The automatic control went higher. And as the pressure increased between the limbs of the tripod, even so increased the power intake from the star itself.
Did a star have within it enough energy to cause its own destruction?
They did not find out.
The feeling of a wrenching increased, and then leaped into full being. Nausea, sheer instantaneous torture, a pulsed wave of pain, a shattering sensation of intolerable noise, a blinding light that came though the eyes were closed.
But these things were merely the physical and mental effects caused by—
By what?
There had been no grinding crash. There had been no failure of the beams.
Yet the meters read zero. Both intake and output. Test power and operation perfect registered on the string of indicators.
Nothing wrong—
—but the flaming disk of VanMaanen's Star was gone.