Space pulling technology
Space pulling technology, also known as a Q-Magnet drive, is a spacecraft propulsion system allowing apparent faster-than-light travel by connecting two points in space through the use of Q-magnets. It was originally developed by humans supposedly prior to the Icnosis, and has since become the primary method of FTL navigation through out the Settled Systems.
Background
Mechanics
Space pulling makes use of the near unique matter settings intrinsic to all areas of space. By connecting two points in space through Q-magnets, starships gain the ability to generate a rift in space analogous to a wormhole (sometimes called "faux-hole") which appears as a roughly spherical "window" to the desired destination. Depending on the distance between the start and end points, the formation of the rift may take more or less time.
Navigating through a rift requires high enough velocity to complete the pull of the Q-magnets. If a starship's velocity is insufficient, the destination will always appear out of reach no matter how much time is spent travelling through the rift, similar to the dichotomy paradox. This situation is called "paradoxing" and may lead to ships getting stranded in deep space.
Drive operation
Q-magnets function by dislocating themselves between two points in quantum space, appearing to exist both at the start and end positions. However, this requires them to be unobserved, as observing them forces them to exist in one location or the other. For this reason, Q-magnets are contained within a sealed casing known as the "black box".
Once dislocated, Q-magnets begin to pull the areas of space around themselves at both ends to one another, creating a rift through space. This rift remains open as long as the Q-magnets are powered. While travelling through a rift takes as much time as it takes to build up sufficient velocity, fully forming the rift may take anywhere from minutes to days, depending on distance. Due to this, longer-distance jumps are rare, with starships conventionally opting for series of shorter jumps to reach their destination.
The plotting of pull jumps is known as hypernavigation, and requires extremely precise and complex calculations which would be impossible for humans to compute. As each jump coordinate has a value typically within the order of 1082 and generates navigation files ranging in the petabytes, calculations are performed by AI running on quantum computers.
To avoid unnecessary strain on starships' on-board AI, many developed star systems contain at least one Warp gate containing pre-calculated jump coordinates, allowing for easier travel. This also enables spaceships without warp drives sufficient for interstellar travel to jump between star systems.
Quantum effects
Due to the nature of pull jumps, paradoxes may arise if precautions are not taken. For example, ships entering a rift at the same time may come out paradoxically overlapped, destroyed or disappear entirely. Another known danger is that ships may sometimes collide with quantum reflections of themselves, leading to mutual destruction.