The Human Equation

[G. Janssen]

A series of short chapters that describe Humanity's relevant technological progress over the course of a century.

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Chapter 1. ECS-X25, 2182CE
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"I still say that we should have nicknamed her McDonald's." Colonel Sven Hendrikx said. The experimental ECS-X25 Moth was unlike any ship he had seen before. But she did look a lot more than a giant "M" than a moth.

Although, with a bit of imagination...

"I zink zhe looks nize." Mayor Sonya Krasinskaia said.

All of Humanity had painfully realized how pathetic its tech level was when the media began showing the documentaries on alien ships after the Great War had ended.

But that the T.C.A. would even be outclassed by Human freighters that had been somewhat upgraded with tech that was obtained from alien criminals, had been a blow.

And so the Powers That Be had made known Their will. "Obtain an intact alien craft, reverse engineer it and put Humanity ahead of everyone else, no matter the cost."

The struggle against the raiders had been humilitating. But even slowpokes sometimes have luck on their side. During a fight one Loroi raider captain had become overconfident and decided to show off. She was subsequently rewarded for her impressive performance with a missile that exploded inside her ship's bridge.

The mostly intact ship had been towed to the "Dusk Works", a highly classified orbital research facility in orbit around Europa. The Mizol on Earth had been kept in the dark about the acquisition of Union tech that violated the diplomatic treaty and the engineers and scientists of the Dusk Works had rubbed their hands and thrown a party.

Twelve years later, the experimental ECS-X25 Moth was ready for her maiden flight. She had been preceeded by the X07, X12, X15, X19 and X22. The models belonging to the numbers in between hadn't made it further than computer simulations.

She was 50 meters long, 56 meters wide, her chassis was "M" shaped and two copied and modified Loroi engine nacelles were placed in the spaces between the legs. The nacelles could rotate up and down around the center line of the ship. The exhausts had thrust vectoring. It gave the craft unparallelled maneuverabilty. Stresses on the hull could be immense, so safeties had been built into the software.

Her cockpit was a sphere that was located in the exact center of the ship and could rotate in all directions to compensate for the craft's rotational movements. And it was lined with copied inertia dampers that would protect the 3 pilots against sudden changes in acceleration and lateral movement.

The reactor was placed behind the cockpit.

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ECS-X25 had launched from Europa and things were looking fine.

The maneuverability test had yielded the expected spectacular results and the craft's crew had begun the acceleration test.

"Acceleration 5G... 7G... 10G..." Colonel Hendrikx reported.

"Reactor at 51% output. Status green." Major Rosseau said.

"All zystemz nominal." Major Krasinskaia reported.

"Continuing." Hendrikx said.

"Acceleration 12G... 14G... 16G... 17G... 17.5G... 18G... 18.5G... 19G. Remaining steady at 19G." He reported.

"Reactor at 100% output. Status yellow." Rosseau reported.

"All zystemz nom... Vait. Temperature in port nazelle rizing fazt! Zhut it do..."

The ECS-X25 became an expanding, short-lived ball of bright white light near Europa.

Three more photographs were added to the collection on the wall behind the counter of the bar aboard the Dusk Works.

The engineers and scientists found the cause of the accident from the analyzed telemetry and made recommendations.

Construction of the ECS-X28 had already started. The recommendations were implemented.

Three new pilots were already being trained.

And the Powers That Be were pleased with the progress.

===/\/===

[Bamax]

I enjoyed this short story.

I was quite amused that pirate freighters with alien upgrades outperformed navy TCA vessels... at which point the TCA was totalky focused on aquiring such technology.

It kiind of reminds me of the race between the Americans and the Soviets to loot German technology and science after WWII.

It was too bad what happened to that crew....but like they say.. you have to crack a few eggs to make an omellete.

So do the ends justify the means?

Sometimes... yeah... they do.

[Cthulhu]

An interesting take on the "catch-up" race. I guess the prototype blew up due to calorie overload?