Codex 003: Dive Space\
Imagine Dive Space like a folded
piece of paper with a hole cut through it.
When folded, you can move through the holes clearly and cleanly, and
when unfolded, the paper is its normal length.
Dive Space functions on the same principle, except the paper is space
itself and, once a ship dives or surfaces, the holes mend.
Scientifically
speaking, the term “compressed space,” is more accurate and more widely used by
the scientific community. Dive Space,
however, has become popularized to the point of conventional usage. The term evokes the image of a submarine of
old dipping into the water, only to appear elsewhere, unharmed. The image is not wholly inaccurate, though
the description of what it does it not entirely factual.
The
Yggdrasil Drive, designed and fashioned after the more advanced compression
drives found on Guide ships, allows ships to exit what has been called ‘flat
space’ or ‘linear space’ and allow them to move in what is called ‘compressed
space.’ Compressed space, which moves
the ship beyond the speed or light (or more accurately outside of light) leaves
the ship’s exterior darkened as the ship moves rapidly between vast distances.
Through the
creation and eventual refinement of the Yggdrasil Drive, which much of the work
being done by the famed Ouranus Innovative Technologies, an Yggdrasil Drive
requires priming and coordinates. Then,
a ship will ‘dive’ into compressed space and surface at those coordinates upon
arrival. Often, this is understood by
laymen as being instantaneous, but just as with a hole through paper, space
must be covered even if the length trip is greatly diminished.
This can be
seen in the first successful test done, a pioneer flight made between the Alpha
star of the Republic to the Beta star neighboring it. This trip, formerly, would have taken
weeks. With the use of an Yggdrasil
Drive, the very same trip was capable of being made within only a few
days. Since, it has been improved to a
few hours, and some scientists believe as we come to understand the nature of
space travel and of the Guide technology, we may be able to make such trips in
minutes or seconds.
While all
of this seems unreal, there are still dangers to the use of Dive Space and the
Yggdrasil Drive. In particular, Dive
Coordinates must place ships outside of gravitational sinks, the most common of
which are planetary orbits and atmospheres.
While a ship can, theoretically, surface within a planet’s atmosphere,
placement is difficult at the best of times, and gravity plays havoc on the
return. Attempts have found ships
tearing apart or disappearing inside of a planet’s crust.
The danger
of a dive malfunction also exists, though such errors are more discreet. In early tests of the Yggdrasil Drive saw
ships simply disappearing into the aether, never to return. In popular media, there are stories of ghost
ships found derelict following a drive malfunction or run by an ageless crew
unaware of the time that has passed outside of their compression bubble. Most theorists, however, say the ships are simply
lost, the compressed space collapsing on them and reducing them to nothing.
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