Balaam's Ark was launched in the Human calender year 10,512 HYS(Human Years in Space) from the planet Balaam, in the Akkad system. It used a form of fusion drive, and MMI (Molecular Motion Inducer) engine to achieve near light-speed velocity quickly. The MMI engine uses a sub-quantum probability feild to control the Brownian motion of particles within the feild matrix. Within the feild, the rest mass of the ship can be reduced relative to the normal time-space matrix. Essentially what this means is the ship can accellerate quickly with out huge fuel tanks. This technology was discovered by the Balaamese just prior to the launch of this vessel. MMI engines can be used in any "anti-gravitational" way up to and including flying cities. On front of the vessel is a huge funnel, which emits a W-field which breaks down matter in front of the vessel for hundreds of millions of kilometers to a sub-atomic level and sucks it into the intake on the front to power the Bussard ramjet. The six glowing paddle-shaped panels generates an electromagnetic field which conducts the sub-atomic debris from the front of the ship, to the sides. This prevents any near light-speed collisions with atoms, or dust which could cripple or destroy the craft. The three life rings are built different from each other. The front and back one spin clockwise in respect to the ship's front. The middle one (which masses twice as much as the other two) spins counter-clockwise, to offset the spinning of the either two.. Aft of that of those are the fuel tanks, the radiation sheild/aerobrake shell, the disposable fuel tanks, and the huge fusion motor which powers the photon drive. The plan that the Balaamese were using was tried and true to most low-tech races using this technology. They would run up to near light-speed, which would dialate time to two or three generations of time onboard, Skew-flip the ship about halfway there, jettison the disposables, begin a braking burn. They would then finish the aero-shell at the aft of the vehicle, brake their final velocity in the photosphere of the target sun and assume an orbit around the target planet. The scene shown is Balaam's Ark beginning accelleration from it's construction site in near orbit of Adamesh, the colony world of Balaam. As far as STL craft of this type goes, this craft is minute! Only 300 meters wide across the rings and only 800 meters long. This was the last craft of it's kind built by the Balaamese. They attacked the breakaway colony world of Adamesh with a thermo-nuclear suprise attack, followed by a counter-revolutionary take over of the government by religious radicals. Two hundred years later, their ecology was destroyed by an over-response to a plague called the Blight, which they may have brought upon themselves. The target star for Balaam's Ark was the Chimer Sytem of CHX-245518, some thiry light years from Akkad, the Balaamese star. They were intercepted by the starship,Challenger, and rescued from destruction by the Chimers. That is a story for another day. Media is Vue 4