Chapter 171: Moving Towards The Artifact That They Came Here For

Rhoswen was the first to move after that, not because she had anything important to add, but because standing still while someone calmly listed dangers wasn’t really something she was good at.

She stepped off to the side, looked around the chamber again, and then glanced back at Eirenne with a narrowed look that showed she was still deciding how much she trusted what she was hearing.

"You’re very calm for someone standing in the middle of a dead station," she said.

Eirenne looked at her without any change in expression.

"That is because I have read through the compiled info from the last AI’s transcripts, that I am so calm," she replied. "But there can always be errors."

That answer landed well enough that Rhoswen didn’t push it further.

Aurelian didn’t step in either. He let his attention move across the room while Eirenne started working.

Around them, small parts of the station began to wake up again under her direction. A display on one side flickered, struggled for a second, then steadied.

A ring of dim projectors around the central platform came online one after another. Old tactical lines dragged themselves out of whatever state they had been stuck in and tried to function again.

None of it looked clean or new in any sense, and he wasn’t expecting them to be either; instead, he would be more shocked and bewildered if there were anything new here.

Eirenne moved closer to the center of the room, and as she did, more systems reacted to her presence. This is because she can access the controls as she moves towards them.

But to others, this looked more like it recognized something it hadn’t seen in a long time and was trying to respond before it failed completely.

"These are the immediate hazards," she said.

A layered display opened above the platform.

The first set of markers was simple.

Detached defense nodes.

Some still worked under her control. Some only responded halfway. A few had been left alone for so long that even she wouldn’t fully trust them without someone checking them directly.

The second set showed environmental problems deeper inside.

Hull stress points.

Dead pressure zones.

Broken structural fields.

Sections where automated systems might react badly if someone moved through them the wrong way, not because they were trying to defend anything, but because they had been left running too long without proper control.

Neris studied that quietly for a moment before speaking.

"So it’s not one big problem. It’s a lot of smaller ones."

"Yes," Eirenne said. "And the smaller ones are usually the ones that kill people who aren’t careful."

Aurelian nodded once.

That was right.

Places like this didn’t need a single major threat to be dangerous. All it took was enough broken systems and bad decisions.

"And deeper than that?" he asked.

Eirenne adjusted the display.

A larger map appeared, older and incomplete, but still clear enough to show what this place had once been.

It wasn’t just a command center. It had been a full support structure, built to handle fleets, logistics, data storage, and manufacturing all at once. It had been tied to the star before it died, drawing power from it and running at a scale that didn’t exist anymore.

Rhoswen looked at it for a few seconds.

"This was bigger than I thought."

"Yes," Eirenne said. "You are only seeing the parts that still have some stable systems, and we can go to, as for others, it is best not to go there."

That wasn’t the most comforting thing to hear, but it was useful.

Aurelian pointed toward one part of the map.

"The engine artifact."

Eirenne followed his gesture and nodded.

"It is stored in a secure vault two levels below us. The vault still works, mostly. Access is possible now that I am here, but the path to it is not safe if handled carelessly."

Rhoswen folded her arms.

"So there are still guns pointing at things they shouldn’t be."

"In some places," Eirenne said. "Yes."

Rhoswen smiled slightly.

Aurelian ignored that and moved to the next point.

"You mentioned archives," he said.

"Yes."

"What kind?"

Eirenne paused just slightly before answering, not hesitating, just focusing.

"Command records. Administrative data. Fleet support systems. Some fabrication patterns. Personnel files, though many are damaged. Strategic notes. Battle records. I preserved what I could, but a large portion is gone."

That was still enough.

Places like this weren’t just about what they were. They were about what they held, what they remembered. Data, designs, and systems that could be reused elsewhere.

Aurelian already understood that.

Still, hearing it laid out clearly made it easier to see the value.

Rhoswen didn’t care much about that part. She pointed at another section instead.

"And the rest of the defense fleet?"

Eirenne answered right away.

"Outer patrols like the one you destroyed. Docked reserve ships. Station weapons. A small number of maintenance units. That is what remains under my control."

"How many ships?" Aurelian asked.

"Enough to look intimidating to unsuspecting space beasts," Eirenne said. "Not enough to survive against a real external force. If this station had stayed isolated much longer, that would not have mattered either."

That answer was better than any exaggerated one.

It matched what he had already seen.

The fleet wasn’t gone.

But it wasn’t strong enough to stand on its own anymore, either.

Time had worn it down.

Support had disappeared.

Given enough time, it would have faded out completely.

Which meant this was a good moment to find it.

Maybe the best moment.

Neris looked toward the center again, thinking ahead like she always did.

"What about power?" she asked.

Eirenne turned her attention to her.

"Poor," she said. "Not catastrophic in the next hour, or the next day, but still very poor. This station was never meant to survive around a dead star for this long. I have preserved what I could, and it seems that the other AI was doing the same as it tried to shift priorities from one system to another, starved some sectors to keep others alive, and, when possible, stripped the fleet down to routine operations. But that does not change the core problem."