Voidspace

The energy that makes vast interstellar travel possible

Created by Khali Crawford

Politics of Space

As mentioned below, the Major Lanes are the most effective means of travel as with them you can travel to anywhere within a 3rd of the entire galaxy. And, naturally, if you control the Lanes you can control who uses them. But, how do you control a naturally occurring space lane? You build 3 absolutely massive space stations with a blackhole generator inside, place them at the start, end, and middle of your desired Lane, and now no one can use the Lane because their Engines can't detect them.
This is what the Atlus Union did, they were the first to do it and control Major Lane: Andromeda, an entire 3rd of the known Galaxy in their pocket. They could normally not maintain this but they have allied themselves with the United Stellar Commonwealth to police and maintain the Lane, with certain caveats on both sides.

Major Lane: Proxima is controlled by the Undurkar Company (UC) founded by the Briggs Family. They are an absolutely massive cooperate guild who hold allegiance to no one faction or party. So long as the coin is right, you can use their lanes to ship your materials, ships, goods, or people. This is a popular option as a party with no bias is better than using an enemy Lane. For this reason, the UC can jack up its travel tax and still make an amazing profit. Notably, the Future War Empire and affiliated parties use this option.

And finally, is Major Lane: Optimus, which is unofficially controlled by The White Lotus, a massive criminal syndicate who miraculously gained control of this Lane. They offer lower fees than both the UC and Atlus Union but often take a portion of your cargo as payment to cover the cost, not always limited to items.

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Localization

There exist pathways in space-time that, when manipulated with Void Energy, a form of concentrated matter tempered from Oblivion, allow for near light speed travel from one place to another. Of these pathways or 'Lanes', there exist two types, Major & Minor.
Major Lanes are these gigantic Voidspace pathways that run the full length of the known galaxy. Only 3 Major Lanes exist, Andromeda, Proxima, and Optimus, and with them, the fastest and easiest travel in the galaxy is made. These Major Lanes are natural in occurrence and will shift around once every 7 thousand years, always running the full length of the galaxy.
Minor Lanes are the fracture points of a Major Lane, the stem off of the bigger ones and never come close to covering the same distance as the Major Lanes, usually restricted to connecting two or more star systems or worlds and not much else. However, these Lanes do not move around or change position with time and are a guarantee for smaller worlds to always have a connection to the galaxy. 

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Using The Lanes

There are two tools needed to use a Minor or Major Lane.

• Skip Drive

A Skip Drive (SD) is used when traversing a Minor Lane, because these Lanes are shorter the SD prioritizes speed over accuracy. This is because Minor Lanes can only lead to a very limited number of places so the chance you will be within spitting distance of your destination is good. Additionally, they can quickly and efficiently enter/ exit the Voidspace with little to no trouble, handy for a quick escape.

• Voidspace Engine

A Voidspace Engine (Ven) is used to traverse Major Lanes, it prioritizes high accuracy over speed because Major Lanes can lead to anywhere within an entire 3rd of the known and unknown Galaxy. For this reason trips with a Ven can often last weeks to months, and it is unable to exit the Voidspace whenever it wants, once a course has been Charted, only an emergency override can stop it dead in its tracks.
Typically speaking, you will only see Voidspace Engines on larger vessels or stations as they are heavier and more expensive to maintain and replace if damaged. 

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Old Canon    Lore      Voidspace

Grandmaster SixPathsSage

Khali Crawford

   

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Collecting Payment

In every system controlled by a Major Lane, the owning organization as a Space Terminal, massive almost planetoid-like structures where ships can arrive to pay their travel tax and access Major Lane. These Terminals are usually well guarded to prevent larger vessels from pushing their way past them.

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Means of Travel

Traditional Space travel, with starships and Voidspace tech, is widely considered an old occupation with the introduction of Spacebridges. These days, the risk of traditional space travel are just too great leaving the vast frontier primarily in the hands of cooperations that need to move large quantities of goods and materials to isolated worlds, pirates who thrive in this new landscape, and the Knights of the Iron Order who are 'old fashioned' and still rely on this form of transportation. 

Type

Natural