Difference between revisions of "Bern Orbital (FI)"

Latest revision as of 12:53, 15 September 2025

The largest habitat in Sol space, the Bern Orbital is a successful megaproject and the jeweled crown of Earthforce.

Bern Orbital

Bern Orbital is the largest space habitat in the solar system and the centerpiece of Earthforce power. Constructed as an open-sky ring habitat at the Earth–Moon L1 near-rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO), it remains one of the few megaprojects to have survived the Fall and the Kessler years largely intact. Its immense size, deliberate legal status, and symbolic ties to the Swiss city of Bern make it both a practical headquarters and a political compromise. Today it houses millions, sustains a complex economy, and serves as both capital and fortress of humanity.

Physical Description

The Orbital consists of two counter-rotating tension spines, each ~103 km from the centerline. Suspended from them are a pair of 10 km wide living bands, shielded by sidewalls and enclosed in a breathable aerosphere. At 0.9 g surface gravity, rim speed is ~0.95 km/s and the sky appears to spin once every ~11.3 minutes, drifting the stars at ~0.5°/s.

The sidewalls are cable-net membranes reinforced with Whipple layers — multiple thin shells that shatter and absorb micrometeoroids before they can reach the main barrier. Curtain membranes can drop across the sidewalls in seconds, fencing off any breach zone. Small leaks are offset by make-up gas, medium tears trigger local shutters, and only freak multi-hundred-meter failures risk wider effects.

Because the Orbital’s scale height is ~10.6 km, weather stratifies naturally: winds, clouds, and even lee vortices form behind terrain. Relief is exaggerated — peaks and valleys higher than most habitats could support — yet carefully engineered to prevent dangerous storms. The result is a convincing small world under open sky, where nature feels real but remains bounded by design.

Power and Heat Management

Before the Fall, Bern Orbital drew power from a heliostat swarm and sun-tracking arrays, with compact fusion plants as reserve. The Kessler cascade destroyed the mirror fleet, forcing reliance on fusion alone for decades. Tugs provided auxiliary power until the infrastructure is rebuilt. Redundancy is high; partial failures do not cascade — a fact proven by the Orbital’s survival of the Fall.

Today Bern Orbital runs on multiple gigawatts of fusion. The heliostat swarm is being rebuilt to restore full seasonal and diurnal control. Until then, weather is pleasant but noticeably curated.

Light and Seasons

Day and season are artificial. Heliostats redirect sunlight to simulate a 24-hour cycle, while ring-mounted panels provide dawn/dusk effects. Seasons are created by adjusting mirror angles over the year. The natural 12-minute star drift is ignored in daily life, though festivals occasionally mark it.

Control of light rests with the Shade Guild, a cross-chamber Earthforce bureau. Ostensibly a technical service, the Guild is also politically powerful: whoever controls the light schedule can punish or reward entire districts. Its members enjoy prestige and influence far beyond their bureaucratic remit.

Orbit and Station-Keeping

Bern Orbital resides in an Earth–Moon L1 NRHO, offering constant line-of-sight to both Earth and Moon while avoiding Earth’s shadow. Relay satellites guarantee communications; outages are rare and mostly remembered from the chaos immediately after the Fall.

Station-keeping uses electric thruster farms mounted on booms, never firing toward the habitat. Rare large corrections are handled by dedicated tugs. Spin stability is maintained by trim masses and reaction wheels, while “spin-quakes” are damped by distributed mass shifters. In an emergency some of the ice radiation shielding can be jettisoned to restore balance.

Law and Jurisdiction

Legally, Bern Orbital is part of the City of Bern, Switzerland. This status was chosen to confer Earth residence and neutrality, avoiding disputes between larger powers. In practice, law is divided:

Dexter Ring — Swiss civil law, applied by colonial courts with a reputation for caution and conservatism.
Sinister Ring — continuous operational law, effectively martial law, though often lightly enforced.
Earthforce facilities — governed by Senate protocols.

Mixed cases go to joint courts, but Earthforce authority usually prevails.

Dexter Ring

Dexter, the “right bank,” houses Earthforce headquarters, the three chambers, and associated bureaucracies. Permanent population is ~15 million, with another ~5 million transients at any time. Prestige housing and resorts line the surface; utilities, agriculture, and recycling run underground.

Architecture emphasizes display: Baroque, Gothic, and neoclassical facades dominate official buildings, while villages echo historical Swiss and European styles. Agriculture is mostly hydroponic and hidden away, supplemented by pastoral farming and herding on the surface.

Dexter is both capital and resort. Its exaggerated mountains attract tourism, while Earthforce institutions and cultural centers create a hybrid of government city and vacation landscape.

Sinister Ring

Sinister, the “left bank,” is Earthforce’s logistics and training hub. Permanent population is ~1 million, but numbers swell during major exercises. Zoning favors barracks, parade grounds, training areas, and vast ports. There are large quarantine areas and others held empty for emergency needs. Civilians are almost entirely excluded.

Rumors abound of secret fleets or alien embassies hidden here, but facilities are prosaic: supply depots, simulator halls, and staging yards. Security is constant, even if discipline sometimes lapses in peacetime.

Safety and Defense

Bern Orbital survived the Fall because its atmosphere and soil mass gave weeks of tolerance for power loss — long enough to gradually bring in fusion plants. Safety remains paramount:

Aegis shield — A Jovian-style electromagnetic shield surrounds the Orbital, producing breathtaking curtains during solar storms. These are spectacular locally, instrument-bright from Earth, but not naked-eye.
Micrometeoroid defense — Radar sweeps detect debris; lasers ablate or deflect sub-centimeter fragments; interceptor tugs divert larger objects. The bounty on large debris can be a fortune.
Shelters — Even with shielding, hard shelters protect against gamma and neutron bursts during severe storms. This is an embarrassment to tourist agencies, but the Storm Time parties are legendary.
Metabolic hull practice — Conservative, closed-loop self-repair layers on Whipple barriers; hard kill-switches and two-person activation.

Complacency may be the greatest hazard — drills are routine, and too often neglected.

Factions and Politics

Several guilds dominate Orbital life:

Shade Guild — controls day/night and seasonal cycles.
Ringers — manage the spines, mass ledgers, and spin balance.
Aero-Wardens — patrol sidewalls and EVA structures.
Debris Bounty Office administers Kessler clean-up bounties — Cislunar operations headquartered on Sinister.
Founders’ Trust vs. Freeholders — contest deeds and shifting land rights.

These groups wield influence to rival Earthforce’s. Rivalries between chambers leave them in a gray zone where they can exceed formal authority — the Shade Guild in particular. Light schedules, mass ledgers, and land claims are tools of power, and intrigue is constant beneath the outward calm.

Culture and Rituals

Culture is diverse, with festivals marking “season flips” when heliostat angles change. The 12-minute sky drift inspires both parties and cult ceremonies. Dexter emphasizes pomp and tourism; Sinister cultivates a martial ethos, softened by long peace.

Dexter districts follow a zodiac naming scheme, each sign repeated twice around the ring. Sinister uses technical coordinates, but nicknames from exercises and accidents persist.

Economy and Logistics

Dexter’s economy is anchored in government, tourism, and education. Sinister supports logistics, training, and fleet maintenance.

Docking facilities are extensive: heavy docks for capital ships, dozens of medium bays, and hundreds of minor tenders. The open structure allows aerodynamic ships to launch directly into space with minimal Δv. Sinister’s facilities allow an entire fleet to sortie simultaneously. Customs and passengers route through Dexter; Sinister handles quarantine and staging. Propellant depots supply both chemical (LOX/LH₂) and electric (argon, krypton, xenon) propellants as well as the more common water.

Debris collection is a standing mission: Earthforce’s Debris Bounty Office is headquartered here, with hunters patrolling cislunar space.

Summary

Bern Orbital is more than a station: it is the capital of cislunar space, the headquarters of Earthforce, and a symbol of resilience. Its twin rings — Dexter for politics and tourism, Sinister for logistics and training — mirror the banks of the Aare in Bern-on-Earth. Its survival of the Fall, fusion-powered endurance, and role as both sanctuary and fortress make it the largest and most important space settlement in the solar system.

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
 {{IF}}{{tocright}}
-The largest habitat in Sol space, the bern Orbital is a megaproject and the jeweled crown of Earthforce.
+The largest habitat in Sol space, the '''Bern Orbital''' is a successful megaproject and the jeweled crown of Earthforce.
 === Bern Orbital ===
-Bern Orbital is the largest settlement in the Terran Orbital Zone and the centerpiece of Earthforce power. Constructed as an open-sky ring habitat at the Earth–Moon L1 near-rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO), it remains one of the few structures to have survived the Fall and the Kessler years largely intact. Its immense size, deliberate legal status, and symbolic ties to the Swiss city of Bern make it both a practical headquarters and a political compromise. Today it houses tens of millions, sustains a complex economy, and serves as both capital and fortress of Earth’s offworld presence.
+Bern Orbital is the largest space habitat in the solar system and the centerpiece of Earthforce power. Constructed as an open-sky ring habitat at the Earth–Moon L1 near-rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO), it remains one of the few megaprojects to have survived the Fall and the Kessler years largely intact. Its immense size, deliberate legal status, and symbolic ties to the Swiss city of Bern make it both a practical headquarters and a political compromise. Today it houses millions, sustains a complex economy, and serves as both capital and fortress of humanity.
 ==== Physical Description ====
-The Orbital consists of two counter-rotating graphene hoops, each 103 km from the centerline. Each is a 10 km wide living band, suspended by tensioned cables and shielded by sidewalls. At 0.9 g surface gravity, rim speed is ~0.95 km/s and the sky appears to spin once every 11.3 minutes, drifting the stars at ~0.5°/s.
+The Orbital consists of two counter-rotating tension spines, each ~103 km from the centerline. Suspended from them are a pair of 10 km wide living bands, shielded by sidewalls and enclosed in a breathable aerosphere. At 0.9 g surface gravity, rim speed is ~0.95 km/s and the sky appears to spin once every ~11.3 minutes, drifting the stars at ~0.5°/s.
-The ring uses curtain membranes every 200–500 m in the sidewalls and pop-up plates/nets in the floor. They drop in seconds to fence off only the breach zone, slowing airflow so crews can patch. Small leaks are covered by make-up gas; medium tears trigger local membranes; only freak, multi-hundred-meter failures risk wider effects.
+The sidewalls are cable-net membranes reinforced with Whipple layers — multiple thin shells that shatter and absorb micrometeoroids before they can reach the main barrier. Curtain membranes can drop across the sidewalls in seconds, fencing off any breach zone. Small leaks are offset by make-up gas, medium tears trigger local shutters, and only freak multi-hundred-meter failures risk wider effects.
-Because the orbital’s scale height is ~10.6 km, weather stratifies naturally: winds, clouds, and even lee vortices form behind mountains. Terrain is exaggerated — peaks and valleys far higher than in Switzerland itself — yet controlled to prevent dangerous storms. The result is a convincing small world under open sky, but one where engineering discipline sets firm limits on wind speed, rainfall, and temperature.
+Because the Orbital’s scale height is ~10.6 km, weather stratifies naturally: winds, clouds, and even lee vortices form behind terrain. Relief is exaggerated — peaks and valleys higher than most habitats could support — yet carefully engineered to prevent dangerous storms. The result is a convincing small world under open sky, where nature feels real but remains bounded by design.
 ==== Power and Heat Management ====
-Before the Fall, Bern Orbital drew most of its power from a heliostat swarm and large arrays of sun-tracking panels, with compact fusion plants as reserve. The Kessler cascade destroyed the mirror fleet, and the ring had to survive on fusion alone for decades. Tugs provided temporary power and heat rejection while the infrastructure was rebuilt.
+Before the Fall, Bern Orbital drew power from a heliostat swarm and sun-tracking arrays, with compact fusion plants as reserve. The Kessler cascade destroyed the mirror fleet, forcing reliance on fusion alone for decades. Tugs provided auxiliary power until the infrastructure is rebuilt. Redundancy is high; partial failures do not cascade — a fact proven by the Orbital’s survival of the Fall.
-Traditional radiators were abandoned in favor of ''laser cooling''. Waste heat from reactors and life support is converted into coherent light beams and vented in narrow cones aligned with tug exhaust or service corridors. This keeps the sky clear of radiator wings and reduces thermal signature. There is enough redundance that complete collapse would only happen along with apocalyptic damage; the system did survive the Fall.
+Today Bern Orbital runs on multiple gigawatts of fusion. The heliostat swarm is being rebuilt to restore full seasonal and diurnal control. Until then, weather is pleasant but noticeably curated.
-Today Bern Orbital runs on multiple gigawatts of fusion, with sun-tracking panels used for auxiliary and emergency lighting. The heliostat swarm is being rebuilt, and when complete will again allow full control of day/night cycles and seasonal variation. At present the weather is pleasant but feels somewhat artificial to environmental connoisseurs.
 ==== Light and Seasons ====
-Day and season inside the Orbital are artificial. Heliostats redirect sunlight into the habitat to simulate a 24-hour cycle, while panels on the ring provide local dawn/dusk effects. Seasons are created by tilting mirror angles over the course of the year. The natural 12-minute star drift is ignored for daily life, though communities sometimes hold “sky spin festivals” to mark it.
+Day and season are artificial. Heliostats redirect sunlight to simulate a 24-hour cycle, while ring-mounted panels provide dawn/dusk effects. Seasons are created by adjusting mirror angles over the year. The natural 12-minute star drift is ignored in daily life, though festivals occasionally mark it.
-Control of light is the prerogative of the ''Shade Guild'', a cross-chamber Earthforce bureau. The Guild is a sought-after posting, a comfortable career path dominated by the children of insiders, yet it is also politically powerful: whoever controls the light schedule can punish, reward, or negotiate with entire districts. An invitation to a Guild social function is to die for!
+Control of light rests with the '''Shade Guild''', a cross-chamber Earthforce bureau. Ostensibly a technical service, the Guild is also politically powerful: whoever controls the light schedule can punish or reward entire districts. Its members enjoy prestige and influence far beyond their bureaucratic remit.
 ==== Orbit and Station-Keeping ====
-Bern Orbital resides in an Earth–Moon L1 NRHO, offering constant line-of-sight to both Earth and Moon and avoiding Earth’s shadow. Relay satellites guarantee communications; outages are rare and remembered mostly from the chaos immediately after the Fall.
+Bern Orbital resides in an Earth–Moon L1 NRHO, offering constant line-of-sight to both Earth and Moon while avoiding Earth’s shadow. Relay satellites guarantee communications; outages are rare and mostly remembered from the chaos immediately after the Fall.
-Station-keeping uses electric thruster farms mounted on booms, never firing toward the habitat or its mirrors. Large corrections are handled by dedicated tugs. Spin stability is maintained through trim masses and reaction wheels, while “spin-quakes” are damped by mass shifters distributed through the spines.
+Station-keeping uses electric thruster farms mounted on booms, never firing toward the habitat. Rare large corrections are handled by dedicated tugs. Spin stability is maintained by trim masses and reaction wheels, while “spin-quakes” are damped by distributed mass shifters. In an emergency some of the ice radiation shielding can be jettisoned to restore balance.
 ==== Law and Jurisdiction ====
 Legally, Bern Orbital is part of the City of Bern, Switzerland. This status was chosen to confer Earth residence and neutrality, avoiding disputes between larger powers. In practice, law is divided:
-* **Dexter Ring** follows Swiss civil law, applied by colonial courts staffed largely by unambitious or semi-retired officials.
+* '''Dexter Ring''' — Swiss civil law, applied by colonial courts with a reputation for caution and conservatism.
-* **Sinister Ring** is under continuous operational law, effectively martial law, though enforcement is often lax after two centuries of peace.
+* '''Sinister Ring''' — continuous operational law, effectively martial law, though often lightly enforced.
-* Earthforce service members and facilities remain under Senate protocols.
+* '''Earthforce facilities''' — governed by Senate protocols.
-Mixed cases are resolved by joint courts, but in practice Earthforce wields authority.
+Mixed cases go to joint courts, but Earthforce authority usually prevails.
 ==== Dexter Ring ====
-Dexter, the “right bank,” houses Earthforce headquarters, the three chambers, and associated bureaucracies. Population is ~15 million permanent residents and another five million transients. Prestige housing and tourism resorts occupy the surface; infrastructure and agriculture run underground.
+Dexter, the “right bank,” houses Earthforce headquarters, the three chambers, and associated bureaucracies. Permanent population is ~15 million, with another ~5 million transients at any time. Prestige housing and resorts line the surface; utilities, agriculture, and recycling run underground.
-Architecture emphasizes display: Baroque, Gothic, and neoclassical facades dominate official buildings, while rural villages and towns recreate historical Swiss and European styles. Agriculture is mostly hydroponic, supplemented by pastoral herding on the surface. “Under the carpet” is the phrase used to describe how utilities, recycling, and industrial functions are buried out of sight.
+Architecture emphasizes display: Baroque, Gothic, and neoclassical facades dominate official buildings, while villages echo historical Swiss and European styles. Agriculture is mostly hydroponic and hidden away, supplemented by pastoral farming and herding on the surface.
-Dexter is both capital and resort. Its exaggerated mountains attract tourism, and unlike in Switzerland, these peaks are open to mass recreation. Earthforce institutions, museums, and cultural centers are part of the same landscape, creating a hybrid of government city and vacation destination.
+Dexter is both capital and resort. Its exaggerated mountains attract tourism, while Earthforce institutions and cultural centers create a hybrid of government city and vacation landscape.
 ==== Sinister Ring ====
-Sinister, the “left bank,” is Earthforce’s logistics and training hub. Permanent population is ~1 million, but numbers swell by several million during large exercises. The ring is zoned for barracks, parade grounds, training districts, and vast ports. Civilians are almost entirely excluded.
+Sinister, the “left bank,” is Earthforce’s logistics and training hub. Permanent population is ~1 million, but numbers swell during major exercises. Zoning favors barracks, parade grounds, training areas, and vast ports. There are large quarantine areas and others held empty for emergency needs. Civilians are almost entirely excluded.
-Rumors swirl of secret war fleets or alien embassies hidden on Sinister, but in practice the facilities are prosaic: supply depots, simulator halls, and restricted marshaling yards. The ring is under continuous operational law, and while discipline is often lax, security presence is constant.
+Rumors abound of secret fleets or alien embassies hidden here, but facilities are prosaic: supply depots, simulator halls, and staging yards. Security is constant, even if discipline sometimes lapses in peacetime.
 ==== Safety and Defense ====
-Bern Orbital survived the Fall because of its size: its atmosphere and soil mass gave it days of tolerance for power loss, enough for fusion plants to restart. Still, safety remains central:
+Bern Orbital survived the Fall because its atmosphere and soil mass gave weeks of tolerance for power loss — long enough to gradually bring in fusion plants. Safety remains paramount:
-* **Micrometeoroid defense**: radar sweeps detect debris; lasers ablate sub-cm fragments; interceptor tugs divert larger objects.
+* '''Aegis shield''' — A Jovian-style electromagnetic shield surrounds the Orbital, producing breathtaking curtains during solar storms. These are spectacular locally, instrument-bright from Earth, but not naked-eye.
-* **Compartmentalization**: 2 km bays can shutter in ten seconds. Gas reserves cover days of leakage.
+* '''Micrometeoroid defense''' — Radar sweeps detect debris; lasers ablate or deflect sub-centimeter fragments; interceptor tugs divert larger objects. The bounty on large debris can be a fortune.
-* **Rescue operations**: Earthforce’s rescue coordination centers are based here, making Bern Orbital the hub for cislunar emergency response.
+* '''Shelters''' — Even with shielding, hard shelters protect against gamma and neutron bursts during severe storms. This is an embarrassment to tourist agencies, but the Storm Time parties are legendary.
+* '''Metabolic hull practice''' — Conservative, closed-loop self-repair layers on Whipple barriers; hard kill-switches and two-person activation.
-Despite this, complacency is a cultural hazard. After centuries of survival, drills are routine and often neglected until a real incident jolts the population back to vigilance.
+Complacency may be the greatest hazard — drills are routine, and too often neglected.
 ==== Factions and Politics ====
-Several guilds and associations dominate Orbital politics:
+Several guilds dominate Orbital life:
-* **Shade Guild** — controls light, day/night, and seasons.
+* '''Shade Guild''' — controls day/night and seasonal cycles.
-* **Ringers** — maintain the spines, mass ledgers, and spin balance.
+* '''Ringers''' — manage the spines, mass ledgers, and spin balance.
-* **Aero-Wardens** — patrol the sidewalls and EVA structures.
+* '''Aero-Wardens''' — patrol sidewalls and EVA structures.
-* **Founders’ Trust vs. Freeholders** — legal battles over deeds and ownership of shifting land.
+* '''Debris Bounty Office''' administers Kessler clean-up bounties — Cislunar operations headquartered on Sinister.
+* '''Founders’ Trust vs. Freeholders''' — contest deeds and shifting land rights.
-These groups shape life as much as Earthforce itself. Control of light schedules, mass ledgers, or land claims can make or break fortunes, and intrigue is constant beneath the outward calm of administration.
+These groups wield influence to rival Earthforce’s. Rivalries between chambers leave them in a gray zone where they can exceed formal authority — the Shade Guild in particular. Light schedules, mass ledgers, and land claims are tools of power, and intrigue is constant beneath the outward calm.
 ==== Culture and Rituals ====
-Culture is varied, with communities recreating aspects of Earth. Festivals mark “season flips” when heliostat angles change. The twelve-minute sky drift inspires both parties and cult rituals. Dexter emphasizes civic pomp and tourism, while Sinister cultivates a martial ethos, though softened by long peace.
+Culture is diverse, with festivals marking “season flips” when heliostat angles change. The 12-minute sky drift inspires both parties and cult ceremonies. Dexter emphasizes pomp and tourism; Sinister cultivates a martial ethos, softened by long peace.
-Nicknames and local traditions abound. Dexter districts follow a zodiac naming scheme, repeating each sign twice along the ring, while Sinister relies on technical coordinates with informal nicknames from exercises and accidents.
+Dexter districts follow a zodiac naming scheme, each sign repeated twice around the ring. Sinister uses technical coordinates, but nicknames from exercises and accidents persist.
 ==== Economy and Logistics ====
-Dexter’s economy is anchored by Earthforce headquarters, education, and tourism. Sinister supports logistics, training, and the maintenance of Earthforce fleets.
+Dexter’s economy is anchored in government, tourism, and education. Sinister supports logistics, training, and fleet maintenance.
-Docking facilities are extensive: heavy docks for capital ships, dozens of medium bays, and hundreds of minor tenders. Customs and passenger traffic route through Dexter, while Sinister handles quarantine and military staging. Propellant depots at NRHO supply both chemical (LOX/LH₂) and electric (argon, krypton, xenon) propellants.
+Docking facilities are extensive: heavy docks for capital ships, dozens of medium bays, and hundreds of minor tenders. The open structure allows aerodynamic ships to launch directly into space with minimal Δv. Sinister’s facilities allow an entire fleet to sortie simultaneously. Customs and passengers route through Dexter; Sinister handles quarantine and staging. Propellant depots supply both chemical (LOX/LH₂) and electric (argon, krypton, xenon) propellants as well as the more common water.
-Garbage collection is a standing mission: Earthforce’s space-debris bounty administration is based here, with hunters patrolling cislunar space.
+Debris collection is a standing mission: Earthforce’s Debris Bounty Office is headquartered here, with hunters patrolling cislunar space.
 ==== Summary ====
-Bern Orbital is more than a station: it is the capital of cislunar space, the headquarters of Earthforce, and a symbol of resilience. Its twin rings—Dexter for politics and tourism, Sinister for logistics and training—mirror the banks of the Aare in Bern itself. Its survival of the Fall, its fusion reconfiguration, and its continuing role as both sanctuary and fortress make it the most powerful settlement in the Terran Orbital Zone.
+Bern Orbital is more than a station: it is the capital of cislunar space, the headquarters of Earthforce, and a symbol of resilience. Its twin rings — Dexter for politics and tourism, Sinister for logistics and training — mirror the banks of the Aare in Bern-on-Earth. Its survival of the Fall, fusion-powered endurance, and role as both sanctuary and fortress make it the largest and most important space settlement in the solar system.