N-Drive

I've got this -Einselar

The N-Drive. Talk about a mystery for the ages. It turns out the same technology that hurled humans and their metal air-buckets into the infinite, was used by every other civilization as well....and had just as mysterious origins. The N-Drive was first noticed by humans when a UFO crash-landed onto Mars in Earth Year 2139, just a few miles outside of a recently established colony. Tickets to Mars were nearly instantly sold out, as every scientist in every field wanted to examine the crashed ship, which was clearly of alien make. No bodies were found on board, but what they did find was what seemed to be an engine. It was made of materials that were frankly, rather common. What was uncommon was the way that light, any light, seemed to be folded and molded around it's complex gyrations.

It took merely a year to figure out what it did. It seemed to generate a field of "Negative Space" around itself in which space seemed to operate differently. Objects were observed to cross the field faster than they normally would. Nearly 25 times faster. The implications were immediately obvious. Suddenly, space travel was not only possible, but plausible. Work began immediately on a prototype, attempting to reverse engineer the original drive. That took significantly longer, but 9 years of failed experiments and hundreds of iterations later, they managed to perfectly replicate the N-drive.

While this was going on, a new ship was being built. Using new engineering techniques discovered on the alien ship, a new, more efficient and faster propulsion system was developed. An entire ship was built. They called it the UEA Hermes, a scouting ship, filled with scientific equipment, and complete with 0-G living quarters. A small crew was put together of 14, selected to fit any needs the ship might have. Mechanics, scientists of multiple fields, trained pilots and navigators to state a few. A test route was charted, and then the maiden flight was scheduled. The flight plan was to fly through the newly dubbed "N"-space to Pluto, take measurements, and then fly back again. The course charted, the world watched with bated breath as the ship counted down. "5, 4, 3, 2...Oh shit, wait a-" And then a bubble expanded from the N-drive, engulfed the ship, and they were gone.

A quick check of the copy of the flight records revealed the problem. At the last second, before they launched into N-Space, the computer had changed coordinates to an unknown point in the milky way...20,000 light years away. While the ship had been equipped for years of travel in case the crew had been stranded....the world mourned the crew as lost.

So when they arrived back 5 years later, with an ambassador from the Syndicate of Stars in tow no less, the world was shocked.