The Archaeologists, Part 2
Previously in "The Archaologists, Part 1":
Aboard a damaged starship fleeing the alien Krakens, geochronologist Misha has been plagued by disturbing prophetic dreams, straining his fractured relationship with Thessalin, the reluctant commander he loves. Their desperate escape strands them in orbit around a star that should have gone supernova generations ago but hasn't. There they discover something far stranger than their enemy: a ring of artificial, mirror-white icosahedral "planets" locked in an orbit gravity alone can't explain. Meanwhile Sonya, still haunted by a cave-in that should have killed her, seeks numb refuge in shipmind Quetzal's alien meditation philosophy of "the Seekers of Seventeen." The ship's missing communications specialist, Kristian, is found hidden in cryo-sleep, having sabotaged the pod bay to buy himself a century of oblivion, his cabin walls scrawled with dragon-glyphs and the name of a dead linguist, Lili, he loved in secret.
Thessalin's forced revival of Kristian kills him days later - a death she owns coldly, admitting she needed to prove to herself she could be ruthless. As grief and suspicion fray the crew, Misha uncovers evidence Kristian sent a mysterious top-priority transmission just before the Kraken struck, while Sonya, seeking purpose, launches alone toward the nearest icosahedron on a reconnaissance run that leaves Misha helpless and watching from afar. Now, with a fresh nightmare pointing them toward something waiting above the plane of the strange planets, the crew braces to learn just what unseen force is holding the supernova at bay, and what devoured the Kraken warship without a trace.
"Progress reports," said Thessalin. "Pyron?"
He shook his head. "The main drive is still out. We have patched up the structural damage, but we're getting strange readings from some of the chamber monitors. Something to do with neutral currents, ESSA thinks, whatever they are. The effects are changing with time, but ESSA says that may be because our orbit alters our distance from the source of the problem."
Thessalin bit her lip. "That means the cause is in this system but not in the ship?"
Pyron spread his hands. "ESSA's right more often than not."
"Noted. Next?"
Quetzal said over the communal frequency: "I have been scanning the area where the Kraken was destroyed. There is definitely a diffuse source of high-energy radiation. I suspect it is being scattered by the interstellar medium, but I haven't analysed it or fully localised it yet." A blurry image appeared in their screens, a ghostly sword blade or outstretched arm.
Peering at it, Misha said: "It does look as though it has some geometrical structure." He entered commands. "And its intensity seems to increase at higher energies. Can we get more data - look at higher-energy gammas?"
"Can we?" Thessalin asked Pyron.
He thought and said, "We could take out filters and re-bias the detectors. It would mean some damage in the long run..."
"Will it interfere with the search perpendicular to the orbit?"
"Not materially."
"Then do it," Thessalin ordered. "Sonya? Where are you now?"
After the time-lag, Sonya's voice said: "I'm just completing the first orbit about the icosahedron. From its mass, I think it must be mostly hollow, though I haven't found an entrance yet. But I think I've recognised something. Remember what I was looking at on Dayson? Igloos. There are fourteen in a cluster at the end of a short tube. They look like a bunch of white grapes. If I can't find anything more promising, I'll go down and check them out next orbit."
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"Quetzal," said Sonya on her private link, "I don't think I can get inside the planet without using force. I'm going to try one of the igloos instead." She stared blankly out at the universe. "I've started thinking about what happened on Dayson again, over and over. I kept waking up last night, choking. And now I can imagine another Kraken ship in the sky, coming for us, any time."
Quetzal's voice sounded quietly in her ears. "Fear is a physical response. You are unable to control it because you find it difficult to think of your body as an attribute, as a container for your essence. For me, it is easy of course. This ship of…
