The Rogue (Planets Shaken Book 1)

by Lee Brainard

  But she needed a rumor. Where was she going to get one? A Google search? Perhaps. That might fly. But both her search parameters and her source had to be kosher. They couldn’t be associated with Planet X nutcases or any other dubious sources that would raise eyebrows. Tainted sources were a non-starter.

  She was running out of time. She decided to investigate now and worry about her cover story later. She would likely find her creative genius once she was in the heat of the fire. As her father had once said, regarding his experience in the high-pressure environment of the Hollywood film industry, “Nothing like a little pressure to bring out the best in a man.”

  She swung the telescope in the right general direction, listening with quiet reverence to the creaks and squeaks of the lumbering giant—this was her cathedral and organ—and entered the coordinates that Irina had given her. She hoped no one would notice that the telescope was pointed in an unauthorized direction. The massive reflector swiveled, adjusted, and stopped. She focused and shot two images. Then she moved backward on Irina’s calculated trajectory three-quarters of a camera frame and shot another two. Next, she moved forward on the trajectory to about three-quarters of camera-frame past the original location for a final set. When she was done, she swiveled the telescope back to its approximate starting point.

  She saved the images in a file she named “Potential NEO near the Pleiades.” Then she made two copies of the file on DVD. She placed one in a folder in her file drawer which she labeled “Potential NEOs.” The other disk she placed in a 5X7 manila envelope, which she promptly buried in her messenger bag. She glanced at her watch. Nuts. It was now 6:23 p.m. Eleven minutes late. She quickly logged in, entered the coordinates for her first assignment, poured herself a cup of coffee, and settled in for an evening of NEO verification and orbital determination—slightly on edge as she listened to the lumbering giant creak and squeak again. If anyone was paying attention, three relatively large moves inside twenty minutes was a bit unusual. She picked up her manifest and glanced at her assignment: two new asteroids, one new short-period comet, and six asteroids she had been tracking for several weeks now.

  5

  Los Angeles

  Saturday, December 1, 2018

  When she returned to her apartment that evening shortly after midnight, she was too excited to immediately go to bed, as she usually did. Feverish with anticipation over what the new images might reveal, she hurried to her bedroom to retrieve Irina’s DVD from under her mattress, raced back to her kitchen table, dug the Hooker DVD out of her purse, opened up her laptop, and . . . hesitated. She winced as she pondered the trouble she could get into for having a copy of SODpro on her laptop. The Stellar Occultation Discovery Program was a proprietary program and only authorized for installation on designated Caltech computers.

  Four months ago she had noticed an installation disc sitting on the desk of one of her colleagues at the observatory and had made a copy of it—just in case. Even back then she had sensed—based on things she had heard in team meetings and the evasive answers given to questions on the new mission focus—that NASA was not disclosing the real cause behind the sweeping changes implemented in the NASA Bill. Something big was up, but she had no idea what. So, she had appropriated a copy of the software—that sounded more legitimate than stealing it—and tossed it into her file cabinet behind the last hanging folder. It seemed like an innocuous place to store the pirated disk. By all appearances, it was either misplaced or lost. She had retrieved the disk on Tuesday evening when she was on the Hooker and had installed SODpro on her laptop the next day, figuring that she would need it to scan for occulted stars if she was going to pursue the lead that Irina had given her.

  She fired up the software and waited. It took ages to load. Once it was running, she installed Irina’s DVD, loaded her data, and . . . waited. The software crept at a snail’s pace—slow CPU and too little memory. Note to self . . . buy a super-fast gaming laptop . . . like yesterday. An-hour-and-a-quarter later, she confirmed the string of stellar occultations that Irina had observed. There was no way around it. A massive body was moving through the heavens, somewhere in the vastness beyond Neptune.

  Next, she inserted the Hooker DVD, installed and labeled the images into SODpro, and started the scanning process. Twenty minutes later she whooped, “Bingo.” Sure enough. The zoomed-in chart of the area showed that a dim star below the Pleiades, on the trajectory Irina had predicted, was fifty-five percent occulted. It was not, however, the one she had predicted, but one slightly farther. That implied that the comet was traveling faster than she had anticipated.

  Like Irina, Ariele did not buy the theory that the apparent occultations were actually light-wave diffraction from the shockwave at the nose of a still growing jet from a black hole. That seemed like a stretch when a much simpler explanation was available—a chunk of rock was traveling through our outer solar system and passing in front of stars, partially or entirely blocking their light. Irina was right. Dr. Goldblum, the MPC, JPL, and NASA had rejected the simple explanation of the phenomenon because they had been required to drink the Kool-Aid—to embrace the official cover-up story.

  She found herself muttering. Stupidity is not ignorance. Stupidity is a moral failure—subverting reason for personal gain. One of her pet peeves in life was men who were willing to set aside common sense and embrace claptrap in order to win the favor of the movers and shakers. Such dereliction of reason was analytical suicide. What could possibly induce men like Dr. Goldblum to set aside common sense and drink the Kool-Aid? Money? Position? Reputation? Fear? Maybe there was an Orwellian juggernaut on the rise. Enough with the muttering and the psychoanalytics . . . focus.

  What next? She decided not to rush to publication. First of all, she had no idea who she could trust to publish this sensitive information. She didn’t trust the mainstream media. They fed you the news through either a left-wing or a right-wing lens. Nor did she trust the alternative media. They had their own agendas which often led them away from common sense and integrity—especially the looney tunes that held forth on late night radio.

  Secondly, she sensed the need to investigate the comet’s path. Was it going to pass as close to Mars as Irina feared? Was it going to pass on its inside or its outside? What were the odds that it could brush the Red Planet? Would it disrupt any asteroids? The latter was a troubling consideration that opened its own can of worms. Asteroidal disruptions could cause problems for centuries to come, long after the present problem had passed and was merely a chapter in the history books.

  She figured that she needed two more occultations to have enough data to make her trajectory projections with the degree of accuracy she desired. It was now November. If she shot two sets of images per week for five months, December through April, and discovered two more occultations, which was likely as the Rogue was passing through a region densely packed with dim stars, she could have her report done in May. But five months felt like five centuries to her. It seemed like an intentional delay to her impetuous spirit to settle on such a distant date. But she had no other option. That’s the way it is . . . deal with it.

  Now she needed a cover story, something to mask her tracks if she were discovered doing unauthorized research. A good story probably wouldn’t keep her out of trouble, but it might lighten her punishment—a verbal warning rather than a termination. If it were half-decent, Sally might even cover for her. But whatever story she came up with, it needed to be something plausible that she found on the internet.

  She started by googling “comet + Taurus OR Pleiades.” When it brought up millions of hits, she sighed. She slogged through 127 pages of results. Nothing. She found several legitimate comet articles that were completely unrelated to Irina’s find. The rest were without scientific merit—a stream of mind-numbing conspiracy theories that ran the gamut from far-fetched apocalyptic scenarios like Planet X, to the reality of UFOs, to Zechariah Sitchin’s comedic take on Sumerian history. She sneered, a real conspiracy would be far
more realistic and far more subtle than this stuff.

  She was numb. It was now 4:00 a.m. and she had been at her search for over four hours. Her eyelids were heavy and her brain was fogging out. She decided to give up and go to bed. As she rose from her chair with a frustrated huff, she was renewed with a sudden inspiration. If there really was a government-directed conspiracy going on, she would likely find nothing using common search parameters like comet, Taurus, or the Pleiades. Any websites covering the Rogue that could be found with such searches would likely have already been taken down. She was going to have to use a little more imagination. She sat down again.

  Use your thinker . . . mind over tired body. Surely at least one person in the know would have had misgivings about the cover-up . . . and leaked the information. But how would a cautious discloser hide the leak in plain sight? Alternative terminology! Of course! They would use lesser known terms. She skewed her mouth and furled her eyebrows, deep in thought. What was the ancient term for a comet? . . . I should know this . . . it was covered in Historical Astronomy. The term was on the tip of her tongue. Hairy stars! . . . that’s what the Greeks called them. She turned her attention to the Pleiades. It was seven something . . . the Seven Sisters!

  She googled “hairy star + seven sisters.” There were tens of thousands of hits—which elicited a dejected sigh. She spent two hours wading through page after page of irrelevant results. On her sixty-second page of hits, she sat up in her chair and blurted out a loud Kowabunga! She had found a recent paper published by a Dr. Steven Youngblood from the University of Arizona in late September, only two months earlier, entitled Another Look at the Phenomenon Near the Seven Sisters—Is it a Hairy Star?

  The introductory paragraph stated, “A newly discovered comet of tremendous size, with an average diameter of approximately 5200 kilometers—fourteen percent larger than Mercury—has been discovered on a path that will take it dangerously close to Mars, within 20,000 miles. This is close enough to the Sun—within 1.6 astronomical units—that it is technically classifiable as an NEO according to the expanded definition in the NASA Bill. While this body has an orbit that suggests a long-period comet, it is fifty-five times the diameter of the largest comet ever observed. Most likely it is either a rogue planet from outside our solar system or a former planet from inside our system that somehow became dislodged from its orbit. Whatever it is, it poses a greater threat to Earth than all other known and potential NEOs put together.”

  She quickly flipped through the paper’s eighty-six pages. It looked very promising. The presentation was clear and cogent. It contained images from all eight of the occultations that Irina had discovered on historical plates, plus two that Dr. Youngblood had found, plus three observations made jointly by the Hooker at Mount Wilson, the Keck 1 at Mauna Kea, and the MMT at Whipple. It also contained recent infrared images from NEOCam, WISE, and Spitzer. On top of that, there were graphs, diagrams, and a spectrographic analysis that had been done by Spitzer which indicated that it was essentially iron, with high amounts of nickel and platinum-group metals, and significant amounts of heavy-rare-earth minerals.

  The mention of the NEOCam, WISE, and Spitzer space telescopes fascinated her. I thought NEOCam was slated to be a warm mission . . . and the cold missions of WISE and Spitzer ended long ago . . . there is no way the latter two could obtain cold-mission data unless they were revitalized . . . that means NASA spent an insane amount of money to revitalize their cold mission abilities . . . and that implies that this comet has NASA’s undivided attention . . . it makes them nervous.

  On the second page, it addressed the interpretation being touted by those in the academic community who were privy to the phenomenon—the theory that the shockwave at the nose of a growing jet from a newborn black hole was causing the refraction of light waves, giving the appearance of a string of stellar occultations. The author, however, disavowed this interpretation in no uncertain terms, pleading for common sense over consensus. “If it looks like a rock, acts like a rock, and moves like a rock, it is a rock.”

  On page forty-two the paper explained why the comet was currently invisible to both optical telescopes and Earth-based infrared telescopes. It was too dark for the former to see and too cold for the latter to see. It pointed out, however, that the comet would become visible to Earth-based infrared telescopes in the mid-range bands of 10, 12.2, and 14 micrometers once it neared Uranus—barring atmospheric problems caused by things like nuclear war or a Tambora-class volcanic eruption. But it would not become visible to optical telescopes until it developed a coma. While this normally occurred between Jupiter and the asteroid belt, we were entering a period of extremely low sunspot activity and decreased solar wind, which meant that the comet might not manifest a coma until it was inside the asteroid belt. When the coma did appear, however, it was going to be a show for the centuries. It would be the brightest comet in modern history by tenfold or more.

  Several things stood out about the author of this paper. First of all, he was well-connected, for he had access to data and tools that weren’t available to Irina. Secondly, he had a tremendous grasp of the subject. Thirdly, he was savvy. His use of innovative search terms had masterfully hidden his paper from prying eyes who wanted to keep this information off the internet while making it discoverable by anyone with a little knowledge in ancient astronomy—true for students of catastrophism who believe that the past sheds light on the future. And fourthly, he wanted this paper to be understood by the average man, for he had written it in plain English, not the typical technical jargon that only the scientist can understand. In other words, he hoped that this paper would be leaked to the public. Ariele smiled and nodded her head in agreement. She would do her part to fulfill his wish. I sure hope I get to meet this man someday . . . gotta admire his wisdom and courage.

  She printed a copy for her own reading, secured it with a large clip, and placed it in a folder. Though a millennial, she still preferred paper. Then she saved a copy to a thumb drive, one to her hard drive, and another to her cloud account. With a sweet sense of relief, she closed her laptop and stood up. Finally! She could go to bed. She had her alibi in hand. With a twinge of curiosity, she glanced at her watch. It was 6:26 in the morning. Oops! Had no idea that it was that late. As she turned, she noticed that the faint gray of dawn was beginning to gleam in the window.

  Before she had even walked two steps, she realized that she was still short one alibi. She needed a cover story to explain how she happened to stumble upon an article on the internet about an NEO threat that is currently near the Seven Sisters. She slumped back into her chair and flipped open her laptop. Would the odyssey never end?

  On a hunch she googled “NEO + hairy star + threat,” indicating that she only wanted those results that contained all three terms, and got twenty thousand hits. Double nuts. Groggily she started working her way through the pages of results, dreading the thought of another protracted search. But her fears didn’t materialize. On the eleventh page, she found what she was looking for—Dr. Youngblood’s article. With a deep sigh of relief, she pushed her laptop away. Now she had a plausible cover story. She could claim that she had stumbled on his paper while doing general research on NEO threats. No one could accuse her of finding the article while wallowing through cheesy websites that were peddling stuff like the Mayan apocalypse or Nibiru’s return.

  Her night was finally over and sunlight was streaming in the window. She shook her head at her pertinacity. I haven’t stayed up all night since I was an undergrad. She sat in satisfied silence for a moment, shouted “Yes!” under her breath, stumbled to her bedroom, kicked her shoes off, and climbed into bed. As her tired eyes succumbed to sleep she foggily contemplated the situation—the letter from Irina, her own investigations, and the seriousness of the situation. Her last waking thought was the line from Irina’s letter, “Here’s an NEO you may wish you never heard about.”

  6

  Caltech

  Monday, December 3, 2018


  Ariele and Woody strolled toward Beckham Auditorium, headed for the food trucks that parked there over lunch hour except in bad weather. Woody could tell that something was on her mind—he knew her almost as well as he knew his own daughter. They had started hanging out together for lunch shortly after she had arrived—more or less by default. The other girls in the department went to the gym during their noon break, which just wasn’t Ariele. The other guys liked to get a beer with their lunch, usually at a noisy club, which wasn’t Woody’s preference. After sitting alone in the break room for several weeks, eating her yogurt in silence, Ariele began tagging along with Woody to the food trucks. Since then, they had become friends.

  The unusual quiet unnerved Woody. He thought about prying but kept his peace. Moments later Ariele spoke up. “Something’s been bugging me all weekend . . . I just don’t know what to do . . . should I go forward with a course of action I’m contemplating? . . . or should I just walk away?”

  “Depends . . . what’s on your mind?”

  “Let’s say you were working for a big corporation that claimed they were only interested in human welfare, but you became privy to information that proved they were covering something up that was detrimental to their well-being. What would you do? Would you abide by your confidentiality agreement? Or would you disseminate the information by some means—like Whistleblowers, WikiLeaks, or The New York Times, or what have you?”

  Woody weighed his response, then replied, “That would really come down to the seriousness of the infraction. If it involved a threat to health or privacy or freedom . . . definitely yes. You would have a moral obligation to disseminate the information. You couldn’t just walk away.”

  “How about hiding information . . . information that would enable people to protect themselves from harm that is lurking in their neighborhood?”