...And We Will Have Snow

Chapter 8-8: Space Pod

They got their drones back to the dome in time for both of them to freshen up before dinner. Dema had thoughtfully arranged a room for Sedna and put her travel bag in it, so she parked her drone there and left Newt's place to go get changed for the evening.

Having spent the day droning, Sedna and Newt were both restless. They decided to go out for dinner somewhere in town and asked Dema and Cern if they'd join them. They did, and Newt took them to a place called The Guadalajara, which apparently had been there forever. There was a live Mariachi band. After dinner Newt and Sedna pretty much danced the night away. Dema and Cern almost kept up with them.

When they left there was no more thought of orbiting drones. Sedna and Newt crashed in their separate quarters. They met up in the morning ready for a day of a different kind of exploring. Newt had promised Sedna a guided tour of the Space Pod project. None of that was really new to Cern or Dema, so after breakfast Newt took Sedna to the Pod hangar.

There was a lot to see. The hangar was big, but obviously wouldn't have been big enough to contain a six hundred meter Sky Dome. Sedna was surprised to see that the Space Pod structure had a lot more in common with the Sea Shell.

Approaching it on foot inside the mammoth hangar, the Pod looked huge. Sedna stood looking at it for a while, awed by the impression of size it gave from this perspective. She turned to Newt.

"I know it's not as big as a Dome balloon, but is it bigger than the Sea Shell?"

"It does look big in here. Actually it's almost identical. This hangar is two hundred meters high. The Pod has less than fifty meters to spare."

There were three buttresses around the base of the Pod to support it in an upright position. They appeared to be jointed.

"Do the legs fold?"

"Yes, they retract into the hull after liftoff."

"And inside is a standard farm and apartment structure?"

"Pretty much so. But come on, I'll give you the whole tour."

As they got closer Sedna realized that the bottom of the Shell, or hull as Newt had called it, was about ten meters above the floor of the hangar. There were a couple of vehicles parked below it, and a wide opening above them.

"That's the loading bay," Newt told her. "The doors retract inside."

Sedna looked up to see if there were also portals like those on the Sea Shell. It looked like there were, in about the same places. The lowest one on the side they were approaching looked like it was open. It was a little hard to tell because there was a deck of some sort butted up to it, with stairs and railings.

"I think I see an open portal there," she said, pointing, "And it opens out just like the ones on the Sea Shell. Isn't that backward for space?"

"It would be, except there's an air lock on the other side. The door to that opens inward, and it's the main pressure seal."

"Are all the portals like that?"

"Yes. We argued about that for months, but so many people fly drones now that it finally made sense."

"So drones can come and go as they please?"

"Pretty much. People access is normally limited to the big bays at the top and bottom."

"There's another bay on top?"

"Almost identical to this one. Except what's the floor on top is the ceiling here. Come on, I'll show you all that."

They walked under the hull so they could look up into the bay. Newt pointed out where the doors folded up, the loading docks between them, and the bottom of the central elevator shaft above. "We can get a better look from inside. This way."

He led her back out and up stairs to the deck by the open portal. Inside there was a flat walkway around the bottom of the apartment ring, and another open air lock door that led inside. This was just like the bottom level of the Sea Shell, except there they would be under water. Here the inner air lock door was also wide open.

Newt showed Sedna an access door that led down to the loading bay. They went far enough down the steps to see how pallets lifted onto the lower deck could be transferred to the big elevator. Then he took her back up for a look at the farm and one of the apartment levels. Again like the Sea Shell, there were air locks opening from the outer apartment deck to the inside of the Pod. That was all so standard there was not much point in exploring further.

As they walked back through the farm to the central shaft, Sedna asked, "Where are all the people? I would have expected to see some people, at least in the farm. It's obviously in full operation, and the crops have to be tended and harvested."

"The crew will come in later in the day for that. Otherwise they won't be needed here until we get closer to launch."

"When will that be?"

"It's not set yet, but soon."

They took the elevator to the top bay and walked around the deck there. Newt pointed to the bay doors overhead, which were closed, and said, "You can see that it will be easier for air cars to enter and unload here, so this will be the main bay in space." They got back in the elevator and he said, "Okay, now for the treat!"