The Portals and their use

THE PORTALS

The so-called portals are actually fields without any physical structure, made up of exotic particles and waves. Foundation professor Yaqub Fazari believes that the fields can be understood and described mathematically, and when this has been achieved, the people of the Horizon will be able to create new portals. However, this is all just a theory so far. When a ship passes through a portal, it is instantly transported to the next. Each field links two star systems together and jumps can be made both ways, simultaneously and without risk of collision. Jehna Karmathe, the noted Dabaran philosopher, teaches that no two things can happen anywhere at the same time in the universe, and that this explains why parallel passage is safe, but that level of philosophical detail is not something normal skippers care about.

THE DANGERS OF THE PORTALS

One major problem with the star portals is that they aren't stable. Complicated algorithms and sequences are used to calculate the flux of the field and a good entry vector, and getting the math wrong can lead to the ship being torn apart or swallowed by the field, never to be seen again. A second problem is that no living creature can portal jump while awake without suffering serious neurological and mental damage. Stasis technology is required to provide some measure of safety for the crew during a jump. The factions are devoting massive funding into research about ways to get around this, but no one has succeeded so far. The last problem is the jump itself. No one knows exactly what happens in the moment when the ship makes the jump, but according to folklore, evil djinni and other darkmorphs hunt in the vicinity of the portals. There are stories about whole crews waking up from their frozen slumber possessed by unspeakable things from the Dark between the Stars.

THE PORTAL JUMP

Because of the dangers and the complicated calculations, preparing for a portal jump takes about a day. To facilitate easier jumping and to prevent accidents, portal stations have been constructed close to all of the portals. The crew of the portal station aids the skippers in calculating the size of the fields, making for quicker preparations, but at a hefty cost. Since several ships can use one entry vector, jumping in groups to share the cost is common. It is not certain exactly how many ships can use the same coordinates – it depends on the flux of the field and the will of the Icons – but no one wants to go last. The portal stations are also small oases for bored crews and somewhere to make repairs. Larger stations even have vacuum docks for proper service. Poor skippers can wait at the station for other ships to come along to share the jump fee with, or jump solo – using self-calculated coordinates, or piggybacking on another ship. This is both risky and illegal, however. The solo jumper could end up at the edge of the field, collide with the other ships or get too close to their graviton exhausts.