Everyone is familiar with stories of mysterious lights in the sky, thought by many to be visitors from beyond Earth. It turns out they’re right.

Endeavour’s deep space mission has its beginnings in the mid-twentieth century, where ill-fated first contact with extra-terrestrial visitors resulted in their vessels being shot down, captured or crashing. The resulting treasure trove of technology has been picked over by engineers and scientists ever since.

Extra Terrestrial Visitors

Their work has evolved key technologies that will make possible the exploration of star systems by humanity. Multiple engineering programs independently aim to construct and launch vessels to make deep space exploration a reality. 

The ISDC

The International Strategic Deep-space Command (ISDC) is one such program, operating in complete secrecy to construct and launch Endeavour, a starship combining exploration and research capabilities with defensive power.

About the ISDC

Endeavour’s deep space mission will have multiple aspects.

Exploration

Very little is known about the origins of our extra terrestrial visitors, although it is thought multiple civilisations have been encountered so far.

While the ability to reach new star systems and explore new planets, Endeavour’s deep space mission is not purely to satisfy scientific curiosity. Initial research cruises will prioritise discovering the location of advanced alien civilisations.

Exploration

First Contact

Once a civilisation is found, a critical mission objective is to make contact and establish dialogue, with the aim of securing alliances for protection and advanced technology. This is seen as vital to preventing a potential war that the human race may be ill-equipped to fight.

Communication and managing vast cultural differences will be key challenges, with expert exolinguistic and exoanthropology teams aboard to help ensure successful first contact.

First Contact

Defence

It remains unclear what response Endeavour’s presence in deep space will provoke, either from alien civilisations encountered or rival Earth-based programs. The ship will be equipped with weapons and defence systems for protection should diplomacy fail.

Of the technology recovered from alien vessels so far very little has been weapons-based, raising important questions about what to expect if combat is engaged.

Defence

Reports of extra-terrestrial visits to Earth have been documented as far back as 1088, when Chinese official Shen Kuo recorded eyewitness accounts of a "a flying object with opening doors [that] would shine a blinding light from its interior". Such reports became more frequent and detailed from the mid-1940’s although these have typically been classified by authorities, their authors discredited and cover-stories issued in order to prevent public panic.

In fact, many of these reports are true.

Experts have speculated on the cause of an apparent increase in extra-terrestrial activity since World War II. Some suggest that there is no real increase, just an improvement in our ability to detect the visitors. Others have speculated that additional activity may have been triggered by extra-terrestrial interest in the first atomic tests of the period.

Roswell

A pivotal event in Earth’s contact with the visitors occurred in 1947 when an alien craft crashed near New Mexico in the United States. Given the proximity of the crash to a nearby atomic weapon test, some experts believe the EM pulse from the test blast was responsible. The US Air Force quickly took over the recovery operation from local officials, ultimately spawning a research program intended replicate the advanced technology contained in the wreckage.

Other vessels have been recovered around the world, usually after being brought down by military aircraft. The craft have various configurations and sizes, which were initially thought to represent different mission roles such as scouts and larger transport craft. However, when compared it became obvious that they were of different origins, based on significant differences in materials and technology configuration. While it has been extremely rare to recover identifiable remains of occupants, the ISDC believes that the extra-terrestrial visitors represent at least two distinct races or species.

Response Options

Extra-terrestrial visits continue to be reported, although the behaviour of the visiting craft has begun to change and is characterised by tactical experts as more “aggressive”. Visiting craft appear to be adopting more confrontational posture in flight and have become much better at avoiding weapons fire. Most recently, forms of electro-magnetic discharges from craft have been detected, with opinion divided as to whether they are a form of weaponry (due to their effect on avionics systems) or an attempt at communication.

What constitutes an appropriate response to these visits has been fiercely debated. Defence hawks and many in the military see the visits as clear threats to Earth’s security, to which the only valid response is to demonstrate an ability to defend ourselves with force. Others see the visits as peaceful attempts at communication, complicated by the vast differences in technology and language between our species. They insist we should be focussing on improving our ability to reach out to the visitors.

US Airforce Program

The US Air Force program that arose from the New Mexico incident eventually developed sufficient technology to make interstellar travel a real possibility. Initially that program favoured the latter approach of exploration and communication. Senior military leaders and political hawks eventually took control of the program and the vessel’s design and construction is now focussed on the creation of a weapons platform capable of interstellar force projection.

Creation of the ISDC

It was this shift in policy that led to the creation of the ISDC. Many of the leading scientists on the US program became so concerned at the new emphasis on aggression that they defected and sought to form an alternative program to counter the military. Their principal fear is that adopting an aggressive stance with an otherwise peaceful but highly advanced civilisation risks provoking a confrontation Earth cannot survive.

The aim of the new program is the construction of an interstellar platform capable of presenting an alternative point of contact with the visitors, in the hope that establishing communication will lead to peaceful relations and overcome previous misunderstandings.

About the ISDC

The ISDC is committed to deep space exploration and peaceful co-existence with any extra-terrestrial civilisations encountered, but also recognises the need for defence. It is not known how many civilisations may be encountered that are capable of space travel and hostilities may be unavoidable, particularly given potential difficulties with communication and translation.

While not conceived as a warship, the vessel will be designed with defensive capabilities that allow safe operation in the unpredictable environment of deep space. This will include both active defence systems such as torpedoes and passive defence measures such as hull armour.

Limited contact with extra-terrestrial vessels experienced so far has not uncovered any useful information on their weapons systems. This has led the ISDC to mandate a ‘broad-spectrum’ approach to the defence technology it will deploy, encompassing projectile, directed-energy and electronic-warfare systems.

"The vessels we've seen so far don't appear to have much at all in the way of weapons systems," says Master Chief Alex Peterson, one of the ISDC's senior tactical specialists. "This could be because we simply can't recognise an alien weapons system, or that the vessels visiting Earth so far are just smaller, unarmed scout ships."

The type of weapons system encountered will infuence tactical approach. Directed energy systems are thought to be most effective at closer range, encouraging a 'dogfight" style of engagement. Alternatvely, high-speed guided projectile systems (like the torpedos planned for deployment on the ISDC's vessel) encourage longer-range engagements, which rely more heavily on the skills of weapons direction and tactical sensor crews.

"We'll be simulating a lot of tactical scenarios during training," says Peterson. "We want crews to be ready for whatever gets thrown at them out there."

More on Combat

Terrestrial Threat

Extra-terrestrial threats are not the ISDC’s only concern. The US Air Force currently believes it has a monopoly on deep-space capability and it is thought likely their leadership will react unfavourably should they discover the existence of the ISDC – which is almost inevitable when the vessel launches. The ability to defend the terrestrial interests of participating governments is therefore a required capability for the vessel.

The ISDC is aware that we share the galaxy with one or more advanced alien civilisations, although contact to date has been limited to tactical engagements with often unfortunate outcomes. Much of the advanced technology that will be used to reach deep space has been recovered from encounters like these.

A key mission objective for the ISDC is to make first contact with these civilisations and establish diplomatic relations. This is seen as vital to preventing a potential war that the human race may be ill-equipped to fight, although little is known about the motivation behind recent visits to Earth and even less about the visitors themselves.

To date there has been no direct contact with any extra-terrestrial visitors. A number of corpses have been recovered which has driven speculation that there may be more than one extra-terrestrial race visiting Earth, although as the ISDC’s lead exo-biologist Dr Daffyd Jones admits, “any physiological differences may simply be the result of gender. We just don’t know enough about them at this stage.”

As to why the visitors have come to Earth, analysis of recovered vessels has failed to detect any form of weapons system. This suggests the visitors are not inherently hostile but simply curious. Alternatively, it may mean such systems are simply too advanced to be recognised, or that the vessels are shuttles or scouts and so not equipped with weapons.

The governments behind the ISDC are not yet prepared to assume the worst, however.

Diplomacy

The drive for diplomacy is one of the major differences with the rival program run by the US Air Force and is why the ISDC was established.

A group of senior scientists and strategists from the US deep space program had become alarmed at the extent of militarisation within that program, fearing it would likely provoke a war that humanity could not win. With no international co-operation, the group also felt it ethically problematic that the rest of the world would only learn of the situation when war broke out.

Concerned that too little was being learnt about the extra-terrestrial visitors to justify the US ‘defence-first’ policy, a subsection of the group staged a dramatic defection in co-operation with sympathetic elements within the Australian government and military, staging their own deaths in a plane crash and relocating in secret to Australia. Even now the US Air Force continues to think the missing scientists are dead.

Communication

A major challenge to making first contact will be finding a way to communicate. Even assuming that the visitors use verbal modes of communication, it is highly likely their language will be fundamentally different to anything heard on Earth.

“We need to create an understanding of language at a much higher level of abstraction than needed for simply translating between terrestrial languages,” says exo-linguistics specialist Dr John Smith.

“We’re searching for the fundamental building blocks of language – the ones needed for any form of complex communication, even non-verbal. But using that to deliver translations in the field under these kinds of circumstances is… well, it’s mind-blowing.”

A key aspect of the ISDC’s mission is deep space exploration. The ability to explore stellar systems and phenomenon at close range is expected to provide unparalleled insights into our universe in a way that long-range telescopy cannot.

The technology being harnessed by the ISDC with the construction of Earth’s first deep space vessel will make extensive exploration within our galaxy possible. Scientists will be able to visit stars and orbit the planets thought to be contained within them, gaining valuable first-hand data where only theoretical conjecture was previously possible.

The ISDC’s leading astronomers, astrophysicists and planetary-science experts speculate that a host of new phenomena not even visible from Earth will be discovered, potentially re-writing scientific texts for years to come. To achieve this, the ISDC’s vessel will be designed as a scientific platform, replete with sensors and instruments that will allow near-range, orbital and even planet-side analysis possible.

Strange New Worlds

Recent evidence suggests that there are far more potentially habitable planets in the galaxy than previously thought, opening up the possibility of making contact with other sentient races.

“Even without the chance of meeting new civilisations, the ability to explore different planetary systems as closely as we can Earth will be of mind-blowing significance,” says Dr Leandro Hogan, a geophysics specialist within the ISDC’s Planetary Science division.

“I can’t tell you how exciting it will be to see data come through the sensors from our first orbital scans outside the solar system. For a scientist it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity.”

The vessel will have the capability of sending exploration teams to the surface of suitable planets, although whether any will be found remains uncertain.

“Given the sheer number of star systems that will now be in reach, I’m confident we’ll find them,” says Hogan.

“The trick will be figuring out where’s best to look first.”

Getting There... and Back

Currently the ISDC is making clandestine use of major telescope arrays around the world to create stellar ‘maps’ that will assist with navigation once the vessel is outside the familiar confines of our solar system. The ability to pinpoint the vessel’s location from vastly different areas of the galaxy will be vital to the success of the mission.

“Traditional, long-range astronomy will still have a role,” according to Dr Zoe Lindquist, an astronomy specialist working on the ISDC’s stellar cartography project.

“Knowing how to get where you’re going next – or even how to get home – needs new techniques and approaches to astronomical navigation that we’ve never really seen before.”

Welcome to the team! Your contribution will make the dream of deep space exploration a reality. The ISDC has provided online tools to help you – this is a brief overview.

Logging In

The crew portal is at isdc.network. The homepage will display your personalized portal page.

Clicking the ISDC logo at the top left of the screen will always take you back to the home page.

Getting Help

You can ask for help at any time using the contact form, which is accessible from the top right of every page, next to your profile pic.

Clicking or hovering over an icon or symbol will usually give you more information about what it is.

Your Profile

Your profile represents you in the ISDC universe. You can access and edit your profile at any time by clicking your avatar (profile pic) in the top right of the window. Clicking someone else's pic takes you to their profile.

Your profile includes information others can't see such as your XP transactions.

Messaging System

The ISDC operates its own internal messaging system, which allows you to communicate with other members without needing to know their email or IM details.

To access your inbox, click the messaging icon in the top right of the window, next to your profile pic. If you have new messages, a red dot will appear over the messaging icon.

Sending Messages

You can message anyone by visiting their profile and clicking the SEND MESSAGE button at the top-right of their profile.

This opens a new message screen, where you can enter the username(s) of the people you want to contact. As you type a username, the system will provide a list of possible matches.

To find someone’s username, just hover your mouse over their profile pic wherever you see it.

Collaboration and Discussion

A key part of your experience with the ISDC will be sharing ideas, news and views with your crewmates. The site offers a number of features to facilitate this.

Groups

Groups are Facebook-style collaboration spaces that allow members with similar interests or working in the area to share updates, exchange insights and debate ideas.

The available groups can be viewed under the NETWORK menu option.

Discussions

Commenting on blogs or group posts is a great way to start or participate in a discussion. Comments appear as a threaded discussion under the original blog or post.

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