The Eternity Artifact

Preface

The last—and most unusual—discovery of the ill-fated and underfunded Deep Space Exploration program of the League of Worlds was Chmnos [see “B²,” “DSE, Section 4-1,” “Galactic Anomalies”]…

Chronos is a perfect sphere of compressed matter in a state that appears as neither regular matter, nor that which would be classified as neutronium. Its diameter is 15,020 kilometers [1.178 T-norm], with an approximate mass of 1.9714X10¹⁵ kilograms [density is wughty 280 T-norm]. Remote tests and probes indicate no atmosphere, and a surface that is perfectly polished [variation less than .0001 mm.] under a thin layer of galactic dust and detritus. Chronos rotates on its own axis with a period of eleven standard hours…

Based on the accumulation and composition of surface matter, the trajectory of the body, the images and sensor readings, the DSE team estimated that Chronos had been formed between 4 and 10 billion years ago. This preliminary finding ignited controversies in all major systems, and two other brief expeditions [see “Covenant Rim Expedition” and “CW Chronos Probe”] were mounted. Their instrumentation was less elaborate, but essentially confirmed the findings of the DSE expedition…

Equally remarkable is the body’s location and velocity. Chronos was detected beyond the outer edge of the trailing arm of the Galaxy moving at a thirty-degree inclination to the galactic ecliptic and tangent to the arm at a constant velocity of 66 km/sec. Because of its speed and gravitational characteristics, confirmation of its properties was both difficult and costly, and those expenses were a major factor in the termination of the DSE program… After the initial furor over the findings of all three expeditions, all the systems of the Galaxy abandoned the enigma that was Chronos to its lonely journey, citing the difficulties and costs involved in further explorations…

—UNIVERSE OF WONDER

J. Joshua Moorty,

D.Sci. Pan-Media

Delhi, O.E., 4323