I’m sitting in queue in the wormhole entry zone. I’m going to be stuck here for hours, maybe half a day cycle or more. There are three ships waiting on our side of the hole and two on the other side. Only one can go through at a time.
The first ship on our side just started through. It will take him a couple of hours to reach the exit, over 500 light years away. When it exits, the station manager on the other side will send a signal through—the signals travel a lot faster than the ships for some reason, and then one of the ships on their side will come through. Marlon tried to explain to me how wormholes work, but that’s way over my head for now. Anyway, we all take turns going through, and I’m last in line.
I’m still fascinated by how the wormholes look, even though I’ve seen them lots of times. There’s this big lit-up circle in the middle of nowhere. Somebody (I don’t know who—I never asked Marlon) has built lights around the event horizon so you can identify it as you approach, although I don’t think there’s any danger of missing it, since the station manager’s computer guides you into it.
The only good part of sitting in queue is that here I can see some of the stars in this sector. When you fly at warp speeds you can’t see the stars.
