exist . . . and then tell the entire crew about the incident.
Eventually she found a way past the lockout. There was an emergency feature hidden in the programming that allowed the captain to input a code and go anywhere he needed. The code was ultra secret at the time, known only by the commanding officer of the ship and the admirals on Earth. It was still redacted when Ed Iron's people looked into it, but with some difficulty they were able to convince the archivists to release it, probably with a monetary incentive.
Janet put in the code and then spent fifteen minutes studying the numbers on the screen. Finally she turned to me and said, "Cam, this ship was decompressed on purpose."
Chapter 11 Day 208
"Intentionally? That's absurd!"
So exclaimed the eminent naval historian Dr. Lawrence Webb aboard the Hyperion , team leader of the academic contingent. He was already reeling from my order to restrict academic access before anyone other than Sanjay had been aboard. The idea of an engineer revealing a major discovery rather than a scholar sent Webb over the edge.
"First, we have the commission records. Second, we have the telescope footage. With all due respect, Janet, you're an engineer, not a historian."
"I know how to interpret technical data. Your views are at odds with everything we've seen on that ship," she responded.
"Your whole argument hinges on the commission's work," I interrupted. "We already know that the telescope footage didn't exist, and the commission had far less information than we do right now. She's right, that ship was set to decompress!"
"You're indulging in conspiracy theory," Webb said dismissively.
"I don't think a computer record that's been in cold storage for two centuries is going to lie. It's as authoritative as things get," my ex-wife interjected. The rest of the salvage personnel listened to her intently. She obviously had cultivated respect among them on the journey from Earth. "It's right there, irrefutable engineering data proving that the ship was ordered to vent its air. We've got everything except a picture of a finger pressing the button."
"Data can be corrupted," Dr. Webb retorted.
"Or falsified," I said.
"By whom? The crew? You haven't found them yet. You don't know what they were doing at the time of the disaster."
"They were UNAG military," I said.
"That doesn't mean anything. Not everyone was dishonest in the government of two hundred years ago, though I'll admit that many of them were."
"Yet you're willing to trust the findings of a UNAG commission," Janet added.
"We're going in circles," I said, hoping to steer the conversation away from the speculative. "We don't have enough information. We need to find those crew members and get a look at Nelson's logs. Has there been any progress in thawing out engineering?"
"It's going to take another week, probably longer," Janet replied. "Remember, the temperature over there is still near absolute zero. Water behaves like solid rock in that kind of cold. Melting it requires powerful directional radiant heaters, and we have only two."
"Is it possible to restore heat and atmosphere to the ship? Would that speed things up?" I asked, hoping to finally get an atmosphere on the derelict.
"Definitely, but I'd have to divert everyone away from the effort in engineering."
"Seems like a good gamble. If we can do that, the ice would melt on its own. We then could adjust the
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