Shepard Quest Mk VI, Technological Revolution
- Thread starter Hoyr
- Start date
Yes, the TIR effect can be used for lensing; in fact that's probably how the higher power laser weapons can work at all, with TIR mass effect fields working to collect and colineate the beam. The problem is that, after the weapon is fired, physics takes over, and diffraction starts to scatter the beam. The solution is to increase the frequency of the laser light, which is what the higher level techs are for.
I'm pretty sure it's a nod to the fact that PI is gearing up for war, and the Council does at least acknowledge that, even if they aren't doing everything they can or should to help. They're also probably trying to get us out of the market, so the Asari competition can charge whatever they want for dark energy reactors.
The legal quota as I understand it is really only for small/new companies. Basically under Citadel law a patent holder must make their product reasonably available at a fair price. The Council can dictate just how much supply is required and how what exactly is a fair price but for big established companies there isn't really a need. Those companies are already familiar with the law and aware that if they break it they can be forced into unfavorable licensing deals.
The quota was dropped because PI has more then proven that it's both willing and able to meet the demand for it's Arc Reactors and provide a fair price. Basically we've earned the legal equvilant of the benefit of the doubt. Now it's up to us to ensure we do nothing to cause the Council to doubt us and either go back to the mandated quota or force us into one of those unfavorable licensing deals.
- Location
- To the left. No, not there, the other left.
Some Council corporation (can't recall specifics now) managed to reproduce the Prothean power cell/reactor which while not as good is comparable with Arc Reactor so now they have viable alternatives. And I imagine they generally prefer to use more familiar and understood eezo based solution that they can produce themselves rather than completely relying on imported stuff they have very little idea about.
Last edited:
- Location
- Low Earth Orbit
So… Omake time? Omake time.
Psychology by Accident
Revy absentmindedly poked her cheek and felt a bump. Three hundred years of medicine, genetic engineering up the wazoo, effectively super soldier treatments, and she still somehow got a zit. Eh, that what stylists are for.
Her focus lay elsewhere. She was in the process of reviewing one of the just-for-fun tests her scientist and engineers were encouraged to do for their job interviews. A test that always marked as voluntary, yet more often than not took up more time than any other of their tests. For that alone it'd been put near the end of the process, just before the actual interview. It had the added benefit of giving interviewers time to gather and sort their files before proceeding to the main part, while the prospective employee didn't get too bored or agitated with the long wait.
The whole test had started out during her… when was it? When she was twenty? Twenty one? Somewhere in that range. She'd come to realise the need of making her technologies safe for and against espionage, be that industrial or national, and so had started to fiddle. At the end of which Revy was fairly certain whoever didn't have blueprints—what an archaic term, could be replaced and made more sensible with—No Revy, don't enter linguistics, there be grammar dragons—whoever didn't have blueprints would have a really hard time figuring out any of her thereby proofed inventions.
The test had been, naturally, herself. After constructing a purely mechanical, but fully blackboxed clock herself, one she'd designed and knew practically everything and anything about, it still took her the better part of the afternoon to verify that yes, this clock wasn't a thermometer. On the one hand she was very proud of that accomplishment—the blackboxing process, that is. On the other she was thoroughly frustrated she'd invented something that she herself was struggling with figuring out.
So she took one of her mother's sayings to heart, 'misery loves company', and inflicted her clock on the unsuspecting employees and interviewees.
The former's interest was easily garnered: simply putting the clock in the break room and calling it Rubik's Cube 2.0 sufficed. As for the latter… eh, she's CEO, let her have her fun.
In hindsight the interviewees reactions and ministrations did give valuable insight into their psychological make-up and Revy kept her mouth shut (thanks, Casie) when asked if that was her intent all along.
Long story short, she was browsing through her employees failures in figuring out a simple, mechanical clock.
Conrad needed twelve consecutive hours to make sure the clock-faced cube was indeed mechanical, despite its ominous glow.
Mordin Solus verified its lack of ionising radiation quite quickly, but had yet to figure out its energy source. So far he was leaning towards energy sink. Mostly, though, he used it as a paperweight that had a tendency to get lost. How he managed that without any paper in his office is anyone's guess.
Kasumi had liberated a nice clock. And another one. And another one. She was currently in the process of building a clock fort.
Her dad had pried the clock open and figured out the spring was the motive force, but had yet to determine how exactly the potential energy was transferred to the pointers.
Her mom had a nice clock..
Indigo had a new toy, one it liked to toss around. The clock still worked, somehow. Revy wasn't sure on the particulars herself.
Gaver Dor hadn't smashed the clock in a fit of rage, once more proving the racial stereotypes wrong. He was actually quite far along, gradually peeling circuits, springs, and levers away until the clock stopped working. He might crack it in his lifetime, given a big enough supply of the clocks.
Next up was the prospective Hanar scientist, Belan. He'd worked furiously on the clock and had ignored the multiple calls for the interview to start in favour of continuing with the examination. What was he doing there…
…Okay, that was strange. Revy was fairly sure the clock wasn't intended to glow. Not on its own.
Revy looked at the time of the interview. It'd been two days ago.
"Cortana, do me a favour and see if this …Belan is still on Mindoir?"
"Certainly." There was a minute pause, one more for Revy's sake rather than Cortana needing it. "They are. Their departure is set for tomorrow morning Landing time. Shall I schedule an interview? This time without your pet clock to distract them, perhaps?"
Revy didn't glare at any cameras. "Yes. An informal interview."
"They agree, and they are eager to meet. Would the day after tomorrow be fine? There's a slot in your afternoon schedule that was recently vacated."
"Yeah, that works. Thanks."
With that off her mind Revy directed her focus elsewhere, trusting Cortana to remind her when the next thing on the agenda came up.
…
"Dr Shepard, may I remind you of your upcoming interview with Belan?"
Revy was in the process of benching her weight. Or something like her weight, since it was just the bar, pseudo-weighing as much as her thanks to mass effect fields.
"What the what?" With but a thought the bar was its original weight. "Belan? Interview?"
"Indeed. You requested an interview with him after reviewing his job interview two days ago."
She wiped the sweat of her face. "He… was that Hanar fellow, right?"
"Quite. They—"
Revy noted the slight emphasis Cortana put there, cheeky little VI it was.
"—requested a more expedient interview and I took the liberty to arrange it so. On an unrelated note, congratulations on exceeding your training regimen for the day. Shall I prepare a shower before the interview?"
Definitely too cheeky by half. She really ought to get that AI license, just to be sure. It would be entirely in line with her accomplishments to—entirely accidentally—plant the seeds for an AI when programming her personal VI.
"Yes. I'll be there in a few."
…
Revy rose from her seat when the Hanar floated into her office.
"This One is delighted to be invited by the Shepherding One."
Scratch one for odd translation suite.
"Nice to meet you, Belan. I'd offer you a handshake, but I know that wouldn't end well for either of us, so… um, welcome." Revy had walked out from her desk and was about to offer a handshake when CASIE'd interrupted her with the prompt to not do that.
"This One appreciates the offer in the spirit it was given, Shepherding One. This One professes curiosity about the reasoning for this interview, if the question is permitted. It had planned to leave the Shepherding One's home planet and was surprised at your VI's invitation."
Revy had taken seat behind her desk again. She made a dismissive gesture.
"You'd piqued my curiosity."
"This One is honoured."
"Ah…" Revy fumbled. CASIE had interrupted her train of thought when it informed her of the Belan's substandard translation suite. A fact she'd cottoned on to by Belan's address for her. To compensate CASIE offered a variety of arm positions to clarify the meaning of her words.
"I was interested in your investigation of the…" she almost said clock before stopping herself, "…device offered to your before the interview."
The Hanar made a gesture with its tentacles CASIE helpfully subtitled as an inquisitive emoji.
"You seemed… rapt. What for?"
"Did not the Shepherding One ask This One to solve this riddle? How could it refuse that request?"
"To the degree of ignoring your interview?"
The hanar's confusion would have been obvious, even without CASIE's helpful emojis. "This One doesn't understand…"
Revy leaned forward, and then backward, and then made the accompanying arm gestures CASIE provided her to get her point across. "Look. You applied for a lab job. You won't have to deal with me on a day to day basis, rarely any scientist does. I… have an idea to what esteem your people hold me, but I'm just a girl tinkering in her lab. There's nothing religious about me. Hell, I don't get most religions.
"What I'm trying to get at is, you can't drop everything because I say so, unless I explicitly tel you to drop everything. Right? Just imagine, there may be a point I ask your input on something, and you just discard your current work. Your coworkers have to pick up the slack, and maybe months of experiments are ruined. Worse comes to worst, lives are lost. I can't have that on my shoulders, and neither should you—or any hanar—put it there."
Silence followed, long enough to become uncomfortable for Revy, but CASIE indicated it wasn't for Belan, and that he was contemplating.
"This One… is shamed to have offended the Shepherding One. It was sent to the Shepherding One by the Illuminated Primacy itself, but it failed in its task. This One is but an… egg, not yet to hatch into the atmospheres. Its preparations were not sufficient, and it was hubris which led This One on its path. This One will do ask for forgiveness and do penance in the name of the Enkindlers, for it has failed Their emissary."
"Failing, Shmailing," Revy tossed out. "This was a tangent anyway.
"Belan, what caught my interest wasn't your zeal in following my 'order', but what you did. You're a biotic, I assume?"
"This One is versed in the biotic arts, yes, but it isn't an adherent. This one can float in the atmospheres but seconds without crutches of artifice. If the Shepherding One's interest lies therein, the Ridged Ones may teach you."
"Naa, I'm already getting classes in that. No, I was curious how you fiddled with your biotics at that intricate level. I mean, any half-wit can toss boxes biotically, but to move threads takes a steady hand. Tentacle. Whatever, you know what I mean."
"Ah, This One understands. It is not a teacher, and This One would never presume to advise the Shepherding One on their abilities, but This One found to use its biotic like a limb embiggened This One's understanding of it. What may be a small hammer can still be a big lever."
Revy leaned back, pondering that herself. With some effort she pulled herself back to reality.
"Belan, you never finished your interview. You can do so now, on one condition!"
"This One is eager to comply."
She focussed on the phrases and arm gestures CASIE offered, then continued. "As long as you work for me, my word has only the weight of my worldly position, not that of an… emissary."
"This One thinks it understands, but… no, This One will think first and only after inquire for clarification."
"Well, you'll have your interview first, but then you can think, so sure, go ahead."
All the hanar's tentacles half rose, a gesture CASIE translated as fluster.
"Now? This One isn't prepared!"
Revy grinned a smile that would be more appropriate on her mother's face on the battlefield than on a young woman heading one the bigger R&D companies of the galaxy. Though… maybe not.
————————
As you might expect, critique and comments(and a freaking name) welcome.
If this qualifies for reward, here are the priorities:
Psychology by Accident
Revy absentmindedly poked her cheek and felt a bump. Three hundred years of medicine, genetic engineering up the wazoo, effectively super soldier treatments, and she still somehow got a zit. Eh, that what stylists are for.
Her focus lay elsewhere. She was in the process of reviewing one of the just-for-fun tests her scientist and engineers were encouraged to do for their job interviews. A test that always marked as voluntary, yet more often than not took up more time than any other of their tests. For that alone it'd been put near the end of the process, just before the actual interview. It had the added benefit of giving interviewers time to gather and sort their files before proceeding to the main part, while the prospective employee didn't get too bored or agitated with the long wait.
The whole test had started out during her… when was it? When she was twenty? Twenty one? Somewhere in that range. She'd come to realise the need of making her technologies safe for and against espionage, be that industrial or national, and so had started to fiddle. At the end of which Revy was fairly certain whoever didn't have blueprints—what an archaic term, could be replaced and made more sensible with—No Revy, don't enter linguistics, there be grammar dragons—whoever didn't have blueprints would have a really hard time figuring out any of her thereby proofed inventions.
The test had been, naturally, herself. After constructing a purely mechanical, but fully blackboxed clock herself, one she'd designed and knew practically everything and anything about, it still took her the better part of the afternoon to verify that yes, this clock wasn't a thermometer. On the one hand she was very proud of that accomplishment—the blackboxing process, that is. On the other she was thoroughly frustrated she'd invented something that she herself was struggling with figuring out.
So she took one of her mother's sayings to heart, 'misery loves company', and inflicted her clock on the unsuspecting employees and interviewees.
The former's interest was easily garnered: simply putting the clock in the break room and calling it Rubik's Cube 2.0 sufficed. As for the latter… eh, she's CEO, let her have her fun.
In hindsight the interviewees reactions and ministrations did give valuable insight into their psychological make-up and Revy kept her mouth shut (thanks, Casie) when asked if that was her intent all along.
Long story short, she was browsing through her employees failures in figuring out a simple, mechanical clock.
Conrad needed twelve consecutive hours to make sure the clock-faced cube was indeed mechanical, despite its ominous glow.
Mordin Solus verified its lack of ionising radiation quite quickly, but had yet to figure out its energy source. So far he was leaning towards energy sink. Mostly, though, he used it as a paperweight that had a tendency to get lost. How he managed that without any paper in his office is anyone's guess.
Kasumi had liberated a nice clock. And another one. And another one. She was currently in the process of building a clock fort.
Her dad had pried the clock open and figured out the spring was the motive force, but had yet to determine how exactly the potential energy was transferred to the pointers.
Her mom had a nice clock..
Indigo had a new toy, one it liked to toss around. The clock still worked, somehow. Revy wasn't sure on the particulars herself.
Gaver Dor hadn't smashed the clock in a fit of rage, once more proving the racial stereotypes wrong. He was actually quite far along, gradually peeling circuits, springs, and levers away until the clock stopped working. He might crack it in his lifetime, given a big enough supply of the clocks.
Next up was the prospective Hanar scientist, Belan. He'd worked furiously on the clock and had ignored the multiple calls for the interview to start in favour of continuing with the examination. What was he doing there…
…Okay, that was strange. Revy was fairly sure the clock wasn't intended to glow. Not on its own.
Revy looked at the time of the interview. It'd been two days ago.
"Cortana, do me a favour and see if this …Belan is still on Mindoir?"
"Certainly." There was a minute pause, one more for Revy's sake rather than Cortana needing it. "They are. Their departure is set for tomorrow morning Landing time. Shall I schedule an interview? This time without your pet clock to distract them, perhaps?"
Revy didn't glare at any cameras. "Yes. An informal interview."
"They agree, and they are eager to meet. Would the day after tomorrow be fine? There's a slot in your afternoon schedule that was recently vacated."
"Yeah, that works. Thanks."
With that off her mind Revy directed her focus elsewhere, trusting Cortana to remind her when the next thing on the agenda came up.
…
"Dr Shepard, may I remind you of your upcoming interview with Belan?"
Revy was in the process of benching her weight. Or something like her weight, since it was just the bar, pseudo-weighing as much as her thanks to mass effect fields.
"What the what?" With but a thought the bar was its original weight. "Belan? Interview?"
"Indeed. You requested an interview with him after reviewing his job interview two days ago."
She wiped the sweat of her face. "He… was that Hanar fellow, right?"
"Quite. They—"
Revy noted the slight emphasis Cortana put there, cheeky little VI it was.
"—requested a more expedient interview and I took the liberty to arrange it so. On an unrelated note, congratulations on exceeding your training regimen for the day. Shall I prepare a shower before the interview?"
Definitely too cheeky by half. She really ought to get that AI license, just to be sure. It would be entirely in line with her accomplishments to—entirely accidentally—plant the seeds for an AI when programming her personal VI.
"Yes. I'll be there in a few."
…
Revy rose from her seat when the Hanar floated into her office.
"This One is delighted to be invited by the Shepherding One."
Scratch one for odd translation suite.
"Nice to meet you, Belan. I'd offer you a handshake, but I know that wouldn't end well for either of us, so… um, welcome." Revy had walked out from her desk and was about to offer a handshake when CASIE'd interrupted her with the prompt to not do that.
"This One appreciates the offer in the spirit it was given, Shepherding One. This One professes curiosity about the reasoning for this interview, if the question is permitted. It had planned to leave the Shepherding One's home planet and was surprised at your VI's invitation."
Revy had taken seat behind her desk again. She made a dismissive gesture.
"You'd piqued my curiosity."
"This One is honoured."
"Ah…" Revy fumbled. CASIE had interrupted her train of thought when it informed her of the Belan's substandard translation suite. A fact she'd cottoned on to by Belan's address for her. To compensate CASIE offered a variety of arm positions to clarify the meaning of her words.
"I was interested in your investigation of the…" she almost said clock before stopping herself, "…device offered to your before the interview."
The Hanar made a gesture with its tentacles CASIE helpfully subtitled as an inquisitive emoji.
"You seemed… rapt. What for?"
"Did not the Shepherding One ask This One to solve this riddle? How could it refuse that request?"
"To the degree of ignoring your interview?"
The hanar's confusion would have been obvious, even without CASIE's helpful emojis. "This One doesn't understand…"
Revy leaned forward, and then backward, and then made the accompanying arm gestures CASIE provided her to get her point across. "Look. You applied for a lab job. You won't have to deal with me on a day to day basis, rarely any scientist does. I… have an idea to what esteem your people hold me, but I'm just a girl tinkering in her lab. There's nothing religious about me. Hell, I don't get most religions.
"What I'm trying to get at is, you can't drop everything because I say so, unless I explicitly tel you to drop everything. Right? Just imagine, there may be a point I ask your input on something, and you just discard your current work. Your coworkers have to pick up the slack, and maybe months of experiments are ruined. Worse comes to worst, lives are lost. I can't have that on my shoulders, and neither should you—or any hanar—put it there."
Silence followed, long enough to become uncomfortable for Revy, but CASIE indicated it wasn't for Belan, and that he was contemplating.
"This One… is shamed to have offended the Shepherding One. It was sent to the Shepherding One by the Illuminated Primacy itself, but it failed in its task. This One is but an… egg, not yet to hatch into the atmospheres. Its preparations were not sufficient, and it was hubris which led This One on its path. This One will do ask for forgiveness and do penance in the name of the Enkindlers, for it has failed Their emissary."
"Failing, Shmailing," Revy tossed out. "This was a tangent anyway.
"Belan, what caught my interest wasn't your zeal in following my 'order', but what you did. You're a biotic, I assume?"
"This One is versed in the biotic arts, yes, but it isn't an adherent. This one can float in the atmospheres but seconds without crutches of artifice. If the Shepherding One's interest lies therein, the Ridged Ones may teach you."
"Naa, I'm already getting classes in that. No, I was curious how you fiddled with your biotics at that intricate level. I mean, any half-wit can toss boxes biotically, but to move threads takes a steady hand. Tentacle. Whatever, you know what I mean."
"Ah, This One understands. It is not a teacher, and This One would never presume to advise the Shepherding One on their abilities, but This One found to use its biotic like a limb embiggened This One's understanding of it. What may be a small hammer can still be a big lever."
Revy leaned back, pondering that herself. With some effort she pulled herself back to reality.
"Belan, you never finished your interview. You can do so now, on one condition!"
"This One is eager to comply."
She focussed on the phrases and arm gestures CASIE offered, then continued. "As long as you work for me, my word has only the weight of my worldly position, not that of an… emissary."
"This One thinks it understands, but… no, This One will think first and only after inquire for clarification."
"Well, you'll have your interview first, but then you can think, so sure, go ahead."
All the hanar's tentacles half rose, a gesture CASIE translated as fluster.
"Now? This One isn't prepared!"
Revy grinned a smile that would be more appropriate on her mother's face on the battlefield than on a young woman heading one the bigger R&D companies of the galaxy. Though… maybe not.
————————
As you might expect, critique and comments
If this qualifies for reward, here are the priorities:
- Anything that would thematically fit and happened to be not RP.
- QEC (part 2 of this omake will make the connection obvious)
- Iron Man II
- General RP pool.
Last edited:
- Location
- The U.P.
I was kind of wondering if it was a bit of backdoor help for the war effort too. The Council lifts the restrictions just as the SA gets into a war and Arc reactors are just as important as Eezo as a war material. So it is an easy way to make sure that PI doesn't have to choose between the SA military or the Citadel if things go bad and the SA needs every Arc Reactor for a couple of quarters.
- Location
- Germany
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Title: Psychology by accident
It's possible that the Council struck a deal with the SA or otherwise used it as a political marker to show its support, yes.
Has anyone consider building a few shipyards at relay hubs?
Not factory shipyards but a few to do repairs on the SA fleet?
Last edited:
Knowing Mordin
he likely got the joke and is now doing the same to his buddies in STG
Likely saying that it is some new important PI technological development.
Lord Death
The ignored one.... This was meant to be a joke
- Location
- RULE BRITANNIA!!!!!
Ghostdevil
The Devil of Ghosts
- Location
- United States
We probably could research them, but is not an efficient way to spend our time right now, besides they won't be that fast for awhile making mass effect ftl and relays still faster
Lord Death
The ignored one.... This was meant to be a joke
- Location
- RULE BRITANNIA!!!!!
But it's still a thing to look into if possible. If we manage to make it faster than standard FTL to a point it's viable to long range travel across at least minor relay ranges. For instance with the Slipspace drives, to people that have no way to see it we can just drop right the fuck out of nowere more or less behind there fleet.
On another note if i'm sort of understanding slipspace correctly we could combine that and ME FTL to go even faster since we could probably hit relative FTL inside Slipspace.
Found this
Slipspace velocities are generally dependent on the ship's momentum on transition, as the Slipspace drive itself does not generate thrust. As a result, ships that are faster in normal space, such as corvettes, usually travel faster than others in the Slipstream as well.
Last edited:
- Location
- Germany
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Will it be enough to matter when the Reapers come, or are you going for an ark?
Lord Death
The ignored one.... This was meant to be a joke
- Location
- RULE BRITANNIA!!!!!
Being more or less invisible to reapers while in FTL and ontop of that not NEEDING to use the relays...yea that would probably be usful
And if we really wanted we could probably set up ark ships. We gotta get to Andromida some how.
- Location
- Low Earth Orbit
So… Omake time? Omake time. Ties into my previous omake "Psychology by Accident", named thusly by MTB. Thanks, buddy. And thanks to @TheEyes for naming this one, too.
Physics by Accident
Revy was in her lab. Her personal, messy lab, not the clean and orderly and PR sanctified lab. Therefore most plane surfaces were cluttered by this knickknack or that, and multiple variations of arc reactors lay in various states of disassembly on her workbench. She'd had some ideas she wanted to test for a new generation, but she was currently stuck and needed some distraction, something that didn't deal with arc reactors whatsoever.
"Cortana, do we have a researcher on site who doesn't know how arc reactors work?"
"Yes, Dr Shepard. The biological researchers in particular do not have the theoretical background."
"Nah, I'm not in the mood for treehuggers. They really have to get off my back about motile plants. Who else do we have?"
"Many of the theorists of various fields, though understandable not the quantum foam variety."
"Hm… no, too think-y for now."
"Well…" The VI's voice carried a note of exasperation. "By definition the non-human researchers are precluded from the more recent work on arc reactors."
Revy started to pace, regularly tapping her lower lip with a finger as she thought.
"Yeah, that feels more like it."
"Of the two hundred forty six non-human researchers on site, sixty one aren't currently otherwise too preoccupied."
"Non-human… non-human…" Revy murmered, pondering. "Who's the alienist alien in our portfolio?"
"That would be likely Belan, a hanar."
"Hanar? This rings a bell."
"I'd hope so, Dr Shepard, you had an interesting discussion with them. It was the most recent one in which you commented on faith."
Revy snapped her fingers. "Hah! I know! Okay, sure. Is Belan free to do science with me?"
"They will be, I presume, once the offer is made."
"Ugh… wait for it till he's finished with whatever, but then, sure."
…
Revy juggled two of the blackboxed mechanical clocks with her biotics when the door buzzer rang. She quickly put them aside on the clean desk. The door opened.
"Hello Belan. Glad you could make it."
"This One is pleased as well. It is, however curious. This One knows your species is diurnal sleeps when there is no light."
Revy waved the comment off. "Don't worry, I keep irregular hours. Anyway, this is a kind of social call, I think? I'm hammering my head against this problem and need a distraction." CASIE informed Revy of how that particular line might come across and quickly continued.
"Something that doesn't deal with that field, so I figured you could take my mind off things."
There was an awkward silence, then, until Cortana spoke up. "Dr Shepard, might I remind you of your interest of the 'device' and Belan's approach to solving it at the time?"
"You might. Thanks, Cortana."
"It was a pleasure," the VI answered with a lilt of amusement to it.
"So…" Revy said, picked up one of the clocks and tossed it to the hanar, who deftly caught it in a biotic weave before actually holding it with a tentacle. "How about you tell me what you figured out and how?"
"As you wish," Belan replied. It floated over to the desk and put the clock down, then got to work. As it did, it began to comment on its progress.
"By outside appearance, this is a timekeeper. In the Encompassing we use other measures, but this one appears suited to atmospheric operation.
"This One tried opening it at the seams, but found it too difficult without tools. By applying a web of biotic field strings, and then changing the mass inside, This One was able to feel some of the mechanisms inside."
…
Belan continued the explanation of their investigation for more than an hour when Revy noticed something. She'd only be following his explanation with half an ear, the rest of her attention was snapping about the various current research projects, until something locked.
"What did you just do?"
"This One connected a biotic field to the inner countercurrent screw."
"Yeah, yeah, I know, I saw that, but… there was something wonky."
"This One doesn't understand.
"How exactly did you connect them?"
"This One birthed a biotic field with the fore front digit and the mid front digit and weaved them like gears, so one may impart the other. Then one's power was decreased to let it pass into the timekeeper's mechanics. The other digit then tucked the former's biotic field, as the former is too thinly strung to be manipulated without tearing it asunder."
"That… I know what you're saying, and I get the mechanics, but… it looks almost like…" Revy stood up. She'd been sitting next to Belan, to get a better look at his work, even if she hadn't tried to repeat his biotic feats herself.
She began pacing.
"Quantum Entanglement is proven true, but it's not a superluminal propagation of information, that was proven more than two hundred years ago. But we have superluminal information, as far the then accepted paradigm goes, by virtue of mass effect."
"You are correct, Dr Shepherding One. Beziquen's formulation of the quantum foam energy equations does not solve otherwise."
"Yes, yes, I've read those. Good on their own, but they don't account for T'Kauli inference. Or rather, only for the special case according to Ben ab Duda'asm. I think he was the one? Doesn't matter, what does is it being a special case."
Via her ANI Revy called up a holographic blackboard in the middle of the room. By the time she'd walked over there, here hyper modular VIA had actually build a functional facsimile for her to write on, curtesy of Cortana.
"Belan, come here. You were working on metamaterials, right? You gotta have some grounding in quantum physics."
"This One does. It's thesis at the university of Everflowing Current Encircling the Fiery Darkness reviewed the then current theories."
"Perfect! Grounding, like I said."
Revy ignored the admonishment CASIE sent her.
"See, we can have all the subluminal and superluminal entanglement all we have, there's no information transfer in Einstein-Kleisenwitch space. Even ME fields don't work, the particles decohere due to the Nguyen limit once they reach relativistic transference in EK space. Let's ignore the micro-dimension for now, they're not that important right now."
As Revy was talking, she was also rapidly scribbling on the blackboard. Cortana took the liberty of saving her original writing, but also substituting it for more legible one, straightening out her diagrams, and so forth.
"What does matter is the… huh, you aren't cleared to know, I think? Wait, no, the patent is out, you are!" She rubbed her hands, grinning.
"Perfect. Where was I?"
"Micro-dimensions, Shepherding One."
"Ah, yes, ignoring that, but not. You know, the arc reactor does kinda draw energy from the vacuum, but not, right? I mean, it can't directly form the vacuum, that would violate the first law of thermodynamics, but we're kinda cheating with the zeroth law anyway, so who cares. What I'm getting at, we're basically accessing the micro dimensions and they're one-dimensional. Insofar as dimensions can have dimensions, in any case. What I'm getting at, all arc reactors are tapping into the same resource."
By now the blackboard was full. With a slap onto the blackboard and a swipe another was summoned while the first one rolled off to the side.
"So what if we were to, say push a quasi-entangled virtual particle into the dimension at EK coordinates A and out at EK coordinates B?"
Belan added their own notations, with multiple tentacles writing at the same time. This time Cortana didn't change anything, but pinged Revy's ANI with translation overlays over the—to her unreadable—ideograms. "This One would think it impossible, as the second law of quantum uncertainty makes this impossible."
Revy waggled her hand. "Kinda? I mean, I was thinking of using an ME field in conjunction with… do we have electroweak force emitters? Hm… no, that doesn't work. Maybe with particle accelerators? Didn't I have one? Or help power one?
"Anyway, getting distracted. What I meant was, with the Electroweak force in an ME field of sufficient strength as a bridge we might tunnel from one arc reactor to another and make their 'horizon' behave like virtually entangled particles. Kinda. I'm not sure on the terminology."
In this last burst Revy had invented two new signs for physical notation, which, after a quick referral by Cortana, were also replaced by more legible ones, asterisked with explanations. They might be replaced at some point, since they were amalgams of already existing signs and defined meanings, but she'd needed them now, so there.
The hanar, far out of its depth, was silent for a long while, one Revy granted at CASIE's insistence.
"This One's innards do not disagree, as your people's saying goes."
"Great! We have to verify with experiments and… ugh, I gotta write it down for others to actually understand."
"The scientific community would appreciate that, Dr Shepard," Cortana agreed.
————————
May I interest someone again in naming this thing?
As before, if reward, then
This basically boils down to: 2 arc reactor + big particle accelerator = instantaneous information transfer between both arc reactors. The information would be transmitted by vibrations or something otherwise detectable on the event horizon of the pseudo white whole that is an arc reactor. Might trickle down into minor fluctuations in the energy grid the arc reactor is connected to.
What does this mean? There's no instantaneous communication between every QEC terminal, but only between paired arc reactors. This would have interesting logistical implications as well (protect the major arc reactor because duh, or protect the subsidiary but communication relevant arc reactors; drone carriers would have more grapes than apples arc reactors, …)
Physics by Accident
Revy was in her lab. Her personal, messy lab, not the clean and orderly and PR sanctified lab. Therefore most plane surfaces were cluttered by this knickknack or that, and multiple variations of arc reactors lay in various states of disassembly on her workbench. She'd had some ideas she wanted to test for a new generation, but she was currently stuck and needed some distraction, something that didn't deal with arc reactors whatsoever.
"Cortana, do we have a researcher on site who doesn't know how arc reactors work?"
"Yes, Dr Shepard. The biological researchers in particular do not have the theoretical background."
"Nah, I'm not in the mood for treehuggers. They really have to get off my back about motile plants. Who else do we have?"
"Many of the theorists of various fields, though understandable not the quantum foam variety."
"Hm… no, too think-y for now."
"Well…" The VI's voice carried a note of exasperation. "By definition the non-human researchers are precluded from the more recent work on arc reactors."
Revy started to pace, regularly tapping her lower lip with a finger as she thought.
"Yeah, that feels more like it."
"Of the two hundred forty six non-human researchers on site, sixty one aren't currently otherwise too preoccupied."
"Non-human… non-human…" Revy murmered, pondering. "Who's the alienist alien in our portfolio?"
"That would be likely Belan, a hanar."
"Hanar? This rings a bell."
"I'd hope so, Dr Shepard, you had an interesting discussion with them. It was the most recent one in which you commented on faith."
Revy snapped her fingers. "Hah! I know! Okay, sure. Is Belan free to do science with me?"
"They will be, I presume, once the offer is made."
"Ugh… wait for it till he's finished with whatever, but then, sure."
…
Revy juggled two of the blackboxed mechanical clocks with her biotics when the door buzzer rang. She quickly put them aside on the clean desk. The door opened.
"Hello Belan. Glad you could make it."
"This One is pleased as well. It is, however curious. This One knows your species is diurnal sleeps when there is no light."
Revy waved the comment off. "Don't worry, I keep irregular hours. Anyway, this is a kind of social call, I think? I'm hammering my head against this problem and need a distraction." CASIE informed Revy of how that particular line might come across and quickly continued.
"Something that doesn't deal with that field, so I figured you could take my mind off things."
There was an awkward silence, then, until Cortana spoke up. "Dr Shepard, might I remind you of your interest of the 'device' and Belan's approach to solving it at the time?"
"You might. Thanks, Cortana."
"It was a pleasure," the VI answered with a lilt of amusement to it.
"So…" Revy said, picked up one of the clocks and tossed it to the hanar, who deftly caught it in a biotic weave before actually holding it with a tentacle. "How about you tell me what you figured out and how?"
"As you wish," Belan replied. It floated over to the desk and put the clock down, then got to work. As it did, it began to comment on its progress.
"By outside appearance, this is a timekeeper. In the Encompassing we use other measures, but this one appears suited to atmospheric operation.
"This One tried opening it at the seams, but found it too difficult without tools. By applying a web of biotic field strings, and then changing the mass inside, This One was able to feel some of the mechanisms inside."
…
Belan continued the explanation of their investigation for more than an hour when Revy noticed something. She'd only be following his explanation with half an ear, the rest of her attention was snapping about the various current research projects, until something locked.
"What did you just do?"
"This One connected a biotic field to the inner countercurrent screw."
"Yeah, yeah, I know, I saw that, but… there was something wonky."
"This One doesn't understand.
"How exactly did you connect them?"
"This One birthed a biotic field with the fore front digit and the mid front digit and weaved them like gears, so one may impart the other. Then one's power was decreased to let it pass into the timekeeper's mechanics. The other digit then tucked the former's biotic field, as the former is too thinly strung to be manipulated without tearing it asunder."
"That… I know what you're saying, and I get the mechanics, but… it looks almost like…" Revy stood up. She'd been sitting next to Belan, to get a better look at his work, even if she hadn't tried to repeat his biotic feats herself.
She began pacing.
"Quantum Entanglement is proven true, but it's not a superluminal propagation of information, that was proven more than two hundred years ago. But we have superluminal information, as far the then accepted paradigm goes, by virtue of mass effect."
"You are correct, Dr Shepherding One. Beziquen's formulation of the quantum foam energy equations does not solve otherwise."
"Yes, yes, I've read those. Good on their own, but they don't account for T'Kauli inference. Or rather, only for the special case according to Ben ab Duda'asm. I think he was the one? Doesn't matter, what does is it being a special case."
Via her ANI Revy called up a holographic blackboard in the middle of the room. By the time she'd walked over there, here hyper modular VIA had actually build a functional facsimile for her to write on, curtesy of Cortana.
"Belan, come here. You were working on metamaterials, right? You gotta have some grounding in quantum physics."
"This One does. It's thesis at the university of Everflowing Current Encircling the Fiery Darkness reviewed the then current theories."
"Perfect! Grounding, like I said."
Revy ignored the admonishment CASIE sent her.
"See, we can have all the subluminal and superluminal entanglement all we have, there's no information transfer in Einstein-Kleisenwitch space. Even ME fields don't work, the particles decohere due to the Nguyen limit once they reach relativistic transference in EK space. Let's ignore the micro-dimension for now, they're not that important right now."
As Revy was talking, she was also rapidly scribbling on the blackboard. Cortana took the liberty of saving her original writing, but also substituting it for more legible one, straightening out her diagrams, and so forth.
"What does matter is the… huh, you aren't cleared to know, I think? Wait, no, the patent is out, you are!" She rubbed her hands, grinning.
"Perfect. Where was I?"
"Micro-dimensions, Shepherding One."
"Ah, yes, ignoring that, but not. You know, the arc reactor does kinda draw energy from the vacuum, but not, right? I mean, it can't directly form the vacuum, that would violate the first law of thermodynamics, but we're kinda cheating with the zeroth law anyway, so who cares. What I'm getting at, we're basically accessing the micro dimensions and they're one-dimensional. Insofar as dimensions can have dimensions, in any case. What I'm getting at, all arc reactors are tapping into the same resource."
By now the blackboard was full. With a slap onto the blackboard and a swipe another was summoned while the first one rolled off to the side.
"So what if we were to, say push a quasi-entangled virtual particle into the dimension at EK coordinates A and out at EK coordinates B?"
Belan added their own notations, with multiple tentacles writing at the same time. This time Cortana didn't change anything, but pinged Revy's ANI with translation overlays over the—to her unreadable—ideograms. "This One would think it impossible, as the second law of quantum uncertainty makes this impossible."
Revy waggled her hand. "Kinda? I mean, I was thinking of using an ME field in conjunction with… do we have electroweak force emitters? Hm… no, that doesn't work. Maybe with particle accelerators? Didn't I have one? Or help power one?
"Anyway, getting distracted. What I meant was, with the Electroweak force in an ME field of sufficient strength as a bridge we might tunnel from one arc reactor to another and make their 'horizon' behave like virtually entangled particles. Kinda. I'm not sure on the terminology."
In this last burst Revy had invented two new signs for physical notation, which, after a quick referral by Cortana, were also replaced by more legible ones, asterisked with explanations. They might be replaced at some point, since they were amalgams of already existing signs and defined meanings, but she'd needed them now, so there.
The hanar, far out of its depth, was silent for a long while, one Revy granted at CASIE's insistence.
"This One's innards do not disagree, as your people's saying goes."
"Great! We have to verify with experiments and… ugh, I gotta write it down for others to actually understand."
"The scientific community would appreciate that, Dr Shepard," Cortana agreed.
————————
May I interest someone again in naming this thing?
As before, if reward, then
- Whatever is deemed thematically appropriate that isn't RP.
- RP for QEC
- RP for Iron Man II
- RP pool
This basically boils down to: 2 arc reactor + big particle accelerator = instantaneous information transfer between both arc reactors. The information would be transmitted by vibrations or something otherwise detectable on the event horizon of the pseudo white whole that is an arc reactor. Might trickle down into minor fluctuations in the energy grid the arc reactor is connected to.
What does this mean? There's no instantaneous communication between every QEC terminal, but only between paired arc reactors. This would have interesting logistical implications as well (protect the major arc reactor because duh, or protect the subsidiary but communication relevant arc reactors; drone carriers would have more grapes than apples arc reactors, …)
Last edited:
- Location
- America
From: Surkesh U HR dept.
To: STG Command
I regret to inform you that the Director is getting quite fed up and wishes for you to retract your covert science teams from the campus or at least not do any examinations of Paragon Industries technology on campus anymore. After acquiring several packages, your agents started acting strangely, mumbling darkly, stalking around, screaming at Paragon Industries branded clocks, sneaking into the campus power station to scream at the arc reactor, and generally scaring the students. This is extremely disruptive and not conducive to learning.
Apologies.
- Location
- Germany
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Playtime
Last edited:
I am fairly sure that rapid (as in, on the fly, in seconds) reconfigurable platforms, ladders, walls, bridges and such, are, in fact, out of our capability to make without this.
1) There's no certainty it's even possible at all
2) We already have the fastest FTL in the galaxy. Yes, Reapers included
3) With Multicore eezo we won't have to discharge at all.
Lord Death
The ignored one.... This was meant to be a joke
- Location
- RULE BRITANNIA!!!!!
1) How do we know if we don't look into it.
2) We should allways aim to be faster.
3) Wat?
On a side note. With an array of ME fields shouldnt Warp be possible since it's the warping of spacetime and mass tends to do that?
Last edited:
- Location
- Germany
- Pronouns
- He/Him
You can simulate a black hole, that warps space-time just fine. And if you believe in life after death, it will also let you travel.
1) Explorative research is great, but, really, we are strapped for RP as it is.
2) 30 Light years per day is fast. It's very unlikely that without massive investment of RPs we'll create something better
3) The main downside of conventional ME travel that's usually brought up is the need to discharge static charge from the core by spending time near planets. With Multicore drives that's no longer a problem, thus negating the only real downside.
Mandabar
Waifu of choice is Rem. Give that girl some hugs!
- Location
- Florida, USA [Yes. Florida *FacePalm*]
Ahhh. I've always wondered why the output of the other research base was reduced by like 90%. I thought for awhile it was because they were still being built or something.
So huh.. This is one major reason to get QEC going? Would majorly boost secure communications and enable Revy to be a bit more hands on the offplanet researchlabs of Mindoir and lower the penalty perhaps to 50% or less.
- Location
- Germany
- Pronouns
- He/Him
If we want a semblance of 'realism', we'd have to take into account that a day has only a finite amount of minutes to visit research groups and inspire them. If we had uploading tech, could copy her and run the copies on multiple research cores ...