Bring it Fools -- Science Fiction Smack Down

Kollock and the Creed song

It started because Kollock had never seen a black hole.

They were on a simple transport run, taking grain from a farming planet called Euston to the great cities on Yín Yuè. They'd done the run a few times before, and Kollock had noticed that the black hole was not exactly on the way, but not a huge detour either.

'Why not?', had asked Kaira Lal. 'What's the worst that can happen?'

So Joyo Sari had set a course through flux space; and they'd popped out over the vast accretion disk. The stellar-mass black hole itself was far too small to see, but the raging spiral of gas and dust that was being pulled from its companion yellow star was not.

'That's pretty cool,' said Kollock, staring at the solar-system-sized light show below them. 'What's the quote? "Every time I see one of those things I expect to spot some guy dressed in red with horns and a pitchfork."'

'What's that from?', asked Lal.

'Disney's The Black Hole,' said Kollock.

Kollock was their mechanic; and she was also a theal, an alien from a planet a very long way away, on the other side of explored space. She had a body about the size and shape of a beach ball, from which sprouted a profusion of different sized and shaped tentacles, a single eye with two pupils, and a disconcertingly human-like mouth. She spoke with a voice that sounded far too low for her little body. The theal had not been a space-faring species when contacted by humanity, and were fascinated by everything they encountered. This included space travel and human culture.

'I didn't know you'd seen that. It is cool, isn't it?', said Lal. 'If you scan you can probably find fragments of planet cores. This thing must have been a monster when it went supernova.'

'Let's see... Yup, a lot of silicon and iron chunks among the gas. Wait, what's that?, asked Kollock.

'Show me?', said Sari. 'Oh, huh. That's weird. It looks artificial.'

It was a cube a few metres in diameter. It was spinning, lazily, and on a long but inevitable spiral into the black hole.

'That's weird,' said Lal. 'It's not a probe, because who'd leave a probe on a decaying orbit? And it's got no external sensors or anything. I think it got dropped and left behind.'

'It looks Creed,' said Sari. 'Do you really want to tangle with them?'

'Creed salvage could be worth money,' said Lal. 'And let's be honest, they won't turn up to an arbitration court. I say we bag it.'

'Fair. Let me get in close and we can load it up. Hold four is empty.'

Sari started planning an orbital trajectory. As he worked, the wires plugged into his skull moved and glittered in the lights of the cockpit. Then with a gentle hiss, their ship, the Fearful Symmetry, started adjusting its orbit to intercept.

#

The queen slept. Around her, her retainers sat, meditating on what was to come. Occasionally one of them would stand to find water or food for their queen; sometimes they would leave to rest, and their place would be taken by others. They all sung, a low, slow song of sorrow and peace.

She was old, so old. She could barely lift a hand, and her speech was unfocused and weak. Her life was but a single thread in the fabric of her people, an important thread that held the material together, picked out the most beautiful patterns, but a single thread nevertheless. And all threads must have their end.

Her chamber was a monument to her: great tapestries that celebrated her rule hung from the high walls, the cooling breeze made the plants sway and the fountains shiver. Through the diamond windows, far below, were the products of a long and stable rule: fields, towers, parks, factories, peace.