The Drowned Orrery

A great bronze-and-crystal planetary engine that models a star system which no longer exists; it is still turning.

Description

A planetary engine of aged bronze and clouded crystal, built by a people to model the star system in which they lived. Several of its spheres are lit faintly from within. The system it charts is gone; the mechanism does not appear to know this.

Provenance

Recovered intact from a dead system in the reference frame (Hollow Sun). No surviving makers; no claim has been entered. Held as a legacy accession pending any contact that will not now come.

Condition

Sound and turning. Left undisturbed it keeps time — slowly, and to a calendar that no longer corresponds to anything observable. The drift between its time and ours is recorded against the Meridian Standard and has not changed.

Handling

Sealed display. It is not to be stopped, and is not to be corrected.