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Beamrider Network

Interstellar mass beam propulsion network

Beamrider Ship
Image from Steve Bowers
A beamrider ship spreads its magnetic sail. This ship has three hulls arranged around its outermost ring; these carry fuel and propellant, which can be used to decelerate at the destination, or used for additonal acceleration if necessary

The idea of an interstellar mass beam propulsion network was first conceived in the mid first century AT (late 20th and early 21st centuries c.e.). Today there are more beamrider routes than wormholes in the galaxy as a whole.

The Network uses arrays of mass beam projectors (also known as Boostbeams) to magnetically accelerate self-maneuvering "smart dust" micropellets to near light speed and direct them toward a vessel equipped with a powerful magnetic plasma sail. The pellets vaporize upon impact with the magsail and transfer their momentum to the craft, accelerating it to a significant percentage of lightspeed. Once accelerated up to cruising speed, the beamrider coasts on a course that takes it past a series of stars, brown dwarfs, and free-floating extra-solar planets. Additional mass-beam booster stations are built on and around these objects. Using a combination of the galactic magnetic field, onboard fuel, and mass beams from the booster stations, the beamrider is able to curve its course in a great arc back to its starting point, which is now used as another booster station to send the vessel around the circuit once again.

As the beamrider passes near each of the booster stations, additional cargo, passenger, and resupply pods are accelerated to match velocity with the ship or are dropped off to be decelerated into the target system. Although the energy required to accelerate/decelerate the pods is considerable, it is far less than that required to constantly boost and decelerate entire self- sufficient spacecraft intended to survive years-long journeys between the stars all by themselves. The Network makes a huge initial investment to boost the main vessel up to speed to take advantage of the much greater savings later.

Beamrider links rarely operate with just a single vessel in the circuit. Rather a great many vessels are boosted up over time so that a constant stream of ships is passing along the network. This ensures that a vessel passes by each station at regular intervals, usually ranging from every six months to every three years on most routes.

History

Although ideas for interstellar beamrider ships and cycler networks date back to the Information Age, it was not until the fifth century AT that various elements came together to make them a reality. In 432 AT, researchers from Hygeia University published a paper on the practicality of an interstellar beamrider cycler network. It claimed that not only was an interstellar beamrider network feasible with current technology, but that it would greatly improve the efficiency and speed of interstellar travel while dramatically reducing the amount of reaction mass required. The network would function by constructing mass-beam projector stations (even then often referred to as boostbeams) around a series of stars, brown dwarfs, and rogue planets. The stations would form a closed loop, allowing ships to accelerate and then cycle between systems without having to slow down. The initial and final stages of travel to and from the linked systems would take place using comparatively small, low mass 'shuttles' propelled by a combination of the local boostbeams and magnetic braking sails, while the primary cycler would receive occasional boosts and course adjustment propulsion from the local mass-beam projectors in each system. Though this paper was originally obscure, it eventually came to the attention of several high-ranking officials of the Cislunar Alliance, the Gengineer Republic, and the Martian Union, who began to campaign for an interstellar beamrider project. Due to strained relations between the Cislunar Alliance and the Gengineer Republic, they did not collaborate, and each made plans for its own beamrider network. The Martian Union kept its options open by supporting both projects. Martians were among the crew of both the Cislunar and Gengineer missions.

Early Beamrider Network Construction

The Early Beamrider Network

Early Beamrider Network 1
Image from MiyuwiAuthor and Worldtree
The development of the earliest elements of the Beamrider Network, including ships, velocities, and colonization dates.

In 460 AT, the Cislunar Alliance began constructing the first mass-beam projectors at the Venus L4 point, selecting the Tiwa system as its first destination. The program suffered from lack of funds, since most officials favored the Nova Terra Project involving the colonization of Tau Ceti over any beamrider plans. Despite this, those in favor of the construction of an interstellar cycler route viewed this mission as a stepping stone to their goal, both as a proof-of-concept and as establishing the first link of a loop that would be completed at an unspecified time in the future, which they dubbed the Cislunese Walk.

The Gengineer Republic, for its part, selected the Jinvanco system as its destination, and began constructing beam stations around Jupiter and Uranus in 465 AT, powered by the magnetic fields of those worlds. It was intended that from Jinvanco the circuit would extend to a number of more distant candidates, eventually curving back towards Solsys and creating a cycler route dubbed the Phosphodiester Railroad.

Beamrider vessels were designed with the latest automation and von Neumann technology so that on arrival colonists would be able to construct boostbeam stations linking back to Solsys and onward to other stars. Each vessel was approximately 1.5 kilometers long, and carried tens of thousands of sophonts. Their large size resulted in relatively low accelerations, slower cruising speeds, and longer trip times, but this was considered a one-time inconvenience and acceptable price to pay for the eventual benefits an established beamrider system would bring. In 472, the Gengineer-Martian vessel Advance was launched towards Jinvanco, followed in 481 by a combined cyborg and ai Cislunar Alliance team aboard the Karl Schroeder launching towards Tiwa. A much later and significantly faster Gengineer Republic ship, the Rannamaari, was launched in 548 towards Yin-Yang, becoming the first of the beamrider craft to arrive at its destination.

In 565 AT, the disasters of the Technocalypse began wreaking havoc across the whole of Solsys, and Cislunar space was no exception. In a desperate escape attempt, the crew and support staff of the Cislunar mass-beam facility hastily gathered their families and community together and used the beam projectors to launch themselves out of the Solar System and toward Tiwa, on a ship named the Sphere of Dis. Shortly afterward, the remaining beam projectors were destroyed, either by rogue Neumanns from Mercury or rampaging Protowars.

All of the initial missions had been launched with the intention of constructing beamrider links back to Solsys as a first priority. But while in flight the havoc of the Technocalypse and then the Great Expulsion led each crew to independently conclude, after much debate, that linking back to Solsys was too hazardous, deciding instead to construct boostbeam stations with the purpose of accelerating ships further away from Sol. Though a minority expressed worries that boostbeam construction might take away resources from ensuring colony survival, it was a matter of record that each ship had been created with enough resources and technology both to settle and develop their systems and to construct boostbeam stations. Utilizing their advanced automation and von Neumann technology, the colonists were able to develop enough industrial infrastructure to finish construction of the first boostbeam stations within half a century. Missions were launched in due course to a number of nearby stars and brown dwarfs. Yin-Yang would colonize Patala and Praxis-Gnosis, Jinvanco would colonize Rihal, and Tiwa would colonize Akela. The Unified Beamrider Network was organized during this time period, leading to the establishment of a set of Beamrider Network Operational Protocols.

The Beamrider Network Operational Protocols

In 684, Tiwa launched the ship Lana lana towards Yin-Yang with a manifest consisting entirely of AIs and uploads. The resulting mass savings allowed the Lana lana to achieve a top speed of .124c, making the crossing to Yin-Yang in only 73 years. The voyage was meant as a symbolic show of unity and connection - the tensions driving the ancient Cold War between the Cislunar Alliance and Gengineer Republic in Solsys having been forgotten by all except a few historians - while also serving the very practical purpose of allowing both civilizations to discuss important matters without the years-long communication lag that otherwise separated them.

The core matter to be discussed was the issue of standards. Cislunar and Gengineer beamrider technology used separate hardware designs, control software, and communications protocols, as both polities had originally planned to construct their own cycler routes completely separate from each other. The political reasons for building separate networks had vanished, and while the two standards were able to operate together when necessary, for reasons of efficiency and safety, developing a single, standardized network seemed the best option.

When the Lana lana arrived at Yin-Yang in 757, the group that would eventually come to be known as the Unified Beamrider Network Operational Committee was called into session, not only to establish a standard for beamrider technology, but also best practices and procedures for future operations. The committee finished its work in 764, when the Beamrider Network Operational Protocols were finalized and transmitted to Tiwa, Jinvanco, Patala, Rihal, and Akela, gradually becoming adopted by all of them. To prevent drift and spread technical and operational improvements as quickly as possible, dedicated high-bandwidth communications channels were established between the various network systems and designated as a standard element of all future beamline installations. This functionally converted the scattered beamrider colonies into a true interstellar civilization and had a number of beneficial effects, including fostering the (initially unintended) spread of the Yin-Yang unityware, a DNI-based empathy mod originating in the binary brown dwarf system.

Ongoing Development and Federation Contact

The launch of the Gerald Nordley from Tiwa to Akela in 708 was followed by a nearly century-long pause during which no new beamriders were launched and the various second-generation colony missions traveled to their destinations, deployed replicators, and built up their infrastructure and population. This period ended with the Tumerspeid-Henshin Great Race, the first recorded interstellar race in Terragen history. The event was organized as a friendly competition between the populations of Akela and Patala to showcase the new beamrider technologies they had each developed, which allowed for much faster travel. In 797, Akela and Patala simultaneously launched voyages towards each other, with the Akelan Tumerspeid and Patalan Henshin each vying to make the (comparatively short) journey in less time than its opposing vessel. The Tumerspeid would win the race, arriving two years later, with a top record-setting speed of 0.238c, 38% faster than the previous record of 0.173c set by the Gerald Nordley. The arrival of the Tumerspeid was met with great fanfare, as it ushered in a new era of beamrider colonization. The 9th century AT saw numerous new voyages, as Jinvanco colonized Kruger 60 and Gliese 687, Tiwa colonized GJ 3622 and Wolf 424, and a small team from Patala attempted the colonization of WISE 1639-6847, though this would fail in the infamous New Sapphire Incident.

In the First Federation Age, after control of the Solar System was regained and new interstellar vessels launched, contact was reestablished with the descendants of the erstwhile colonists and construction workers living around Yin-Yang, Tiwa, Patala, Praxis-Gnosis, Akela, Rihal, Jinvanco, Kruger 60, Gliese 687, GJ 3622, and Wolf 424. During their long isolation, they had managed to create a vibrant star-spanning civilization of their own, extend their respective networks, and maintain contact with each other, although no complete cycler route had been finished yet.

After centuries of being cut off from Sol, the inhabitants of the cycler systems represented an alliance of independent civilizations that were eager to rejoin the rest of Terragen society, while at the same time maintaining the unique culture and identity they had developed while living on their own. Perhaps more importantly, they desired to continue the great projects they had begun so long ago. With more resources available to them due to new Federation technologies and methods, they set about their work with renewed vigor, sometimes on their own (cf. EV Lacertae and Gliese 526), and sometimes with the help of idealistic Federation visionaries (cf. Unon-Duuz and Howling Sky). The Cislunese Walk and the Phosphodiester Railroad would be completed, along with a number of other cycler routes including Genchey's Glimmers, Familiar Trade, and the Microtubule Railroad. The seeds of what would become the modern Beamrider Network and Deeper Covenant were born.

beamrider station
Image from Steve Bowers
A Beamrider Station showing several beam projector arrays

The Beamrider Network Today

The modern Beamrider Network extends across approximately a third of explored space and passes near just over a hundred million stars, brown dwarves, and extra-solar planets. Nearly all of these systems are inhabited by members of the Deeper Covenant.

Modern beamriders are huge vessels, often extending across hundreds of kilometers of space. Most of the ships' great size is made up of superconducting cables spread out across space with habitat modules affixed near the center of the meshwork. Most ships rotate and individual modules are attached at points where the local gravity is at the desired level.

Despite their impressive dimensions, beamriders are actually rather small by modern standards. Even the largest vessels rarely have a complement of passengers and crew larger than a few hundred people, most of them travelling in biostasis (It is common practice on most ships for passengers and crew to spend 1/3 of the trip awake. Random shuffling of stasis/waking schedules ensures that a traveler will meet at least some new people with each awakening. More than a few people can report that they met their mate or a great romance while travelling aboard a beamrider).

Beamrider 3
Image from Steve Bowers
The smart particles used in modern Beamrider systems remain tightly collimated over interstellar distances, and when they reach the magnetic sail of the beamrider they transfer much of their momentum to the vessel

In the past, beamriders employed a variety of shielding methods to protect themselves against radiation and interstellar debris. Shields were initially a combination of magnetic fields and ionization lasers. Also a plasma screen, consisting of a portion of the vaporized incoming mass stream that was allowed to 'slip thru' the magsail, was fired ahead of the ship and acted to vaporize any larger particles encountered. As a last resort the ship employed powerful radar to locate larger bodies and would then use a combination of magnetic 'tacking' and onboard thrusters to dodge the object in question. At a standard cruise speed of .3 c there was generally time to maneuver at least a little.

In the modern era most beamriders use a combination of magnetic and plasma shields backed up by Emple-dokcetic shielding. A very few ships rely solely on Emple-dokcetic shields, but most crews reject the idea of depending on but a single method to protect themselves and their passengers.

Standard cruising speed for a modern beamrider is .5c although smaller, faster 'hot beam' vessels can achieve speeds as high as .9c.

Throughout most of the history of mindkind the Beamrider Network has provided a constant, if unobtrusive method of travelling between the stars. Although the development of conversion drive, reactionless drives, and wormholes has diverted some traffic from the Network, the majority of systems in the Nexus still make some use of it, if only for recreational purposes. For the majority of isolated solar systems, the Beamrider Network is their main link with the rest of galactic civilization, while the citizens of the Deeper Covenant and some non-militant Backgrounder cultures still make use of it almost exclusively.

Praxis 2
Image from Steve Bowers
This Beam Station in orbit around the brown dwarf Eps Indi Bb projects powerful particle beams towards beamrider ships, to accelerate or decelerate them, or change their course. Several beam projector arrays can be seen, as well as a dynamic orbital ring which helps keep the station on orbit.

 
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Appears in Topics
Deeper CovenantHigh Tech / HitechInterstellar Transport
Megascale Engineering
 
Development Notes
Text by Todd Drashner
some material by M. Alan Kazlev; amended by Steve Bowers and The Astronomer 2019; further amended by MiyuwiAuthor 2025
Initially published on 10 August 2002.

Images by Steve Bowers added April 24, 2008
Beamrider in flight images updated by Steve Bowers Dec 2025
Early Beamrider Network image added December 2025
 
Additional Information
Mass Beam Propulsion, An Overview - Gerald D. Nordley and Adam James Crowl
 
 
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