Solar Express (31 page)

There was a message from the colonel, requesting a report on any new developments as they occurred. Tavoian replied that there were no new developments, but that he had dispatched an AI-guided unit on another search of an area of the artifact in an effort to discover a way into apparently sealed areas.

Once that message was dispatched, he took several long swallows of tea from one of his squeezebottles, ate a few crackers, trying to do so without spraying crumbs anywhere, since they'd eventually end up in the ventilation system, and turned to the problem at hand. What other ways might there be to discover more about the artifact? The light reflected from the green surfaces varied minutely, but precisely, with a definitely engineered wavelength differential.
What would happen if you replicated those exact wavelengths?
The first step was to determine if that were possible with the resources he had on board Recon three. It only took moments to verify that he did indeed have a tunable broadband laser that covered wavelengths from longer than the infrared up through the UV spectrum, and it had enough power to generate a continuous light that would meet his specifications. Best of all, it could be recharged from the deployed solar panels, and it had been adapted to be mounted on the ISV.

Tavoian had no idea who had been intelligent or farsighted enough to include that piece of equipment, but he was glad of it. Without it, it would have been hard to pursue that line of inquiry. Then he took a deep breath and called up the “Investigatory Methods” document that suggested various tests. It didn't take much reading for him to see that some of the suggested “inquiries” weren't going to be much help. How could he sample various materials when he didn't have anything that could cut or break the material of the artifact? Then he read the line beneath:

Any loose material, detritus, or even dust might prove useful …

He hadn't even thought of that. He continued reading, nodding occasionally. When he finished, he had to admit that the colonel either knew a great deal more than military and space matters, or he had access to a wide range of expertise. Either way …

While he waited for the return of the AI rover—and kept hoping that it would return—he made his way to the equipment hold, the one aft of the passenger area, where he located the tunable broadband laser and brought it forward to the passenger area, now serving as a de facto workroom, where he readied it, as much as he could, for mounting on the ISV. He had taken out the small extruder/nanotube formulator, just in case he needed additional supports for mounting, but it turned out those weren't needed.

When he finished and returned to the control area, he asked the ship's AI, “Is there any signal from the AI rover?”

NEGATIVE.

With a headshake, Tavoian made his way forward to the control area, where he used the system to find the location of the sampling gear. While he hadn't looked for dust or loose material in corners of the artifact, surely there had to be some … somewhere in all those chambers and passageways.

He was just about to go aft once more for the sampling gear when the ship's AI announced,
SIGNAL RECEIVED FROM AI ROVER.

Simultaneously, an image appeared on the control wall—that of the ISV as seen from the hexagonal opening.

“YES!” Tavoian couldn't help shouting, but that was tempered by the AI.

THE ROVER IS IN A LOW POWER STATE.

Immediately Tavoian took control of the ISV and the rover, and began the recovery of the AI. He didn't breathe easily until the ISV was safely in the main lock of Recon three, a good half hour later. While the lock was being pressurized and the temperature slowly raised, he had the rover's images uploaded to the ship's AI.

Then he began to watch them, from the beginning, so that he had some idea where the AI had guided the rover. The first views were what he had already seen before the fiber-optic line had separated. After that, the AI followed the general guidelines he'd set up, and worked itself “down” another set of hexagons, then out into another blank wall, then back and down, and into what looked to be another dead end … but wasn't, because in the corner of what initially appeared to be a corner, there was an open hexagonal “door,” except narrower than those open above, perhaps a little less than a meter across at its widest point. The passageway ran straight onward beyond the door, if roughly paralleling the outer hull.

The rover continued through the opening and along the passageway for less than twenty meters before coming to another narrow hexagonal door on the outboard side of the passageway. The rover entered and scanned the chamber beyond—the first actual semirectangular space in the artifact—some thirty meters wide and thirty high, it extended at least 150 meters in length, and the side away from the rover curved slightly, suggesting that it might lie directly beneath the outer hull. There were also ridges protruding less than half a meter from the hull-side surface, forming a rectangle slightly smaller than the surface itself. From what Tavoian could tell from the rover's scanning light, the surfaces were all green, possibly slightly lighter in color than those on the outside.

A cargo or launching lock?
While that was Tavoian's first thought, outside of the suggestion of lock doors created by the protrusions, there was nothing else obvious in the chamber.

The AI completed its scan, returned to the narrow passage, and continued onward for another fifty meters to where the passage turned left and ended at another hexagonal opening. The “door” was fully open, assuming that the false color images the ship's AI had created for Tavoian earlier corresponded to full opening, but what the rover's image revealed for the first time was that a section of the interior edges of the opening were not regular. The corners of the opening that would have been at the base, assuming the artifact had been rotating for artificial gravity, were surrounded by uneven rounded masses of the same green material as the walls, as if someone or something had deliberately done so to keep the opening from closing. There was no sign of melting or other materials any higher.

As the rover moved through the defaced doorway and began to scan the immense chamber beyond, Tavoian swallowed even at the initial images. It took him a moment to place what he saw in perspective, especially with the limited beam width of the rover's light. What appeared to be an immense pillar or small tower jutted out in front of him, except that it was more than twenty meters away and extended toward what had to be the underside of the outer hull. The towerlike column, which also looked to be hexagonal, did not quite reach that underside, but stopped a few meters short of one end of what looked to be hexagonal funnel-like devices, possibly energy-focusing equipment, apparently just beneath the inside of the outer hull of the artifact. Unlike anything else Tavoian had seen in the artifact, that hexagonal pillar or tower was a pale gray.

As the rover moved farther into the huge chamber, Tavoian checked the other images. Standard radar showed nothing, but the laser scanner showed other columns protruding from the wall or barrier that separated the chamber from the remainder of the artifact. How many, he couldn't tell, but his gut instinct was that there were thirty-two—the same number as the slightly discolored circles revealed by Recon three's scanners. The rover slowly turned, and its scanners took in the area around it, but revealed nothing but bulkheads and decks, and the towerlike pillars. There were no fused masses, no other protrusions, and not even any debris, from what Tavoian could determine.

After moving to a point close to and beneath the first pillar, the rover again scanned the chamber, revealing more towers, then turned and began the return to the ISV. Tavoian checked the timing, then nodded. The rover was down to a little more than half power, and the AI had cut off the exploration. As the rover reentered the passageway paralleling the outer hull, Tavoian had the AI create programming for the route the rover had taken, so that it could be used again. Then he returned his attention to the screens showing the area around Recon three.

“Are there any other craft in detection range?”

NEGATIVE THIS TIME.

Tavoian considered what the AI rover had discovered. Although he had no way to prove it, his instincts told him that the columns were the discharge points of something, most likely the drives or engines that had propelled the original sphere.

“Can you determine where that drive or engine chamber is from the rover's track and data?”

AFFIRMATIVE.

“Display it.”

An image of the silver side of the artifact appeared. After an instant, the false color image of the thirty-two circles appeared. Then a red dot appeared midway beside one of the circles closest to the edge of the silver circle, although that slightly discolored circle was a good fifty meters inboard of the long-severed edge.

It had been hard to judge the distance between the outboard end of the hexagonal pillar—or drive/engine shaft—and those massive hexagonal clamshell nozzle-doors or energy-focusing devices, or whatever they were, apparently just beneath the hull of the artifact, but it appeared to Tavoian that the barrier wall between the drive or engine output devices was more than fifty meters thick.

That can't all be wall. Are the drive systems or controls within that space?
He didn't have an answer for his own question.

While he waited for the ISV and rover to warm up so that he could prepare them for the next investigation, he began to compose a message to the colonel, informing him of the latest findings. After he dispatched it, he noted that he still had no messages. That suggested not that he had none, but that any he did have were being delayed.

The colonel doesn't want you distracted.

With that thought, he went to find something to eat and drink.

He'd barely finished what passed for a sandwich—a chicken spread squeezed onto half a bagel, topped with a cheese spread, and captured by the top half of the bagel—when the message system chimed and a horn squawked loudly enough that Tavoian almost spit out the last bite. He had no doubt that the urgent message was from the colonel.

It was.

Tavoian, Christopher A.

Major, NSC

NSS-21/Recon Three

Re: Last Report

Last report received, along with data and images.

More detailed information absolutely necessary. Request greater investigation of technological capabilities embodied in artifact.

Estimate arrival of Sinese longliner at artifact at approximately 0814 UTC on 11 November 2114. Sinese Federation readying full exploratory expedition. Timetable currently unknown.

More detailed information absolutely necessary?
Tavoian shook his head.
Hasn't anyone read or understood what you've sent?
More likely, no one believed what he'd sent.
After all, how could anything manufactured or created be so strong that no human tool could penetrate it?

Tavoian realized that he was being excessively cynical. The colonel was likely under great pressure to produce results. He immediately began to compose a reply.

While all of the passageways connecting the hexagons in the section of the artifact entered from the dark green side appear to be open, so far investigations have revealed no objects at all in any passageways. The section of the artifact below the dark-entered side appears to be separated from the section beneath it by a bulkhead barrier extending across the entire artifact. Beyond the barrier is a space ranging in “height” from fifty to approximately 150 meters, as calculated along the center hexagonal shaft. Neither the laser nor the diamond nanorod drill will even scratch any of the material. To make matters more challenging …

Tavoian smiled wryly. Challenging was an understatement.

 … all the surfaces of the object, interior and exterior, are so smooth that nothing adheres to them. With the rotation of the artifact no device can maintain position without power and thrusters.

In addition, there are over ten thousand separate hexagonal compartments. The smallest measure twenty-five meters on a side and are five meters in height/width. So far, as noted in previous reports, searches have only found eighteen intact that also were left open, either deliberately or as a result of the event that apparently severed the artifact from a much larger craft. Of the hexagons that could be entered, the only objects found were those protrusions in five of the partly open intact hexagons. Since each hexagon is surrounded by passageways, it appears unlikely that all passageways can be explored within the time and resources set for the mission.

While the rover and ISV are being repowered, another investigation is being prepared to probe other possibilities for obtaining entrance to sealed areas. Will report on the results when that probe has returned.

What else can you say?

Tavoian sent the message, then headed to the main lock to mount the tunable laser and the sampling module on the ISV.

Positioning and mounting the tunable laser on the ISV took Tavoian more than half an hour. Surprisingly, setting up the sampling gear took slightly less time, but he also had to load two signal repeaters. When he closed the airlock and returned to the control section, he immediately checked for another message from the colonel. Thankfully, there wasn't one. In fact, there were no messages.

Still wanting to keep you undistracted and on task.

A scan of all screens and inputs from the cubesats revealed nothing new about or around the artifact. There was also no sign of the Sinese longliner. After satisfying himself that there was nothing requiring his immediate attention, Tavoian did a last check to make certain the ISV was fully repowered, then opened the outer door of the main lock and dispatched the ISV to return to the artifact.

Once it neared the artifact, he guided it back to a position less than a meter from the first opening that the rover had investigated.