It would be a tough place for a single mother and her son, though Samuel had them set up with the funds they would need to survive while he was gone. If the mission was a success he could pay off his medical debt, cover his own expatriation fee, and have enough to set them up with a new life far from Grotto. As it was, Sura and Orion would keep a low profile and wait for him on the station.
They made love on that last night as if it would be the last time, which they did every time he left, though that night it had felt different. It had felt to Samuel, for the first time, like this time it could be true. He’d felt that certainty so powerfully that he’d gone into the Reaper financial benefits office and double-inspected his death benefit assignment just to be sure.
All Reapers who had served a minimum of two years were assigned a death benefit, which was to be paid to whomever the Reaper logged as his or her desired recipient. After those two years the benefit amount, which was modest, would slowly grow by miniscule daily increments.
If Samuel died on the mission he knew his death benefit would at least get Sura and Orion off the station with enough resources to provide for them while Sura pledged to a new corporation. There would be no homestead without his survival. At least Samuel knew that if he were to die, Sura would be able to take her time and find a corporation more suitable and less grindingly inhuman. One way or the other his family would be taken care of. That was a certainty he needed to combat the growing feeling of doom that had been building in his mind ever since waking up in the middle of the night several times while home. His nightmares of Tetra Prime were now joined by twisted visions of downspire. Decisions made, there was nothing more he could do and he committed himself to the mission at hand.
The planet designated UK1326 was a small grey world, and had it possessed 0.2% less mass it would have been classified as a moon. As it was, the unique planet hung in a wide orbit between two dying stars.
Conventional planetary science estimated that within another few thousand years the increased gravitational pull of the two suns would rip the planet into pieces as the entire sector was slowly drawn into a black hole. Such natural phenomena were not uncommon in the deeper parts of necrospace, where the star systems were at their most ancient.
In their early education, children in the Grotto system, like those in most other corporate institutions throughout the universe, were taught that known space was shaped like three interconnected rings, each smaller one inside the borders of the larger one.
The largest was frontier space, the wild and untamed fringe of the universe containing the newest planets and the youngest of star systems, many of which were still molten balls of rock and swirling clouds of gases.
The central ring was generally referred to as mapped space, or more commonly, corporate space, and contained the bulk of human civilization, as many of the planets and star systems within were matured enough to sustain life.
The smallest ring was called necrospace, sharing the same designation as the forgotten and used up worlds of corporate space. Within necrospace the planets were ancient, the star systems decayed and dying, and any resource of value already stripped away. However, there were often anomalies of physics that puzzled scientists of the age, and many suspected that necrospace might actually comprise more area than any thought possible. It had proven difficult to create accurate mapping of necrospace beyond a certain point.
There were a multitude of planets and systems in necrospace that had been successfully mapped and exploited for what little wealth remained, but once ships reached a specific distance from corporate space it was as if the laws of physics became more fluid.
A scientist named Dorian Ellis pinpointed the border within necrospace, and thanks to his discovery, spent much of his life working there, funded by an Archon Industries grant, to discover what exactly was going on. Dorian died before he could draw any definitive conclusions. His funding had been pulled in the later years of his life due to failure to yield any profits, as apparently it had been seen as venture capital and not an actual grant.
Dorian had become convinced that a civilization much older than humanity had populated the area of space that existed on the other side of what had become known as the Ellisian Line. He postulated that there must be a singularity at the center of the universe, drawing old space into itself even as frontier space expanded, which held with conventional astrophysics understanding of the age.
However, where Dorian’s theories became untenable within the corporate world was his adamant belief in this unnamed ancient civilization. He claimed to have been to a planet on the other side of the line that contained a dead city, filled with artifacts that had led him to believe that this ancient civilization had attempted to alter the singularity. He insisted that somehow they had broken the laws of physics, and that the very fabric of the universe had remained broken long after their passing.
Sadly, he was not able to provide an accurate location for the planet, and was professionally deposed. His numerous volumes of photographic evidence supporting his claims were later deemed fraudulent. Dorian had died in relative poverty and professional disgrace, though he was still credited with the discovery and subsequent establishment of the Ellisian Line.
Corporate ships did not cross the line; because the locations of planets or entire star systems would change, maps could not be trusted on the other side. The distance between one place and another would warp in transit.
In corporate culture it was considered unprofitable to venture beyond the Ellisian Line. Even pirates would not venture beyond it, much less the various squatter flotillas that wandered the universe; which was why Samuel found himself leaning forward in his seat with a sense of shocked curiosity as the shift manager displayed the first of several maps detailing the mission.
“You were all made aware of the Ellisian Line during your compulsory education, and from the looks on your faces I can tell that you realize this map details a small star system on the other side of the line.” The shift manager looked out at the assembled marines, “I had the same look of shock on my face, but you’ll get over it.”
She zoomed in on the map, past the line, to reveal a more detailed photo image of UK1326. The surface of the planet swirled with dark clouds of grey and black, and what little ground they could see looked to be rock scrabble and vast expanses of barren earth.
“The information you are about to receive is classified, and I will remind you that any breach of the non-disclosure agreement you signed upon taking this mission will be treated with the upmost severity,” the shift manager warned as she gripped the edge of the podium and looked hard at the assembled marines. “We don’t know how or why, but UK1326 and its two suns appeared during a routine scanner sweep by a Grotto chartered prospecting ship. By happenstance the prospectors took the same route back to corporate space three months later and the scanner revealed the same star system, existing in space in the same coordinates. Thanks to the report, this system has been under observation for six months, and it has yet to disappear, making it anomalous compared to the other systems on the other side of the Ellisian Line.
Several probes have been sent to the planet and it has been determined that a derelict city, with no signs of life, exists on the planet surface, and Grotto has decided that the time has come to exploit the opportunity.”