Dust to Dust 3

As they drew closer to the source of the radiation, now taking up almost the entirety of the forward half of the sensor sight, Don took note of how the dispersion of radiation was starting to level out.

"Do the sensors have a limit to their sensitivity? It looks like it's capping out."

"No, this is accurate. The radiation level per unit surface area appears to relatively even."

"So are we close? What would have to happen to give an even radiation signature?"

"The only situation that comes to mind is that the source of the radiation is spread evenly over a large area."

"So something blew up?"

"That would give credence to the report of a sudden burst of radiation."

Don buried his head in his hands. "So we are out here for nothing? The damn thing's already gone?"

"The act of confirming that there was something being built out here should be enough information for Central to act on. If there is a wreck remaining, we should analyze it and see what they were trying to make."

"Yeah, true enough. How far are we from the source then? We can't be far. can we?"

"Comparing the angle of the edges of the initial encounter with the current angle limits, I cannot imagine we are far off. The size of the cloaking field would have to be level of a small star though, assuming that the source of the Split Radiation is contained within it."

"But if they can't detect it, they might not know it exists. We could be looking for a much smaller volume than you think."

"A valid point. I will plot a suggested trajectory for the volumetric center of the cloud. Before proceeding onto a search pattern I would recommend a short nap. I am not detecting any debris in our path."

"I'll take you up on the offer. You know what to do if something comes up. Mercedes!"

The puppy, who he had sworn got bigger over the past week, stumbled up to the cockpit in a hurry. Don appreciated the company, especially when it was time to de-stress. She was soft, and she made a nice warm blanket.

-----

"Captain. . . the split wave has made contact."

The Captain's eyes were red at this point, and underneath them were bags sagging deeper than any the navigator had ever seen. Evidently, he hadn't gotten sleep.

This wasn't surprising considering he felt his hands were soaked in the blood of billions of innocent lives.

". . . and their star?" His usually strong tone that commanded the respect of his crew was now weak.

The navigator, the young man in charge of tracking their progress, couldn't bring himself to answer. This was an answer in and of itself, prompting a defeated sigh and a collapse deeper into his chair.

The surge of split, the energy responsible for their civilization's progression into space and the spark required for the creation of life, had infiltrated their star. They had seen the results along the way, but some hope remained that the sudden infusion of a volatile source of energy into the hottest furnaces they knew of would have a different result in one that harbored life.

Evidently this was not the case.

If the sun acted in a way similar to the stars they had seen prior, then all solid bodies were currently in the process of turning into a fine powder.

If this process took the same amount of time as they expected, then every living organism outside of the pulse shield would be living in absolute agony for the next five minutes, their bodies crumbling and breaking apart, decomposing at a rate faster than was natural.

This was horrifying, but there was nothing that they could do about it at this point. Their worries spawned from the final calamity, the one they would have to defeat to secure the future of this doomed version of life.

"Prepare the Oberlux for combat."

""Aye Captain.""

As the bridge got to work preparing for the fight ahead, the Captain returned to his quarters. He needed to rest, he needed to eat, he needed to mourn.

-----

A sharp pricking around his neck dragged Donovan from his slumber. After taking a second to gag (reflexively) and a minute to gather his thoughts, he asked ARC for a situation report.

"Sol has disappeared from our sensors."

"Run that by me again."

"The Sun is no longer showing on sensors."

"Slightly concerning. Mind elaborating?"

"On every sensor save the Split Radiation, the Sun is gone."

Don, fresh out of bed and still spooling up to go, took a minute to think. ARC, well aware that there was plenty of time, simply wanted to know what they should be doing and looking for in this situation.

"Does our concealment field have the ability to work both ways?"

"Yes, though it was not designed operate in that capacity."

"Then I think we may have found our way into a similar array, just a lot larger in scale. What do we see?"

"Interestingly, nothing of note. Even on long range scanners I can only detect a few dust clouds. Judging by the split radiation scanning, it appears we are now inside the cloud of radiation."

"Is there anything else strange going on? Some systems taking more power?"

"The Pulse Shield is now using twenty percent of our power output as opposed to ten. I hypothesize that this is a result of this cloud and not worth mentioning."

"Will that cause issues?"

"Not until it reaches fifty."

Acknowledging this, Don started rubbing Mercedes' ears and just thought in silence for a few minutes. "I don't want to look at this radiation map, it's too distracting. Turning on the visible spectrum."

The result was not what he had expected.

"Is it just me, or is there a terrifyingly low number of stars in the sky?"

The display was pitch black save for the dots indicating dust clouds. Pulling a 180, not even the sun was visible.

"I told you that nothing was showing up on sensors. In light of this I feel your assessment was accurate."