BACKUP 5 is a science fiction thriller which incorporates the technologies and theoretical science now on the border separating the known from the unknown.
The cast of characters are cosmopolitan and presumes the advance of mankind to the edge of deserving preservation as a species. All are intensively trained in their professional fields because it was recognized long ago that education had to begin at a very young age and continue intensively until the individual was fully trained and capable in the chosen field.
The plot is complex because it depicts the initial broad expansion of colonies at widely separated locations. However, many strange and intriguing beliefs and policies are encountered by the reader that were never foreseen.
As the great thinker, Kumoki, First Prime of United Earth, said in his landmark address on space colonization delivered to the United Nations,
"The closest thing to an alien species with whom we might desire to engage in exchanges of knowledge, trade, alliance, and beyond those, love, is found here on earth. Man and Woman can be euphemistically deemed alien species. We must never forget human inertia. Even having been familiar and fully engaged for more than 7 million years, most women still did not understand how a man thinks; most men did not understand how a woman feels or thinks. How could this be? We all know the answer; the sciences had not progressed sufficiently. However, even after they had, it still took almost a century to accomplish the task of fully understanding what could semantically be termed, sub-species. Men and women are fundamentally different in physiology, emotional matrix, and other ways.
It required not just knowledge, even understanding, but a willingness to really see and engage with a significantly different creature, however much one tried to mimmick the other. As we now venture into the cosmos, we are very unlikely to encounter another species so similar as the counterparts of ourselves. We face first understanding who they are, how they think, how they feel. Only then can we even BEGIN the process of engagement.
Moreover, though opinions differ, I suspect that few will be as benign as some assert. Charity aside, our very preservation as a species may be in the balance. Those who have bitterly opposed space weaponry are, in my opinion, naive. If we encounter a hostile species and have no means of defense, we stand little chance of forging an alliance of worlds. Even that concept is almost surely vain. It is far more likely that we will, if not immediately destroyed, be included in already existing alliances, perhaps older than the first hominid to walk upon the earth. It is they at large, but ourselves, who may face the challenges of "catching up," if you will. We will encounter sciences, and certainly technologies, entirely alien to us. To master these will require our great universities to teach these to a new generation of scientists and engineers.
Now, consider that while we are undertaking so massive a quest, the other species is psychic and was able to download our entire minds upon contact or shortly thereafter. What could result? The easiest way to comprehend that question is how we would regard a desirable planet controlled by an intelligent species something akin to a cockroach, which communicates in much the same way. I have an idea what would happen, and suspect it wouldn't be that long until it did. How have those mankind at any point in time considered other MEN they valued less than themselves, entire racial or ethnic groups. We could find ourselves weighed in their balance and found wanting.
A century passed before the argument was won that man must spread to the stars. It was not won in terms of encountering other species. The arguments of the opposition largely prevailed and remain with us. It was won on the larger question of preserving mankind from an extinction event. This led us to the profound realization that in spreading colonies at any "safe distance," it was a virtual certainty that we would happen upon others in innumerable ways.
So here we are, the first spacecraft we do not consider experimental. Still, as we have not been able to send communications via ZPF except by utilizing our best psychics, BACKUP 5 at ZPF speeds has on board a new device we believe capable of what has always been popularly referred to as SUB-SPACE transmission. Our psychics do not always agree. Thus, we really do not know what COSMOS 1 through COSMOS BACKUP 1 through 4 have encountered, because we are receiving data transmitted from relatively near distances. COSMOS BACKUP 5 has the capability to retrofit the four previous craft with Sub-Space, and also ZPF drive switch-outs, yielding the EARTH COSMOS FLEET.
I do not mean to be alarmist, but if one is traveling in the dark or through fog, it is wise to proceed with caution, carefully and continually observing the road ahead."
Thus, the day came for the first manned mission, sent with the first slip-stream engine technology to a far point in our galaxy. When the next generation of engines materialized, BACKUP 2 was sent after it, and was expected to overtake it halfway to its destination. This process was repeated three times, with all spacecraft expected to arrive at about the same time. BACKUP 5, the most advanced spacecraft ever conceived and built, is now preparing to leave.
