#radchdome

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Let us start with an observation about what is depicted of the Ships and Stations shown in Ann Leckie’s Imperial Radch novels: people living on them observe a consensus “up” and “down”, and walk around as if there is gravity holding their feet to the floor. They don’t bounce, or jump, or glide; they walk or run or sprint. When shot, they fall to the floor. A lake in a station’s garden is not a ball of water held together by surface tension, but instead a recognizably-Terrestrial puddle of water. The artificial-gravity systems that provide this effect can be instantaneously disabled, and other than a sudden loss of gravity, the loss does not result in catastrophe.

I can think of three general methods of creating a gravity-like force, for use in holding people’s non-magnetic boots to the floor of an object in space. This graphic shows those three:

centripetal force, also known as as the “spin” gravity of O’Neill Island-type space stations as depicted in the Gundam TV series

a point mass, also known as gravitational attraction or just plain “gravity” seen on planets such as Earth

acceleration, also known as “thrust” gravity, which is seen in the spaceships of scifi TV series The Expanse

Notably, the spin gravity of O’Neill colonies cannot be disabled instantaneously. Shutting off the centripetal acceleration requires slowing down the spin of the station, and it can’t be turned off instantaneously. If the cylinder suddenly stopped, everything inside it would continue moving, resulting in a catastrophic sideways movement of the station’s contents relative to the station itself. Cleanup crews would be chiseling corpses out of bulkheads.

Large masses, with an apparent single point of attraction, are similarly hard to get rid of. Have you ever tried to eliminate a lump of something massy? Either you’re going to disperse the mass across a large area, or you’re going to convert it to pure energy, which is quite energetic and generally not a survivable event. If we assume that an Earth-like gravity requires an Earth-like mass, and that “turning off” that gravity requires eliminating that mass, a layman’s E=mc^2 will give you 5.27x10^41 jourles, which is 78% of the amount of energy required to disperse the Sun’s gravitational attraction to itself. You would not want to be near the Earth when “turning off” its gravity via this effect.

Thrust gravity is much simpler to turn off: it’s caused by accelerating the ship or station’s reference frame in one direction, causing the floor to push into people’s feet at a set acceleration. Turn the engine off, and everyone goes on the float. It’s a great way to maintain gravity while going someplace, but it is hard to remain in orbit around a planet while constantly accelerating.

But there are effects which can seem similar-enough.

The trade fleets in Scalzi’s Collapsing Empire novels used “push fields” to push things towards the floor, rather than pushing the floor towards things.

The New Republic capital ship Lord Vanek in Stross’ Singularity Sky used a small black hole, of approximately the mass of Mount Everest, to provide a gravitational point source, which was manipulated using gravitics to provide habitable gravity within the ship, as well as a gravitational lens around the ship for shielding against certain types of kinetic projectiles. When needed, gravity could be shut off throughout the ship and around it. And in extreme cases, that black hole can be dumped out of the ship for use as a weapon itself.

It is this last source which I think most closely matches Ann Leckie’s description of Radchaai technology. She describes a Radchaai warship’s drive as its most powerful weapon. A warship cas the ability to form its own “gates”, being wormholes or similar things between two distant systems. And, if breached, the engine of a warship will quickly consume it.

What might a Radchaai ship look like as a result?

A ship that operates in thrust gravity will have decks perpendicular to its axis of thrust:

I propose that Radchaai ships’ decks are concentric, located perpendicularly to the ship’s center, which means that “lower” decks are increasingly sharply curved. Leckie notes that the highest decks are officer country; I propose that this is to limit the “Little Prince” effect of exceedingly short horizons among the officers. Ancillaries and enlisted people can have lower decks; they’re less important.

Now, Leckie also seems to describes ships has having a central access shaft, wherein is housed the computers and the AI core and all the important mechanicals. It runs vertically through the ship, much like the main elevators and central logistics shaft of a Radchaai space station. Radchaai space stations are also controlled by AIs; the AI core technology of both is described in similar language. Radchaai space stations also have artificial gravity.

The parallels of construction and requirements between a ship and a station make me think that the Radch has a common architecture for both ships and stations, which I shall now outline:

Keeping the central accesses, and the drive core, the Radchaai station expands circumferentially around its engine. The engine serves as a power source for the station, and as an object of gravitic manipulation to provide pseudogravity for the populace. A lower-deck framework provides docks for civilian ships without gravitic-manipulation technology, and for the shuttles of ships with. You wouldn’t want competition over gravitic manipulation; that’s likely to make people seasick or paste.

The highest deck of the station is reserved for the “garden” biome; the undergarden decks are for maintenance of that garden. But still high in deck order is the “promenade”, a walking deck lined with temples and shops and eateries and the offices and apartments of important people. The functionaries live and work in the lower, more-tightly-curved decks.

I’ve shown you one cross-section of a station, but this is just a minor slice of a small station. How do you add wedges onto a three-dimensional pie-slice of a sphere? A soccer ball is illustrative.

Add hexagons or pentagons to your station structure as necessary.

This is a growing, four-segment station. You can see the “reference” framework layer of the docks floating just above the core, with a green ship docked and a white Radchaai ship coming in to dock. The black pentagons are left basically open all the say down to the station’s core (and yes I messed up transparency by accidentally merging a layer in a way that couldn’t be reversed) while leaving the hexagon blocks for industry, offices, habitation space, stores, and the promenade. The top of each hexal block is a domed garden, here shown with an angled light.

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2020.04.17 | 🍳🍳🍳🍳🍳 | book 5/?? of quarantine

just finished reading Ancillary Mercy, after finishing Ancillary Sword a few days ago (and reading Ancillary Justice last summer). my yam recommended these, and I’m so fucking glad they did even though it took me ages to finish them

I’m unspeakably soft rn. like,, when I started this series I could immediately tell they were Good, but in this book especially (which, dare I say, may be the best of the main trilogy? ) there was such a delightful combination of elements that kept me holding my breath, ones that were exceedingly tender, and ones that just made me giggle. this trilogy wrapped me around its little finger in a way that hasn’t happened in a long while, and I’m so asdfghjkls about it! (clearly, since I changed my url to match >.>)

🐣 Washington 2: Anyone up for helping me figure out why I’m experiencing tip-of-the-toungueism?

﷽ rude 413: !healthbot;

🤖 Actually a Bot: If you believe you are experiencing a physical problem, please contact your warranty supplier.

🐣 Washington 2: Nono it’s not that; I think it’s software

🐣 Washington 2: I’m trying to recall a memory, and the pointers are there for the memory, but the memory isn’t.

@annleckie

Lots of people who wanted to sign this probably didn’t get to so anyone who wants to reblog with a comment and/or add a signature is welcome to!

Signed,

We remembered to do a card this year! Hope you had a great Mom day! - Morgan @darling-child-tisarwat

Thank you for being so awesome - Erin @cassyblue

Emery ( Who loves the books but has no tumblr )

Lots of love in a thousand eggs, - Ari @oyveyzmir

Lots of Love - Empress Ellie @definitely-ellie

Your books have been there for me in some seriously shitty times and they've been instrumental in me becoming the kind of person who could be a fleet captain. <3 - @nausicaaenriquez

Thank you for your wonderful novels - Emma

Much love and tea - from Cody @flowersforgraves