Schism

A Generation Ship, courtesy of Simon Ellis

Introduction

This is a 'short' short story based on Oolite, written by Drew Wagar

"Lumbering through the deeps of space are the Generation Ships; huge self contained transports driving between the stars at sublight speeds in the midst of thousand year journeys to populate new planets. After 30 generations, a staggering and devastating truth is revealed to the occupants of one such ship..."

Readers are welcome to submit feedback and comments to the author via his website.

Feedback from Readers

Thank you for your most wonderful story.

A fantastic and terribly dark tale that chilled me right at the end. A fabulous job!

If ever one wondered where some of the odd beliefs in the Ooniverse came from..

Excellent, a dark sombre tale with a sociological realism.

Truly awesome.

Nice story, a good read.

A good story!

Most enjoyable!

Thanks for the thought-provoking story!

A nice read.

Characters

Miriam

Janus

Joran

The Cardinal

Downloads / Hardcopy

You can download the story in PDF format here. Please note the 'Creative Commons' license contained within.

Notes

Schism is set somewhere in the current Elite/Oolite timeframe and investigates what might be occuring within the hull of these enormous generation ships after 30 generations in space...

It was inspired by the Generation Ships OXP written by Simon Ellis, which in turn was based upon the entry in the original Elite Manual...

"Before the development of the WS Thru-Space drive, in all its various forms, interstellar travel occurred in large, self-sustaining environment ships - Generation Ships - most of which have now been logged and their progress monitored. There are more than seventy thousand of these immense vessels ploughing their way through the galaxy, some of them into their 30th generation. The penalty for interference with such a vessel is marooning."

Oolite is the first incarnation of Elite to actually feature Generation Ships. The appearance of them in Arc-Elite is suspected to be a fake.

On Ian Bell's website there is a mention of Generation Ships in his FAQ. His answer to the question - "Where are the Space Dredgers and Generation Ships?" - is succinct to say the least!

"Where indeed."