Mike Frantz's Blog: 4 Empires Series - Posts Tagged "galactic-fiction"

4 Empires Thean Academy, first short story in the 4 Empires science fiction series has been published. 4 Empires is a new science fiction series set in the constellation Taurus, starting in the year 3051 A.D. The series will consist of short stories, anthologies and novels. 4 Empires Thean Academy, the first short story, covers the first semester at the Thean Academy for the two main players, Prince Daggen and Princess Sagittaria. Prince Daggen meets Princess Sagittaria and a rivalry develops between Prince Daggen and Prince Abariel. A rivalry that could have consequences for all of Taurus. 4 Empires Thean Academy will be followed by 4 Empires Rivals.

4 Empires Thean Academy is available at the following retailers:

Amazon.com
Apple iBooks
Barnes & Noble.com
Kobo
Smashwords

https://www.4empires.com
Mike Frantz@FrantzAuthor (Twitter)

4 Empires begins in the 22nd Century. It was at this time that physicists developed a theory to do what no one at the time said could be done, travel faster than light. Under the theory, if a 4th dimensional space window could be located, physicists believed that it was possible to travel outside of the 3rd dimension at one point, into the 4th dimension and then back into the 3rd dimension at another point, at a speed faster than light.

NASA engineers designed the first unmanned space craft, Taurus A, to travel through a space window that had been located by a long range and very accurate telescope, in the direction of the Constellation Taurus. Taurus A crash landed into the Atlantic ocean after take-off from Cape Canaveral, when one of its rocket engines failed. An identical space craft, Taurus B, was later launched with the same mission. The space window was reached as estimated after a ten year journey. Images of the Constellation Taurus and the Hyades Star Cluster were received within one month after Taurus B entered the space window. NASA then knew that extremely fast interstellar space travel was possible.

Rocket engines for space craft had not improved that much since space missions of the 21st century and now with the discovery of the space window came the same problem of relatively slow interplanetary travel. NASA engineers then began to work on designs of engines in an effort to improve their speed. Although they did increase rocket velocity somewhat, the determination was made that an alternative fuel source had to be used to increase engine speed.

Physicists were called upon to experiment with dark energy to determine if it could be harnessed as a fuel source. Experiments were conducted and the results showed that dark energy, when a gravitational force was applied to it, created powerful negative pressure which would cause an object to be accelerated at great momentum. It then went back to the NASA engineers to create an engine that could use dark energy safely for a space craft.

The DE 22 rocket was first tested by NASA at White Sands Testing Facility in 2127 A.D. Although the engine proved to be far faster than any previous rocket engine, the rocket veered off the planned course. The navigational controls of a similar rocket were then adjusted and the engine was tested again but the same navigational problems existed. It was then determined that the issue was not with the navigation system of the rocket, instead it was the actual dark energy fuel cells which were causing the rocket to veer.

Two years later this problem was corrected when the fuel cells were stabilized and the DE 23 rocket was launched with no navigational trouble. This was the answer that NASA design engineers wanted. The dark energy engine had increased the ability of a space craft to travel one Astronomical Unit (AU) by six times. This meant that travel from earth to mars, could be accomplished in just under eight days, on closest approach. It was also envisioned that with better space craft and engine designs these interplanetary speeds could be greatly increased.