Star-Born Anomaly (Blueshift #2)

Prologue

Secure communication

General Inger: Omega Station is lost, and any ambassador we send turns into one of these automatons, insisting we stop sending negotiators, but they will not return home themselves.

General Dorse: I wouldn’t want them too.

Inger: These are CORE officials, some related to the Chancellor. We can’t abandon them.

Dorse: They’ve started calling themselves Calypson like the others. There is no doubt that these… people are no longer human.

Inger: Do we understand what has happened to them yet? Or if it’s reversible?

Dorse: Top scientists have been on the task since the very beginning, and none of them will make a solid hypothesis. They’re demanding test subjects and access to the Calypso’s logs. But all ships entering Sector Ten are absorbed without fail, just like Omega Station.

Inger: Do we declare war? Send a warship to obliterate the entire colony?

Dorse: The crew of the Calypso are obeying our directive and not advancing into our space. But they’re creating some sort of gaseous barrier. Our scientists don’t know what to make of it. Plus, there are children on board.

Inger: Children die every day from a wide range of hazards, including war.

Dorse: As long as they don’t advance toward Jupiter, we have no recourse in launching an attack.

Inger: No one of influence agrees with one another. There are those with their fingers on the trigger just waiting for an excuse, and those not willing to destroy one hundred years of history because of fear.

Dorse: We also have the benefit of distance. They would need to pass through Tellusian space to get to CORE territory.

Inger: My spies tell me the Tellusians are just as nervous and threatened by their presence as we are. There may come a time when doing nothing is no longer an option.

Dorse: Public sentiment—

Inger: Can only last so long. If they become a threat, we will do what we must to exterminate them.