Behind The Scenes

One thing that could be a factor would be to have the technology lost for making the engines for the Asteroid Ships. They know how to soup them up, but they don’t know how to make them. Or they don’t know how to make the machines to make them.

The impact would be that the total number of ACC is limited. This would be why they took The Dizzy Dean and would force excess population to inhabit the various asteroids.

Smaller interstellar ships could be made, but they would top out at 0.25c.

They might feel responsible for helping support the various sleeper colonies.

They would probably also resent the Terrans for the loss of life both on quarantine duty and the Great Break Out. Even non-combatants were killed.

It might be that the Terrans need something to help manufacture the vaccine?

In any event, they have to go back to the Terran System every so often and they don’t want to. Actually, the Terrans don’t want them to either.

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So they can’t make new Asteroid Ships. There are about 3000 in existence. They can maintain them indefinitely, but if lost they can not be repaired. They can make all of the Asteroid bases they want and all of the space habitats. Some people will want to stay at these locations.And others will not want to be tied down to any one system.

It takes about a year to refuel/refit an ACC ship. It would be quicker to have stations that would do the repairs.

They need to be traveling to spread genetic diversity. While there are over 25 million spacers, with a capacity of 10 thousand, they need to trading people.

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It is a matter of transit time - vacationers do not want to spend 7 years each way to get somewhere. If your new job took 7 years to get to, who would want to go?You can’t be shipping something that would spoil/rot in 7 years.

Hmm, perhaps they could be traveling distilleries? Where would they grow the wood to burn?

The only thing which makes sense is either something is extremely rare or they have a pipeline running.

One of the things floating back in my head is that while sub-FTL time dilation effects are well understood, perhaps the slingshot effects are not.

Consider that you go in and come out in one of three states:

1. Classic time dilation - ignore the fact that we can’t predict what would happen here.
2. No dilation at all - if it takes you 7 years, then 7 years pass outside.
3. Random effect - you might find out it:
   1. Took 2 years for every 1 year of voyage
   2. 1/2 year for every 1 year of voyage

I want Spacers/Clans to be willing to take the risks. Their families travel with them and so what if they effectively see negative time dilation.

And Grounders/Corporates would be unwilling to take the risks. If it were constant, they could do it, but they are scared of getting out of touch.

Hmm, perhaps the one of the spin routes is pretty tame (so the Corps take it) and one is pretty wild (so the Clans take it). The rewards would outweigh the risks.

And why do the Spacers want to become traders? If they can produce all they want at any system they travel to, what needs do they have? Perhaps as systems fill up, they have to expand ever outward. And perhaps some just want excuses to wander?

Ignore how many Spacers there are before 2089. Once we reach it, 3,000 people are emigrating daily - which is 1 million a year.

25 years of emigration would put the population at least at 25 million. Which is still a drop in the bucket compared to 12 billion on the planet. Either something happens to cut back the emigration rate or something happens to them.

I didn’t do any numbers as to whether enough ACC cruisers (cruisers are for Spacers and sleepers are for Earthers) could be constructed. We would need 300 to carry the original population and 2500 to carry this new estimate.

I wonder if it is easier for a new cultural outlook to establish itself on 3 vs 25 million people. :-> I think it would be a stretch for the 3 million in the first place. We would need time and a common hardship/environment.

I guess my problem is that I want things to happen rather quickly. Instead of about 200 years of the Spacers tooling around to become the Clan, I want it to happen in about 100 years. Or sooner. I’m resisting making Jenny near immortal such that she can see it all.

And I really want to introduce the sub-FTL drive (.9c) and the Slingshot effect (say 1.5c). I want to differentiate between cold and hyper sleep. I want crews to age months as decades go by.

It may end up looking more like a timeline, but that outline was the hardest writing exercise to date. I can typically think in terms of short stories - in this case the opening ones for Jenny and Dagar. But putting down the rough outline of a novel in one sitting is both exhilarating and exhausting.

The hardest part was not diving into writing anything - I gave detail where it was needed as a plot point or I didn’t want to forget it.

The outline isn’t carved in stone. It definitely went places I hadn’t imagined. I.e., it was alive in my head. An example of it drifting from my vision was the sheer scale of death by the Plague and the resultant animosity between Earther/Grounder and Spacer/Clan. I wanted that to be there, but I didn’t know it was going to be so virulent.

I know the next hardest thing I will ever do is taking the outline into a story. I’m trying to determine how I can both serialize that and spread the load to minimize impact to the rest of my  life.

And of course, dialog scares me….

2075 - In response to repeated accidents at research universities and laboratories, legislation is passed to severely curtail Earth based research. Fearing regulation even in space, companies start launching deep space research labs. Some of these are launched as survey ships to Alpha Centauri and Bernard’s Star. The crews range from 30 - 100 personnel. The technologies for cold sleep, improvements on the stellar drive, etc are some of the advances that are published from this era of the Pandora’s Boxes. What is not widely known is DSRL 27, which heavily explored human cloning and embryonic engineering.

Current drive speeds max out at 0.25c.

2089 - The space elevator to Near Earth Station 1 is finally christened and doubles the emigration rate. On the average, 2,000 people travel up it daily. The return carts carry mainly Spacer rice to feed the overpopulated planet.

2094 - Kochai Umarzai born

2100 - Dagar Umarzai born, 1st generation Spacer on his mother’s side, 3rd generation on his father’s side

2101 - A second elevator to Near Earth Station 4 is opened. The main cargo is inbound foodstuffs. The outbound flow of emigrants is constrained by construction of apartment habitats. Most new construction is geared towards agricultural habitats. Natural Spacer expansion is given a priority to new living habitats. Spacers are reluctant to settle deep or work for extended periods of time in gravity wells.

2102 - A major breakthrough sees drive speeds double to .5c. First asteroid ship is launched to Bernard’s Star. Successive launches to other nearby systems.

2103 - The first Deep Space Research Station is launched beyond the solar system. These are half the size of the asteroid survey ships and have much smaller crews - in the hundreds. This is the start of the second wave of Pandora’s Boxes.

2106 - Jenny Dalton born, 4th generation Spacer

2110 - Population pressure has resulted in the elevator for NES 4 sending up cold sleep containers. The people are at first criminals and the poor. When Spacers hear about the roving chain gangs, they stage the first sign of rebellion. Under Spacer pressure (i.e., rocks not grain), special lotteries are formed - with volunteers given special compensation. This might be priority wakening, favors for family, etc. Despite periodic awakenings to luxury condos in Spacer habitats, there is a growing fear that the sleep is one way.

2113 - The Neptune Far Observatory predicts the existence of polar ice caps on Epsilon Eridani 5.

2114 - March - First reported outbreaks of the Plague. 40,000 die the first weekend. After a week of no reported cases, Australia declares a DMZ and ruthlessly enforces it.

2114 - April - Near Earth Station 1 is swamped by refugees, grain is no longer flowing back to the surface. Rioting breaks out when the refugees hear that Spacers have the cure. Spacer families are torn apart by the mobs - Jenny Dalton sees her family trampled live while she is on a field trip to Luna City. And then Plague carriers are detected. The elevator is cut, plummeting down to the Earth. Most of it lands in the Pacific Ocean, with the resulting tidal waves striking Australia. The Braveheart cleanses NES 1 with nuclear fire.

Lunar Central declares the Terran Quarantine and forms the Interdiction Patrol, whose rules of engagement are shoot first, ask questions later, maybe.

2114 - July - NES 4 halts upward shipment of cold sleep containers. Downward shipment of grain is suspended while all containers since February are routed back to the surface. Under fear that food shipments will not resume, a Japanese strike force takes NES 4. This time, it is The Khyber Pass which cleanses the station. It becomes very clear that Spacers exposed to the Infected (plague carriers) are to be considered Infected themselves.

This is not too shocking as it is a common perception planet side as well. What is different is that the Spacers consider this to be a species extinction event. The stated goal is to preserve the 3 million Spacers and the 2 million cold sleepers.

Lunar Central opens up Near Earth Station 5 as a research hospital. Spacer personnel are relocated to other stations. A set flight path is opened from Earth to NES 5 and all vessels in near Earth orbit which are not in the Corridor are to be destroyed. All remaining NES are converted to missile platforms.

2114 - September - The Asteroid Belt Shipyards ramp up production on the Asteroid Colonization Class - rock is cheap and so are other raw materials. In an effort to increase production, two variants are produced. The first one emphasis communal living quarters in cylindrical drums and massive collections of raw material. The expectation is that the 10,000 man crew will flesh out the ship during the journey. The second one has an emphasis on a smaller skeleton crew of 300 and massive cold sleep chambers. Depending on the size of the ACC, between 30,000 to 50,000 popsicles can be stored.

2114 - October - ACC launching starts. As a whole, non-1st generation Spacers prefer not to go the cold sleep route. The stockpiled popsicles are packed onto the cold sleep variants. When possible, 1st generation Spacers form the skeleton crews. In some cases, ships launch in pairs, with skeleton crews rotating from the communal variant.

2114 - November - The Khyber Pass is assumed infected when overseeing the evacuation of Near Earth Station 2. Dagar Umarzai assumes command after shooting the captain, who wanted to make a break for The Frostbridge, which was about to depart for Alpha Centuari. The Khyber Pass assumes station inside the corridor, providing fire support for the light attack skimmers. (Hmm, it helps out the Parasol?)

2114 - December - The Khan starts resupplying The Khyber Pass to enable it to continue on its mission. The commander of this light attack cruiser is Kochai Umarzai.

2115 - March - 20% of the Earth’s population have succumbed from either the Plague or starvation caused by the loss of the elevator grain shipments. Of the estimated 12 billion on the planet at the start of 2114, over 2.4 billion are dead.

Appeals for a new elevator or manned shuttles are ignored.

Lunar Central starts a program of delivering grain via a mass accelerator. Black marketeers rush to grab the floating canisters at sea.

The converted cruise liners start hauling food stores back.

2115 - May - The Parasol destroys The City of London as it tries to blast out from Australia. A week later, The Khyber Pass is able to guard the Parasol after is it left for dead when The Arosa Sky leads an escape effort. Jenny Dalton lives, but loses both legs.

2115 - June - Jenny finds out that after physical therapy, she will be assigned to The Voodoo Lounge, which is shipping out within a year. She starts up Radio Free Spacer as DJ Zombie Queen. The radio broadcasts start out as part of her mental therapy.

2116 - March - The grain shipments and near paranoia have dented the death rate - only 1 billion have died in the second year of the Plague. Travel between countries is prohibited and even between cities it is virtually unheard of in this new era. The only real traffic are either the body haulers or the food distributors. Stranger is now synonymous with death.

2116 - May - Kochai Umarzai and family are supposed to ship out on The Big Easy, but it launches without them during a foiled hijacking. As The Voodoo Lounge and The Dizzy Dean are about to launch, they are reassigned to it. Jenny Dalton becomes their sponsor on The Voodoo Lounge, even though Kochai is 2 levels above in her direct chain of command.

The Khyber Pass is lost and all crew assumed dead during a massive breakout attempt.

2116 - June - During the pre-launch checks, an unscheduled quality assurance inspection determines that the cold storage chambers for The Dizzy Dean have been switched. Several craft swiftly board and take the ACC ship. The inspection team is jetitsoned safely in a lifeboat and it is assumed the remaining maintenance crew were sleeper agents. It is launched a week early and is believed to be off course - the launch looks erratic. It is assumed that the launch was rushed due to the early discovery of the hijacker’s plans. (The Voodoo Lounge crew was going to rotate time on The Dizzy Dean.)

A week later, under tighter security, The Voodoo Lounge launches. Jenny Dalton takes her Radio Free Spacer show on tour to Epsilon Eridani.

2117 - January - The Voodoo Lounge crew determines that The Dizzy Dean is not on automatic pilot and is on course for Epsilon Eridani itself. They start to arm their shuttles.

2117 - March - Jenny Dalton starts to get song requests from The Dizzy Dean. This is the start of communication between the two ships.

2118 - March - The colors of the IP - black and silver - are outlawed on the Earth. Wearing this color combination can lead to death. The Earthers resent the Spacers.

2120 - June - The Dizzy Dean starts to have engine and life support trouble. The cold sleep warehouses are drawing too much power. It is discovered that there are 80,000 popsicles when the maximum capacity is 50,000. Engineers on The Voodoo Lounge help alleviate problems, but realize the solution is temporary. They do not share this fact with The Dizzy Dean.

2121 - April - An UFO is spotted by The Dizzy Dean, which is still out in front by a considerable margin. It is determined to be Terran in origin and one of the smaller DSRS asteroid ships. A faint SOS is heard, but all attempts to hail it are ignored.

The Dizzy Dean does not have the ships to rescue the expected crew size, but it turns out that they do have security pass codes and keys necessary for boarding. Hmm, why? The Voodoo Lounge does, the larger scout craft could ferry some back. As The Dizzy Dean is willing to send aid, the crew of The Voodoo Lounge inform them that they will need a resupply of the magic powder. It is agreed that they will meet at the DSRS. Based on their findings, The Voodoo Lounge will send over more shuttles as needed. But with the Plague fresh in their minds, fear of both the unknown on the DSRS and the somewhat known on The Dizzy Dean makes them cautious.

Jenny Dalton is the captain of The Voodoo Childe, the scoutship. Kochai Umarzai has to defend keeping her in that capacity. While she is still young, female, and crippled, in his mind she has earned the right by her sacrifice. She and her crew have trained together and also contributed to construction on the asteroid.

2121 - June - The Childe rendezvous with The Ace from The Dizzy Dean. Dagar Umarzai commands it. They explore the DSRS Peapod and discover that the original crew is dead. There are two factions now alive on the ship - each a set of clones of the original scientists. The research on this ship was in cloning and nanotech reconstruction of memories. Dagar uses the machinery to make a template of Jenny.

Dagar and Jenny are alone for a bit and decide to get friendly. Jenny is by this time equivalent to a Hollywood movie star, she recognizes Dagar from pictures his family had, she remembers The Khyber Pass guarding her wreckage, etc. In short, she will become pregnant.

2122 - Rhyne and Brekhna Dalton, twin girls, are born.

2124 - The Dizzy Dean improves the stellar drive. They are able to increase the maximum speed. They inform The Voodoo Lounge on their breakthrough.

Hmm, time for a break. I’m trying to figure out how fast I want the ACC ships to be going. At plot speed, I need them to take 20 years to get to Epsilon Eridani. But that is twice as fast as I planned. I.e., I wanted it to take 4 years to traverse 1 ly.

Going from 1/4th the speed of light to 1/2th the speed of light would introduce some real relativistic aging - it would be 23 years on Earth. I guess the main overall desire is for the sub-FTL drive to go closer to .9 times the speed of light and the slingshot effect to go somewhere close to 1.25 times the speed of light. Aargh, trying to figure out relativistic effects in reverse is hurting my head.

So current drive technology has a maximum speed of 0.55c. The ships will arrive a year earlier than anticipated. An effect of this is that any automated awakening programs on The Dizzy Dean will be thrown out of sync with the arrival!

Current drive speeds max out at 0.55c.

2125 - March - 6 billion are dead from the Plague. Over 2.5 million Spacers are now either in transit or arrived at their stellar destinations. Secondary voyages have commenced from Bernard’s Star.

With the 2 million popsicles in transit, construction of ACC sleepers is halted.

2125 - April - A massive fleet is launched from the Earth. All NES stations and IP ships are lost. Lunar Central is evacuated back to the Asteroids.

2125 - June - Over 100,000 Spacers have died defending the Asteroid belt. ACC carriers are launching hourly. 20,000 more Spacers die as the last ships are launched. A suicide force makes sure that the Asteroid Shipyards are destroyed.

2126 - July - The last remnants of the Spacers are eradicated. The Earth once again rules the system.

2126 - August - Cal and Davi Dalton, twin boys, are born.

2127 - December - Agatha Dalton, girl, stillborn.

2129 - March - A vaccination for the Plague is finally developed at DSRS 71 - it will take months for Earthers to accept the cure and they will eventually deny that Spacers found it. 8 billion are dead and the remaining population is united in their hatred of the Spacers. The Terran Confederation is formed and the Solar System is renamed the Terran System as a symbol of pride.

2129 - September - With the planet now quite capable of sustaining the 5 billion humans on it and the deep-seated fear of another Spacer community, travel off-planet is severely restricted. Families are not allowed to be off planet and there is a strict 4 year limit for service. At that point, you need to spend a year Earthside before you are allowed back out. That concession is only made because of the extensive training costs and lack of volunteers.

2129 - June - Spacer researchers utilizing the work on The Dizzy Dean manage to crank out an additional 20% performance from the stellar drive. Unlike the earlier work, the engines need to be offline to be retooled.

Current drive speeds max out at 0.75c.

2129 - November - Jules Dalton, boy, born.

2131 - April - Sinead and Azul Dalton, twin girls, born.

2134 - March - The Dizzy Dean arrives at Epsilon Eridani. The 5th planet has polar ice caps, oceans, and continents. There is no life. They set up a satellite network, including mirrors to warm the planet, drop terraforming gear to start producing oxygen from the water, etc. By universal consent, none of the popsicles are wakened. The containers have a minimum of 1000 people and the fear of Infected roaming the corridors convinces everyone. Note: All of the crew had been in space when the Plague started.

While space habitats are easier to build, the crew want the colonists on the ground until a quarantine is lifted. With them at the bottom of the gravity well and with no ships, they will be easier to control. Also, none of the colonists are trained to live in space.

2134 - April - Construction of an Orbital Agriculture Station is started. Most of the pieces were built on the journey out, so the main work is just final construction.

The Voodoo Lounge arrives and sets up shop in the asteroids.

2134 - May - The Spacers start retooling their engines to get the 0.75c speed. They also start mining the asteroids. This last is mainly an excuse for people to get out and see the sights. They also build an Agricultural Station to lay in new supplies.

2134 - July - The second OAS is finished and work starts on underground bases for the popsicles. The crew wants to leverage the knowledge of Lunar and asteroid construction methods. The Dizzy Dean petitions the Spacers for raw supplies and they are sent with the provision that The Voodoo Lounge is given ample warning for when the popsicles are thawed.

The reason for the need is the extra colonists. The Dizzy Dean is able to power the cold sleep cylinders with solar energy, but are concerned about laying in enough supplies to sustain the extra bodies. The goods they brought from Earth will not last long.

2134 - September - The OAS crops are being stored planet side. Raw construction on the bases is finished - they are following the communal model and the colonists will be busy with construction once they wake.

2134 - October - The Voodoo Childe arrives to start construction of a space elevator. This will allow for crops to be dropped without human contact. The initial protocol is for canisters to go down only.

2134 - November - Realizing that all they are doing is stockpiling resources, the decision is made to transfer the cold sleep cylinders planet side. Strict protocols are agreed upon to keep crew away from colonists.

The Dizzy Dean engineers start to retool her engines, because they can, that’s why.

2135 - February - With the last canister in place, The Voodoo Childe, starts back towards the asteroids.

Immediate plans to open up the popsicles are put on hold as a zero gravity research facility is hastily constructed. By the end of the month, they are able to start producing the vaccine.

2136 - March - The first canisters are dethawed and instead of the expected Australian colonists, a hodgepodge of people emerge (Hmm, make one nationality? Koreans?). It quickly becomes clear that space went to the highest bidder. There is a cadre of armed men who quickly take over control of the colony. Note that many of the crew were of Australian descent and are dismayed that their country men are not the cargo.

Infected people are seen before the video feed is cut. Telescopes won’t be of much use because of them being underground.

One week later, the video feed is restored. The spokesman on the ground demands that The Dizzy Dean crew surrender and start ferrying up guards. The crew refuses and they are shown their family members as hostages. Even the Australian agents on the ship realize that family hostages are present.

Dagar recognizes where they are being held. Perhaps he has a secondary video feed? Kochai has to be watching this interplay and realizes why the crew of The Khyber Pass and others helped the hijackers. The Voodoo Childe and armed shuttles are sent to The Dizzy Dean on a rescue mission. Kochai leads the strike force and Jenny captains her ship. She is second-in-command of the mission.

20-25 of the crew are sleeper agents and end up seizing control of control room, the defenses, etc of The Dizzy Dean. They do not control the hanger. Dagar and others manage to form a rescue team of their own with The Khyber Pass and the other craft which originally seized the ACC craft. The Australians throw in with them and not the colonists.

The families are rescued, but there is a chance they were exposed to the Plague. The vaccine only prevents the spread, it does not cure it. The rescuers are all inoculated, but still wary of the results.

The Spacers retake The Dizzy Dean, but Kochai is killed. Jenny assumes command of the mission and refuses to leave the families behind. They’ll come aboard The Dizzy Dean out to the asteroids. The crew will build habitats just like the Spacers had done on their way out. The populations of The Voodoo Lounge is about 13,000 and The Dizzy Dean now numbers about 2100.

2136 - April - The Spacers are torn between staying in the asteroids and going to Tau Ceti. Jenny leads the faction wanting to go to Tau Ceti - staying will only encourage the Grounders to come after them. She becomes the captain of The Voodoo Lounge and effectively admiral of the fleet of two.

2136 - June - The Spacers mothball the asteroid factories and deliver a fleet of 5 shuttles to the space elevator. The Grounders have no craft. They perform routine maintenance on the stations and start sending down food and medical supplies.

2136 - July - The Spacers enable the elevator to bring up passengers. As the first Grounders enter the Station, both ships blast off to Tau Ceti.

2137 - April - Kochai and Alexi Dalton, twin boys, are born to Jenny Dalton (Father is Dagar)

2137 - July - Piper and Breen Dalton, twin girls, are born to Rhyne Dalton

2138 - March - Cherry and Apana Dalton, twin girls, are born to Brekhna Dalton

2138 - November - Wynonie Dalton, girl, is born to Jenny Dalton

2143 - May - Agatha Dalton, girl, is born to Brekhna Dalton

2143 - July - Dagar Dalton, boy, is born to Rhyne Dalton

2143 - September - The Voodoo Lounge and The Dizzy Dean arrive in Tau Ceti.

Where would we go from here, besides more Daltons being born? Note, I’m not keeping track of male descendants.

Well, Jenny is 37 years old. She could tool around Tau Ceti for a while, there would already be some Spacers there. And then the Terran Confederation would be in trouble. She would take The Voodoo Lounge, but not The Dizzy Dean, back to the Terran System to deliver something vital. Or perhaps she is sent as a diplomat? It would take 16 years and might be the start of interstellar trade. She would be 55-56 when they got there. Something exciting happens and then they take off to parts unknown. She could easily survive as the captain for another 10-11 ly trip.

The point would be that she sets the tone for the cultural evolution from Spacers to Clans. She does this both by example and by radio broadcasts. At some point her kids might take over the broadcasts, but by then she would be a legend and people would key off of the Dalton surname.

This period of development should last until 2289 at which point the sub-FTL drive is discovered. It will allow travel at .9c.

I want a matriarchal system for the Clans, which means that the needs of women in the workforce can not be overruled by their need to bear and rear children. In the Atares series by McCollum, Alta women did not serve in the Navy because during the frontier days, they needed to have 10 children and had no energy to spare.

I think the difference here will be that the Spacer women will not be on frontiers - the asteroid ships are just like their space habitats (read Limbo by Rich Cook, it expounds on this concept). There is no real push to expand the population.

The Earthers (i.e., the colonists that hijacked The Dizzy Dean) are a different matter - they are popsicles such that they can establish a new colony on a planet and as such are on a frontier.

I want the Spacer migration to yield a different culture than the Earthers. The Earther expansion may give rise to the Trade Consortiums, but the Spacer expansion will definitely give rise to the Clans.

As such, Jenny needs a career and a family. At least until The Voodoo Lounge reaches the first system, she needs to be unwed and having children. Kochai’s family helps her out of a sense of obligation/family, but as she has other children, she does not get married.

Her job as the pilot of the scout craft is safe in that it is hardly ever used. Besides the journey end, which she can predict, and the trip to the Pandora’s Box, she mainly trains and helps out with large scale construction tasks on the asteroid.

I need two characters, brothers, who may be twins. I also want some diversity.

I want them to be of Pakistani descent, but after 100 years in space, their families will be different. I.e., diversity does not mean stereotypical. I do want them to be Pashtun and to be descended from a strong Pashtunwali upbringing. I do want that upbringing to have adapted to not being totally masculine - i.e., I want the sense of family from Pashtunwali to permeate the formation of the Clans, but I still want the Clans to be matriarchal.

Kochai Umarzai will be the older brother (see, no twins!) and he will ship on The Voodoo Lounge. He will be a father figure for Jenny. He will have a large family, larger than normal. It will include his parents, his sister (and her family), and his wife and children.

Dagar Umarzai will be the younger brother. He will be about 16 when he serves in the Interdiction Patrol. He will command a fast attack destroyer, The Khyber Pass, which gets trapped in the corridor because of a possible infection. He will stay there, work hard, and enable his brother to take out more of their family. He in essence sacrifices his chance to go.

For some reason (i.e., I haven’t reconciled his duty and honor in staying in the corridor with why) he ends up on The Dizzy Dean. It has to be family - that ties in with the development of the Clan and allows his brother to finally forgive him. His uncles were on Earth and were used as a bribe to get his help to take and man The Dizzy Dean.

Kochai doesn’t know about the family aboard The Dizzy Dean. This doesn’t come out until the crew of The Voodoo Lounge try to rescue those on The Dizzy Dean. There are some other families down on the planet. Dagar and others are leading a raid with The Khyber Pass to rescue the families. They will find some infected alongside the families and have to eliminate them. There will be a 1 year decontamination period when they get back.

Dagar will also be the commander of the expedition to the first Pandora’s Box. And he will also be the father of Jenny’s twin daughters. I knew I needed twins somewhere. It won’t be until the expedition that Kochai learns that his brother is on the The Dizzy Dean. I.e., Dagar thought they went out on another ship - he wouldn’t have jeopardized their passage - which means that The Dizzy Dean and The Voodoo Lounge have to leave at about the same time. They were supposed to go to neighboring systems, but due to the hijackers not being properly trained, they will end up in the same system.

Okay, the new start of the story is better, information is conveyed as part of the story and not as a means to the end.

But I quickly got more interested in the background events than in the dialog/action.

I’ll need to start the 3rd pass soon…

Jenny starts a pirate radio station before she ships out on The Voodoo Lounge. She broadcasts to Station 5 and down the corridor. When the Spacer ship starts its journey, she continues her show on the road - some tag lines:

• “Beaming in from the Stars”
• “Enjoy the slow ride”
• “The view is worth the trip”

She sets the mood and tone for intership communication. Even the different hijacker ships tune in. She broadcasts new music trends from The Voodoo Lounge (believe me, I’m not a Rolling Stones fan, but I wanted a zombie motif for the ships).

She becomes a voice for her generation. Her change of focus from naming things from My Little Ponies to the more macabre shows her maturity and dealing with her injuries. Instead of withdrawing into alcohol and/or recreation drugs, she becomes more outgoing. She refuses to accept that her injury forces her to man a desk.

Timeline wise, she spends a year in system after the destruction of the Parasol in Jenny’s War. Five years later, on the mission to the first Pandora’s Box, she would be about 16. (Note: I wanted to keep this close to my chest, but as I don’t have the story written and I’m designing the future, I’ll pull the shock ending in a little bit to have all of this make sense.)

The complication of her getting command will be older crew chaffing about her age. But when she gets her legs blown off (ouch I have to share more), she becomes a full citizen at age 9. She earned her way on The Voodoo Lounge (not sure if she has family yet) and into the command chain. Questions of her maturity and/or capability are swept aside by the captain because of her service record.

I’ve gone from having a neat universe with no story to having a little short story to having the potential for a book. One of the biggest problems with action adventures is how many times can the hero save the world? Either you have to get new villains (more powerful natch), do the city -> state -> nation -> world -> solar system -> galaxy -> universe scaling, etc.

For me, the book would be the journey of the Spacers and The Dizzy Dean caretaker crew to the new system and their decision to leave. Of interest would be what got Jenny to go with the Spacers, how she learned to interact with them, how she influenced their culture to form the basis of the Clans, how the crew of the XXX (including how/why the iconoclastic YYY capitulated) got on The Dizzy Dean, how the two crews interacted, etc.

In short, the journey is the destination and the story.