Her Superhero Lover: A BWWM BBW Billionaire Superhero Romance (16 page)

Ravid's discovery
was simple and profound. First classified as YT-X7-4B, then renamed
Karrlson's Rock before the government stepped in, the planet was as
close to Earth as had ever been found before. Orbiting a star both
younger and larger than Sol, it still was within the so-called
"Goldilocks zone." A perfect nitrogen/oxygen atmosphere
combined with a mass only ten percent heavier than Earth's. Almost
eighty percent of the surface was covered in water, and by all
initial readings the planet was perfect for human life. It even had
two moons, which provided tides and protected the planet from meteor
strikes. In fact, the only major difference between Karrlson's Rock
and Earth was the length of its year, which was nearly three times
that of Earth. Dying at thirty 'years' old would be commonplace.

Once his discovery
was confirmed, Ravid Karrlson became more of a public figure than a
scientist, and his work was taken over by engineers and scientists in
other fields. Knowing about Iðavöllr (as it had been
renamed) was only part of the problem. Getting people there was the
bigger issue. While faster than light communication had been
conquered early in the twenty second century, FTL drives for physical
matter had been a much more difficult challenge. Despite development
of warp bubble theory, the largest object yet sent through warp space
and confirmed to have survived were barely larger than the typical
office desk. A few pundits cracked jokes about building a billion
"space coffins" for the mission, before the censors stepped
in and shut them up.

Another concern by
the Solar government was support. With resources already stretched,
any colonization attempt would have to be a self sufficient mission,
able to survive years without exterior support. There was no way they
could build two ships at a time, even if they could figure out just
how the hell to get them to Iðavöllr. The facilities and
resources just didn't exist.

The big breakthrough
came when the CyberGalactic Corporation partnered with
ExpandedReality Ltd. The credit was claimed by both companies, and
ended up going into litigation that stretched out until both
companies were bankrupt. Not too many people were upset over it,
since both were due to obtain enough money to bankrupt Mars at least.

The biggest problem
facing the designers was power supply. Geometry states that as a
sphere expands, the surface area of the sphere increases not
linearly, but by a cubic factor. If you double the size of your
sphere, you create eight times the amount of surface area. Tripling
the size requires twenty seven times the surface area, and so on and
so forth. In the realm of warp bubble generation, surface area
equated to power. There was no technology in human science that could
create the power needed to generate a stable warp bubble large enough
for a colony ship, it would take a fusion reactor the size of a
medium sized apartment building, even before any sort of radiation
shielding, fuel supply, or other necessities. The pure amount of size
needed was stopping the colony ship.

In the end, the
solution was elegant, dangerous, and groundbreaking. By combining
fusion technology with controlled anti-matter explosions, the ship
would be able to generate enough power to run the ship, provided the
ship stopped at regular intervals to collect interstellar fuel, in
what the designers called a "lily pad" arrangement. By
eliminating the huge fuel tanks, the ship could just squeeze inside
the possible warp bubble when combined with the new power supply
arrangement. Of course, there were plenty of dangers too. If the ship
miscalculated any of their jumps by more than five percent, it would
run out of fuel.

With the major
design flaws taken care of, the government turned its attention to
the ship's crew. Debates raged among the various political factions,
until once again economic and political expediency took over.
Population was the biggest pressure in the colonization effort, and
the powers that be wanted real estate that other people were living
in. The problem was that, regardless of power, there were laws in
place that were hard to circumvent. In setting up the colony program,
the unspoken goal was to free up valuable areas for those who wanted
it. As such, the use of the media was required.

The media campaign
was unprecedented, and carefully planned. The first wave of the
campaign came through the political pundits and talking heads, who
carefully crafted their commentary to stoke the twin goals of sowing
economic discontent and the idea of new frontiers. A lot of it
required subtle timing and juxtaposition, combined with data mining
of social media commentary. Regardless of what privacy laws were put
in place, the government could read every packet of data that crossed
the solar system if they wished. Instead of taking out enemies
however, they used this informational intelligence to instead steer
the public opinion. It was much more effective than direct action
anyway.

After a year of
stoking the fires of public discontent, the next phase of the plan
was launched. With great fanfare, the existence of the new stardrive
design was revealed, and plans were announced for a new government
program for development of large scale interstellar ships. While the
idea of a colony program was not specifically announced, the
government let the people put together the ideas on their own. It
wasn't long, hours in fact, before the first public petitions
(electronically signed by eight million) reached the government's
servers. By the end of the first week, over one hundred million
people had signed various electronic petitions requesting colonial
programs, deep space exploration, and various other ideas.

The trickiest phase
of the government's plan came next. With public pressure at a high,
the government had to look inept and careless, or at least partially
corrupt. Unleashing the media again, populist politicians and media
personalities cast doubt on any unannounced governmental plans for
picking colonists, making it seem as if the system was corrupt. "Only
those who have ties to the power players in the government are going
to get this opportunity when it arises!" Takahiro O'Shea, one of
the most popular media icons, blared one day. "This corrupt
system of currying favor for your friends has got to stop! What are
you supposed to do if you are what our leaders call Dirts? Stuck in
your dead-end jobs, economically and politically bereft of any power
or influence, you're stuck while the Quals march onto their shiny new
colony ship to go off to the stars, and to a cleaner, better future.
Perhaps it's time to raise a ruckus, and storm the new Bastille?"

The results were
predictable, especially among the Dirts. Outcry started, and tension
ratcheted up in the Dirt enclaves. The police responded by increasing
both the number and the severity of their patrols, until the
inevitable happened. On Mars, a police arrest of a forty year old
Dirt man who had been violating curfew due to working overtime at his
job, ended in a police shooting. Within a week, another shooting in
South America led to riots, and an outcry for justice. When the
flames were high enough, the government stepped in, the President
declaring he will be making a public statement at noon, Greenwhich
time. The riots subsided momentarily, while the Solar System turned
its attention to the President, who spoke from in front of the
classic facade of Buckingham Palace.

"Citizens of
the Solar System, good afternoon, wherever and whenever you are.

"Recently, we
have watched as neighborhoods have burned, torn apart by social
upheaval. Regardless of the reason behind the upheaval, businesses
have closed, homes have been destroyed, and innocent men and women
lie bleeding in the streets. Now, there are some in our society who
claim that since these riots have been confined to the areas
inhabited by those who are commonly called Dirts, that it doesn't
matter. They're just Dirts, you say, let them destroy themselves.

"I cannot let
that happen. I was elected to represent and lead all of humanity,
Qualified and Unqualified. I refuse to use the word Dirt for those
who are not Qualified any longer. For you, the Unqualified, I say
here today that we are going to institute changes. I have already
spoken to the leaders of the System Congress, and have submitted
bills to speak.

"Long before we
had a System-wide government, the nations of this planet represented
many different areas. I myself come from North America, where about
six hundred years ago another group of what we can only call
Unqualifieds stood up against the man who lived in this building
behind me now. They rioted, they looted, they burned, they fought,
and they won their freedom. From them, a new society rose, one which
a few hundred years later became the most powerful on Earth at the
time. While that nation, America, has faded into the pages of
history, the fact is some of their ideas have stood the test of the
centuries.

"Opportunity
should not be limited to just those who are Qualified. History has
shown us that regardless of their status, every human being has the
potential to make something of themselves. While our current society
tries to provide that opportunity for everyone, the fact is that some
manifest their talents at times later than others. Some manifest
those talents in situations they would never have before. Abraham
Lincoln was a failure as a lawyer, and was barely mediocre as a state
legislator. Yet, when confronted with the crisis of the First
American Civil War, he led the nation and held it together.

"Even in more
modern history, we see this lesson. Tamara Villalobos Griorgina was
born to one of the most extreme levels of poverty ever seen. Growing
up in the Australian outback, she writes in her autobiography that
she often had to catch locusts that would infest the solar farm her
father worked at in order to have enough to eat. Yet, she went on to
pass her Qualified exam and stand where I am today, as President of
the Solar System.

"Therefore, in
agreement with the heads of the Space Agency and with the leaders of
the major parties of the System Congress, I am pleased to announce
that opportunity has again arisen for every resident of the Solar
System, Qualified and Unqualified alike, one that hasn't been seen in
human society in two centuries.

"Five years
ago, we as a people were greeted with great news, long in the
waiting. Professor Ravid Karrlson discovered the first truly Earth
like planet in orbit around another star. While Professor Karrlson
has been rewarded greatly for his efforts including the Nobel Prize,
his discovery sat dormant for far too long, tantalizingly out of
reach due to the limits of our technology. Recent technological
breakthroughs however have allowed us a new future. Starting in two
weeks, construction begins on humanity's first interstellar colony
ship. This new kind of vessel will be the first of many, to take
humanity out of just our neighborhood and into the wider galactic
neighborhood. As such, it is with only a hint of sentimentality that
we have agreed to name the ship Glorious Enterprise.

"The Enterprise
is designed to be able to carry five thousand colonists from our
Solar System to Iðavöllr and allow them to set up the first
human colony on another Earth like planet. While the ship's crew will
be made up of mostly Qualified individuals in order to ensure those
with sufficient levels of skill and education are present on this
adventure, they make up only one hundred members of the total crew.
The rest of the crew will be colonists, composed of both Qualified
and Unqualified members alike.

"At the behest
of the Party for an Equal Society, I have agreed that the colonial
crew will reflect human society, with two thirds of the remaining
colonists coming from the Unqualified. With that in mind, I am
announcing the Great Colonial Lottery. All Unqualified citizens of
the Solar System who wish will be eligible to enter a random lottery
for slots on the Enterprise, and for later consideration upon her
sister ship to launch later, the Columbia Ascendant. Upon reaching
Iðavöllr, the potential and possibilities of a new world
await anyone who can seize it in their own two hands.

"With that
however, there are certain rules that must apply. Only those who are
citizens of the Solar System are eligible for the Lottery. As such,
those of you who are rioting, or are convicted of a felony, will be
stripped of your eligibility for the Lottery. So I advise all of you
who are rioting now, go home. Put down your rocks and your firebombs,
and rebuild. Enter the Lottery, and take control of your own future.
I thank you, and wish everyone the best of luck."

The few members of
the assembled press corps called out questions, but the President
ignored them, going inside Buckingham Palace without another word. By
the end of the news day however, the details had emerged, released by
his press office. There wasn't much that wasn't already known.

Any citizen with
voting rights (Qualified or Unqualified) had the opportunity to enter
for one of the slots available to their particular group. Officially,
that meant of the 5000 colonists (the crew would be separate), one
thousand would be for Qualified colonists, while another 4000 would
be set aside for Unqualified colonists. The only requirements were to
be healthy, and between the ages of fifteen and forty five. If you
wished to enter, you only had to go to a governmental health facility
to get a checkup and enter your name. Two thousand Quals and five
thousand Unquals would be picked, with the leftovers being backups
and offered first slot on the Columbia.

The results were
just as those in power anticipated. Within twenty four hours, those
in the most severely affected areas of rioting quieted down, while
those in the areas where tension was high but nothing had broken out
yet were flooding their local health facilities in order to sign up
for the trip. Of course, few if any of the potential colonists
noticed the fact that by accepting a berth upon the Glorious
Enterprise, they were rescinding all claims to land or property
within the Terran solar system.