Five days later...

The Surface of Steinhull, The Steinhull ruins

Sinn'Are'Sen stands at the end of a radial corridor leading to the third ring passageway of the Steinhull ruins. His new respirator hangs from his neck and the hostile environment vest hugs Sinn's chest underneath his habitual robes. The outer two rings had been thoroughly mapped and lightly searched but nothing spectacular had been revealed. No other compartments held strange phenomenon or mysterious remains. Sinn did not doubt that he had missed things but something was pulling him deeper into the Steinhull ruins. He was increasingly certain that the answers to his questions, the secret of his history, lay deeper into the ruined station. Sinn takes a step forwards, determined to find something of value to his personal quest before withdrawing for the day.

“Daran Tonn to Sinn.”

“Sinn here, go ahead Dara Tonn.”

“I'm getting distortion on your audio feed. Echoes. Will advise if signal degrades further.”

“Understood.”

Sinn decides to push forward and strides deeper into the Steinhull ruins. Within three paces he notices a change in the sound of his footsteps. Three steps later Sinn pauses to listen to the echoes. He lets the sound fade then takes four measured steps to generate a fresh set of echoes to listen to. As the echoes trickle back Sinn frowns in thought. The echoes aren't uniform. He expected to hear four distinct footsteps in an even rhythm, just the same as his own. Instead it sounds more like the drag-thump drag-thump of a limping man.

“Still there Dara Tonn?”

“I'm still here. Echoes are not great.”

“Stand by, let me try something.”

Sinn retraces his steps to just outside of the radial passage way.

“How is the audio quality now?”

“Echo free. Do you think?”

“I'm fairly certain it is. Ready for another log?”

“Ready.”

“Begin exploration log addendum.

“Be aware that this section concerns an unknown psionic phenomenon. I attempted to enter radial passage to third ring passageway an encountered severely non-standard echoes. Measured footsteps echo back in an uneven pattern. Additionally all voice communication develops an echo despite no degradation in connection strength. I intend to record the audio of my passage though this area as a sample, and as a measure to judge the extent of the area. Expect the audio recording to also be distorted. RSC-2W-0063, please display audio signal strength and clarity alongside the audio and video for this sample. Confirm last instruction.”

“Instruction: display audio signal strength and celerity in audio / visual sample.”

“Thank you. Begin audio / visual sample for current exploration log addendum.”

Sinn looks down at his booted feet, going so far as to lift a foot to show the sole of his boot to the camera.

“As you can see this sound is generated by standard hard rubber boot soles on metal mesh. RSC standard issue size ten (wide) boots if it makes any difference.”

Sinn stomps his feet a few times.

“That should yield a base sample for comparison. I will now enter the passageway in question.”

Sinn walks forward into the radial passageway. Once again the sound of his footsteps echoes strangely. The pattern distorts in impossible ways, turning measure steps into ragged limps and random stumbles. Sinn turns the camera to his feet periodically to show that he is still walking in near perfect metronome. Halfway down the radial passageway he stops and lets the echoes fade.

“I am pausing here to add my voice and it's echoes to the sample. As already demonstrated; measured footsteps do not sound like measured footsteps. Listening to them is quite disorienting. I keep having to check that there is nothing else moving in this passageway. So far that appears to be the case. I am proceeding to end of passageway at the jog. Let's see if that changes the echoes.”

Sinn sets off at a leisurely jog. The echoes likewise accelerate to keep pace but retain the same limping, stumbling quality. Sinn steps into the third radial passageway and stops to listen. He stamps a foot twice to generate a fresh set of echoes and listens to them as well.

“Psionic audio phenomenon does not appear to extend past the end of the radial passageway in question. It has been marked on map and will be updated in the event that it changes size.

“End audio / visual sample. End exploration log addendum.”

“Mostly clean copy.”

“'Mostly clean'? I know there were the strange echoes but the signal strength and clarity were still good right?”

“Five by five on that score. The echoes of your voice were the strange part. Did you notice anything about them while you were speaking?”

“Nothing in particular. What did you hear?”

“I put the sample on speaker to see if I could hear anything different. The echoes of your voice sounded high pitched, almost female. The also had a lyrical quality to them, as if you were singing in the shower.”

“That is just... how?”

“You are the psion here, you tell me.”

“Not a damn clue Dara Tonn. Not a damn clue. That's for the RPC to figure out. I don't have the training, equipment or knowledge at this time. In any case, I think I want to try checking a compartment right off the bat. The outer ring compartments, all of them I explored anyways, were barracks compartments.”

“At forty five beds to a compartment, two thousand compartments in total, and assuming no hot-bunking, that would equate to a literal army. One hundred thousand individuals. That is a far larger staff then my data indicates is present on any Republic space infrastructure. Even the shipyards do not have on location housing for that m,any individuals.”

“And none of those compartments were officer's or manager's quarters. All of the second ring compartment I checked were suitable for low ranking officers or middle managers if the larger beds and sparse surviving furnishings are anything to go by. So if inner rings house more and more important people...”

“Then a third ring compartment may have useful information. If it is more personnel accommodations then all other functions occurred on other decks. Looking at the map so far, and presuming the pattern of compartment size and ring passageway spacing holds, the fourth and center most ring will be wrapped around a transport network of some sort.”

“The fourth ring is for a later day. All those thousands of people are going to need infrastructure. Dining halls, clinics, kitchens, recreational facilities, and so on. If the fourth ring compartments are transit related, then those facilities must be in the third ring. Kind of a long walk for the poor working class grunts..”

“Not all that far, considering the prevalence of the radial passageways and the way that they are aligned.”

“I'll give you that observation Dara Tonn. I'm going to walk this passageway and look for signage. I don't expect to find any but it's worth checking.”

“Agreed.”

Sinn takes a left hand turn and starts walking along the third ring passageway. The hatches to his left and right are the same uniform unremarkable hatches. Ten meters of walking later one hatch catches Sinn's eye. He walks up to it and

lets the camera play across the doorway and the two insignia present on it.

“Well I guess I was mistaken about all of the hatches being without identifying marks. Ready for an log entry Dara Tonn?”

“Ready.”

“Begin exploration log addendum.

“I am in the third ring passageway and have encountered a compartment hatch that bears two insignia instead of the usual one. The expected bird and cog insignia is present, but elevated to above head height. A second insignia is present at eye level. It is a set of three diamonds in a vertical column, interlinked in the manner of knot work ark, set into the same cog as the bird. Hypothesis: the interlinked diamonds are a pictorial representation of DNA, thus indicating a medical facility. Further hypothesis: given that this hatch is permanently marked wit this iconography while other hatches are not marked indicates that many compartments are subject tor renovation on an as needed basis but this compartment and possibly others was not.

“I will now endeavor to open the hatch. With no power available withing the Steinhull ruins at this time, opening any hatch is a manual process. Apologies in advance for the unprofessional exclamations of effort. ”

Sinn sets his pickax into the hatch and heaves it open. It takes fur heaves, each with their own grunt of effort, to heave the hatch open.

“Whew. Most hatches have yielded in only one or two heaves. This one was much more difficult. Now that it is open the reason is evident. This hatch is much thicker and heavier then the others. I'd estimate by as much as half.

“Visual examination of the compartment does indicate a clinic of some sort. There is the expected waiting area, front desk, and passageway to subcompartments.”

Sinn walks carefully down the internal passageway, noting the simple marking on the internal hatches.

“Internal hatches are all marked with what appears to be a numeral of some sort. The hatch at the end of this passageway is marked with the triple diamond insignia as well. I'm going to try and open that one.”

Sinn heaves the indicated hatch open with significant effort to reveal a laboratory beyond. A slow chirping noise echoes from the compartment.

“The hatch was almost as heavy as the main hatch into this compartment. I'm now investigating the chirping noise... It appears to be coming from a rectangular container on one of the laboratory benches. I have a lit display panel here, it must have an internal battery or power supply of some sort. Only thing on the display is a par of red horizontal parallel lines, slightly 'crimped' together at one end. Possibly a low battery indicator. Looks like a power cable is inserted into one end of the container, detaching it now.”

Sinn plucks the cable from the side of the container with minimal effort. It comes free to reveal a socket containing three metal prongs.

“Definitely a power connection. Container has the same triple diamond insignia. Hypothesis: container for the transport of biological material, possibly genetic materiel. RSC-2W-0063, prepare the archaeology lab. I'm bring this container back at once for examination. Perhaps we can rig up a power connection.

“End exploration log addendum.”

“Clean copy. Already working on that power connector. I'll need your hands to assemble it, but I should have basic schematics worked up by the time you get back.”

“Any Idea how much power this thing will draw?”

“Not a clue, but the sensors in the archaeology lab should help with that.”