Fiction
Beyond Infinity
The Sunborn
The Martian Race
Eater
The Stars in Shroud
Jupiter Project
Shiva Descending (with William Rostler)
Heart of the Comet (with David Brin)
A Darker Geometry (with Mark O. Martin)
Beyond the Fall of Night (with Arthur C. Clarke)
Against Infinity
Cosm
Foundation’s Fear
Artifact
Timescape
The Galactic Center Series
In the Ocean of Night
Across the Sea of Suns
Great Sky River
Tides of Light
Furious Gulf
Sailing Bright Eternity
Non-fiction
Deep Time: How Humanity Communicates Across Millennia
For Joan, forever
PROLOGUE
True Center
Toby watched his father walk the hull.
Killeen was a silvery figure, his suit tuned to reflect as much radiation as possible. A mirror man. Slick light slid over him as he moved, shimmering with the phosphorescence of stars and gas. Toby could follow Killeen’s smooth, slow lope as a rippling warp against the fiery background.
—Dad!—Toby called over his skinsuit comm band.
—What? Oh . . . —Killeen’s surprise came through the fizz of comm static.—How come you’re outside?—
—Crew’s wondering how come you’re out here so long.—
As Cap’n of the Argo, Killeen could do whatever he liked, of course. But Toby had felt the growing uncertainty among the officers inside. Somebody had to act, to say something, so he had pulled on his skin-tight suit and come clumping out here. Lately Cap’n Killeen had kept himself isolated. He came out here to hike over the fat curves of the ship’s hull, often not even leaving his suit comm line open.
Killeen said distantly,—I’m navigating. Watching.—
The big man’s watery image flowed, liquid with light, as Killeen came toward Toby across Argo’s blunt prow. His suit momentarily mirrored the black depths of a nearby molecular cloud, and Toby saw him as an eerie shadow-man against the distant burnt-orange wash of star-speckled gas.
—You can do that from the bridge,—Toby said.
—Get a better feel for it out here.—Killeen came close enough for Toby to make out his father’s stern expression through the suit’s small vision slit.
