The North Star was an artificially created stellar-mass black hole and associated microquasar located 15,750 light years directly above Galactic Center.
During its period of active luminosity, the North Star black hole possessed an accretion disk of undigested plasma, gases, and stellar detritus with a diameter of roughly 103 Imperial standard kilometers.[2] The black hole's intense rate of axial rotation, coupled with the resultant high friction present in its accretion disk, generated a stellar luminosity that rendered it one of the brightest phenomena in the galaxy during the pre-Republic era. It earned its name for its use as a navigational aid denoting north on the galactic z-axis and for its resemblance to a particularly luminous star when viewed at a great distance.
The North Star was created by the Celestials countless millennia prior to the Celestial-Rakata War for three primary purposes—to establish galactic z-axis north, denote the extremities of the galactic bulge, and provide the galaxy's nascent spacefaring civilizations with a navigational aid for the purposes of triangulation in an era prior to the development of navicomputers. As quasars and microquasars were easily capable of outshining even Type Ia supernovae in luminosity when provided enough stellar matter for ingestion, the North Star black hole was fed a steady diet of main-sequence stars towed to its location by the Celestials' hyperspace tractor beam engines.[5][6] The resultant energy discharge from friction in the accretion disk generated by the intense spin of the black hole produced heat and bright light as byproducts.
By the time galactic civilizations began to rise countless millennia after its initial creation, light from the North Star had successfully traveled the 60,000 light year radius of the galaxy[5] and was visible from the Deep Core to the Outer Rim Territories. However, at some point prior to the Rakata revolt and the Infinite Empire's war against the Celestial client species around 35,000 BBY,[7][8] the Celestials ceased feeding the North Star stellar material and had removed any remaining stars in the process of consumption. With only the diminishing accretion disk to feed the black hole, the microquasar became dimmer over subsequent millennia and was little brighter than a main-sequence star by the time of the Imperial Period.
Description
The North Star was a stellar-mass black hole and associated microquasar possessing an accretion disk of plasma, solar gases, and stellar debris torn from partially digested main-sequence stars. Though the actual diameter of the black hole itself was unknown, the North Star's collective diameter—including the black hole and the accretion disk—measured roughly 103 Imperial standard kilometers,[2] constituting an area around 1,000,000 square kilometers in total. The mass of the black hole was even less well documented, estimated as lying anywhere between three and eighteen Imperial solar masses, with most estimations settling for an estimated value of nine solar masses.[3] As a microquasar capable of generating immense luminosity visible from across the galaxy, the North Star rotated at a rate close to 1,150 axial rotations per standard second, with a resultant spin parameter value of ≥ 0.82.[9]
History
Background
Though many details of their exploits were unknown, the Celestials were generally believed to have accomplished a great many feats of engineering unmatched by later cultures during their millennia-spanning period of galactic hegemony. These ranged from the artificial construction of star systems like the Corellian system[10] and hyperspace disturbance barriers encompassing the entire breadth of the galaxy[7] to pocket universes like Mortis,[11] an expansive world contained within a monolith only five standard kilometers long.[11] Through the use of hyperspace tractor beam engines like Centerpoint Station and Sinkhole Station,[10] the Celestials moved stars across the galaxy and pushed black holes together to form clusters like the Maw.[5] By 100,000 BBY, the Celestials were the undisputed masters of the galaxy, ruling over burgeoning spacefaring species like the Kwa, Gree, and Killiks as patrons and benefactors.
Around 95,000 BBY, the Celestials oversaw the development of an artificial microquasar 15,750 light years directly over Galactic Center that would subsequently be known as the North Star by the galaxy's nascent civilizations. Though the Celestials' rationale for the microquasar's creation was unknown to later researchers, pre-Republic era specialists at the Obroan Institute for Archaeology and Galactic Institute of Anthropology generally held to the theory that the celestial phenomenon was developed to aid the Celestial's client species in astronavigation. The North Star accomplished this in three primary ways—its location atop the Galactic Center supermassive black hole established a subjective galactic z-axis north, it clearly denoted the edge of the galactic bulge and the boundary between the galaxy and the Intergalactic Void, and it served as a useful aid in triangulation in an era prior to the development of advanced navicomputers.
Purpose
Though largely speculative due to a distinct lack of evidence, the theory of the North Star as a navigational aid was the general consensus in the academic community due to the microquasar's unnaturally perfect positioning. Like many other artifacts of alleged Celestial origin, the North Star was positioned with mathematical precision. Its singularity lay directly above that of Galactic Center such that a line segment drawn on the galactic z-axis would perfectly bisect both singularities at their exact centers. The means by which the Celestials accomplished such a feat were unknown to later researchers, though it was posited that the Force was involved in conjunction with a process not unlike that used to create hyperspace disturbance barriers. Furthermore, the North Star lay at the edge of the galactic bulge, marking the border between the Core and the Intergalactic Void.[5] Though such a distinction was inherently subjective, the North Star appeared to sit precisely at the summit of the galactic bulge when viewed from afar, leading researchers to conclude its positioning was intentional.
Quasars and microquasars had long been observed to be among the most luminous natural phenomena in the galaxy, outshining even Type Ia supernovae and neutron star mergers in maximum output. Additionally, unlike such transient deep-sky events, quasars were significantly longer lived and capable of sustaining their luminous output indefinitely, provided the black hole itself remained too small to ingest stars whole or devour its accretion disk. Lending further credence to the navigational theory, some researchers believed the Celestials were well aware of these facts and chose to develop the North Star as a microquasar specifically due to the phenomenon's longevity and above-average luminosity, allowing it to live long enough for its light to traverse the galaxy's 60,000 light year radius[5] and shine in the night skies of worlds as far as the Outer Rim Territories.[5] Additionally, given their previously documented ability to move stars[10] and black holes[7] across the galaxy, the Celestials would have faced no difficulty in assembling the North Star and providing it with stellar fuel for its accretion disk on an indefinite basis.
Development
Though the exact details of the process by which the stellar phenomenon was created were unknown, most theories held to a number of shared elements based on the Celestials' known technological capabilities. As illustrated by the Maw cluster, a grouping of black holes artificially created by the Celestials and their Killik client species to imprison the being Abeloth,[5][7] the Celestials were clearly capable of producing and moving black holes across the galaxy. Most theories regarding the North Star's origins posited that its stellar black hole was moved in a similar manner from the galactic plane to a location 15,750 light years above Galactic Center by means of stellar engines equipped with hyperspace tractor beams.[7] Its companion stars were subsequently towed into the vicinity of its ergosphere and pulverized by these tractor beams, collapsing their cores through massive gravitational fluxes.[12] The resultant stellar matter was then fed into the ergosphere to form the microquasar's accretion disk.
The actual origins of the black hole itself were a mystery. Some theorized that the black hole was formed from Celestial interference in a red supergiant's death throes, during which process the Celestials may have used their tractor beams to accelerate the star's rate of collapse into a hypernova. Others considered that the Celestials may have artificially contrived a neutron star merger, producing a hybrid neutron star above the Tolman–Oppenheimer–Volkoff limit that collapsed in on itself and formed a black hole. Still others, citing the Celestials' ability to compress matter into pocket universes contained within small spaces à la Mortis,[11] considered that the Celestials may have been sufficiently advanced enough to reduce matter into a singularity themselves without the need for any natural mechanism like a stellar collapse or merger.
Fate
At some point prior to the Rakata revolt and the Infinite Empire's war against the Celestial client species in 35,000 BBY,[7][8] the Celestials had ceased providing the North Star with stellar material, leaving the black hole to slowly devour its remaining stellar fuel in its accretion disk. The reasons for this were unknown, though some researchers posited that the star was no longer required as a navigational aid by the galaxy's civilizations due to the ongoing development of navigation computers and standardizing mapping of the galaxy. Some Celestial client species, like the Kwa and Rakata, had even begun using the Force to assist in their interstellar travels,[13] developing technology like the Force-drive[14] and Infinity Gate[15] to traverse the galaxy.
With the North Star no longer an integral part of galactic astrography, it was largely abandoned by the Celestials. As a result, the microquasar's luminosity diminished as the black hole devoured its accretion disk over time. By the time of the establishment of the Galactic Republic, the North Star was barely visible in the skies of worlds located in the Core and Mid Rim and was largely forgotten by the galaxy's civilizations. It was little brighter than an F-type main sequence star by the Imperial Period, remembered only by pre-Republic researchers and astrographers interested in ancient history and Celestial phenomena.
Behind the scenes
In one of the author's previous iterations of the North Star fanon concept, the stellar phenomenon was originally an F-type main sequence star, a so-called "yellow-white dwarf" only a few fractions more massive and luminous than the Sun. Over time, the author came to the conclusion that such a star would be difficult to see at a distance of 60,000 light years and thus could not easily serve its intended purpose as a navigational aid. As microquasars generally exhibit consistent light emissions greater than those of many supernovae, the North Star was refactored into a microquasar black hole provided main-sequence stars as fuel for its accretion disk. This ended up being more consistently in keeping with Legends descriptions of Celestial technological capabilities regarding the movement of stars and black holes.
For the purposes of simplicity in subsequent calculations for time dilation and safe orbital distance, the author has seen fit to employ the academic community's average values for microquasar diameter and mass as denoted in "Microquasars as sources of high energy phenomena" and "Black Hole Mass of Microquasars and Quasars," namely 103 kilometers and 9 +9
−6 M☉ respectively. For all intents and purposes, the North Star is a completely average and unspectacular microquasar black hole. Regarding its spin parameter and rotational rate, these statistics were borrowed from those observed around GRS 1915+105 for the sake of convenience and ease of calculation.
The North Star was voted "Best Location" in the Fifteenth Wiki Awards.