Supernova

Chapter One: Stellar Wound

Captain Dao Chen stared at the spectrographic readout and felt the coffee turn to acid in her stomach. Kepler-442b's sun was not behaving like a star in late-stage hydrogen depletion. It was behaving like a star that had been stabbed.

"The helium flash is artificial," said Dr. Okonkwo from the astrophysics station, his voice the careful monotone of a man trying very hard not to panic. "Someone or something is injecting heavy elements directly into the core. At this rate, we have eleven days before full collapse." Eleven days. Forty thousand colonists on the surface. Two evacuation ships in orbit, each rated for six thousand.

Dao set down her coffee. "Get me the colonial governor on a priority channel. And wake up the weapons officer." Okonkwo blinked. "Captain, this is a science vessel." "It was," Dao said. "Now it is the only ship between forty thousand people and a murder weapon the size of a sun."