They were lying several million kilometers back from the mini system, far enough outsystem that they could see both the strange dense star and the close-in massive gas giant as well. The visible-light screen view was impressive; it was almost as if they were looking at two suns, one on fire, the other not.

"Science is not my strong point," Maslovic told him. "In fact, I believe it because the folks who know it tell me about it."

"This kind of system is unprecedented, and for good reason," Darch explained, not just to his boss but to all of them. "The kind of gravitational forces I'm reading show that there is simply no way this system can be in this kind of stable formation. This is a system that should be at war, pulling things apart, pulling others in for incineration. That kind of star shouldn't even have planets. The turbulence on the big gas giant is an indicator of just how nasty things should be. These kinds of forces are why that wild hole field is where it is." He exhaled and shook his head. "No, I don't even envy the captain keeping us in any kind of stable orbit anywhere around here. No wonder almost nobody came back. Anybody who came along here who wasn't the best would have been sucked in or flung down and crashed. This kind of system makes no sense. It can't exist like this if physics is to be believed. There has to be a third force here, something not showing up on our instruments, that acts as the stabilizing constant between the warring sides. Otherwise it's voodoo, Chief. It's magic."

"I knew it! I knew it!" Macouri muttered. "This is Hell! The seat of the Powers of Darkness! Oh, my! Oh, my!"

Maslovic totally ignored him. "Any idea of the force?"

"Well, in one sense our quaking friend here is right. In a good simulator I might well be able to build this thing. Sure, this is the universe. Anything's possible out here, or so it seems, but it would be a lot easier to build it than to wait to find it, maybe, naturally, including some mysterious third force we haven't seen anywhere else."

Maslovic turned and looked at him. "And you could create a third force?"

"Maybe. It wouldn't probably work here, or be much like here, but I could kludge it. This, now-this is no kludge. This was designed. This was engineered. I'd bet anything I had that this whole damned place was built."

"Well, we sure couldn't build it," Broz noted.

"Irrelevant," Maslovic told her.

"Huh?"

"If it was built, and I defer to the experts on that, then the question isn't how, not unless you want to build another and I have no desire to do that. The question is why."

"Beg your pardon," he heard Murphy's voice behind him. "Sure'n it's obvious, I would think."

"More of your wheelbarrows, Captain?"

"No, not exactly. But the same analogy. On at least twenty worlds that I know of there exist plants, or what serves for plants, that don't eat sunlight and minerals or the usual. They got confused somewhere after creation, poor things, and decided to eat meat instead. There's a ton of them types back on Barnum's World. They keep the insect population down to that dull roar, or help to."

"Yes? So?"

"That's what that is, don't you see? It's a giant flycatcher. And we're the flies."

"He might be right," Darch commented. "Hold on. Let me do a hypothetical here." His tone changed and he adjusted something on his control panel, then said, "Computer, assume for problem that the data read in represents an intelligent construct."

"Postulating," the computer responded.

"Now, give me a visible representation of the missing energy force X that would be required by a builder to maintain the system at stasis."

On the screen, superimposed on the actual view, was a series of translucent spidery webs connecting the various parts of the inner solar system and particularly the secondary system around the gas giant. Primary energy flowed not from the moons or sun as expected but from the gas giant.

"Interesting. They're using the very instability of the system that's causing the tremendous storms and volatility on the planet to give them the power they need to stabilize the inner system," Darch noted. "There's no perfect stability, however. Eventually sufficient energy will be lost in the exchange to weaken the planet. Not much, but the tolerances here are very slight. It will slow, begin falling inward taking everything with it, and collide with the sun. The result will be a monstrous explosion and possibly the formation of a small singularity. We don't want to be anywhere around when that happens."

"How far away would be safe?" Maslovic asked him.

"Um, how about a hundred and fifty or so light-years minimum? No, when this goes, it's going to take the evidence with it."

"How long until that happens?"

"Hard to say. Remember, what you're seeing is presupposing an artificial construct with forces we can't measure or understand and which, if they exist, have been fairly stable for centuries, maybe longer. However, there is very small slippage, measurable slippage, of the big guy in system. Whatever process is going on, it's begun. Still, I don't think we're talking tomorrow or next week or even next year, but when it goes, it's going to go really quick."

"Which of those three big moons in the life tolerances zone around the big boy would be most likely to harbor the builders?"

Darch chuckled. "Oh, none of 'em. Whoever did this, assuming somebody did, wasn't from around here any more than we are. But, boy! Is that technology impressive!"

Maslovic thought a moment, then asked, "So, Darch, if they have that kind of power, could we blow it up if we have to?"

"All else being even, I'd say yes," the tech chief replied. "Depends on whether or not they deployed defenses at the same level as their building projects. I'd walk real careful on this one, Chief. If we could blow it, we'd almost certainly be killed in the same attempt, since it would destabilize everything. Wouldn't be much of an escape route."

"Have you done a lifescan of the big three moons there?"

"No sweat. Now, understand, there's a ton of moons around this baby, but only three that could sustain our kind of carbon-based life. That and the Macouri pictures identify those three as the Kings. They're not all resort spots, but I can tell you that all three are just teeming with life. The one that gives the weirdest readings is the little cold one. I'm not sure that the majority life-form there is carbon-based, but it's within our biological understanding. If there are any devils or even angels around, then they're made of something our sensors don't know about."

"What about humans?"

"I don't get any signs of our folks on any one except the middle one. Not real surprising, I don't think, if we're the smart ones. A land of milk and honey. Rich atmosphere, mostly warm to hot on all the land masses, vegetable life that might well produce stuff we can eat, all that. We're by no means the majority population there, but there's a lot of our kind. I don't get any close matches on the other two, which means that if any of us are there we're in numbers too small to register. Just what is there, well, we'll have to go and see, I guess. Not human. Not consistent types, either. I'd say at least twenty different major life-forms on the big volcanic one alone, and a couple on the little cold one, although in that case one really stands out. I think, though, Chief, we've broken the old puzzle. I don't know how intelligent they'll turn out to be, but I'll bet you pretty good that we've got not one but several thinking alien types out there."

"Well," Murphy muttered, "there goes the neighborhood."

"Let's go see," Darch suggested.

Maslovic wasn't quite as eager. "We aren't the first ship from our species to make it this far," he reminded them all. "And none of them got back. Murphy may be right. That may be a gigantic flytrap. It's definitely well baited."