An Invisible Cosmic Predator Is Hunting Thousands Of Space Refugees

When a ship at the end of the line dies, the sound comes up the tow cable like a church bell struck underwater, and nine hundred refugees sit up in the dark to face it.

A navy tug admiral has strung sixteen overloaded refugee haulers behind his ship, fleeing the dying farm moons for a heavy world. Something follows them that no instrument can detect, betrayed only by the stars behind it, bent into rings around perfect black.

It takes the last ship first. Her weight drains away until hair lifts off every...