The Gordon family was enjoying a very long morning sleep.
Leslie in particular who had been up practically every morning and every night, catching only a four hour sleep here and there... it brought back memories of when he used to do shift work. He wasn't as young as he used to be though and this was just not possible to keep up for long.
His wife laid next to him, equally as tired. Even she was tapped out. Educating Lilly of her new existence as a girl, combined with using up all their savings to send her to that private school, and the general stress of seeing Stacy as an older boy- which was all still so very confusing to her.
Their room was dark, of course. Leslie had wanted to install some kind of artificial sun light bulb, to help them adjust. But somehow both of them could tell it just wasn't the same. Having the curtains drawn all the time made the room feel as if it were a cave. Still the two coped because, if God forbid they changed into something awkward, there would be nobody left to keep the family together. The two made a promise that if somehow the other was exposed, they would take care of each other... but... what if...
Leslie stirred up, feeling well rested. It had to be late afternoon now, but he had to glance at his VHS recorder to be sure. Yes, he kept one of those still- though generally it was just used to keep the time now. He stretched a bit, and glanced at the dark heavy curtains, beyond which he could see shimmers of the iridescent colours of the new sun. Who knew what fate lay for them, in that world... who knew... not him. Not anyone... and as smart as he was, he could find no pattern to the change.
He had a quick shower, dressed, and passed by Stacy's room. The dinosaur boy was snoring quite loudly. It made him smile a bit as he glanced at him. While certainly different, the strength and size of him was certainly not unattractive. Different yes but... not quite as alien, as one would imagine. That was his son... and he was proud of him in helping out so much.
The scientist went into his study, to catch up on some of the latest reports. He had correspondence from many of his friends and colleagues, expressing condolences on the destruction of his biology lab. They all had high hopes his work would come up with part of the puzzle... but now all that hope had gone into physics scientists, who analysed photons and radiation interaction. Still, without the biological data, it would be an incomplete picture... but maybe they could infer something with his expertise and assistance.
Gordon fired up his computer, and scrolled though the data. It was in many ways one of the most impressive achievements of science to date. Every nation had every probe, satellite, telescope, even military and civilian technology (Smart Phone cameras mainly that were given the codes for exact positional GPS) all shared towards one common goal: To record every aspect of the sun in one full cycle. Everything was compiled into a super computer, and every pixel analysed. Most of it was not in his area of knowledge. Though some of the data even he arched a weary eyebrow on.
*Sun Spectrometry data:
Satellites have recorded the spectrum of the iridescent sun, before it is scattered by the atmosphere. Using this new data, we have attempted to track the production of a single photon of light, before it reaches The Earth.*
Leslie was familiar with the approach. Mathematically, one changed the issue into the smallest possible interaction and then it would allude to the larger questions. What followed was a bunch of equations, related to the process of fusion. A photon is emitted due to essentially the very high temperatures... and what follows is essentially a photon of every single colour in the visual spectrum, along with X-ray and UV light.
There is no change to the temperature of the sun, or in the amount of energy transmitted to the Earth. This is fortunate, otherwise we would be speaking of geological consequences on the scale of a snow-ball Earth or severe global warming. Currently, there exists a single sun spot. We term it a sunspot, because it emits the same energy as the old sun but only measures a tiny area. It does not correlate to a cooled area as before.
There was a lot of interest in the sun spot. Leslie continued to read with interest.
We have a theory on how the light that should be randomised white light, has become a spectrum of colour instead. It is believed that a new layer has formed around the sun, which we term the 'Iridescent sphere'. It would appear to be non-particle in nature, possibly electromagnetic or Bose-Einstein condensate. There is no theory on how it has been generated. When photons hit this layer, they start to lose some energy, while others gain it quickly. As a result the total energy leaving the sun is constant, however the effect is not unlike a prism, with the sun at the centre.
There were some further equations explaining the theory, but at this point it was going into highly theoretical physics. As the area was non-particle in nature, it required something else to exert this effect on a photon. A very long time ago, people once thought a photon could fly through 'ether'... and Leslie started to wonder, that if the sun was enveloped in some kind of ether, that would actually be a very accurate way of describing what they were seeing. The scientist leaned into his chair absorbing all this new knowledge. He wished so hard, he could have contributed to the biology of the situation too.
he decided to call an old friend at the physics laboratory.
"Hello is Derek there please?" He asked politely. "Congratulations on your study- yes I know... it is a shame we lost that one. I will rebuild though- yes indeed... Yuu'll invite me in the E-system? Really?" After a while Leslie was given the codes to access the sun data live on his computer.
Leslie typed it into the secure gateway, and was soon among the world conference of excited scientists trying to work out what they were seeing. Leslie wished he could contribute more, but all he could do was listen. Still he learned a bit more about the physics. Some people even got to talk about a way to 'fix' the sun, by firing some kind of nuke into the sphere... Leslie shuddered at that. Of course the scientists here were saying this in jest, but he knew people might consider that an option. For some reason, people thought Terra-forming was a worse idea then 'sol-forming.'. In any case, it was hugely impractical. Any rocket launched to the sun would take months to get there, and any payload would just be a sand particle to it- Given the sun could shrug off a planet hitting it.
There was an idea that the Iridescent sphere could be dissipated by the ejection of coronal matter... a solar flair. Such should happen naturally, eventually... but what it would do when it hit the sphere was unknown.
Suddenly, there was a lot of excitement at something the camera's picked up. The engineers were using every satellite to zoom in onto the furtherest end of the sun. An asteroid? No... way too small... It was quite a distance from the sun whatever it was. A rogue Satellite from another nation maybe? That was entirely possible.. it was just about the right size...
Leslie stared as the image started to solidify....
.... it was a green haired girl?
Anneza 'stepped' in the void of space. Below her bare feet was the iridescent sun, and above her the scorched surface of Mercury. She didn't know why she decided to spend Saturday here. She kind of just... wanted to be alone again. Now she was far, so far away from everyone and everything, but so close to the thing that made her what she was.
She was exactly where she wanted to be, for now.
She was not burned to a crisp as she had initially feared, though she was feeling a little warm. Somehow she knew that if she got any closer, she would be burned though. This spot was the le grange point between the Sun and Mercury. Though as always, there wasn't much to see here. It was all just the same... the same space, the same void. Earth was a distant light, similar to Venus... and nobody could see her.
She closed her eyes and listened to the hum that the sun was making. It was so loud and primal... beautiful really. She could listen to the sounds of the universe all day... but... at the same time... She felt herself dancing to the beat of the sunlight sound. It felt comfortable and nice to do, though... she was lonely. She thought of her mother and father, and knew they would love her, no matter what... the friends she made on the Earth...
... and the fact that she could never speak to them in their language. Learning it was so hard! She just wasn't able to.. to...
Why did you so this to me? She shouted pointing 'down' at the sun. she shifted her feet, becoming parallel to it, so that the sun was in front of her. She had to shield her eyes some, and not look directly at it... how strange was that? She should be fried here, but even she could not look at the sun directly, when it encompassed almost the entire sky.
Tell me why I am like this! Just tell me why! ... Am I being punished? For my sins in life? I... I know I wasn't a good... good... man... but... I don't deserve.... She paused a little at that. Actually.. she did deserve it. I... could have learned the lesson another way. You didn't have to do this to me... I didn't know... it isn't fair People have done worse then me, and didn't change as badly... so why me?.
Still the music of the sun continued. Roaring, sounding like a drum of fire, creation and destruction, her tone just sounded like the wailing of a guitar, adding to the rock and roll. Anneza brushed her hair, and found herself collapsing onto her knees, allowing a few tearful cries.
Leslie and all the others continued to watch, in hushed silence. Not a single one in the E-conference could bring themselves to type anything. They were seeing an emotionally distraught girl, in space... clearly thinking she was alone, yet practically the entire world was watching her...
The scientist now felt a horrible guilt well up, and he disconnected himself from the link. That... that was unintended, but... God....
he didn't know who that girl was but... he hoped she would be okay.
