Hutch couldn’t believe he was serious. “Why did they cancel the Johnson mission twelve years ago, when they wanted to go to Betelgeuse?”

“That was pure politics.”

He was right. The Conservatives were cutting back on funding. And President McCore scared everybody about the potential for something we might do that would trigger the supernova. That was absolutely crazy, but it was an election year and nobody could come up with a good reason to go, since we couldn’t possibly learn anything that would be of any practical use. It was strictly blue-sky science. So why waste the money? The lives of the crew didn’t even enter the issue, since the mission was to have been automated. But interstellars were expensive. And the private corporations already had tourists begging for visits to a star threatening to explode. The risk was the whole point of going out there, Harry Klison had famously said on Smart Talk. It fueled the movement that has virtually shut down interstellar travel altogether. The Academy was eventually strangled.

“I’m not in favor of it.”

“Why not, Priscilla?”

“I can’t see what we stand to gain.”

“Can you really sit there and tell me the prospect of getting a good look at a red giant doesn’t turn you on?”

“Not particularly.”

“Can I ask you, as a favor, to support me on this? Look, nobody’s ever gotten close to one of these things. We’re probably not going to figure out what the waterfall was all about. Let’s at least go home with something.”

She closed her eyes. “We got an up-close with the Wasserman Cluster.”

“I hate to say this,” he said, “but you’re beginning to sound like Unterkoefler.”

•  •  •

“How big is that thing?” asked Wally. The bright red globe occupied most of the sky. The surface was tumultuous, chaotic, a boiling fire. The passenger cabin’s virtual effects had been shut down and they were all looking out windows. “It looks as if it’s ready to let go.”

“I don’t think we need to worry,” said Derek. “Of course it’s big. If it were in the solar system, it would extend out well past Mars.”

“Incredible,” said Beth.

“It’s not as hot as the sun, though,” said Ken. “Red giants have a surface temperature not much more than half what the sun does.”

“That sounds almost comfortable,” said Wally.

“He’s been researching,” said Beth. “He was at it half the night. But he needs to have it explode before the book comes out.”

“She isn’t kidding,” said Ken. “If this thing goes before publication, it wouldn’t matter if we didn’t find the waterfall. The supernova would be the whole story. People love explosions. Especially something like this.”

Hutch couldn’t resist. “Derek, can you think of any way we could trigger it?”

“Sure,” he said. “Just keep tempting fate.”