Chronicles of Sol: The Fall

Humanity has been a spacefaring power for well over a century and an interstellar one for just a couple of years. Despite this the human race has neither developed nor encountered a practical form of teleportation. This doesn’t mean no form exists. Numerous transporters, teleport pads, and quantum gates have been proposed designed and tested in the decades since mankind developed spaceflight. Regardless of the form and the device in question, several common factors have been noted. First is that any successful device has always required two devices, not unlike a radio transmission. In order to send one, you need a device to broadcast the transmission, but there is no point if there isn’t a second device with which to receive the transmission.

Requiring two devices limits the usefulness of teleportation, but why don’t we see it being used on starships? Surely it would be of significant use for moving crew and cargo between ships, even if you can’t materialize armies seemingly out of nowhere or teleport endangered soldiers out of certain death situations. Well to answer that, one has to look no further than the other limitations. These devices are not only limited, but they are also expensive. Worse, no device designed can teleport anything of significant mass. The earliest examples could only move subatomic particles, but more recent ones can move small objects. Unfortunately, by small we mean quite small, only a few hundred grams and in some cases with the especially costly kind a couple of kilograms.

It seems aliens haven’t solved these issues either. As such all known races continue to employ more traditional methods for moving crew and cargo between ships, stations, and planet side ports.

The key to moving large volumes of cargo effectively and efficiently requires a large well-designed cargo fleet. The most important member of which would be the cargo shuttle, effectively a small freight ship, these vessels are the lifeblood of any logistics fleet. Often equipped with high-power sublight drives and a large cargo bay. These engines and the cargo bay allow them to lift a significant payload into orbit from ports on a planetary surface to ships and supply depots in orbit. Where they can be transferred to larger ships or moved again by another cargo shuttle. Cargo shuttles while surprisingly fast when not burdened by bulk cargo are not equipped for interplanetary travel much less interstellar. As such they are often considered short-range craft and are typically attached to capital ships or ports.

Many large capital ships while well-suited to interstellar travel due to their bulk are not well suited to landing on a surface. Cargo shuttles are used to ferry goods to these ships to keep them supplied. Food, fuel, spare parts and munitions are commonly transferred to these vessels via cargo shuttle. Many capital ships carry their own cargo shuttles for ferrying goods but the cargo shuttle doesn’t mean much without a properly designed hanger with which to receive and offload the cargo.

The Enterprise has an excellent example. Her forward hanger is specifically designed for this duty. It has a large landing volume with which to accept cargo and mining vessels. These ships can land here and begin offloading goods. Specialized cargo trams lead into the bay and can be used to transfer those goods quickly and easily to where they need to go. It is this internal network that not only allows the Enterprise to be effectively supplied in orbit without having to land, but it can in return distribute cargo to other ships easily while in the field. Including freshly manufactured goods, as the Enterprise has all the facilities needed to convert raw materials into spare parts, armor plating, and other goods a fleet may need while away from port.

Personnel transfer is a good deal simpler, but no less important. To avoid interfering with main hanger operations many larger vessels have secondary hangers dedicated to the supply maintenance and deployment of small shuttlecraft. These light shuttles are often used to transfer personnel between ships and these bays can be used to receive guests. Personnel shuttles are small and light. Designed to transfer only small numbers of people, but large versions do exist. They like their cargo shuttle versions are short ranged, but still make up a vital part of the logistical network. Getting people where they need to go.