The Halo

long-range cruiser · a wandering starship that folds space

A long-range cruiser from a civilisation that learned to fold space. Seen from above it is a trident: a needle-shaped bow and two crescent arms sweeping back to the engines at their tips. Between the arms floats its heart, a captured ball of star plasma inside two rings of light. It roams round the wonders of the universe, a couple of minutes at each, then moves on: light speed for short hops, a fold through space for long ones. At each place it does a job or two: a sensor scan, a weapons test, a skim through a gas giant or a star, or an outing by Pip, its little drone. (The Halo and Pip are the only made-up things in this atlas.)

• the Halo is made up · ~4.2 km from needle to engines

kind

made up: not a real craft