"That is not extremely unexpected," Xenogears said.

"True. The anomaly is a star, with a very interesting spectrum." Altas brought it up on the screen. The other two stared at it, instantly comprehending what Altas found interesting.

By the color of the star, it was a G-eight or thereabouts, golden yellow. The problem was, the spectrum was not a spectrum: it was a short band of gold and orange.

"This spectrum is completely impossible unless there is something between us and the star that perfectly absorbs all radiation above and below this spectral range. As I am sure you know, there isn't any kind of gas or dust that would do so. This is an artificial manifestation."

Razorback studied the spectrum. "To completely occult a star, an object would have to be either huge and far away, or smaller but closer. In the latter situation, the object would quickly move out of our line of sight with the star, unless it had a pretty powerful engine or something on it."

"Correct. I have been monitoring it for several hours. Anything in this system, even a superjovian planet, could only occlude a star for minutes, considering our orbital speed."

"Estimate the most likely scenario," Xenogears said.

"Object of stellar or greater size at one to one hundred lightyears."

"I see..." Xenogears said, though she didn't. No natural object, none! could pass a specific wide band of a star's radiation and no other. Xenogears could do it herself with combinations of transparent glass and plastic filters, but to create an object of stellar size...

"I have sent a complete analysis of the data to your server," Altas said.

"I will check it later," Xenogears said.

"I believe it to be of primary importance to determine the cause of this at once--"

"Later," she repeated, and put her arm around Razorback as they turned and left.

"Humans," Altas muttered, and returned to his work.

"Let's get up to the colony," Icey said, and Jehrico shrugged. "It is obvious Maria is not here anyway."

"Yeah. This was a waste of time," Tycho agreed, and stood.

"Lot of fun though, eh Ice?"

Icey grinned. "Yep. Let's go."

"Wait, what about Del? We can't leave her down here."

"Yeah. Wait a minute... how did she get down here if the lift is down here?"

Jehrico stared at him.

"Delithita?" Icey called. No answer. He turned, then, and faced the south, then began to walk. "Del, we gotta get back, you coming?"

Del came out of the woods, shook her head. "No, that's okay. I'll get back up."

"How?"

"Same way I got down."

"Which is?"

Del grinned, and vanished into the ground. Icey stared at the faintly glowing patch of dirt she had been standing on. "Del?" She reappeared, growing out of the ground like a tree.

"I have no problem with transport," she said. "Go away; I have work to do."

"Oh really," Icey said, miffed.

"Aw, don't take it like that Ice," Del said contritely. Del? Apologetic? Icey wondered if he had slipped into some weird parallel universe.

Icey sighed, but didn't comment. "Alright, then. See you... whenever." He turned to go.

"Ice?"

Icey looked over his shoulder. "Yeah?"

"Keep your energy up," she said with a faint smile, then disappeared into the earth.

"Okay what the hell was that?" Jehrico demanded as the three of them dropped onto the barstools in the Deep End. It seemed to be a recurring theme lately.

"Hell if I know," Tycho said. "I don't know if I even want to."

"So, I guess the rumors of the ghost colony on Mercury were true," Jehrico muttered. "How many people here?"

"About... five thousand now, with the TDF." Tycho grimaced, as the bartender held a bottle of swill up to the light with a questioning look. Tycho nodded sullenly. "We'll take the bottle," he muttered.

"Yeah, we need it," Icey said. "What's the proof today?"

"One eighty, give or take," the bartender said gruffly. "Didn't have much for flavoring today so it'll taste like isopropyl."

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