Here Be Monsters - Chapter 25

     The Monolith-class colony transport was more than 700 meters long, and had a cross section of 77 meters by 42.  The ship was double hulled, with a sealed, airtight inner hull protected by an outer skin consisting of a highly flexible laminate of foamed titanium-aluminum alloy and boron fiber reinforced metaceramic.  The interstices between inner and outer hulls were filled with a low density elastomer foam designed to absorb any residual shock from impact on the outer hull, and prevent spall from compromising the inner.  Far from being indestructible, the hull of the ship was nevertheless proof against damage from impacts that would have destroyed or crippled it without those layers of flexible, passive defense.
     Dirk was cocooned in his Baccardax PA-2M exo, listening to the subliminal hiss of its life support system as he drifted along the ship's exterior, the relative silence of being on extravehicular activities broken only by the occasional burst of chatter from the Jester, or Rollie and Hicks on the suits' comm channel.  His exosuit's LIDAR showed him a range of information on the helmet's heads up display, regarding the very large hole in the outer hull at the location of the ship's main cargo bay.  He saw that, at its widest point, the hole was 5.73 meters, and the edges were bent outward, meaning that the explosion which had created it had been internal.  It was his last stop along the section of the ship's hull that he was responsible for inspecting; Rollie, Hicks, and he were doing a preliminary exterior survey, before moving into the ship itself.  His survey had turned up several curious bits of data, not the least of which was the fact that the sockets for the emergency escape vehicles were all empty, and the ventral bay for the shuttlecraft was open to space, and empty as well.  He used the EVA pack to maneuver away from the ship's hull, making it easier for him to get a good comm signal.
     Time to check with the others
     "Rollie, what's your status, find anything out of the ordinary?" He inquired over the suit channel.
     "I'm just about finished my sweep, but aside from some minor damage caused by micrometeorites, it doesn't seem too bad.  I should be headed up your way in two or three minutes."  Replied Rollie, succinctly.
     "Good enough.  Hicks, got anything on your end?"  He asked her.
     "Nothing unusual, but the FTL drive module is still intact, so we've got that going for us.  I tested the forward airlock, but it looks like even the backups have failed.  If we want to get in, then we'll need one of the CATs to make a door."  She reported back.
     Dirk had considered loading up one of the CAT-Hyundai salvage mechs on Mule-1 for the trip over from the Jester, but had decided against it in favor of a more rapid departure.  Fueling, prepping, and loading one of the CATs took several hours, and he had wanted to get things moving along, so he had gotten one of the tug drivers to bring his small survey crew out on the Mule.  The other three members of his team consisted of Sung Kwon, their tug driver, Monika Bujdoso and Yong-Bai Xu, both of whom were first rate salvage operations techs.
     Monika and Yong-Bai were currently examining the hole in the Monolith's main cargo bay, looking for any structural safety issues that might present a danger to working in that area.  The ship had lost all power, having been abandoned for what was probably several years, as a result, gravity and life support had failed a long time ago.  The loss of gravity was problematic, but if the ship's inner hull was entirely without air, if too many of the essential crew sections were open to space, or at air pressure too low to sustain long term operations, then the value of their discovery would be far lower than had originally been hoped.  The Jester had very large air reserves for just such problems, but they were nowhere near the size needed to get a Monolith aired up, except perhaps in the most critical areas.  The transport should have its own reserves, however, the condition of the ship made it unlikely that those could be counted on to be available.  The large hole in the hull had opened the largest single space in the ship to hard vacuum.
     He could see Bujdoso and Xu packing up the survey equipment they had been using, and a quick glance at his exo's HUD showed that Hicks and Rollie were headed his way.  He already had the information directly through his cranial interface, but he occasionally felt the need to do things himself, just to keep the skills sharp.  He was using the CI to continually monitor his life support and power levels, however, and he had direct neural access to the EVA pack patched into his exo as well, giving him the ability to maneuver with far greater ease than with only the manual controls.  Hicks' suit was completely fly-by-wire, using a pair of cranial interfaces - one behind each ear, and could literally move herself around just by thinking about it.
     "Bujdoso, did you and Xu get a good look at the damage to the hull?  Can we head inside now?"  He asked, impatiently, wanting nothing more than to get to it.
     "Internally, the ship is OK, but the cargo hold isn't going to be aired up anytime soon.  The explosion that made the hole doesn't appear to have hit any of the major structural supports, or load bearing framework, although it goes without saying that there's a lot of debris floating around in there."  Bujdoso reported back, her last statement a subtle warning.
     "OK, let's switch things up a bit.  Bujdoso, you and Rollie, get to work forward; Xu, you, Hicks, and I will work our way aft.  Remember, this is just survey work; if you get jammed up, don't force your way in, just mark it off, and double back.  On the other hand, if you see something interesting, tag it, and we'll check it out later.  Ready?"  He waited until he had four thumbs up, "Alright, let's do this."
     He and the others drifted silently towards the looming bulk of the colony ship, which had appeared small from afar, with only the starry black of space to which to compare it, but as they landed on the portside outer hull, their immediate frame of reference made them realize just exactly how large the ship truly was.  Rollie was the only one who didn't bother to orient himself feet to the hull, Dirk and the rest had done so automatically, to give the comforting impression that they were standing on the edge of a hole in the floor, Rollie simply hung there directly over the hole, positioned at an angle that allowed him to see into its Stygian depths.
     Dirk could hear the grin on his face over their shared comm frequency.
     "Oh, this is gonna be fun.  Beware the curse of the flying dutchman, spacers.  Bwa-ha-ha-ha!"  He joked, in a hokey impression of some cheap thespian of the early 20th century, as he drifted slowly into the unknown.
     The small upward tilt, and slight shaking of Bujdoso's helmet told Dirk that Monika was probably rolling her eyes, in a time-honored expression of exasperation mixed with disbelief.  He thought that Xu might have snorted, either in disgust, or amusement he couldn't tell, but Hicks was vocal with her opinion.
     "That's not funny, you little runt!  Cut it out!"  She said, angrily, her voice subtly edged in fear.
     "Cut the chatter, both of you, I need you focused on the job at hand."  Dirk chided them, before he stepped off the edge of the hole and initiated a short burst of thrust from his EVA pack, dropping into the darkness.
     The cargo bay was of fairly conventional layout, with a main floor for palletized freight, and secure cargo modules stacked, and clamped in place, along the walls to port and starboard.  The fore and aft bulkheads were left clear, for storing the equipment to move the cargo around, and was also where the doors to the areas of the ship fore and aft of their point of entry.  Dirk, Xu, and Hicks drifted toward the aft doorway, their suits' external lights casting hard edged shadows across the bay, the absence of air leaving the beams of light undiffused.
     "DJ, we're in," called out Rollie from the forward doorway, "I'll see if we can't get this done quick, and then we can help you guys out."
     "Right."  Dirk replied, curtly.
     Xu went to work on the door, prying open the panel for the manual release, and pulled the handle inside, disconnecting the door's primary motor and safety locks.  Once he was done, it took little effort to get the door open using a spacer's pry bar, often called a 'hooligan bar'.  Dirk was given to understand that the term was derived from the name Halligan, presumably the inventor's, and he was always glad to carry one on EVA.
     The corridor beyond was a mess, there was debris floating everywhere, making it virtually impossible to use his exo's LIDAR array to make his way along.  With a disgusted sigh, he activated his suit's external cameras, and the corridor became visible in full color high resolution inside his helmet.
     "Hicks, Xu, there should be a stairwell just up ahead, let's see if we can't get into it.  Maybe we can get to Broadway, and take a straight shot all the way to the engineering sections, then make our way forward."  He said, with more optimism than he really felt.
     Hicks was in the lead, and headed up the short hallway to the main stairwell, only to find that the horizontal pressure doors between the decks had been closed.  Xu went to work, but they were stopped yet again, and again at every level.  The ship was completely without air, and that meant the doors had been sealed before the air bled out, otherwise why bother.  Dirk was trying to figure out what could have gone so catastrophically wrongful, as they made their way up the stairwell.  He still couldn't understand why anyone would be crazy enough to want to colonize a planet this far out.  He was using the time he had to wait, while Hicks and Xu opened the last door, to do some speculating.
     Maybe their preliminary survey turned up something really valuable.  Something so valuable that the cost of a colony ship was made practical.  If that was the case, Dirk, they should have come back for it, shouldn't they?  Maybe Cam was right, and the information got lost in the -  His train of thought was violently derailed by Hicks' scream of terror in his ears.
     "SHIT!"  Exclaimed Xu, at pretty much the exact same time.
     Dirk, without conscious thought, grabbed his 11mm pistol from the holster on his chest, and used his cranial interface to activate the exo's HUD targeting system, before he saw what had elicited such a reaction from his two companions.
     It was a body.  A very dead body, wearing what appeared to be a uniform and light body armor, common to corporate security personnel.  Dirk pulled Hicks and Xu out of the way, and holstering his pistol, took a closer look at their grisly discovery.  He grabbed the armor the figure was wearing and saw that a knife was sticking out of the right side, just at the armor's weak point.
     Nicely done. He thought, admiringly.  I doubt I could have done better.
     He used both hands to turn the body around as it floated in zero-G, and he was able to see what had probably caused the reaction from Hicks.  The face looked like it had been savaged by an animal.  The vacuum of space had preserved the body, and he could see that there had been little blood loss around the damage, meaning that it had probably happened after death.  He looked over the rest of the body, and saw a Velcro name tag on the armor vest and pulled it off to read it.
     Dirk spent a long time looking at it before doing anything else.  A flood of memories washed over him, from his first year in the Alliance Marine Corps, and the man who had mentored him through the initial, perilous months of his first tour of duty on Draconis.
     The name on the tag was T. Bullard.