December 2017 Post

(from “The Archives of the United Nations Quantum Corps”)

“The Battle at Conamara Chaos: Part I”

Q2 Intelligence Briefing (NOFORN)

One of the most consequential and significant battles that UN Quantum Corps and UN Frontier Corps fought against the advance elements of the Old Ones was the Battle at Conamara Chaos.  Here’s an orbital look at the battlefield, with a surface view of the icescape of Europa:

The battle was fought entirely below the ice, with the Frontier Corps ship FCS Trident making her borehole west of one of the surface linea at the point indicated. 

Trident’s mission was simple to state: to locate, engage and, if possible, render harmless the suspected elements of the Old Ones’ advance scouts thought to be present below Europa’s ice.  Long-range decoherence wake analysis from Station P in Mars orbit and Gateway in Earth orbit had determined that a large fluctuating quantum system was present at Europa.  Intelligence analysts determined from multiple sources and from this analysis that the source could only be the long-suspected Keeper, a known reconnaissance formation working to scout the outer solar system in preparation for the arrival of the Old Ones’ mother swarm.  Trident’s mission was to investigate and take direct action to render such a sentinel effectively harmless.

The initial engagement occurred on or around January 2, 2100 (see Johnny Winger and the Golden Horde for details).

Upon detection and a cautious approach, Trident came to a full stop about five hundred meters away.  The crew discussed their options.  Sonar resolution and what visuals they could get indicated the object must be the Keeper system.  It was a large buoyant platform, surmounted by spheres and other structures.  It was floating freely, but something was keeping it stationary in fixed position…perhaps some kind of thrusters.  The most telling evidence came from the expedition’s quantum engineering specialists (CQE’s).  The object was emitting quantum state waves at a very hard-to-detect entanglement level.  “It’s a quantum device,” one of the techs determined.  And even as the sonar resolved the shape and extent of the object, nearly half a kilometer in longest dimension, its shape changed again and again, morphing from one state to another, right before their eyes.

This was going to be a most unusual engagement.

Intelligence from Q2 determined that the Keeper was in fact a portal to the Old Ones, though the crewmembers didn’t know at the time if it could physically transport anything or if it was more like a comm portal.  In time, they would learn that the Keeper could communicate directly with the Old Ones and could transport objects across physical time and space for limited distances and time periods.  It could move things around the Solar System and it could also move small objects through time.  It was at the same time a transmitter, an archive and a kind of ‘library’ of all possible states for a defined period of solar system history, from just after the Sun formed to now.  All these things would be learned later by the task force. 

Colonel John Winger, expedition commander, made the decision.  “The only way we’re going to know for sure what we’re dealing with here is to go out there.  Examine it close up.”

Quantum Corps nanotroopers then donned hypersuits equipped for sub-surface activity, armed their weapons, primed their defensive ANAD swarms and exited Trident.

After-action reports from Conamara Chaos detailed what happened next:

The recon team suited up.  They were all respirocyte-treated, but they still needed pressure and temperature protection, plus personal propulsors, so they wore hypersuits that provided these things.  In time, they exited Trident’s airlock and made their way slowly over toward the Keeper platform.  To help out, Trident moved in a little closer, launched some robotic underwater drones and shone floodlights on as much of the platform as they could reach.

It was a vast complex, a huge platform with structures studding top and bottom surfaces.  There were loose smaller nanobotic swarms and swarm elements floating nearby, forming a loose protective sphere around the platform. The water flow around the platform was turbulent and the recon team had trouble maneuvering in the turbulence.  Plus periodic quantum waves passed by and through them and one such wave had the effect of displacing the entire team in time and space right back aboard the Trident, to the time they had just started suiting up for the dive.

Winger and the others shook off the effects of the quantum displacement and realized, to the consternation of Frontier Corps Captain Stella and the rest of the Trident crew, what had just happened.

Winger realized that dealing with this Keeper system and disabling or destroying it were not going to be easy.  Winger summarized the conundrum for Stella and the crew at an impromptu briefing:

“How do we fight an object that can displace us to just about anywhere in time and space as soon as we approach it?”

It was nanotrooper Turbo Fatah that offered evidence that the entire Keeper system was nothing but a giant swarm, collected together to form a transmitting/displacement lens and an archive of quantum states. 

The only sure way to fight a swarm was with another swarm.  Winger and his troopers got to work to devise a tactical plan to achieve their mission.

Additional intelligence from our sources will be provided in the next briefing posted to this platform in the second half of December, as it becomes available.  Monitor all comm channels for updates.

See you in mid-December.

Phil B.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

November 2017 Post

(from “The Archives of the United Nations Quantum Corps”)

“Backgrounder on Off-Earth Settlements, Bases and Facilities”

Q2 Intelligence Briefing (NOFORN)

UN Quantum Corps could not execute many of its assigned missions without the close cooperation of its sister service UN Frontier Corps and Frontier Corps’ many bases and facilities.  This briefing will look at a few key stations that are important to the joint mission of these two agencies.

Mariner City, Mars

Mariner City is a full-scale multinational settlement located at the western end of Ophir Chasma along the rugged scar of the vast Valles Marineris basin in Mars’ northern hemisphere.  The city is located on a plateau at the very edge of a steep escarpment overlooking the Chasma.  It has spectacular views, as might be expected. 

While Mariner City is nominally governed by MarsFed, the Federal Council of Mars Settlements and Communities, the major tenant is Frontier Corps.  From Mariner City, Frontier Corps exercises security, law enforcement and police missions across the entire planet’s surface.  Everything from permits to leave the city locks to venture outside to tracking down fugitives and  smugglers to rescuing marscat or hopper crews that have crashed or suffered breakdowns falls within the purview of Frontier Corps’ Mariner City detachment.  The mission on Mars is somewhat similar to that of coast guard forces on Earth.  The detachment is headed by a Frontier Corps Colonel who reports directly to UNIFORCE headquarters at the Quartier-General in Paris.

Of course, Mariner City (MC) is a full settlement and Frontier Corps is only the major tenant, not the only one.    Research activities are also a key element of what goes on at MC.   All the operations necessary to sustain a human settlement on Mars…agriculture, environmental control, medical, legal, etc are also resident and in full swing there.  By the end of the 21^st century, MC sustains a population of nearly 8000 permanent residents.  It’s the biggest settlement on Mars.

H    Here’s the location:

Station P: Phobos Station

Located in orbit around Mars, Station P is installed both in and around the moon Phobos. 

Here’s what it looks like:

Station P was built initially as a facility orbiting the moon, but later development added structures such as laboratories and shelters on and inside this small satellite.  Much of Phobos has now been hollowed out in a series of caves, tunnels and warrens which provide working and living space for a crew of about four hundred men and women, most of whom serve in Frontier Corps. 

The principle business of Station P is to function as a space dock.  The space dock is a series of docking ports physically anchored in Phobos’ regolith surface, which provide hard docking points for up to four ships, such as the great cycler ships which regularly ply the spacelanes between Earth, Luna, Mars and Venus.  Space Dock provides a variety of maintenance, repair, depot, logistics and other services for docked ships.  As such, it is a key way station for Frontier Corps vessels heading out toward further destinations beyond Mars and a way station and refit site for ships headed to the inner system. 

Station P is headed also by a Frontier Corps Colonel and reports directly to UNIFORCE Paris.

Additional facilities maintained by Frontier Corps are as follows:

Gateway (Earth-Moon L2 point in Earth orbit) – primary repair and refit station for missions in Earth-Moon space and missions heading into and out of Earth orbit.  Gateway also has significant quarantine and health care facilities for crewmembers who need to be medically isolated and treated before entering Earth (or any) biosphere.

Station T (Titan orbit, around Saturn) -  a principle way station for missions to the outer solar system.

A final word should be said about Frontier Corps’ Sentinel System, the farthest physical system maintained by the Corps, beyond the orbit of Pluto and roughly centered around the position of the dwarf planet Sedna.  Details are currently classified but Quantum Corps Times is working with the Corps’ administrative and security departments to provide at least a minimal description of this critical system and its role in the missions of the Corps.  More on this in a later post. 

The next post to Quantum Corps Times will be available on December 1.  This post will look at a key battlefield in the Corps’ campaign to prepare for and ultimately engage the Old Ones.  This battlefield is the sub-ice ocean of Europa, a moon of Jupiter.  And the adversary was the Keeper, an autonomous robotic advance scout for the Old Ones, discovered and engaged in this ocean by courageous units of both Frontier Corps and Quantum Corps…today known as the Battle of Rathmore Chaos. 

Additional intelligence from our sources will be provided in December as it becomes available and is declassified.  Monitor all comm channels for updates.

See you in December.

Phil B.