This science fiction setting uses concepts and rules from Traveller, applied to three-dimensional near-earth space in the not-so-far future. Events before 2008, the Solar system, and the stars identified here are real. Just about everything else is not.
The launch of the first man-made artifical satellite into orbit around earth in the Sol system on October 14, 1957 AD or 19 Virgo 0 NSC is considered the beginning of the Space Age. Within half a century, the moon had been visited, three successive space stations had been launched into low earth orbit., and myriad unmanned probes had explored the solar system.
In the last half of the century, the first fully reusable suborbital craft were developed, and scaled up to reach the space station. A new permanent station was developed in higher orbit, this one intended as a way station for manned exploration of the Moon and Mars. An astronomical and research observatory was built on the Moon, and the first manned exploration to Mars occurred. Toward the end of the century, the first advances in gravitic technology began to make space travel more accessible than the old chemical rockets.
Early in the second century, as Earth Station continued to grow, the Lunar colony gained its first permanent inhabitants, and more missions to mars took place. Later in the century, a colony was planted on Mars, a manned exploration of Venis from near orbit, was planted, a vistit to Ceres in the asteroid belt, and, near the end of the century, a colony on Callisto, the outermost Galilean moon of Jupiter. At the same time, new advances in physics resulted in development of the Jump drive, which offered the promise of exploration of the stars.
In the third century, the first primitive jump drive was developed and cent to the Alpha Centauri system. The first one-way unmanned probe, sent to Proxima Centauri and broadcast its automated mesage. The first manned expedition also reached its destination but failed to return:, the second never arrived. The third successfully returned, though several of the crew did not survive. The fourth, a significantly larger ship, with detailed observations of the Alphacent system made from Proxima Centauri, was sent to Alpha Centauri, and returned with its scientific mission complate but no survivors. The first colony planted in the Alphacent system was set up to provide purified fuel as well as begin mapping the Alphacent systen. It struggled and numerous members died, but by the end of the century, experienced colonists from Luna, Mars, and Callisto immigrated and stabilized it. Regular monthly visits and in-system craft helped expand the colony. By the end of the century, it began to show success. In the next century, colonies in the Solar system continued to develop. An additional colony on the most habitable planet of the Alphacent system was planted in addition to the original colony: At first, these colonies were government supported, but gradually began to become self-sustaining and capable of growth.
Jump drives contined to develop and the first colony, little more than a research station, planted at Barnard's Star, which was shortened to Barnard. Soon thereafter, more of the same class of ship were developed and Barnard star was used as the jumping point for further exploration of Ross 154.
This was renamed Terminus, because without better developments in the jump drive, this was as far as explortion could go. Only a small and sometimes intermittently manned research station was planted there. Alphacent was more or less bypassed, although as the site of the second-most hospitable planet in explored space, it continued to grow. However, further developments in jump technology made it possible to jump directly from Alphacent to Barnard's star, and a three-way trade began to develop.
Later on, as jump drive capacity and range increased, it became possible to make the jump from Terminus to LaCaille 8760, which was given the name Gateway, because it gave access to an an entire cluster of relatively close stars, called the Ceti Cluster. From this point, colonization could begin in earnest. The colony at Barnard began to boom, and the hastily expanded one at Terminus did also. The colony at Alphacent, while not on the direct route, nevertheless served as an alternate supplier to earth, especially for specialized organics. Although research into jump technology continued, it slowed considerably, as industrialists began to pour resources into the construction of exploration vessels, colony ships, freighters, and couriers.
The second colony established in the Ceti Cluster was at Epsilon Indi, which was named Seneca. This provided the most attractive site for colonization that had been found since the initial discoveries at Alphacent, and a steady trickle of new colonists began to come all the way from Earth. This was far more attractive than the site at Gateway, which nevertheless benefitted greatly from a closer source of trade goods than distant earth.
A third colony was at the star once known only by the obscure catalog number of CD -49 13515, which was called Eldoret. Although not especially attractive in itself, Eldoret offered the opportunity to take exploration in a different direction than the Ceti cluster. This was not immediately followed up. Instead, starting from Gateway, exploration went toward the heart of the Ceti Cluster.
An obscure star similar to Eldoret, formerly called Lacaille 9352, was named Kepler. Althourh Kepler was not in itself a particularly attractive star, its more or less central location later became important.. The next nearby system, at EZ Aquarii, was a triple star, composed of two stars in close orbit around each other, and a third nearby, all of them tiny M-class dwarfs.
Although the rotations and orbital motions of the earth and the moon had been used since the earliest recorded history, the proposed colonization of Mars suggested that the time had come for a simplifed calendar, one which could be detached from the planetary motions of earth. The New Space Calendar employed a year of 360 days exactly, divided into twelve months of 30 days each. Each day was 864000 standard seconds long. The months were named after the 12 signs of the ancient Zodiac: Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, Saggitarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, Pisces. However, since the NSC is about 5 days shorter than the Terrestrial year, there is no other connection to western astrology.
| Event | Gregorian | New Space |
| NSC Begining | 19 April 1957 | 1 Aries 0 |
| Sputnik Launch | 4 Oct 1957 | 19 Virgo 0 |
| First Lunar landing | 21 July 1969 | 8 Virgo 12 |
| 1 Jan 2008 | 10 Virgo 51 |
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