QuasiSpace
QuasiSpace (literally resembling or to some degree like Space) is one of the "higher dimensions" that forms a space-time analogue to TrueSpace, home to the Arilou Lalee'lay and only recently discovered by Humans during the events of the Second War. It is only accessible from HyperSpace, having an analogous relationship to HyperSpace similar to that which HyperSpace has to TrueSpace. HyperSpatial distances are enormously compressed in QuasiSpace; however, HyperSpatial relationships in QuasiSpace are even more distorted than TrueSpatial relationships in HyperSpace. Unlike the vortices between HyperSpace and TrueSpace, there appears to be no correlation between the access points connecting QuasiSpace to HyperSpace and any natural phenomena like gravity wells. QuasiSpace also provides access to Falayalaralfali (QuasiSpace coordinates 613.4 : 590.0), the home planet of the Arilou Lalee'lay, which they describe as kept in a giant TrueSpace pocket embedded within QuasiSpace.
The only Human to travel extensively in QuasiSpace was The Captain, who was given free passage through QuasiSpace during the War by the Arilou as part of their effort to assist the New Alliance of Free Stars in their struggle against the Ur-Quan. During that time a number of strange, seemingly inexplicable and self-contradictory observations were made about the properties of QuasiSpace. Superficial observations of QuasiSpace show it to be similar to HyperSpace, a four-dimensional space-time in which time passed at the same standard rate as in HyperSpace. Unlike HyperSpace, QuasiSpace was filled with broadband radiation that peaks in the green wavelengths of the visible spectrum rather than the red. Against the green background were sudden bursts and explosions, similar to those observed in HyperSpace but appearing black instead of bright white. It is unknown if the dark and bright bursts of energy in QuasiSpace and HyperSpace are related, but the phenomena in HyperSpace are theorized to be manifestations of objects which are moving quickly between adjacent dimensions1 such as HyperSpace and QuasiSpace. It is interesting to note that the color scheme of QuasiSpace, including these energetic bursts, is nearly the exact complement (according to Human visual perception) of HyperSpace's color scheme.
More bizarre than this was the behavior of The Flagship's own systems in QuasiSpace. The Flagship's systems appeared to respond exactly as they did in HyperSpace, engaging the engines to thrust through the QuasiSpace and being dragged to a halt relative to the QuasiSpatial absolute reference frame when thrust ceased. However, although the starship's engines appeared to be firing, The Flagship was consuming none of its fuel.
To create a QuasiSpace portal requires augmenting normal Hyperdrive with a more subtle form of manipulation of space-time known as Dimensional Fatigue, a term also used by the Androsynth in their own research in this subject. It may be that Dimensional Fatigue is easier to achieve in QuasiSpace than HyperSpace. The local region of QuasiSpace features a very tight cluster of several portals into HyperSpace, prossibly all close together because they were all formed by the same Dimensional Fatigue event. However, there is only one portal to QuasiSpace from HyperSpace in our region of space. This intermittent portal is located in the the Chandrasekhar constellation; it manifests as a large region of green-glowing space visible from HyperSpace and mistaken for a variable star by the Spathi, as it only appears for a period of about three Human days on a roughly thirty-day cycle, such that its open times occur near the end of each month on the Human calendar -- a mnemonic the Captain's crew used to locate the natural portal in their first dealings with the Arilou. Apart from this portal, QuasiSpace can only be accessed via a QuasiSpace Portal Spawner. Only the Arilou are known to possess this technology; the only time they have created a Portal Spawner for another race's use was their donation of one to The Captain during the Second War, which was subsequently destroyed along with the rest of The Flagship.
A few have interpreted the strange observations in QuasiSpace, certain references by the Arilou, and the name "QuasiSpace" itself to mean that QuasiSpace's appearance to the crew of The Flagship may have been some kind of illusion or falsely generated set of perceptions obscuring a more bizarre reality.
QuasiSpace Portals
This table shows the QuasiSpace locations and HyperSpace endpoints of the 15 uni-directional portals and the single bi-directional portal.
| QS portal | HS endpoint | HS endpoint description |
|---|---|---|
| 500.0 : 500.0 | 043.8 : 637.2 | center of Arilou space; bi-directional; open monthly 17th - 20th |
| 448.0 : 504.0 | 565.8 : 971.2 | far north on the map, near Delta Lyncis |
| 458.0 : 492.0 | 860.7 : 015.1 | far southeast on the map |
| 466.0 : 514.0 | 230.2 : 398.8 | in the middle of Spathi space |
| 468.0 : 464.0 | 921.1 : 610.4 | far east on the map; near Arcturus |
| 476.0 : 458.0 | 409.1 : 774.8 | northwest edge of Ur-Quan space |
| 476.0 : 496.0 | 611.7 : 413.1 | south edge in Ur-Quan space |
| 488.0 : 538.0 | 973.5 : 315.3 | in the middle of Druuge space |
| 492.0 : 492.0 | 005.0 : 164.7 | in the middle of Ilwrath space |
| 502.0 : 460.0 | 318.4 : 490.6 | between Spathi and ZFP space |
| 506.0 : 474.0 | 191.0 : 092.6 | near Earth |
| 516.0 : 466.0 | 567.3 : 120.7 | between VUX, Mycon, and Yehat space |
| 520.0 : 514.0 | 011.2 : 940.9 | far northwest on the map, near the Slylandro |
| 520.0 : 540.0 | 585.0 : 621.3 | in the middle of Ur-Quan space |
| 530.0 : 528.0 | 775.2 : 890.6 | between Supox and Utwig space |
| 544.0 : 532.0 | 036.8 : 633.2 | in the middle of Arilou space |
Notes and references
- Star Control II manual, pg. 34.