Ah, I'm glad you commented :) I admit that I'm not an expert on all these things. But based on my novice understanding, it seems hard to swallow. I actually have read something agreeing with you completely--that if our sun magically turned into a black hole, the system wouldn't budge because the mass would remain the same. But that's what I find hard to believe. Our sun won't ever magically turn into a black hole because it lacks the mass to do so. If it magically attained the mass to turn into a black hole, then it would indeed swallow our system.

And that's why I'm having trouble wrapping my head around the red matter black holes. The only explanation for a black hole is incredibly massive amounts of gravity. The only creator of gravity that I'm aware of is mass. Where does the mass come from that consumes Vulcan? And if that mass were present, why was it not enough to consume Delta Vega as well? Am I still missing something? It makes sense in my little noggin.

As for the gamma rays, I agree--they could be dangerous to Romulus if close enough, but certainly wouldn't be enough to destroy the planet Death Star-style.