Past The Brink

Stories come about in many ways, I find. Some I come to the keyboard with a broad sketch in my head. That's happened a couple times lately. Those have almost been more a surprise than the other sort.

The kind where I just sit down and find out what's been hiding on the inside of my head. This kind of story.

This story might well be about the vastness of the universe, a vast deep containing all the possibilities. And, packed into an equal but decidedly more compact infinity, all the destruction.

This story might also be about the drives that might ask us to look upon such destruction. That's what the good Professor Roon is after, you see. A good look, and an even better set of measurements of just how the black hole at the center of the galaxy goes about its gluttony.

But then, for Artie Moreno, I suspect that this story's about something a little simpler. A little closer to home. You see, dear reader, now that I've had a chance to think about it, I believe that this week's story, for Artie Moreno at least, is about what you do when you've been asked to do something very much against who you are.

Who you are, who you want to be. What will your answer be when someone asks you the question that forces you to look...

Past The Brink by M. K. Dreysen

"You're right," Artie Moreno told his prospective passenger. "I will say your idea is awfully crazy."

That's how she'd pitched it to him. "You're going to say I'm crazy."

Only, Artie didn't think she was.

The idea maybe. But even that one...

"I want, I need to see, to take pictures of the boundary layers. I need to analyze it. Understand it."

Boundary layers. Which, there were an awful lot of boundary layers in Artie Moreno's Milky Way. Shock waves in nebula. The edges of all the solar systems.

You didn't need much from pilot and ship to get pictures of those boundary layers. Professor Gir Mazila Roon wanted data from the boundary layer that ruled the galaxy.

The one where the black hole at the center did its level best to digest the universe. One bite at a time.

Artie sent the professor back to her hotel room with the usual. "I'll have to think about it, talk it over with my crew. We'll be no good to you if they aren't on board."

Her chances went way up in Artie's estimation when she nodded her acceptance and left on cue. "I understand completely."

Of course, the crew would have to wait until Artie finished his drink. And the second one. "Double with a water back, right?"

"Yep." And a second drink. For fool's luck, he told himself.

****

"This opportunity of course comes with a suitable remuneration, Captain Moreno."

The second offer of the day came in the way the majority of them did. As a video mail message to the Windrush's main network address.

Artie admired the care that Professor Roon's university colleagues took in dancing around the subject. "There are so many possibilities, Captain. We're certain you'll find an appropriate time and place. Our only request, should you accept the opportunity, is that you place a device within the Professor's remote. We'll of course provide the device to you. All you need do then is find an appropriate location and collect the rest of your payment."

One third of that had been wired to the Windrush's exchange account already. "As assurety," the video message told him.

Artie accepted the offer with no second thoughts. Space is large, after all. He did remember to tell the rest of the crew of the state of play.

****

Thousands of years of carrying the power of the universe around in everything from handheld devices to the core of a battleship, and the physics geeks just couldn't shake the fascination with black holes.

It was one thing to create lab-scale versions, Artie reminded himself. It was another thing altogether to sit here and watch the most vicious of the universe's little secrets rip a star apart.

Roon had monopolized the observation ports with her gear. So to get an actual visual view of the show, she'd had to ask permission to take up the co-pilot's chair. When she could sit long enough to enjoy it at all, Roon spent most of the time running back and forth to her sensors.

Artie lounged in his chair, feet up. He worried that tea and an oatmeal raisin cookie wasn't up to the task. But really, what would have been?

The process had taken weeks. First, jump to the last known safe system. Then, plot out a search trail, one system at a time.

And always keep a planet between the Windrush and the star. The tortured beast Roon sought would, had, lash out unpredictably. The almost-superluminal particle jets spewed their way up and down, relative to the Windrush's approach, before splitting in a brilliant cascade.

At least, this side, the escapable side was brilliant. The sacrificed twins vanished into the hole's maw, half an arc and then nothing.

Those jets, Artie could predict, more or less, and they served admirably as a navigational beacon. The gamma ray bursts, unpredictable massive planet killers, they were another thing entirely.

Roon would have gone farther. Artie had stopped when they reached the last identifiable core of a gas giant. "No. We're here where even Jupiter must kneel before Chaos. It will make a good, safe place to park."

And an even better one to escape from. The super-dense remains kept the gamma shower on the proper side of the planet. Which was nowhere near the 'Rush. Uijer, the 'Rush's co-pilot, spent most of their time checking their observation orbit, a hair's breath below the horizon of the old chunk of metal.

"Far enough to see, not far enough to get roasted." The 'Rush's shields could handle the blast echoes, here, with the dead gas giant's help. A little farther, and the 'Rush would be all alone.

And gone. So Uijer worried, and Artie as well.

"When are you going to want to send the probe?"

They'd been in orbit for a week. Long enough to get comfortable with it.

Which made Artie nervous. Because it was also long enough to get complacent.

"Tomorrow?"

Artie saluted the Professor with his tea cup. "Perfect."

****

He'd already defused the device, and placed it in a carefully chosen nook of Roon's probe. He knew enough of tense working days to know that, if he'd waited, Roon would never let him near her baby at this time and place.

Uijer had wondered if Roon's colleagues thought she would be actually riding the probe. "They're paying enough for an assassination."

Artie spun the detonator where it lay on the table. He'd spent the weeks pondering that question. Here, a few hours from launch, he'd given it up for too little information.

The heart of the sabotage had been removed. But the Windrush had been payed.

He'd checked, before they left safe space and the network connection that had long since been lost in the noise of the dying star.

****

"Your colleagues worry about you, don't they?" he asked Roon, as she shepherded her packages off the 'Rush.

Roon stopped and walked to join Artie where he sat on a packing crate. "They approached you? What did they want?"

He handed her the detonator. It had ridden in his pocket for most of three months.

She tucked the explosive into her own pocket. After a long lingering look over. "Ambition scares folks, I guess."

"Reminds them of too much, I think."

"I don't suppose..."

"No names, no identifiable faces or voices." The video message had used a common masking protocol; the Actor's Guild saw to it that thousands of years of dreams were available for pennies. And the Professor's jealous colleagues had known enough to pay for an inseparable masking, one that couldn't be lifted because there was nothing to lift it from. "They just fed a script to a director and let them do the rest."

"Probably an AI," Roon mused.

"Just so. Listen, Doc, are you gonna be ok?" Artie had invested some of the 'Rush's time and energy into her and her project. He didn't want to see it wasted.

She shrugged. "Sure."

"Uh-huh." Artie, Uijer more, had spent a little time with folks who did business via explosives. "We'll be checking in on you, Professor. You need anything, anytime anywhere, holler. Preferably enough before the fan hits the shit for us to get here and remove you from particulate path? Please?"

She paused at the bay door, the last of her gear crates trundling its way down the ramp. Then she turned, her face a study in distraction and dawning trust. "I'll do that, Captain."

"Promise?"

Roon smiled. "Of course." Then she turned and walked down the ramp.