21 Dec 2007
Final Destination, Chapter 12: August 19, 3094
I’ve run into some problems trying to explore the lower level. It looks like part of it was lost when the planet was destroyed; there is a tunnel that just ends in a wall of solid rock, and my instruments tell me that there is nothing beyond it. I’m going to fervently hope that there was nothing important down that particular hallway.
So far I have been able to find two things of interest. The first is a giant wall-sized display that acts as a sort of interactive wiring diagram for the entire base. The diagram tells me that there is a hidden door on the lower level that leads to the heart of the base itself, but I haven’t been able to find it yet. I’m hoping that if I can trace the wiring in the walls, I’ll be able to locate it.
The second interesting discovery is what appears to be a tachyon communications center. None of the hardware is working, unfortunately, and it looks like it is has been in disrepair for a very long time. The log messages stored in its memory indicate that at one time it could be used to send messages but not receive them, making it pretty much useless.
The communications center did reveal a few interesting messages, however. I was able to find these log entries:
A system diagnostic has revealed that this tachyon communications lab is no longer functional, as both the receiving and sending equipment has been destroyed. Since this is the case, all communications functions on this panel have been disabled. If you need the functions restored please contact the maintenance personnel and have them repair the damaged units.
Posted by AI unit Charlie on January 1, 3094
Well, what can I say? We tried – at least, we did until the equipment gave out. Our receiver has been dead ever since the war started and the transmitter gave out two weeks ago. We’ve been trying everything we know to get it to work again and we just can’t do it. None of us know what we’re doing, and even if we did, we don’t have the plans for this sort of unit. It’s hopeless.
Really, though, it was hopeless all along. Even if some planet did pick up our distress signals, what could they do? Nobody has ever invented a means of traveling faster than light. It would have taken ten years for a sublight rescue ship from the nearest habited star system to reach us, and our doom is only one year away.
So much can be blamed on that stupid war! If those bureaucrats had minded their own business we wouldn’t be in this situation, but no: they had to get into squabbles, and before you knew it everything was destroyed – and here we are, about to be fried because some star decided it was a good time to explode.
What were people thinking when they decided to colonize the galaxy without a means of traveling faster than light? Sure, tachyons are nice, but you can only transport non-living things. Transporting supplies is easy; transporting people is impossible. Communication is in realtime, and by using proxybots you can even “visit” remote places: you get in your VR suit, establish a tachyon link with a robot on your intended destination, and voila: you see what your proxybot sees, and you can walk around, do things, and whatever.
All that worked fine until the war broke out, and politicians decided to use tachyon transport beams to materialize droids and bombs instead of supplies. The next thing you know industry was destroyed, most planets were leveled, and commerce was dead. Larson’s Folly was spared a lot of the disaster because we were so far from the center of things, but even we got hit, leaving us with a damaged receiver, no way to get supplies, and no functional spaceships. We can’t even get into planetary orbit anymore.
We survived – yes, we survived, and somehow over the past hundred years since the war we’ve managed to stabilize our planet, until that star went and exploded. Now what are we going to do?
All of our hopes rest on Durant’s crazy machine, which he wants to use to bend space so that distant planets are right next door. No offense, Henry, but I’ll believe it when I see it. Personally, I think it’s over.
And what are people doing? Holding prayer groups, for crying out loud! Asking some supreme being to come down and magically rescue us. These people need to get a grip. Maybe Brandon was right about them after all. At least he has a solution to surviving the end of the world that doesn’t involve black magic disguised as machinery – or calling people who aren’t there.
Posted by Matthew Oakley on April 28, 2814
I’m still hoping to find some clues to their technology that I can take back home. Up to this point I haven’t found a single thing that is of use, and I can’t return empty-handed. I have just got to find something. The zero-point-energy plant is too large for me to take back with me, but maybe I’ll find a smaller demonstration model, or some wiring diagrams for it, or something. Too many people’s lives back home are counting on me, and so far I don’t have anything to show for it.
I’m going to experiment with the electrical wiring diagram I found; perhaps I’ll be able to trace down that hidden door.