Starlight!: The Star That Should Not Be There

Arthur Trent thinks he has planned the perfect escape. A stolen cargo of Krillium worth ten million credits, a fast ship, and a hyperspace Jump that will carry him farther than any pursuer could hope to track.

The real genius behind the plan belonged to an old computer designer named Brennmeyer. For thirty years he gathered astronomical records and fed them into a powerful navigation computer. After a random hyperspace Jump, the machine would scan the sky, identify the pattern of nearby stars, and calculate the ship’s position anywhere in the Galaxy. From there, one more Jump would deliver Trent safely to the nearest inhabited world.

It was brilliant. It was foolproof. It was built on decades of careful observation and data.

Now Trent sits alone in deep space while the computer searches the heavens for a pattern it recognizes. The stars are bright. The sky is full of them. Yet the machine keeps searching, comparing, rejecting, and starting again.

Time passes. Air grows thin.

And Trent slowly realizes that one tiny change in the universe—something no one could have predicted—may have turned the perfect escape into the longest final hour of his life.

Isaac Asimov wrote “Starlight!” as a compact demonstration of how scientific detail can become the engine of suspense. The story appeared in the 1960s and later became part of Asimov’s collection Asimov’s Mysteries, where he blended science fiction ideas with puzzle-style storytelling.

Asimov (1920–1992) was one of the most prolific writers in modern literature. He published more than 500 books and thousands of essays, stories, and articles. His science fiction classics include Foundation, I, Robot, and The Caves of Steel. He also wrote extensively about science itself, helping millions of readers understand astronomy, physics, chemistry, and robotics.