Jack of Harts

Some people describe Betelgeuse as a rogue star barging through the stellar neighborhood on the lookout for stray moons, planets, or even stars to feed its faltering furnace. Most of the stars have managed to escape on their own courses, but at tremendous cost to their planetary systems. Betelgeuse’s five companion stars and what remains of their planetary systems are a legacy of this rogue path through the galaxy. These small stars orbit between one and three lightyears from the supergiant with some surviving gas giants that have guarded small planets and moons of their own during their difficult trek through the cosmos. It was these systems that the Branan targeted with their first interstellar colonization missions.