“Let’s just hold on people,” said the captain. As the senior man present, he thought it might be time to take charge. “Let’s get a stick or a pole to stick into it, before we do anything.” They found a six-foot tent pole in the shuttle, and Al pushed it through the rock and into the mountain. Outside of the outline was solid rock, inside the red line, was nothing. When he removed the pole, it was undamaged. Not even warm. Al set the pole down and took a moment to think. The next logical step would be to stick his arm into the wall.
Al was not typically one to play around, but he believed that doing was better than debating. He smiled, glanced around at his companions, and then disappeared into the mountain. He was gone only a moment before he reappeared, unharmed and excited.
“It’s a hangar bay all right, with room for two shuttles like ours.”
With only a small amount of trepidation, they all walked into the shuttle bay.
Inside the bay, a single large ceiling panel lit up as soon as they poked their heads into the room. There were cabinets lined up against both walls, but the doors were without handles or locks and would not open. At the end of the silver-lined room was another of the transparent cubes, identical to the one they had used before. It must be a transporter to other rooms in the complex.
The captain said, “I’m going to bring the shuttle in, so everybody stand back.”
Ever so carefully, the captain maneuvered the craft through the door and into the hangar bay. He landed, shut down the engines and opened the door. When he stepped down to the ground, he wore a look of amazement on his face.
He said, “I just flew into a mountain! I’ve never done that before.”
Chris was smiling at Tammy. Her childhood did not include much exposure to technology, and her actions reflected her curiosity. Saying little, she noticed everything.
Chris said, “Wait until you see the rest, you are going to love this place.”
“Are you sure there is nobody home?” She asked.
Al answered her question, trying to reassure his daughter-in-law, “We haven’t seen any indication of anybody being here for a long time. A long, long time.”
They picked up their gear from the shuttle and began looking around. Next to the transporter was a square hatch leading into the wall.
“Should we check that out? I’m not sure I’m ready to have my molecules disassembled and then reassembled somewhere else,” Elizabeth asked. Tammy was nodding her head in the affirmative. The rest agreed. “We should find out where this goes anyway…right?” asked Elizabeth.
****
The passageway was identical to the one they had used on their first visit, except this tunnel, had a gentle slope downward. It was difficult for Robot Nine, but he managed. The shaft was square and clean. The metal a dull silver, without visible seams. Space was limited, and Chris had to duck, to keep from banging his head.
Robot Nine was in the lead and unlike the other corridor, evenly spaced ceiling panels came on as he progressed.
“I don’t hear any echoes,” Elizabeth commented.
Some property of the metal surrounding them seemed to be swallowing the sounds they made as they walked down the passageway.
Al seconded her observation. “It is awfully quiet.”
The seven explorers did not waste time discussing the strange silence of their passage, and with only the soft sound of their plastic soled boots they approached the next door.
Chapter Six
The room they entered was in the shape of a square, with a ten-foot ceiling that was unlike the rooms they visited earlier. A short hallway beyond the hatch led to a square room with twelve evenly spaced rectangles along the walls. In the center of this unusual room stood another clear transport cube, and surrounding the cubical was a place for little aliens to gather with six stunted chairs and two tables.
Each outer wall had three of these unusual door-shaped rectangles made from a material they had never seen before. Al walked over and stood before one of the milky white sections; the captain joined him in front of the swirling shape to Al’s left.
“It looks like smoke,” suggested the captain.
Al turned and looked at him with a thoughtful expression on his face. “Maybe it’s a door.”
“It is like no door I have ever seen,” quipped the captain.
Chris said, “It looks like thick smoke swirling behind a sheet of glass. Go ahead Captain, see if it is solid.”
Before he could move, Al interrupted and said, I’ll try it, Captain.”
Al was already reaching for the strange smoke filled rectangle. His hand touched, and then pressed down. “It’s soft when you first touch it and becomes harder as you add pressure.”
Elizabeth’s voice was a little higher than normal when she asked, “Do you think we should even try to get through there? It looks to me like a room full of hard breathing.”
Edward said nothing. He had an idea but was not yet sure if it was worth mentioning. He decided to test his theory. “Check the rest of the doors Al. You’re the one with the key.”
Al moved around the room and starting pushing his hand against them, one by one. On the fourth try, his hand disappeared into the smoke. He was so startled he almost fell through head first. He removed his hand immediately and stepped back. “It is a door!”
“Someone has to stick their head in there,” Chris said. Everyone but Elizabeth looked at the man with the robotic body.
He realized right away what they were thinking, “I don’t want to put my head in there.”
Al thought for a moment and then suggested, “Why don’t I put my datapad on an extension stick and use it as a camera, and one of you can use yours for us to see inside…how about that?”
Al accepted the badge from the captain, prepared his pad, fastened it to the extension and waited to put the stick with the datapad into the door. Elizabeth configured her pad to receive the images and a moment later she told Al to go ahead. With everyone holding their breath, Al pushed the pad through the barrier.
On the other side of the smoky door was a cubicle, with what appeared to be a small bed, a desk with a machine implanted in the wall above it, and an opening into another room. You couldn’t tell from outside the room, but lights came on inside as soon as the datapad crossed the barrier.
Edward’s theory had proven true. “It’s a force field. One that can be made solid or not depending on the proper badge. The badge we have must belong to this room.”
“I’m going in,” Al said.
Before an extended discussion could begin, Al stepped through and into the room beyond, carrying the datapad set to record. His fellow explorers watched on Elizabeth’s datapad as Al went through the door and over to the opening for the interior room. He was speaking into the tablet, but there was no sound. They watched as he gave a complete dissertation of the interior of the room, and heard not a word. Eventually, he reappeared thinking they knew as much as he did.
“Couldn’t hear a word,” said Liz, “What’s it like?”
“You couldn’t hear anything?”
“Not one word.”
“The rooms inside must be shielded to block certain signals. It’s funny you could get the video and not the audio,” he said. “Well anyway, it appears to be sleeping quarters of some kind. The opening leads to something that looks like a bathroom.” He hesitated for a second and then added, “Everything is some form of a square: The room, the desk, the…bed? And what I’m guessing is a square toilet in the bathroom. Over the desk is some kind of square cabinet with a transparent door and controls to the side.”
“They do seem to favor squares,” the captain said.
“Maybe they just don’t want to be disturbed while they are in there, it could be a part of their religion or something” suggested Tammy. She was familiar with unusual practices due to faith.
The captain was ready to move on, thinking they should continue exploring. “I believe we can safely assume this is a rest area with space for twelve researche
rs. Tiro did say there used to be others here. Maybe this is where they stayed when they weren’t working. The hologram can tell us more. Don’t you think we should make our way to the library?”
“Are we going to use the transport machine?” asked Liz, appearing nervous.
Al was looking around, weighing their options and came to an obvious truth. “Do we have a choice? I don’t see another way out of here except the way we came in, and we do need to speak with the hologram.”
Edward turned to Chris, his concern visible on his face, “Did it hurt…when you used it before?”
Chris laughed and said, “Not a bit. There is a little tingle, but no, it didn’t hurt at all.”
The captain watched as the group broke into a discussion about the pros and cons of teleportation. Chris was trying to reassure Tammy while Al did his best to convince Liz, and Edward watched, taking it all in with a look of concern.
The captain listened for a few minutes and then said, “We are wasting time. If we are to get back by dark, we are going to have to trust the technology—and just go.”
With the decision made, they gathered by the door to the teleport cubicle. Because the cube would not hold them all, they decided to divide the group in two. Al still wore the badge and activated the door.
Chris, Tammy, Edward, and Robot Nine would go first with robot nine acting as security in case there were problems.
“Press the bottom button; that should be the library,” Al reminded Chris. Chris nodded in acknowledgment and followed his wife, their friend, and Robot Nine into the transporter cubicle.
The remaining three watched as the other half of their team stepped inside and gathered around the thin control pedestal. Before anybody could have second thoughts, Chris checked to make sure everyone was ready and then, almost casually, pressed the button. With a sparkling of atoms—they disappeared.
The remaining three did not hesitate, stepping into the machine they gathered around the control pediment.
“Here we go. I sure hope this works as well as it did last time,” Al said as he smiled at Elizabeth and pressed the lowest button. With a flash, the room was left in silence once again.
****
The library was as they left it. The desiccated remains of the ancient alien still sitting at his workstation, metaphorically standing guard over the information contained in the depository of knowledge.
“We should bury him,” suggested Liz. “He deserves that much.”
They placed him gently on the floor and wrapped his body in a lightweight tarp. It was a small bundle, with nothing to indicate the sacrifices he had made for his adopted world.
Elizabeth asked, “Where do we bury him? If we take him back to Camelot, everyone will know that something is up.”
“We’ll bury him at the bottom of the mountain. I think he would like that,” suggested the captain.
Al reinserted the data cube into the console’s receptacle, and Tiro appeared to answer their many questions.
“I see you have returned. Do you wish my assistance?” he asked.
Al, with the help of the team, had prepared a list. The first question was, “How long ago were your kind here?”
“We came to this planet nine hundred and eighty-four summers ago.
“That’s almost a thousand years ago…,” exclaimed Chris. “This place does not look a thousand years old. How is it maintained?”
“There are artificial mechanisms to maintain the facility that are self-repairing.”
Al hesitated, the previous answer leading to another question, “How big is this place?”
“There are five chambers to the sentinel station. Total cubic footage of twenty-six thousand four hundred and—.
“That’s okay Tiro, can you tell us the name of each chamber?”
“I am here to help. The facility consists of the observatory, a…hangar for aircraft, a sampling room where you came in the first time, and the…resting compartment with a workshop above.”
The sentinel station was bigger than they had thought. A fast subdued exchange ended with Edward asking, “Were these images recorded from this observatory? Do you have cameras mounted on the mountain? Are they still working? Can we have access to the files?”
“One moment please.” The hologram flickered, gray lines rolling slowly up from the bottom.
“Maybe you asked too many questions,” Chris suggested.
Edward looked at Chris, raised his eyebrows, and said, “You think?”
Chris hastily added, “I’m just saying we don’t want to break him.”
Edward nodded, “You’re right, one question at a time.”
The image turned solid again and continued, “The observatory is at the top of the mountain. We have working…recording devices, but we performed most of the day to day observation from the observatory.”
Al turned to the team, and a discussion began. They had all seen the hangar bay, the sleeping quarters, and the library. Chris, Al, and the captain had seen the sampling room. The only unvisited chamber was the observatory and this shop above the sleeping quarters. They decided they would proceed to the observatory next.
“Can we get more of these access badges?” asked Al.
A panel slid open below Tiro, and inside were eleven badges, each one a little different.
“The badge in your possession belonged to…my companion,” Again a note of sadness became apparent in the hologram. “It is a special access device and needs to be protected. The other cards are programmable to allow access as needed, but I would be careful as unrestricted access to this complex can…complicate things.”
“Ask about the metal,” Liz reminded Al.
With all the questions they had, he had almost forgotten why they came. “Where did you get the materials to make the metal samples you gave us?”
“There are specialized teleporters placed at strategic locations in the valley for specific elements. All these materials are sent directly to the replicators in the shop. Is there something specific you wish to produce?”
What Tiro was saying sounded too good to be true. After a short discussion, they decided just to lay it out for the alien. The fact that Al had a robotic body might not seem so strange to an advanced race like his.
“I have a cybernetic body that requires a new power supply,” Al told him. “We would like to manufacture a replacement using metals like the samples you provided. Can you make more of these metals?”
The holographic program was silent for two seconds and then asked, “You will install this power supply within your construct?”
“Yes,” Edward said. He finished the explanation of Al’s unusual circumstance and filled Tiro in on the basic requirements for the construction of his power pack. Basic physical size, ampere hours, resistance to corrosive fluids, and the proper terminals to hook to his body took only a few minutes.
“Do you have all the proper schematics and technical details necessary to complete this device?”
Becoming excited, Edward replied, “Yes, I believe we do.”
“Then you need only to input the schematics and parameters into the replicator in the shop, and we can produce the necessary components.”
“A replicator? It can produce parts just like that?”
“Yes, if your information is thorough and correct—just like that.”
Edward was a modern scientist and a roboticist, but to him what Tiro said sounded like magic. “I have to see this.”
Al wholeheartedly agreed.
The group quickly changed their minds about where to go next.
“Where is this shop?” asked Al.
“It is above the sleeping compartment. If you wish, I can meet you there.”
“You can do that?”
“As long as my data storage cube is active, I can be anywhere in this outpost that is necessary,” affirmed Tiro as he stepped down from the platform to stand in front of the group.
“This place is full of surprises,” said Chris.
The things Tiro told them was good news to the settlers from Camelot. The discovery of this alien facility had turned into a gift from another world that could help to save the settlement.
Elizabeth, still nervous about their use of the transporter asked, “Must we use your…matter-moving-machine to get there?”
“There are secondary routes available for emergencies, but I don’t know why you would inconvenience yourselves when the transporter is so much more efficient. These devices have been in use for centuries, and I assure you, they are perfectly safe.”
“Hah,” she replied, “Says the big-headed gray alien hologram to the unsuspecting humans.”
Tiro’s face crinkled, and he made a sound resembling a laugh, which made everyone else laugh. Then he said, “You have a sense of humor. That is an excellent sign.”
Elizabeth remained wary of the transport machines but knew that she had no options other than to trust Tiro, so she took her turn and made the trip to the sleeping compartment along with the others.
As the last of the humans disappeared, and the flash of light faded, twenty-five six-inch panels opened on the baseboards of the workstations. From twelve of those openings, darted small flying blocks. Floating just above the floor they transformed themselves into the perfect cleaning crew. Some developed long fine haired sweeps, some had pincers appear; whatever they needed for the job was made ready.
In a flurry of activity, the small robotic swarm removed all remnants left by the biological units and returned the room to its original design configuration. When finished, the room was clean, functional, and once again empty.
****
Tiro was waiting for them when they arrived. He was standing in the corner of the room, directly across from the morphed opening of the transporter. He indicated a symbol by his feet. “The symbol on the floor indicates the lift to the shop. I have programmed the facility computer to obey your commands, spoken in your language.”
Al asked, “What is the command to get to the shop?”
AL CLARK - Avalon -: (Book Two) Page 8