understanding of our place in the universe. But although the event is celebrated as the beginning of the "interstellar age", nothing really changes in everyday life. While there is great excitement – initially and also over the following decades as new discoveries are published – the daily life in the interplanetary civilization remains unchanged. And on Earth the information blockade means that the population does not even take note. Life continues as before.

However, within a mere half century, the first vessels with still relatively slow and cumbersome unconventional reactionless drives appear.

So, humanity gains access to exo-technology so advanced that it is impossible to understand, except for the information storage and metric gear. The gap between the human tech level and the alien ship's tech is just about manageable in distinct fields, while others are practically closed off.

The alien vessel's metric technology arrives at exactly the right time, a few years after scientists had successfully demonstrated the prototype of a metric drive. These scientists then have exactly the right knowledge to learn from the alien technology. And just as humanity's metric research is about to go in the wrong direction, the insights from the alien vessel's space modulation gear move metric science back on track, avoiding a technological stalemate, thereby immensely accelerating humanity's access to FTL travel. The timing of these events is a remarkable coincidence.

Beyond that, the data storage technology appeared to be somewhat less advanced than other fields. It is on a tech level allowing for physical scanning and rudimentary information extraction. The retrieved data contained the location of a nearby exo-civilization willing to trade with humans and sufficiently detached as to not exploit humanity like many interstellar factions, essentially providing an easy destination for humanity's first FTL flights.

Remarkably, unencrypted data storage is virtually unheard of, and it was assumed that all technological developments would follow this route, as encryption is both cheap and unbreakable – apparently not in this case.

The fact that the vessel had not been discovered before was almost inexplicable. While the hull was in fact very stealthy as a side effect of its metric function, it should have been detected by scouts at least half a century ago.

Speculations are running wild. Some argue that these are not mere coincidences, but that some advanced actor is trying to set humanity on an expedited interstellar path.

On the other hand, this might just be a 30,000 year old derelict that had been missed by one or two faulty scout drones 50 years ago.

But maybe, there are powers so advanced that they can produce a perfectly believable, forensics-proof replica with exactly the right properties to advance humanity's technology with unobtrusively placed hints.