The airlock they've just started to work on was one of the smallest ones that they had so far identified. Being 8m in diameter it was still large compared to the ones Sunblast and his team was used to working on. The bulkhead itself was recessed about one meter into the hull. A shuttlepod was hovering 50m away from the airlock with Joe at the controls and Rick at the co-pilot seat. Sunblast and two of his ratings where wearing spacesuits to operate in vacuum, Joe was also suited up to be able to keep the shuttlepod depressurized. The three personal hovering in front of the airlock where equipped similarly with scanners and toolsets.
To Sunblast this was a simple engineering problem. Getting the airlock operational to gain access to the station, preferably without venting the atmosphere into space in the process. On first glance it looked like an airlock, only much larger than usual. Which was to be expected as it was most likely not been built for or by humans. Whoever this was built for they must still be able to operate it. Of course, it could be operated completely on automated controls or remotely. But usually some form of manual controls should be in place somewhere.
"Alright. We're looking for something that looks like controls. Sofia, you take the left side. Luca, the right side. Look for anything that resembles some kind of controls or interface. Just look and scan, don't touch. I'll look at the inside of that recess."
The three swarmed out slowly using their suite thrusters carefully. Sunblast came to a stop in front of the bulkhead, carefully turning to the side where humans would place a control interface. On first glance the surface appeared to be smooth so he moved around to cover the whole circumference. On what would be the bottom he finally spotted a first crack that could easily outline what appeared to be a large hatch. Activating his scanner it confirmed a small hollow space under a thin layer of metal. There was what appeared to be mechanism at the middle of one side. He anchored his boots next to the hatch and placed his hand there and pushed. Nothing happened. The scanner was picking up some activity and slowly the hatch began to raise from the wall. It swung to the side. "I was able to open a hatch of some sort. I can't see any form of hinges, the hatch is floating free." He pointed the scanner at the inside of the hatch. "I'm reading a very strong and highly localized magnetic field."
The mechanism concealed by the hatch was very anachronistic compared to the high-tech hinges. A large lever, obviously to be pulled manually.
"That should be the manual override. Pretty much like we use in case of emergencies." Sunblast mentioned. "Just a lot bigger, I can barely grab it with one hand."
"These people could be a lot bigger and stronger than we are. Question is if we could even operate their equipment." Rick answered over the shared channel, he was tuned in by the shoulder mounted cameras mounted on each suit.
"I think I found something." Sofia called over the channel.
"Me too." Luca chimed in.
"Ok, try to open them by pressing the middle of the shorter sides. One of them should to it." Sunblast explained.
"Ok, that's working." Sofia said.
Sunblast was slowly moving over to her.
The hatch was about the same size as the one found by Sunblast but the content was very different. There where some large square keys, some unknown connectors and what appeared to be a status display. All where blank with no visible markings.
"Are you getting this?" Sunblast asked pointing his suit for the camera to see.
"Yes, can you point the camera at the inside of the hatch?" Rick answered.
Sunblast reoriented his suit and pointed his scanner at the hatch and the content.
"Running a full scan." Sunblast started the scanning cycle of the scanner.
It took the scanner only seconds to run through the radiation spectrum causing some flashes on the hatch and the buttons.
"Did you see that?" Rick asked excited?
"Yes, re-calibrating the scanner." Sunblast answered.
With the freshly calibrated scanner pointed at the hatch detailed schematics lit up, indicating the operation of the hatch-mechanism. The writing was incomprehensible but the icons where very simplistic and easy to understand.
"Ok, judging from the graphics here this panel is used to open the airlock from the outside. Can you scan the text and the controls in detail so we can analyze it?" Rick commented.
Sunblast nodded to Sofia who started scanning and moved over to Luca.
"What have you found?" He asked him over the channel.
"It looks like some sort of maintenance interface. I thinks these are circuit boards. But the technology is completely different. This graphics seem to indicate instructions on how to remove them. I would not want to try that, though." He explained.
"Agreed. We have absolutely no understanding how this works so far." Sunblast answered.
"Can you check the first hatch again?" Rick asked.
"Scan what you can." He told Luca. "On my way."
Sunblast carefully made his way over to the hatch he found at first. Re-scanning it revealed some scripture and a graphic.
"Ok, seems to be a override to pump open the airlock manually. I have no idea how this is supposed to work. If you consider the pressure differences and everything." Sunblast analyzed over the open channel.
"Right. I have an idea. Ensign?" Rick called over to the pod.
"Go on." Joe answered.
"Modify the pod's scanner and illuminate the area around the airlock. That should give some interesting results." Rick ordered.
"Make sure to limit the output to 5 percent. You don't want to fry us, Ensign." Sunblast shot off.
"I would have started with 1 percent, Commander. Illuminating now." Joe answered and powered on the scanner.
The scanner on the shuttle pod was much smaller than the one carried by the Hermes and therefore much simpler and a lot less powerful. But still it had much more power than the handheld devices although it was not as sophisticated. For this mundane task it was than then sufficient.
After a moment markings on and around the airlock became visible.
"Are you getting all of this?" Sunblast asked.
"Yes, please increase power to the scanner by 2 percent." Pet'l answered.
Carefully Joe increased the power to the scanner, revealing some more details to the markings.
"That looks remarkably familiar." Rick stated.
The markings generally outlining the airlock and the hatches with the controls looked very similar to the ones one the airlocks on the Hermes. The writing was unreadable for now though.
"Chief, I think I know how to operate the airlock." Sofia called over the channel.
"Let me have a look." Sunblast answered, making his way over to her.
"Luca? Are you done with your scans?" he asked.
"Yes. These have to be analyzed in detail but for now there is nothing more I can learn." Luca answered.
"Ok. I'd like you to try and close the hatch. Stand clear of its pathway, we don't know how fast it'll move." Rick instructed.
After a moment of hesitation Sunblast called "Proceed, Luca".
He stepped to the side of the hatch, well clear of it and anchored his boots to the hull.
"Where do I press?" Luca asked.
"First try the same spot you pressed to open it." Rick instructed.
Awkwardly Luca crouched down and pressed the top of the hatch that was facing the hull that did open it. Nothing happened.
"Ok, wait one." Rick called.
After a moment he came back: "If I interpret these markings correctly you need to press the outside of the corners of the bottom of the hatch. It should be marked."
Now that he was no longer partially blocking the scanner from the shuttle pod the hatch was oulined by the markings that clearly indicated two rather large surfaces outside of it.
Carefully Luca maneuvered to the bottom of the hatch and anchored his boots. He then placed both of his hands on the markings and pushed. The hatch closed smoothly and slowly.
"That worked." Luca stated.
"Good. Could you please close the one I opened? I think this describes how to operate the airlock, we should be able to get it open." Sunblast stated over studying the description on the inside of Sofias hatch.
Meanwhile Luca made his way to the manual override and closed that hatch as well and went over to the other two.
"I think we have the sequence to open and close the hatch. Should we proceed?" Sunblast asked.
It took a moment but the answer came from Rick: "Proceed."
Slowly Sofia pressed the controls in the identified sequence. The controls where rather large as if made for much larger hands than they where currently being operated by. Upon completion nothing happened.
After while a flash on the display beside the controls caught their attention.
"Ok, something is happening." Sofia stated the obvious. "Maybe the airlock is cycling?"
"I'm reading some kind of activity. Pressure is dropping on the inside of the airlock." Joe reported.
Through their boots they could feel a slight vibration of the outer airlock doors opening.
"Ok, that was easier than expected." Sunblast stated what they where all thinking.
"Try to cycle it again. We need a way to get out if we're going to go in." Sunblast instructed Sofia.
"Alright, cycling airlock." She answered.
The airlock closed immediately. After some time the controls where again showing what they showed initially.
"Ok, open it again, please." He instructed.
"Let's check this out."
After a wile Sunblast, Sofia and Rick where carefully entering the airlock, carrying scanning equipment, a portable signal amplifier and extra-oxygen.
"We're entering the airlock. There's little ambient light and no gravity. We have found a control panel, looks very similar to the one outside and it does have the same form of schematics we saw before." Sunblast commented.
Rick clumsily walked over to the panel that Sofia was studying. "Yes,this looks like a control to cycle the airlock both ways. The description is remarkably clear, as if it would be assumed that an operator would not necessarily be able to read the accompanying text." Rick stated.
"That makes sense, keep it simple, stupid." Sofia answered.
"Remarkably. Do you see that?" Rick pointed to a second control panel that was much higher than the one in front of him, about halfway up the interior wall.
"It looks identical in every way. The markings are the same. What does that mean? Redundancy?" Sunblast asked.
"Not sure. Maybe whoever built this varies in height enough that these two sets make sense. Like a highchair for children." Rick explained.
"That would explain the schematics that are so easy to read. Even children could understand them." Sofia answered. "Children operating an airlock…"
"Alright. Sunblast to Hermes, do you read?" Sunblast checked the channel.
"This is Hermes. Loud and clear. Telemetry looks good. Signal is stable. Be sure to tilt around all the way so your suit-cameras can pick up as much as possible," Smyke answered from his console on Board the Hermes.
"Cycling Airlock." Sunblast nodded to Sofia.
Sofia operated the now familiar controls and the outer hatch cycled shut. After a while lights of every spectrum flickered wildly and the scanners started beeping madly.
"We're being scanned. At least I think." Sunblast managed to say while checking his scanner.
The vacuum receded as gas was pumped in.
"Pure nitrogen." Sunblast confirmed.
They felt a bit dizzy as gravity was slowly activating.
"Gravity is a .7g, a bit low but otherwise fine." Sunblast confirmed.
After a while the pressure stabilized and the inner hatch was starting to open.
"Sunblast to Hermes, do you read?"
"This is Hermes. Still reading loud and clear. All signals are good."
"Inner airlock hatch is open, we're proceeding through the airlock."
They walked, now more easily in the reduced gravity to the other end of the airlock. As the airlock was about 60m long this took a moment longer than expected.
"This is pretty much the smallest airlock we could find, just imagine the big ones we saw." Sofia stated.
"Pretty mind boggling, yes." Rick answered.
As they finally reached the inner hatch they stepped into the station proper. They entered a large room, what would be the locker room on the Hermes. They room was equally dimly lit and held large recesses on both sides.
Rick was approaching one of them, scanning the contents with his eyes in awe. His scanner forgotten.
"This. You. What?" He stumbled for words.
"They're large, that's for sure." Sofia stated.
"Hermes, are you getting this?" Sunblast called.
"Confirmed. Can you get a scan of it?"
Rick took out his scanner and pointed it at the giant. It looked like some sort of space suit, about 5m to the top.
"I see what appears to be three legs. I don't see any arms or other appendages. I thinks these ports are where the arms would connect." Rick waved his scanner over a round coupling on the suit.
"The legs don't have distinctive joints, they appear to be completely flexible." Sunblast added
"This one is very different. It has four legs." Sofia stated, scanning a much smaller suit.
"That would mean that this station could very well be operated by multi-species crew." Rick stated.
The other recesses held different suits, none like the others. They took their time for detailed scans which took nearly an hour.
"Alright guys. I think this is enough time spent here, I'd like to see what lies beyond the next door." Sunblast pointed to another hatch identical to the one leading to the airlock.
"Interesting. Part of these schematics is identical, I think this might be an airlock as well." Rick said after studying the control panel.
"But we are already inside the station, why use multiple airlocks?" Sofia asked.
"Could be a bunch of reasons. Compartmentalization in any space based installation or ship is a good idea. When the hull is breached you don't vent all compartments into space and can safely enter them for repairs." Sunblast answered.
"The different kind of space suits suggest multiple species which would require different forms of atmosphere. Airlocks would be needed to travel from one to the other." Rick added.
"Fair enough. This seems to be working the same as the outer airlock. Should I cycle it?" Sofia asked.
"Yes, go ahead. Hermes? You still copy?" Sunblast called.
"We still copy. Signal is clear and strong, proceed." Smyke answered.
The airlock cycled just like before. Beside it being shorter it was virtually identical to the one they had already passed.
After completing the cycle the airlock opened to a large, dimly lit open area. It looked more like a high-tech cavern then part of a space station just by its size.
"This thing is huge!" Rick said.
"I think this forms at least partially a ring inside the outer compartments of the station. The scanners can detect a slight curvature in the distance. It's too dark to see it though." Sunblast said reading from his scanner. "The next compartments leading deeper into the station are over there." He pointed straight ahead at some dim lights in the distance. "Only 4.6 km away."
"Only?" Rick asked. "By foot wearing these suits that is quite a hike, especially in gravity and this atmosphere.
He was right. The suits where quite light, nothing compared to the cumbersome things that man had worn ages ago when they had first stepped on the surface of earths moon. But they where meant to be used in a vacuum, this atmosphere was pushing against them making them uncomfortable. Walking in them in zero-gravity was one thing. Hiking 5km in gravity and atmosphere and then back again something completely different.
"I agree. That might be a bit far considering that we still have to go all the way back." Sunblast agreed.
Meanwhile Sofia was down on one knee and fiddling with a small piece of equipment she had disconnected from her suit.
"I'd suggest we launch one of the drones. They can map the area and remotely transmit the data back to the ship." she said.
"That's a good idea. Let's have a look at some of the equipment while it scans the area." Sunblast confirmed but hesitated. "Launch more than one. Judging by the scanner this area is pretty large, I can't see any walls or even the ceiling." he added.
As Sofia was busy configuring the drones, Rick and Sunblast hunched over the scanner.
"Where should we have a look? There are several large pieces of equipment not that far away I'd like to check out. What do you say?" Sunblast asked.
"I think this here is a computer station." Rick pointed at one blip on the scanner. "See these lines running to it?"
"Hmm." Sunblast tried to make sense of the readings. "It's possible, yes. It is close by to one of the machines I'd like to look at anyway. So as good a point to start as any." He concluded.
"Ready." Sofia announced as three drones hovered in the air before her for a moment before quickly gaining altitude and speeding of into the distance. Sunblast quickly informed her of the next step they wanted to take.
"Should we mark the airlock first so we find it on the way back?" She asked.
Sunblast and Rick looked puzzled at each other.
"Good point. This thing is so large and basically featureless it would be easy to miss it." Sunblast conceded. He took out the signal repeater he was carrying, switched it on and placed it on the floor next to the airlock hatch.
"Hermes, do you get the signal from the repeater?"
"Confirmed. We're connected to the drones as well, data is coming in." Smyke confirmed.
"Good thinking, Sofia. Let's go."
After a short walk of a few hundred meters they neared a large husk of metal nearly 10m tall, clearly some kind of equipment. They approached it with their scanners pointed at it.
"Wonder what that is. Any ideas?" Sunblast asked.
Silence was the only answer. They circled it once to scan in detail and then pressed on. They eventually reached their target after several more minutes.
A tall column stood lonely on the vast plain that was this part of the station. It was dotted with lights of different color but was showing no obvious signs of activity. Odd protrusions of different color, form or shape dotted the surface starting about 3m from the ground level and going up several meters. The surface below and above this ring was relatively smooth with only a few of the protrusions doting it.
"Alright. This seems to be a computer station of some sort. I can see power lines and other lines that might be data lines going into it. The mechanism seems to consist of some kind of crystalline matrix. Is that a computer?" Rick stated.
"That is more than possible. I'm not reading much activity, but what is there is signals being processed." Sunblast answered.
"Any way to interface with it?" Sofia asked.
She was scanning one of the protrusions that was low enough for him to reach. "That is odd. This is like a channel that goes about a meter into the computer. Is this an interface for hardware?"
"That would be a pretty large piece of hardware. The overall layout and the sheer number of them would suggest it to be some kind of control interface." Rick said shining a penlight into the one in front of him.
An Alert from his Suit startled Sunblast slightly. "We're now at 50% oxygen supply on our suits. I suggest we wrap up here and get back to the ship." He informed the others.
"I'd like to have a closer look at some of the smaller equipment. Maybe we can bring something along for analysis." Rick answered.
They made a detour on their way back to the airlock to inspect some of the smaller pieces that where scattered around. But nothing was small enough to easily fit through the airlock much less be carried by them. They where finally lucky at a rack next to the airlock.
"What do you think this is?" Sunblast asked as he hefted a cylinder about 1 m in length that weighted about 20 kg.
"A tool? Flashlight? No idea." Rick answered. "The interesting fact is that they seem to come in two sizes."
The rack was split with one at a level that was accessible to them holding cylinders of a size that they could carry more or less easily and one at a higher level holding cylinders of a more massive variation. Thicker but not longer.
"Would make sense to have equipment usable by everyone working here. I can't find any controls though." Rick answered looking at his scanner.
"Never mind. Let's get back to the ship and decide how to proceed." Sunblast decided.
The trip back through the airlocks and into the pod almost took another hour, they still had a considerable supply of oxygen left.
"The drones are still scanning, we're getting their signal and can remotely control them via the amplifier you left." Joe informed them on the way back to the Hermes.
Several hours later they met in the conference room. The people attending the meeting where: Dr. Schmitz, Rick, Cmdr. Sunblast, Sofia and the Captain.
The Captain opened the meeting:
"Welcome back. In this meeting I want to go over your initial findings and decide how to proceed with our investigation here. After all finding this incredible installation was a lucky break and investigating it is part of our mission but not the main mission here." The Captain opened the meeting.
"Dr. Halas, would you please present your impression?"
"Certainly. Judging from what we found this station seems to have been operated by different species whether it was all at one point in time or one species after the other we don't know. Judging from the overall state of this station and the low activity inside I think it is shut down or in standby. Might have been mothballed or even abandoned.
The facility we entered had equipment all over the place, which again we don't know if that is normal for it.
The scans we took are still under analysis but so far we where unable to identify any of the equipment we found beyond the space suits with certainty. The only thing we could remotely identify seems to be a computer station."
Using his Pad Rick switched on the screen mounted on the bulkhead to display a model of one of the suits.
"As you can see this is a completely new and unknown species. They seem to have three legs and are very tall. The legs on the suit are fully flexible, maybe they have some kind of tentacles. That is all that we can say at this time as we did not find any organic traces."
The schematics changed, showing a suit that was more a cylinder standing on four distinct legs.
"This seems to be used by a different species altogether which seems to have four legs with three joins, judging from the suit. Again the suit has no identifiable arms to we don't know how an operator would work with it or what it would look like."
The schematics changed again showing 2 other suits belonging to different species of different shape and size.
"At this point pretty much everything is possible this could be a commercial station using contracted workers, it could be that this suits belong to slaves who are forced to work here."
"It's also possible that this station was used by these different species over time and they never met." Dr. Schmitz added.
"Also possible, yes. We have no way to tell."
The display changed to a schematic of the supposed computer station.
"As you can see there are what we think are interface or access port at different heights. Although the lower ones are far fewer in number and seem to be less sophisticated."
The display changed again to a more detailed scan of a crystal that was clearly artificial.
"The technology is very different and completely unknown to us. While we understood and could easily operate the basic function of the airlock we where unable to interact in any way with the computer station. These crystals appear to be some kind of processing or storage device. They have signals going in and out so something is going on. However the technology is just too different from what we understand to make any sense of it."
"What about the device you brought back with you?" The Captain asked.
"Yes, that is the last item on my list. We've thoroughly scanned it." The scan of the device was shown on the display, a small part on the bottom was highlighted.
"It contains an energy storage not unlike a battery. The interesting thing is that this battery is made of a uniform material that is unknown to us. It has a very high capacity that would in itself revolutionize energy storage as we know it. It has a remote charging mechanism that would allow wireless charging.
We're still trying to identify the mechanism inside it but the tip contains a light emitter. We where unable to test it as we could not identify any control mechanism. We where unable to open it, our scans don't show any way to do that."
"Comparing the different pieces of equipment and the technology of the station itself they are not uniform."
"What do you mean?"
"When you look at the Hermes and the equipment on board, most of it can be easily linked as it uses the same technology basis. The processors that are used in the pods or our probes can also be found in our pads or the scanner arrays. Even our suits contain them. This is not the case here. The station itself is made of an unknown material, the various items we analyzed have completely different makeups. Even the design-philosophy behind them seem to be different."
"But would that not be expected when different species work so closely together?" Sofia asked.
"To some extend, yes. But we would expect some level of integration and blending that we don't see here. At least as far as we can tell. Overall we have little answers and an ever growing amount of questions."
"Thank you. Cmdr. Sunblast, what do you think?"
"The technology is very different but quite advanced. We should absolutely study it. The station itself is an engineering marvel that is more than worth exploring. If we manage to bring the live-support systems online we might even be able to make it habitable and use it."
"Is that feasible? Have you identified any life-support systems?"
"So far no. But I think it is merely shut down. The equipment we found was stored or sitting on the deck, we did not see any evidence of things being scattered about." Sunblast stated.
"We don't really know that." Rick answered.
"That is true. But the parts we where in are flooded with nitrogen at a low pressure. This is just what you would do for long time storage. A vacuum would damage equipment that is not rated for it and leaving the normal atmosphere in place invites all kind of problems in an enclosed environment. I'm talking corrosion, mold and all other kinds of things that happen over a long period of time. Doing so would require some massive engineering but no more than what would be necessary to build a station like that."
"Alright, thank you. Ms. Sacci, what do you have to report?"
"The section that we entered seems to be part of an engineering space. The drones mapped it out and found several airlocks like the one we used, including some that are a lot larger." Sofia typed on her pad and a schematic of the section was shown on the display.
"There is equipment all over the place in what seems chaotic. But it feels like a controlled chaos, just what we have in our workspaces. There are multiple of these computer station scattered all over the place. The section extends for almost 20 km along the outer hull of the station and is cordoned of by airlocks of different sizes."
"It is about 5km deep where smaller airlocks appear to lead deeper into the station. The drones keep scanning but they are not very sophisticated and have their limits."
"Thank you. Now the big question: What do we do next?" The Captain asked.