Red Star Resort - scrap that!
I've just found a second draft with a prologue that I rather like. So . . as you were.
The galaxy was shrinking. Mankind had gone to the Moon and set up bases there, which had served as a springboard to Mars. Centuries of terraforming had rendered the red planet habitable to Humans genetically engineered to survive there. From Mars Humanity had spread further out, plundered the mineral wealth of the solar system. And, predictably, had grown bored. Bored with the planets. Bored with the planetoids, or planetettes, or whatever the hell they were designated this week - poor old Pluto had been reclassified so many times that it was no surprise to anyone when it simply detached from its orbit and buggered off by itself, the cosmological equivalent of 'sod you, I'm taking my ball and taking it away'.
This boredom and Man's insatiable curiosity - or greed - led to intense research into faster than light travel. Research teams from different countries raced one another to find a practical method of travelling to extra-solar planets. Massive budgets fuelled massive egos and these researchers became the new rock stars. Admittedly, the efforts of one doddering professor at the 'Live 1,0008' concert to run on to the stage and powerslide into a guitar solo met with justifiable derision and the viral video 'DON'T THINK AND SLIDE' was the hit of the year.
In the end, though, it was Ethel Briggs of Scunthorpe who stumbled upon the solution to the problem. Ethel had bo education, no qualifications, no super-computers churning out statistics and crunching through calculations. Oh, no. What Ethel had was an instinctinve, but previously unrealised, grasp of hyper physics akin to Mozart's genius in the field of music. One autumn morning Ethel, finishing off her 11 o'clock cup of tea, slurped the last mouthful and thought, 'ahhh, yes, that'd work' and announced her findings on the local video phone-in. Ethel made no money out of her discovery, she didn't want to - all she asked was that the engines based upon her ideas be named after her. Hence, the Etheldrive was born.
Now that Humanity had a practical way to travel at immense velocities impossible in normal space, the design and construction of new ships was begun. Navigational techniques were worked upon as the day approached when the first ship, the SS Magnificent, was built in Earth orbit. the crew were trained intensively, the ship's systems tested and re-tested and the course was computed over and over until there could be no chance of a mistake. The ship was ready.
And was promptly eaten by a monstrous deep space Gulper, lurking just beyond Neptune. A probe shadowing the Magnificent captured the whole thing on camera and relayed it back to Earth, leaving a horrified and shocked mission control silent, until the toilet cleaner chirped up, 'Well, none of you expected THAT did you? Wotcher!'
Fortunately, Gulpers were very rare and it was an enormously unlucky chance that had led to the demise of the Magnificent. Future ships were wary of the mysterious creatures and the initial sensor readings from the probe had provided valuable data. More ships were built and began to reach the stars. And the stain if Humanity spread slowly away from Earth and outwards, through the galaxy. Habitable planets identified centuries earlier were targeted and an aggressive wave of exploration and colonisation began.
In the van of the surge of expansion was the Navy. No fancy titles, no grand names - just the Navy. They were an old-fashioned bunch, tough and hardy but more willing than most to look beyond the garden wall. The Navy was used as the instrument of Man's desire to conquer. Not that there was much conquering to be done; the galaxy was surprisingly bereft of intelligent life. Oh, there was plenty of flora and fauna, but not much that could be described as sentient. Until, one day, an intelligent form of life was discovered. Dinosaurs. A whole planet populated with them.
At first, cordial greetings were exchanged and amicable relations established. However, when representatives of the dinosaurs came to visit Earth, they were shocked by the countless museum exhibits of dinosaur remains. One horrified dinosaur inspected a deinonychus skeleton and roared out 'Noooooo!!!!! Uncle Fred!' (The fact that the skeleton was 80 million years old didn't seem to cut any ice, 'There's a definite family resemblance' another dino noted.) It was all downhill from there. One misunderstanding led to another and soon a full scale war was raging. The Navy, with its ability to bombard a planetary surface from orbit, ended the conflict quickly. The Navy had proved its efficiency in ruthless fashion.
(Note: I ended up rewriting a lot as I typed this, the stuff about Ethel for example just flew into my stupid brain for no good rerason ;-) )
The galaxy was shrinking. Mankind had gone to the Moon and set up bases there, which had served as a springboard to Mars. Centuries of terraforming had rendered the red planet habitable to Humans genetically engineered to survive there. From Mars Humanity had spread further out, plundered the mineral wealth of the solar system. And, predictably, had grown bored. Bored with the planets. Bored with the planetoids, or planetettes, or whatever the hell they were designated this week - poor old Pluto had been reclassified so many times that it was no surprise to anyone when it simply detached from its orbit and buggered off by itself, the cosmological equivalent of 'sod you, I'm taking my ball and taking it away'.
This boredom and Man's insatiable curiosity - or greed - led to intense research into faster than light travel. Research teams from different countries raced one another to find a practical method of travelling to extra-solar planets. Massive budgets fuelled massive egos and these researchers became the new rock stars. Admittedly, the efforts of one doddering professor at the 'Live 1,0008' concert to run on to the stage and powerslide into a guitar solo met with justifiable derision and the viral video 'DON'T THINK AND SLIDE' was the hit of the year.
In the end, though, it was Ethel Briggs of Scunthorpe who stumbled upon the solution to the problem. Ethel had bo education, no qualifications, no super-computers churning out statistics and crunching through calculations. Oh, no. What Ethel had was an instinctinve, but previously unrealised, grasp of hyper physics akin to Mozart's genius in the field of music. One autumn morning Ethel, finishing off her 11 o'clock cup of tea, slurped the last mouthful and thought, 'ahhh, yes, that'd work' and announced her findings on the local video phone-in. Ethel made no money out of her discovery, she didn't want to - all she asked was that the engines based upon her ideas be named after her. Hence, the Etheldrive was born.
Now that Humanity had a practical way to travel at immense velocities impossible in normal space, the design and construction of new ships was begun. Navigational techniques were worked upon as the day approached when the first ship, the SS Magnificent, was built in Earth orbit. the crew were trained intensively, the ship's systems tested and re-tested and the course was computed over and over until there could be no chance of a mistake. The ship was ready.
And was promptly eaten by a monstrous deep space Gulper, lurking just beyond Neptune. A probe shadowing the Magnificent captured the whole thing on camera and relayed it back to Earth, leaving a horrified and shocked mission control silent, until the toilet cleaner chirped up, 'Well, none of you expected THAT did you? Wotcher!'
Fortunately, Gulpers were very rare and it was an enormously unlucky chance that had led to the demise of the Magnificent. Future ships were wary of the mysterious creatures and the initial sensor readings from the probe had provided valuable data. More ships were built and began to reach the stars. And the stain if Humanity spread slowly away from Earth and outwards, through the galaxy. Habitable planets identified centuries earlier were targeted and an aggressive wave of exploration and colonisation began.
In the van of the surge of expansion was the Navy. No fancy titles, no grand names - just the Navy. They were an old-fashioned bunch, tough and hardy but more willing than most to look beyond the garden wall. The Navy was used as the instrument of Man's desire to conquer. Not that there was much conquering to be done; the galaxy was surprisingly bereft of intelligent life. Oh, there was plenty of flora and fauna, but not much that could be described as sentient. Until, one day, an intelligent form of life was discovered. Dinosaurs. A whole planet populated with them.
At first, cordial greetings were exchanged and amicable relations established. However, when representatives of the dinosaurs came to visit Earth, they were shocked by the countless museum exhibits of dinosaur remains. One horrified dinosaur inspected a deinonychus skeleton and roared out 'Noooooo!!!!! Uncle Fred!' (The fact that the skeleton was 80 million years old didn't seem to cut any ice, 'There's a definite family resemblance' another dino noted.) It was all downhill from there. One misunderstanding led to another and soon a full scale war was raging. The Navy, with its ability to bombard a planetary surface from orbit, ended the conflict quickly. The Navy had proved its efficiency in ruthless fashion.
(Note: I ended up rewriting a lot as I typed this, the stuff about Ethel for example just flew into my stupid brain for no good rerason ;-) )