He had been speeding past an off-color white dwarf when it happened. If he had taken the trouble to look around, he would have seen that the white star was going to explode. He knew a potential nova when he took a good look at one. But after all these centuries he had grown careless, and when the blast had come—the small star suddenly blazing into a billion-fold brilliance—the penetrating radiation had hit him with full intensity. There had been no ship to protect him, no clothing that might serve as a shield. His kind had done away with such things eons before, as they had learned to move through space by using some of the radiant energy that filled it.

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