STAR II: Where the Light Cannot Reach
Book Two of the STAR Trilogy
Preface
Light travels 300,000 kilometers per second. For humanity, that is both impossibly fast and impossibly slow.
In the previous volume, STAR - Protein Behavior, I traced those who were driven by their genes to leap 4.37 light-years into the unknown.
This book is the other voyage that runs parallel to that one.
When humanity rows out onto the sea of stars, there are always two kinds of gaze. The gaze that looks out from the ship's window toward the darkness ahead, and the gaze that looks up from the ground, believing that the ship will someday arrive somewhere.
People who let their words reverberate through a rift in spacetime, waiting years for a reply. They, too, standing still on unmoving ground, are voyagers whose hearts travel the stars.
This is the record of those who kept a light burning in a place where light cannot reach.
Prologue Poem
Those with
even a little
spirit of adventure
risked their lives
to go beyond
and beyond that
And those who remained
held a light
and waited
— from the Stars
Prologue: Light That Does Not Arrive
Light travels at 299,792 kilometers per second.
The distance to Alpha Centauri B is 4.37 light-years. That is, even if something happens on that star at this very moment, it will take more than four years for its light to reach Earth.
Conversely, the light of that star we see tonight is four years old.
Thirty-eight years have passed since Exo-Ark 1 departed.
On Earth, a generation has been born, grown up, and had children who never knew that ship.
On Mars, the third generation of settlers walks the surface. They have never been to Earth.
But Rin Moriya remembers.
Even at ninety-one, she remembers that morning.
The last video her granddaughter sent before entering the hibernation pod.
PART ONE: THE SEA THAT REMAINS (Tokyo / Mars, 2094-2101)
Chapter 1: Rin at Eighty-Seven
Every morning since Kake left, Rin Moriya did the same thing.
She got out of bed, opened the southwest window, and looked for three seconds toward Centaurus.
She knew she couldn't see it. In the morning sky over Tokyo, a star 4 light-years away dissolves. She looked anyway.
At eighty-seven, Rin's hands could no longer draw blueprints. Her joints had deformed, she could no longer draw fine lines. Instead she gave verbal instructions to younger researchers. Only her mind still worked.
What she was working on now was the propulsion system for Exo-Ark 2.
"Sensei, please rest," said Sota Miyauchi, her assistant. Twenty-six years old, the same generation as Rin's grandchild.
"Sota, do you carry the NOVA1 variant?"
Sota was thrown by the abrupt question. "...I do. The Foundation contacted me last month."
"I see," Rin said, not looking up from her terminal. "Then don't worry. You're going to go anyway."
"Did you want to go, Sensei?" Sota asked after a pause.
Rin didn't answer. She looked out the window for three seconds.
"I'm a designer. Building the ship was my way of going."
That night, Rin wrote in her diary.
A paper diary. A habit she started after So died, almost twenty years ago now.
"Kake's signal arrived. Seven years after departure, distance 0.9 light-years. Still not outside the solar system. Because she's in hibernation, the content is short. Hull temperature, oxygen concentration, fusion reactor output. Only numbers. And yet, numbers arriving means she's alive. I still can't imagine the day when numbers stop coming."
Chapter 2: Children of Mars
Kai Kamishiro was fourteen when he learned about his great-grandfather's father in school.
So Kamishiro. A member of the first crewed Mars expedition. The man who stayed alone at the base for a hundred days during a dust storm. The geologist who discovered the carbon isotope anomaly.
Kai was born on Mars. So were his parents. He had never been to Earth. He only knew blue sky from video.
The Martian sky had been salmon pink for as long as Kai could remember. He thought that was normal.
"Kamishiro, present," his history teacher said.
Kai stood. "So Kamishiro was... a Protein Behavior with a NOVA1 variant, selected for the first Mars crew after Foundation training. During a power crisis at Akebono Base caused by a dust storm, he volunteered to remain..."
"That's what's in the textbook. What do you think?"
Kai thought for a moment. "...I think he was scared. But he went."
"Why do you think he went?"
"I think he was the kind of person who said scary things are interesting. I heard his great-grandfather was a fisherman who said the same thing."
After school, Kai went to the outer dome. It required special permission, but he had a Foundation scholarship, so they let him in.
Beyond the thick transparent acrylic stretched the Martian surface. Reddish-brown rocks, sand, horizon. The sky the usual pink.
This was where So Kamishiro walked. In a spacesuit, picking up rock samples.
Kai put his hand on the window. Cold, even through the glass.
His own genetic results hadn't come back yet. They would soon.
He didn't know yet whether he was a Protein Behavior.
But he thought, regardless of what his genes said, that feeling — that scary things are interesting — was already inside him.
Chapter 3: The Day Signals Stop Coming
The signals from Exo-Ark 1 changed in its eleventh year after departure.
Some of the crew had begun to wake from hibernation. The spec called for eight people on management duty to wake in rotation once the ship reached twelve percent of light speed and its flight stabilized.
The first voice that arrived was in March, 2105 Earth time.
At that point the delay was 1.4 light-years, about seventeen months. That voice had been spoken more than a year earlier.
"To everyone on Earth. To everyone on Mars. This is Exo-Ark 1, management watch, Nakamura here. All systems nominal. Sensei Rin's design was perfect. Nothing has broken."
Rin listened to that recording more than a hundred times.
Nakamura was a student she had taught directly. He boarded at thirty. He should be forty-one by now. His voice still sounded young.
She sent a reply. It would arrive in a year and four months.
"Nakamura-kun. This is Rin Moriya. I'm glad I could hear your voice. How is Kake? Please check valve A-17 on the ship's fourth cooling system regularly. There's a subtle point in the design. Stay well."
Sota quietly took out a handkerchief beside her, but Rin didn't notice.
In the fall at ninety-one, Rin stopped coming to the design room.
It wasn't a fever. Her body simply stopped obeying.
Sota came to her house and showed her the blueprints for Exo-Ark 2.
"We were able to improve propulsion efficiency by twenty-three percent based on your design, Sensei."
"Show me," Rin reached out her hand.
Sota handed her the tablet. Rin stared through her reading glasses and pointed at one spot.
"Here. Make the coolant flow path here a little thicker. In long-duration flight, it will clog."
"...Sensei, that's the part I've been stuck on for three months."
"I see," Rin said. "So always used to say. The place where you're stuck is the right place."
On the last page of her diary, Rin wrote:
"I will probably die without seeing Kake again. But Sota is building the continuation of the dream Kake designed. That's enough. I built a ship. The ship went. Where it went, another ship will be built. That is enough."
Rin Moriya died quietly in her sleep that winter.
She was ninety-one.
PART TWO: THE STARS OF THOSE WHO WAIT (Mars / Earth, 2101-2120)
Chapter 4: Kai's Genes
Kai Kamishiro's genetic results arrived the day after his sixteenth birthday.
CHRM2 — positive. DRD4 — negative. NOVA1 — positive.
Two out of three. He did not meet the criteria for Protein Behavior.
He read the result three times and turned the terminal face-down.
He didn't feel sad. Just quiet.
The following week there was an interview with the Foundation. A gentle middle-aged woman was in charge.
"Are you disappointed?"
"A little," Kai said honestly. "But it's weird, feeling disappointed about a number in your genes."
"It's a special number, but not everything," she said. "There were people on So Kamishiro's crew who weren't Protein Behaviors. Rin was one of them."
Kai looked up.
"Rin Moriya had only one of the three variants. And yet she was the greatest starship designer in history. Exploration isn't done only by those who go. Those who build, those who wait, those who record — everyone is heading for the stars."
That night Kai went to the outer dome.
The Martian night sky was far clearer than Earth's. The atmosphere is thin, so stars don't blur.
In the southwest there is a particularly bright star. The Sun. From Earth a brilliantly shining star, from here it looks a little smaller. But still visible.
Alpha Centauri is below the horizon in this season. Invisible.
But it is there.
Kai put his hand on the window. Even if he wasn't a Protein Behavior, this feeling was there. The feeling of believing that something invisible is there.
Maybe it wasn't genes. Maybe it was something else.
Chapter 5: Exo-Ark 2
Sota Miyauchi was thirty-eight.
The design for Exo-Ark 2 was completed in 2111. It was a ship that a new generation of engineers spent seventeen years completing, using Rin Moriya's design philosophy as its backbone.
Four hundred and twenty meters long. Thirty-one percent higher propulsion efficiency than No.1. Top speed nineteen percent of light. Time to destination about twenty-three years.
The destination had changed. Not Alpha Centauri B, but beyond it — the Tau Ceti system. About 11.9 light-years from Earth.
"Sensei might be angry," Sota said, looking at the blueprints.
Kai Kamishiro, standing beside him, tilted his head. "Moriya-sensei?"
"We're launching something even farther before No.1 even arrives at Centaurus."
"But didn't Sensei say? The ship went. Where it went, another ship will be built."
Sota looked at Kai. Kai was twenty-three now, working in the Foundation's geological survey department, analyzing planetary data for candidate destinations for the No.2 crew. He had chosen the role of supporting exploration from the ground, as someone who was not a Protein Behavior.
"Don't you envy me?" Sota said. "That I get to go?"
"You're saying the same thing as me," Kai laughed a little. "My ancestor was a fisherman. That man went out to the stormy sea. But there must have been someone who stayed in the harbor and kept a light on. If there's no place for the ship to return to, you can't leave."
"No.2 isn't planning to return to Mars, though."
"I know. It's a metaphor."
Selection began.
Sota applied without hesitation.
Three hundred slots. Four hundred thousand applicants.
Chapter 6: Two Ships
The last regular signal from Exo-Ark 1 arrived in the summer of 2115.
Distance 4.1 light-years. Signal delay more than four years. That is, when that signal was sent, No.1 was 0.27 light-years from its destination.
The content was simple.
"Everyone's fine. Kake is fine. Almost there."
Kai Kamishiro was thirty-five.
When he received the signal, he was at the communications center on Mars. The moment reception was confirmed, everyone in the center stood up and applauded. An old researcher was crying.
If the next signal from No.1 comes, it will be a post-landing report. Distance more than 4.37 light-years. More than four and a half years until it arrives.
Four and a half years from now, Kai will be forty.
What will arrive then?
Kake's voice? The color of the sky on a new planet? Or silence?
Whatever arrives, Kai will be here. On Mars. On the receiving side.
And even if nothing arrives —
Kai looked out the window.
The sun was about to set on the horizon. The sky was dyed a deeper red than usual.
That light left the sun eight minutes ago.
All light comes from the past.
And yet, there is light.
PART THREE: THE REPLY OF LIGHT (Mars, 2128-2132)
Chapter 7: The Voice Four and a Half Years Later
The signal came six weeks later than predicted.
Kai Kamishiro was forty-two.
January 2128, a Martian morning. Kai jumped out of bed at an emergency call from the comm center.
"It's here."
That was all.
He ran to the center and put on headphones. A voice flowed from the speakers. Clear, after delay correction.
"To everyone on Earth. To everyone on Mars. This is Exo-Ark 1. This is Kake Kamishiro."
Kai's breath stopped.
He had only known Kake's voice from recordings. The owner of this voice had left on a journey in the year Kai was born on Mars.
"We have arrived. We have entered orbit around the third planet of Alpha Centauri B. We are naming the planet Akea — a Hawaiian word meaning 'dawn'. It has an atmosphere, liquid water reaction. Preparing to descend. I have so much I want to tell you. But first, just one thing."
A beat.
"The sky is blue."
The center fell silent.
Someone sobbed quietly.
Then a wave came. That feeling where laughter and crying mix.
Kai remained seated, unable to move.
A blue sky. A blue sky he had never seen on Mars, never seen on Earth, a blue sky on another star.
Kake is seeing it. At this very moment — no, four and a half years ago — looking up under another sun.
Kai looked out the window.
The Martian sky was salmon pink.
That was okay.
Each star has its own sky.
Chapter 8: Writing a Reply
It was decided that Kai would handle the reply as the representative of Mars.
Distance 4.37 light-years. Signal delay four years and four months. What Kai records now will reach Akea in four years. Kake's voice of "the sky is blue" was spoken more than four years ago. In that cycle, two stars exchange words.
Kai spent a night writing the manuscript.
"To Kake. This is Kai Kamishiro on Mars. I'm your great-great-great-grandchild — your father's father's father's grandchild. The great-great-grandson of So Kamishiro. I was born here on Mars in the year you left. So I always thought of you as a distant person. But hearing your voice, I don't think that anymore.
Rin Moriya-sensei passed away nine years ago. She was ninety-one. She was designing No.2 until the very end. Exo-Ark 2 will leave for Tau Ceti next year. Sota is on board. Sota, who inherited Rin's design.
I still don't know what kind of color blue sky is. I've seen footage. But I've never looked up and experienced it. Maybe I never will in my life. But you saw it. I know that you saw it. I think that's the same as believing in an invisible star.
The sky on Mars is red today as well. But it's beautiful.
Please stay well."
He recorded it and sent it.
It will arrive in four years.
By then Kai will be forty-six.
Its reply will come four years after that. When he is fifty.
People live within the round-trip of light.
Even if it doesn't arrive, you keep sending.
That, too, Kai thought, is a voyage.
Chapter 9: Exo-Ark 2 Departs
Departure day was in the spring of 2129.
Exo-Ark 2 left the launch platform in orbit around Uranus. Four hundred and twenty meters long. Three hundred crew. Destination, Tau Ceti system. About twenty-three years to arrival.
Kai Kamishiro saw it off from the communications center on Mars.
He couldn't actually see it. The launch platform was too far. But he was in front of the screen that received the signal.
Sota Miyauchi's final message arrived.
"Kai-kun, I'm reading Moriya-sensei's diary. So's name comes up many times. They were amazing people. But Sensei said. It's because ordinary people hold lights in their respective places that ships can go. I'm counting on you."
Kai replied.
"Leave it to me. I will receive them properly. I'll be here in twenty-three years. No, even if I'm not here, someone will be here. Someone will always be here."
After sending the signal, Kai went outside.
It was a Martian night. The air was thin, a spacesuit was necessary. But he liked this sky.
Stars were unbelievably clear.
The atmosphere is thin, so they don't twinkle. They just shine quietly.
In the southwest direction there is a particularly bright point. The Sun.
Nearby, invisible to the naked eye, is Alpha Centauri.
Akea is there. Kake is there. She should be in her seventies by now.
The direction of Tau Ceti is somewhere else. Where Sota is heading.
Getting farther away.
But connected.
Exchanging words at the speed of light.
Kai looked up at the sky.
He didn't know which stars were visible and which were still invisible.
But all of them are there.
Even if you can't see them, they are there.
That is enough, Kai thought.
He knew that his father's father's father's father had been a fisherman.
The man who took his boat out even on stormy nights.
The man who said scary things are interesting.
Whether that blood is in him, his genes didn't tell him.
But standing here tonight, under this sky.
Believing that an invisible star is there.
He thought that was the answer.
Epilogue: If You Could See Every Star
The second report from Akea arrived.
Kake Kamishiro was seventy-four. Her voice was old, but clear.
"To Kai on Mars. Thank you. I cried about Sensei Rin. I wanted to talk more. But we all read the last blueprint Sensei Rin sent us together. We are building a small research facility here on Akea. We're going to name it after her. The Rin Moriya Laboratory. How about that?
Akea is beautiful. The sky is blue, there is an ocean. As for signs of life — I can't say for sure yet, but we found a layer of silicon-based compounds. In a stratum three billion years old. I'll include a detailed report in the next transmission.
I heard Sota left. In twenty-three years, he'll arrive at Tau Ceti. When I'm ninety-seven. I probably won't be alive. But the signal will come. Someone will receive it. That's fine.
I want to see you. But I can't. But your voice reaches me. My voice reaches you too. Going back and forth at the speed of light.
I think that's what humanity has become.
Those who crossed the ancient sea and those who remained, each holding a light on their own shore.
I heard the Martian sky is red, and I felt nostalgic. I grew up in that color too. I've gotten used to the blue sky here. But sometimes I want to see the red sky.
Please stay well."
Kai Kamishiro was forty-six.
After receiving the signal at the center and finishing listening to the recording, he couldn't move for a while.
And then he recorded a reply.
"To Kake. It's Kai. I'm well. The Rin Moriya Laboratory, I think it's the best name. It's a naming style like Sensei. Simple, and only the essence.
Sota is in hibernation now. Twenty-two more years until Tau Ceti. He will arrive when I'm sixty-eight.
Things have changed here, too. The population of Mars has exceeded five hundred thousand. Children are running around on the surface. For children born here, this red sky is normal. Just like it was for you. Just like it was for me.
Today I went outside. I looked at the night sky. I looked for three seconds in your direction. As Moriya-sensei always did.
I can't see it, but I know it's there.
I think that's our way of voyaging.
Please stay well. I'm waiting for the signal."
After sending, Kai went outside.
The Martian night sky was clear tonight as well.
Countless stars.
There are more stars we cannot see than stars we can see.
And yet the sky was dark.
Because it's dark, you can see the stars.
Each one stands out.
Kai didn't know which star someone was on.
Just, for the number of those lights, there are possibilities.
There is ground humanity has not yet stepped on.
There is sky we have not yet seen.
Kai looked up.
To the other side of the invisible sea.
Exchanging words at the speed of light, humanity goes onward.
0.3 percent goes ahead, the rest hold a light and wait. Both are voyagers.
If you could see every star, the night sky would be filled with light.
But it is not yet so.
Because there is darkness, stars shine.
Because there are invisible stars, there is a reason to go.
Kai looked at the southwestern sky for three seconds.
Then he returned to the comm center.
To wait for the next signal.
THE END
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Author's Note
Book One, STAR - Protein Behavior, was the story of those who leave.
This sequel is the story of those who remain.
Looking back at the history of human exploration, there have always been two kinds of people. Those who boarded the ship and those who stood on the shore. Magellan and those who waited for Magellan's return. Armstrong and those who prayed in mission control.
It is not a question of which is more courageous. Both lived the same dream in different forms.
Exchanging words at the speed of light — that is perhaps a sense of time humanity is experiencing for the first time. It takes years for a reply to arrive. By the time the words you sent arrive, both the other person and yourself have changed. And yet you keep sending.
How is that different from prayer?
There are more invisible stars. More light that does not arrive. And yet there are those on this planet who never stop looking up at the sky.
They are called humanity.
