The Traxati
The USS
Coronado has uncovered almost nothing about the Traxati themselves.
What they look like and their culture is a complete mystery. The USS Coronado's
crew thinks they are not humanoid, but has absolutely no evidence of the Traxati
as a lifeform -- we don't know a thing. The only thing we've encountered
of them so far is their technology, which is quite advanced, but has gone in
a COMPLETELY different direction than any of the established Trek races.
Even in their technology, we haven't seen very much. So far, we've encountered
two examples of it: the Traxati "hypergate" and their probes.
First, basic descriptions of both.
A Traxati hypergate is a ring or torus between 10,000km and 25,000km in diameter
and 1km in cross section. The ring is made of nearly pure neutronium and
as such, Traxati hypergates are incredibly massive objects with distinct and
powerful gravity fields. A Traxati hypergate spins (much like a tire)
at 0.95C -- so fast that to a casual observer, it doesn't appear to move at
all. Each hypergate spins at a precisely calculated speed near 0.95C but
not exactly at it. Two gates spinning at the exact same speed are linked,
no matter how far apart they are. Passing through a gate spinning at 0.9531C
will send the traveller hurtling across the cosmos to reappear at another gate
spinning at that speed.
Each gate is controlled by dozens of gravimetric drives mounted on their outside
surfaces. These drives respond to transmissions on a specific frequency.
Sending the correct transmission to the drives will cause them to accelerate
or decellerate the spin of the gate. This takes anywhere from several
minutes to several hours depending on the change ordered, but will result in
linking that gate to another in the cosmos with the new speed. One could
theoretically explore and pinpoint the locations all of the connected gates
by using a base gate, passing through, recording the location you emerge, passing
back through, adjusting the speed of the base gate slightly, passing through
again, recording the new location, etc., over and over until you had an "address
book" of the other gates.
Hypergates only operate when spinning at speeds within 5% of 0.95C. If
the spin of the gate is changed to faster or slower than this range by
transmitting the appropriate signals to the drives, the gate will be rendered
inoperative until it is returned to the operational range. The gates can
be closed permanently by shifting their spin outside of this range and then
destroying the gravimetric drives themselves.
The other Traxati technology that the USS Coronado has encountered is their
probes. Probes are self-replicating machines anywhere from 20 meters to
75 meters in length. They are not made of neutronium -- they can be destroyed
by standard weaponry. The USS Coronado managed to capture a damaged probe
but couldn't understand much of the technology in it. Probes are extremely
difficult to capture because they have two defense mechanisms.
First, a probe can convert any matter it touches into either neutronium (to
construct the hypergates) or antineutronium (used to power the gravimetric drives
on the gates).
Second and related, a probe can touch a bit of matter, converting it to a neutronium
needle approximately a quarter-meter long and 2cm in diameter and then "launch"
this needle at an attacker. Several probes working in concert can thus
make it extremely uncomfortable for an attacker, either converting parts of
the attacking ship into anti-neutronium or launching "clouds" of neutronium
needles at them. Since neutronium is denser than just about anything,
it will pass through virtually any material as if it were very thin air.
Starships facing such a neutronium needle cloud will be riddled with tiny holes
through all manner of critical systems and crew members.
Several probes working together can also construct two enormous needles, one
of neutronium, one of anti-neutronium. These two needles are approximately
1000 meters long and 10 meters in diameter, weighing approximately 200 million
tonnes each. The probes will then launch these two needles at a planet,
where, after several days, they will meet in the planet's core, mutually annihilating
each other and causing a massive explosion at the center of the planet.
The planet's destruction is usually the result of such an attack. The
raw material from such a cataclysm is then used to construct a hypergate.
The primary purpose of the probes seems to be the construction of the hypergates.
The probes do not possess hyperlight drive of any kind -- they arrive in a target
system at speeds near C, use some sort of gravimetric drive and a slingshot
manuever around the target star to slow to a normal speed. They then proceed
with the construction of a gate. Once the gate is complete, it is assumed
that the Traxati use it to explore that part of the galaxy. The secondary
purpose of the probes is to maintain and defend the gates once they're constructed.
A working gate will be attended by nywhere from two to twenty probes.
Such a gate is under construction in the Zadar system. The probes used
the neutronium/antineutronium needle combination to destroy Zadar 3 (and
most of the planet's 825 million inhabitants), then began construction using
the planet's rubble as raw material. the USS Coronado's crew estimates it will
take several years, if not decades to break up the planets in the system, convert
the raw material to neutronium, build the gate and attach the drives, and spin
the gate up to 0.95C. In the meantime, the USS Coronado has encounterd
another, finished gate in the Iju system, and has evidence of at least two other
finished gates in nearby systems.