Supra-C Missiles

            In space warfare battles can be fought across huge volumes, and wepoans that merely travel at the speed of light can be avoided by opposing craft, it was therefore a priority of Federation military defence to create missiles that could carry payload at speeds far greater than light, and therefore can target even remote targets in times which limit defensive response.

            The Supra-C missile builds upon existing flight technologies, though for its development in military applications increased robustness and miniaturisation have been applied to the original technologies. The predominant problem is propulsion as the existing payload technologies have already been well developed, traditional faster than light propulsion plants are typically large, even small spaceraft will have many cubic metres of hardware for only limited propulsion. The answer to this problem was to draw on inducted flight systems (link), which do not use high-energy powerplants, and only minimal, relatively unsophisticated driver coils.

            The main body of the missile contains a series of stacked toroids which from the driver core of the missile, in its storage state the coils do not generate any strong propulsive effect, however at missile launch, the hollow cavity of the missile is injected with ultra high energy plasma derived from the warships main power plants, this high energy plasma them powers the driver coils. The missile launcher contains ancillary driver coils, which define the propulsion field, the missile’s own propulsion systems maintain this field from the energy of the onboard plasma. Depending on the type of missile supra luminal flight can be maintained from seconds up to many minutes, though this time scale seems short is often sufficient for the missile to travel the many light hours between the combating craft, and many magnitudes quicker than conventional missiles.

            In addition to the propulsive effects of the inducted flight mechanisms the spatial distortion around the missile confers some defence, especially against laser and particle weapon fire, however as these missiles are relatively small and unsophisticated they have fairly limited defence mechanisms, and rely instead on their velocity and small attack profile to reach their target. The plasma inside the weapon also allows for manoeuvring even when the propulsion field collapses, meaning that when the missiles field is collapsed when it enters the enemy ship’s own spatial distortion mechanisms, though the venting of the plasma constitutes only a small amount of the total delta-V reserve of the missile it can be sufficient to refine any trajectory prior to impact.

            Missiles are stored as inert units, the payload (antimatter, or plasma bomb) warhead loaded prior to launch, and the driver coil chamber vacuum pumped (to allow for plasma injection). A missile may only typically be a few metres long by a little more than half a metre wide, though larger models can carry larger payloads and have greater range. There are also much smaller models, typically only a meter long and ten centimetres wide that can be used in close quarters exchanges (and these kind of missile are installed on small strike craft and fighter groups). The missile cases are fed from a magazine into the launcher where the payload material is injected, and then the plasma, the electronics and avionics systems are powered in flight by a micro generator that uses the heat of the plasma to generate the required power. The missile launcher has necessarily has to have conduits for the payload material and high energy plasma, the latter used not only to launch the missile but also for the launcher’s own spatial distortion generator.

            Though these missiles allow for long range exchanges at supra luminal speeds they have only a limited ability to change course, and the enemy ships can potentially out manoeuvre them. Another weakness in this system is the relatively low stealth of the missiles, although their attack profile is relatively slim, the signature of the spatial distortion is blindingly conspicuous. The other major problem with the warheads is that they self-destruct when their internal power reserves fail, plasma and antimatter both lose containment, and destroy the missile, though this prevents space from being littered with unexploded ordinance, it can be dangerous in close quarters exchanges, however whilst the unit has power it can be instructed to detonate, and so some control other the missiles is maintained. The other problem, especially with antimatter warheads is that the blaze of annihilation can temporarily blind some sensors even at quite some distance, and of course illuminate any craft in the area, regardless of any stealth hull material.

            There is some design work within the Federation to try and improve missile technology, especially with the aim of producing more sophisticated weapons, whilst these new missile will be more powerful, with better flight, defence and stealth characteristics they will probably end up bigger, and most likely confined to larger vessels, or to serve a more limited arsenal on strike craft.

The ultimate advance in this particular field is the production of micro scale wormhole generators which create a portal to transfer high temperature plasma directly to the missile whilst in flight.