The Worlds of the Sheaf

The Ring - Part 4

     They had no way of knowing that they'd been right to be alarmed, because the docking module was even at that moment transmitting a distress signal, reporting the damage it had suffered and urgently requesting a repair team.

     There were no repair teams any longer, but the defence grid picked up the distress signal and noted that the damage had been suffered by the module into which it had seen the Mantric ship enter shortly before. One of the very few modules that still had a functional power source.

     The defence grid felt no emotion as it responded according to its programming. The situation it was now faced with, the failure of the command grid to respond to its enquiries, the failure of all repair and police units, the almost total loss of power across the ring and planet below, were all indicative of a massive attack and invasion by enemy forces, from which widespread damage had already been caused.

     Anything that failed to respond to its hails were therefore labeled as enemies, and that included the Mantric ship. It would have to wait until it emerged from the docking module, but then they would see whether it shared the alien ship's immunity to missiles.

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     It would have taken weeks to explore the whole block, which was well over a mile across and almost as large in its other dimensions, so they stayed in the vicinity of the Bescot, being careful not to stray more than a couple of hundred yards from the felisian ship. The arrangement of rooms and corridors was three dimensional again, with entrances and passageways leading off in the up and down directions as well as left and right, and there was a very real danger that they might lose themselves in the maze they formed.

     They found no more bodies, which didn't surprise them as the block clearly hadn't been a habitation area. No-one had lived here. This had been a work area, and whoever had occupied this place when the disaster, whatever it had been, had occurred must have returned home to die with their families. This was a disappointment to Saturn, but at the same time it meant that the place was still in pristine condition. Unchanged from the time, an unknown age ago, when the block had last known life. There might be valuable clues to be found, and the elderly wizard pointed out one artifact after another to be carried back with them until everyone was laden down with dusty, crumbling books and nik naks. Each held fast in its own envelope of preserving crystal.

     Several of the rooms they discovered showed some residual signs of activity. Dimly glowing strips along walls and ceiling that must once have been enough to light the complex as brightly as full daylight. Glass panels in which smaller lights flashed and text wrote itself, usually the same short line of characters over and over again. Saturn's translation spell was still working, but when he tried to read the writing he couldn't make sense of it.

     "Power levels critical," he mumbled in puzzlement. "Solar panels out of alignment. Repair crews to solar panels immediately." Those same lines were repeating over and over again, and for all Saturn knew they might have been doing so for a thousand years. Maybe longer.

     "Look!" cried Thomas however, floating alongside another glass paneled display, and Saturn levitated himself across to see what he'd found. It seemed to be a representation of the harbour, with small pictograms representing the ships they'd seen moored there. Each pictogram had a couple of lines of text beside it as well as a string of numbers, all of which meant absolutely nothing to Saturn despite everything his translation spell could do.

     "These first few characters might, just might, be the name of the ship," he speculated, "but as for the rest..."

     "There's the Bescot," said Matthew, indicating the pictogram that appeared to represent the felisian ship, alongside three identical symbols that had to be the Masters' ships. These three ships were a different colour from the others, though. Yellow rather than green, and the Bescot flashed an angry red.