Event · event
Calder's death
The truth about the Lifeboat's cargo leaks.
Read more in Reaching outward
What was secret. The ship itself could not be hidden: its construction in Calder's Belt yards was public, and a fusion torch burning for years is visible across the solar system. Calder announced it as an uncrewed survey that would brake into orbit at Gliese 876, a red dwarf 15 light-years away with four known planets, and tour them for decades. That story explained everything observers could see: the fuel load of a ship that must stop, and a huge receiving array. The destination was true. What was secret was the cargo — the embryos, the Raised crew and a charter to found a colony. The truth about the cargo leaked after Calder's death in 2233, by which time the ship was already moving too fast to be caught. Its telemetry went silent years later "to save power", and Earth expects to see its braking flare in the 2510s.