Deep in the LB-10C sector of the Milky Way, there was nothing but void. There hadn’t been anything there since the Milky Way was formed except the occasional wave of a data from a distant world or the x-rays that signified the death of a distant star. Then suddenly, the LB-10C sector was home to consciousness. A ship crossed over some invisible boundary defined on a planet called Earth and the LB-10C sector became one of only a handful of sectors in the Galaxy to contain life.

No transmissions came from the ship and no scans were performed by its equipment. It simply entered the sector and continued its rapid and direct course to a distant point in space. For nine years it hurtled through the sector, and with it three identical companions.

They reached the edge of the sector without a single maneuvering thruster having fired and without a single change in speed, and just as silently as they arrived, they left and the LB-10C sector was nothing but void once again.