The Dead Sun

by B. V. Larson

  “Are you referring to the dead-man’s switch? If so, it has been prepared and attached. I constructed it after our previous conversation.”

  “Of course you did. Fire when ready. The fleet is arranged to react to any Macro response.”

  “The bomb is away, Colonel.”

  Almost immediately, a contact appeared. Jasmine drew a circle around it with her finger and tapped at it, assigning it a yellow color. An appropriate color, I thought, neither friend nor foe, but a neutral entity.

  It occurred to me as the weapon sailed in our direction with alarming speed that Marvin had a golden opportunity in his tentacles should he decide to take it. The bomb would pass right through our fleet. If it was truly as powerful as he’d said it was, he could detonate it early just by “accidentally” cutting out the signal when it was in our midst.

  Sure, I trusted Marvin. He’d saved Earth’s bacon on many occasions. But it was unnerving to have a non-human—a sentient machine, no less—with his circuitry on the trigger. If we lost this fleet, there would be no time to build another before Earth was hit by the Macros.

  “Newcome,” I said. “Rearrange our ships into a safer configuration. I think we should be a bit farther out from the ring, and we should encircle it at a more oblique angle.”

  Newcome frowned, then looked down at the yellow contact which followed an arcing line through the middle of our ships. His puffy white eyebrows shot up when he figured out what I was talking about.

  “Immediately, sir,” he said. “And—good thinking.”

  He rushed off to the navigational table and began relaying orders to place the ships at a safe distance. By the time Marvin’s bomb passed through the middle of us, it looked as if a school of fish had been scared off by a thrown rock.

  The entire process took hours. When it was finally done, the bomb went through the ring, and the signal was cut off in that precise instant. I can safely say that we were holding our collective breath.

  “Marvin is calling again,” Jasmine said.

  I tapped the channel open. I was watching the ring closely, not sure what to expect. So far, nothing had happened.

  “Even if your approval is a little late at this point, I’m still looking forward to it,” Marvin said.

  “What?”

  “Have you forgotten our previous conversation, Colonel Riggs?”

  “No, I haven’t. But I don’t see anything to get excited about yet.”

  “The bomb reached the ring, went to the other side, and detonated.”

  “We don’t know that yet,” I pointed out. “All we know is that it vanished through the ring. So far, the Macros haven’t sent anything back in our direction. I’m not breaking out champagne yet, Marvin. What if it was a dud?”

  “Highly unlikely.”

  “So you say. How can we be sure?”

  “Launch a normal probe.”

  I looked at the command table. He was right, of course. In order to verify the test, we had to go in there and take a look around. But the last time I’d done so, hundreds of enemy ships had appeared in response.

  I tightened my guts and straightened my spine.

  “The robot is right. Launch a probe. Hell, launch ten of them. Use the wire-guided types and the seek-and-return models.”

  The staff worked relaying the commands. We soon had a shower of small contacts headed for the ring. We watched as they crawled forward and vanished one at a time.

  The wait was a short one this time, but it was agonizing none the less. Had they all been destroyed?

  I’d almost given up hope before I looked at the timer Jasmine had set up. The fastest of them took a few minutes to go in, scan and return. Getting a good amount of data from an unexplored system took time. In this case, we’d get little more than a snapshot—but it would be much better than nothing.

  “The first probe has returned, sir!” Jasmine said.

  I could hear the excitement in her voice. Her tone was taken up by a dozen throats. People shouted and laughed. The unbreachable ring had been breached. We eagerly awaited the data as it was transmitted and relayed.

  All the probes were coming back, all ten of them.

  “Sir?” Jasmine said. She pointed to a blinking light on my console. “Marvin’s calling again.”

  “Yeah,” I said, “I know. He wants his pat on the head, and I’m going to have to give it to him. But I don’t quite feel like telling him how great he is yet.”

  -25-

  The data pouring in from the probes painted a strange picture. The image of the system on the far side of this ring was unlike anything I’d ever seen before. We couldn’t see the whole system as we’d sent the probes in and out so quickly, giving us just a glimpse.

  There were planets—but no sun. As a result, the planets were only drifting, frozen hulks, icy blocks of stone and minerals in more or less spherical shapes. In addition, a few of these forlorn worlds had been broken up into asteroid belts due to some past calamity.

  “We didn’t leave the probes over there for long, but they picked up a fair amount of data,” Jasmine said. “We can be certain there isn’t a normal star system on the far side of this ring. There’s only wreckage with a lot of ionization and debris.”

  Newcome stared at the images that swam into being on our screens with alarm. “Could Marvin’s bomb have been so powerful that it destroyed a star system?” he asked.

  The thought had occurred to me. I was just as alarmed as Newcome was, but I laughed off his suggestion.

  “We can’t have put out a star!” I said. “No, I think this is the dark place that was always on the far side of this ring. This is a dead system of planets with a dead star in the center. Is there any strong gravitational force that could have been the star? Maybe there was one that went nova long ago and left a dwarf core behind?”

  They tapped and analyzed. I could tell my nerds were baffled.

  “Maybe,” Jasmine said at last. “There is a gravitational force. It is something bigger than Jupiter but much smaller than a viable sun. It is too small by half to exert the gravitational pull to cause fusion in the core. In other words, it’s too small to ignite and become a star.”

  “Place it,” I said, looking at the shadowy contacts. “Then light it up on the boards as if it was a sun.”

  After she did so, everything became clear. The gravity well we’d detected was indeed at the center of this grouping of cold planetoids. At the center of the blacked-out system was a large object that didn’t give off heat. It had to be a burned-out star.

  “Just as I thought,” I said. “It was a sun once, but now it’s burned out, or blown up, or whatever.”

  “Is it possible it’s a neutron star?” Newcome asked.

  Jasmine shook her head. “Insufficient mass.”

  “Looks like we’ve discovered something new,” I said. “Whatever we call it, there are still planets circling around this dead star, providing something for the Macros to mine. They aren’t afraid of the dark.”

  “Such a lonely place,” Jasmine said, staring at it. “The chemical signatures I’m reading indicate the star once burned, but this is a dead system. It will be like walking through a graveyard to travel through it.”

  “What about defenses?” I demanded. “What do the Macros have?”

  “The probes didn’t report anything dangerous. There was a lot of debris around the ring with high metallic content but nothing that poses more than a navigational hazard.”

  “Hmm,” I said thoughtfully. “High metallic content you say? I bet they had a trap set up. Maybe something like the laser firing-squad Crow set up on the Sol ring but more intense. The trap had been destroying our probes for years, but now Marvin’s bomb took it out.”

  I grabbed hold of my com-link and opened the general command channel. Instantly, I was put in contact with every commander in the fleet.

  “All ahead full!” I shouted. “Execute Invasion Plan Alpha immediately.”

  I closed the channel. Ne
wcome and Jasmine looked alarmed.

  “Sir?” Newcome said, speaking up first. “Don’t you think we should send in another set of probes? If they took a little longer to look around, say ten or twenty minutes this time—”

  “No,” I said. “Let’s cross into their system before the enemy can get on their feet and mount an effective defense. The door is open, and I’m not going to let them slam it closed again.”

  Everyone scrambled to obey my orders. The ring couldn’t handle the entire fleet at once, of course. Fighters swarmed in, followed by a long line of cruisers. After that, if disaster didn’t strike the initial invaders, the carriers, transports and support ships would join them on the far side.

  We watched our fleet surge forward and thin out into a column of ships. The first entered and vanished. I felt my guts churn. Heading into the unknown was always the hardest part of a space battle for me. I preferred to be in the thick of it with an enemy in my sights. Our battleship was still on the wrong side of the ring and would remain so for quite some time while waiting its turn to wriggle through into enemy territory.

  I felt helpless and uncertain, cut off from a growing portion of my fleet. If things were going badly, I wouldn’t be able to fix anything.

  “Newcome,” I said, “you have command of this side of the invasion force. I’m taking a pinnace to the Andoria. I’m going through right now.”

  The Andoria was a cruiser of our latest type. It was big, sleek and deadly. It was also about to slip through the ring. If I transferred to that ship, I’d be in the system a full hour before the carrier would finally wallow through.

  I almost made it to the airlock when Jasmine caught up with me.

  “Wow,” I said, laughing, “you sure move fast for a pregnant lady.”

  “Shh!” she shushed me, putting a finger to my lips and frowning. “That’s a secret! And besides, I’m a nanotized, barely-pregnant lady.”

  I went for a good-bye kiss, but she dodged me.

  “Why are you doing this, Kyle?”

  “I can’t stand waiting. The whole battle could play out on the far side of this ring while I’m sitting in the caboose. I should never have declared my flagship as one of the last in the line.”

  She looked down and glowered at my chest.

  “What?” I asked. But I knew the answer before she spoke.

  “I don’t want you to go. That system looks creepy—dead. It’s a graveyard.”

  “Yeah, so? Stars go nova all the time.”

  She shook her head. “Not like that. It looks strange. I’ve seen astronomical imagery of a thousand systems. There should be a dust cloud if there was a stellar explosion, and a lot of radiation, too. We aren’t reading any of that.”

  “What do you think it is, then?”

  “It is a dead system, yes, but what if it experienced a new kind of calamity: something that sheared most of the mass of their sun away? Or what if the trap you spoke of, the weapons system that’s been destroying our probes, is far stranger than we understand it to be?”

  I laughed and hugged her. “That’s crazy. Stop worrying. I know you’re feeling paranoid right now, that’s normal in your condition. Don’t worry, I won’t die or vanish. I’m going to be fine. Now, get back up to the bridge and command your ship. Newcome needs you.”

  I kissed the top of her head and entered the airlock. She didn’t go up to the bridge, however. She pressed up against the tiny circular window and stared into the airlock, watching me. I did my best to smile and wave and pretend I was as happy and carefree as the proverbial clam.

  But I wasn’t. Even as I rode over to Andoria, I felt the same sort of disquiet Jasmine was obviously feeling. I had to wonder if I’d just said goodbye to her for the last time.

  It was this newly discovered system. It was alien, in an entirely new way. A school of dead planets circling an equally dead larger carcass in the center, a mass that had to have once been a shining star. Strange.

  Had those worlds been alive with people living on them at one time? Perhaps biotic species we’d never meet? Were they erased from time and history as thoroughly as it was possible to be?

  That idea was upsetting me. I knew the others were thinking about it, too. We weren’t just feeling mid-mission combat jitters. We were encountering the unknown, and like humans throughout time, we didn’t like it.

  The captain of Andoria was surprised to see me, to put it mildly. But she made no complaints and gave me no attitude.

  Captain Nomura was one of my better captains, a stern type who ran her ship tightly. She wasn’t tall, but she had broad shoulders and breasts that jutted out from her uniform like apples because she held herself so rigidly. Her black hair had been trimmed almost as short as a jarhead. Her face was attractive despite a complete lack of makeup.

  Nomura led me personally up to the bridge. To my credit, I managed not to study her trim figure too closely. People were watching.

  “Colonel on the Bridge!” shouted a marine at the hatch.

  A dozen people snapped salutes to me. I wasn’t accustomed to this, especially not when we were in a combat zone. Maybe the captain had ordered them to snap to attention when I boarded. Whatever the case, I saluted in return and moved directly to the command table.

  Everyone on the bridge acted like they had a broomstick for a spine, and there wasn’t a smile to be had when they greeted me. I did my best not to notice. I allowed captains to run their ships the way they wanted within Star Force regs. It was a tradition that dated back to our formation as an organization.

  “Captain Nomura,” I said, addressing the zealous commander. “Is your ship in good condition?”

  “It’s in flawless operating condition, sir,” she said.

  Her response was a little intense, and I didn’t know her that well, so I simply nodded. I might have chuckled at anyone else. I’d heard she didn’t have much of a sense of humor, and I could see the rumors were correct. The woman rarely even blinked her large, dark eyes.

  “When do we go through the ring?” I asked.

  She glanced at her table. I saw her eyes fix on a timer that had been placed in one corner.

  “We have less than two minutes to go, Colonel. May I say it’s an honor to serve in your presence. I hope my crew doesn’t disappoint you.”

  “Uh, I’m sure they’ll do fine.”

  No one else said a word. I figured they didn’t dare to, that talking unnecessarily on this bridge wasn’t allowed.

  In the back of my mind, I was beginning to feel a little sorry for her crew, but I didn’t say anything. The ring loomed closer on the screens, and I braced myself. Sure, all the reports said this was going to be like a walk in the park…but I never fully trusted probes and scouts. Sometimes an enemy held back their surprises until the cat was fully ensconced in the bag. I was still worried this was one of those times.

  -26-

  We crossed into the dead system without incident. I found it strange to be in a region of space where there was no sun. I’d never been out in the empty void of velvet darkness that makes up most of the universe. There was nothing out here other than the few floating chunks of burnt flotsam: Ex-planets without day, existing in perpetual night. Their icy crusts of frozen methane were richly pocketed with minerals, we could detect that, but we still hadn’t found our enemy.

  I commandeered Andoria’s command table. Captain Nomura’s face was a mask of stone. I couldn’t tell if she was pissed about my sudden arrival or not—but then, I didn’t really care.

  “I understand this ring isn’t being jammed,” I said. “Link me up with central command.”

  Nomura worked the table like a master. I was impressed. She was almost as fast and effective as Jasmine.

  One of the reasons I’d chosen to go through the ring on Andoria was because it had a ring-communications system aboard. Most of our ships weren’t capable of inter-system com-links.

  The channel to Potemkin opened. In one corner of the screen, I now saw Jasmine’s
face. She was running her own table on her own ship. Newcome was at her side.

  “We haven’t encountered the enemy yet, Captain Sarin,” I reported.

  “We’ve received the same report from several sources so far,” she replied. “No contact made. But we do have a fix on the new system’s navigational position, sir.”

  I looked at her, and I could tell there was concern in her eyes. They were big, and dark, like the eyes of someone who knows the worst is true.

  “Give it to me,” I said. “Where are we?”

  “Can I remotely link to your table?”

  “Nomura?” I asked.

  She tapped rapidly. Her fingers were a blur, but she never said a word. The words connection made appeared on my table.

  “I think we’re synched now, Captain Sarin,” I said. “Show me something.”

  My screen shifted under my hands. It now showed a regional star map. Seen top-down from a point of view hanging above the Milky Way, a yellow box appeared far out on the disk of the galaxy. It zoomed in with sickening speed.

  “It looks like you’re taking me to local space,” I said.

  “Yes. It appears Marvin was correct.”

  I nodded, unsurprised.

  “We’re at the predicted origin point of the Macro fleet heading to Earth. See this line?”

  A red line appeared with an arrowhead at one end. It looked like a spearhead aimed at Earth.

  “That’s the path of the Macro invasion fleet that’s flying along with their comets. We weren’t sure how far they’d come, but it turns out they launched from this system, which is actually quite close to us in relative terms. This dead system is less than a light year from Earth.”

  “I’m surprised our astronomers never spotted this collection of dead rocks.”

  “We have tracked a few of the larger ones in the past, but these planetoids are so far out, so black and cold, we never knew they were here.”

  I looked over her data. Really, it wasn’t hard to verify. Just looking at the local constellations and the neighboring stars would have been enough for any navigator. Orion still looked like Orion and the Big Dipper was clear in the sky. We were very close to home.