Middle-hard
I’ve had a few ideas knocking around in my head. I feel like there has been a lack of a certain kind of sci-fi. The middle ground stuff- the stuff that isn’t quite hard realism and digging into quantum mechanics or specific real world technology, but is a little bit harder than “a bunch of wacky space creatures are in space because they’re in space, and nothing is explained, everything is on the table”. Not quite as lackadaisical as Guardians of the Galaxy, but not as slow and subdued as 2001: Space Odyssey.
To that end I’ve had an idea rattling around for some time. The ultra short elevator pitch is: Snowpiercer IN SPACE.
Slower Than Light
The galaxy is stuffed, but FTL travel has turned out to be an impossibility. Interstellar communication between species is possible, but limited and unreliable, prone to corruption and data loss, sometimes written in a galactic standard language that is centuries or millenia out of date, and can take years to arrive. Expanding to a new planet is a centuries long process, undertaken in generational ships, and requires careful coordination with neighbouring species and a decades-long process to ensure the proposed planet will even still be viable by the time the colonists arrive hundreds of years later- and even with careful management, there are the occasional incidents and catastrophic disasters. Interspecies contact is simply not something that is done - a round trip that will take many lifetimes of your ancestors grandchildren isn’t set out on just to have a picnic with the neighbours, and the majority of known interspecies encounters are two species arriving at the same planet, competing for the same resources with no way out, and fighting each other to extinction.
On a generational trip to a new uncharted planet, the Qokina stumble upon an ancient shipwreck in deep space- a one-in-a-trillion impossible coincidence. On exploring, salvaging and studying the wreckage they discover an engine which sends the wreckage hurtling towards their destination in days instead of decades, while dragging the Qokina’s ship along in its wake.
Traveling to their destination without the engine took over 400 years. With it, returning back took 4 weeks. In a year, they had connected every one of their inhabited planets through intercosmic trade, and sent ecstatic communications to all neighbouring species to join their new collective. The omnirail is one of a kind - they do not know how to replicate the engine, only how to keep it going. Over time they have endlessly modified it, adding tens of thousands of city-sized cars to the endless train, transporting people and product between their worlds. The miracle train runs a permanent loop through their entire interconnected civilization, and as long as it never stops moving, the future is promising and bright.