They looked at the monitor as the world ended around them. It felt like destiny, that now, just as they prepared to launch the ark meant to be the salvation of mankind, a wormhole appeared at the edge of Sol’s system. Within they saw a reassuring blue dot. Liquid water! It was an improbable shot. Even if successful, the planet could prove inhospitable, but no other options remained. Launch was initiated.

They looked at the monitor tracking the extra-solar object they called Oumuamua in befuddlement. It accelerated as if it had engines! Whatever it was, fortunately it missed Earth.

NGC 4565 – the Needle Galaxy

Located between 30 – 50 million light years away, it’s the most prominent edge-on spiral galaxies we have in our view. Residing near the North Galactic Pole in the constellation Coma Berenices (named for “Berenice's Hair" in Latin and refers to Queen Berenice II of Egypt, who cut off her hair in gratitude to the gods for the safe return of her husband from battle), it has a spatial diameter of 140,000 light-years (Milky Way = 105,000 ly) and is estimated to contain a trillion stars (Milky Way 250-400 billion). With the darkness from a central dust lane obscuring much of the visual core of the galaxy, it’s very similar to our view of the core our Milky Way, and as such is studied extensively by astronomers.

Guillermo Ferla

Scout

Chronos

They looked at the monitor as the world ended around them. It felt like destiny, that now, just as they prepared to launch the ark meant to be the salvation of mankind, a wormhole appeared at the edge of Sol’s system. Within they saw a reassuring blue dot. Liquid water! It was an improbable shot. Even if successful, the planet could prove inhospitable, but no other options remained. Launch was initiated.



Scout

Chronos

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Alexander G Gonzales

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