FTL
- FTL refers to superluminal travel, for superluminal communication see IIC
Faster-than-light (FTL) travel is the transport of matter at speeds higher than the speed of light.
Special Relativity doesn't contemplate the possibility of an object with a positive rest mass accelerating from subluminal speeds into superluminal ones, but Field Theory, the in-universe field of Physics that succeeded Relativity and Quantum Theory, accommodates it within its framework. Long thought to be beyond mankind's reach, even if theoretically possible, it was achieved through Project Janus, one of the EDC's efforts to rehabilitate its image after the Unification Wars.
Humans and Cephalopods both have access to it, but the aliens have a better control of it, being able to achieve instantaneous travel through blink technology. It is fueled by exotic matter, which can only be produced with the large amounts of energy available in the Core Worlds. As such, exotic matter represents Governance's single biggest expenditure in the energy budget, and its production and transportation are important logistical bottlenecks. Apparently, the aliens suffer from similar limitations, as even though their FTL engines seem to be powered by fragments of space‐time itself, they also need very large amounts of energy to extract it.
