THE COST OF FTL
Strange auroras peeled passed the windows, giving off the smooth melodies of yellow & blue & red. Delicately splashed greens zipped in & out of view as golds dashed feverishly between its spectrum fashioned partners. "Its the sugar." she said quietly as his eyes left the window of the ship to meet hers.
"Im sorry, what?" He’d been lost in the labyrinthine hallways of his own mind. The colors of the hyper-space tunnel had that effect on him. She repeated herself, slowly working around the worry building on his face. "Its the sugar that makes the lights. One of the side effects of the space fracking process." He nodded, happy to have his mind occupied by anything other than their destination. "I was never totally clear as to how the whole system worked." he said. She smiled at him & replied "Well, about a hundred years ago, a mining crew in the asteroid belt found an odd substance leaking out of empty space. Tiny amounts, but enough to warrent further investigation."
He felt the ship lurch slightly, the cue that told him they had dropped out of hyper-space. They were close now. "What scientists discovered was what they called Cosmic Oil. A seemingly natural substance that remained fluid at near absolute zero. It had what they called negative viscosity & changed the entire face of commercial movement & transportation. So companies began investing in Void Fracturing, tapping hidden veins of Cosmic Oil using various chemical cocktails." She, the captain of the vessel, walked over the main counsoul & punched in the new coordinates for planetary descent.
She knew he was afraid, who wouldn’t be, when fate comes calling, no one wants to answer the door. She continued talking, hoping to ease his transition into the coming hour. "But it was sugar that worked the best. Simple sugar, under pressure & intense heat split open empty spaces & broke right into the veins of the universe, letting the oil spill out. Hyper-space was one of the unforseen consequences of the process, albeit a positive one. Now instead of engines, Void fracking rigs are retrofit into deep space craft, allowing for faster than light travel, gathering the Cosmic Oil & venturing out into the unknown. The ships literally pay for themselves. Discovery has never been such a lucrative endeavor."
Another side effect of Void Fracturing were the chasms. Not quite black holes, Void Chasms appeared in areas where fracking was heaviest. There were things down in the chasms, things that ate both metal & men. And in this new world, feeding the beasts that occupied those deepest pits of exposed hell was the only thing keeping them from boiling up & consuming all.
His hands were shaking. Like so many before him his number had been called, he was next in line to be fed to the foul things down in the pits that appeared on mars after orbital fracking rigs ripped out a chasm on its surface. "You’re doing a great thing." she said leading him to the launch pod. "You’re helping keep tens of billions of humans safe from these horrors. Per the contract your family will be well taken care of." A final prayer before she pushed the button, he could barely hear "May death find you before they do."
