We did some more research on Afelahn the last days. It seems, that air, water and soil are quite similar to those on earth, except there are a lot of small lifeforms which look like clams in the soil. On the other side, there are no worms or wormlike creatures – so it seems, the “earth-clams” are Afelahns equivalent to our worms. Fascinating.
Kennett brought a small excavator with him on Saturday, and did some test bores. He said, the rock is stable enough to excavate bigger cavities – maybe even rooms!
The only problem is, that it would need a lot of time to cut out rooms with this small excavator – if only we could bring one of the bigger ones into Afelahn… but as we know, only that which comes with you when you walk comes with you when you link.
So, how are we supposed to get the bigger equipment from age to age?
After spending a lot of time in Afelahn, I went to Tufolehn again, this time joined by Alex and Peter Chang, who is a microbiologist. He had done a little research on Tufolehns water and wanted to see it himself – he said, there were a lot of strange microorganisms in it.
When I showed them some of the strange fauna of Tufolehn – sea urchins, jellyfish, starfish and a strange, slimy mass (yuck!) floating on the water – Peter said, the fauna of the age is quite similar to our own earth in the geological era of Cambrium or Ordovicium.
And he recommended not to swim in the water… there are a lot of small creatures with nettles swimming in it – some even might be poisonous, but at least swimming would be quite uncomfortable.
A pity… I would like to explore the other, bigger island – it´s just a few dozen meters away.
One strategy might be to partially disassemble a larger excavation machine and carry it through in parts. The disadvantage of this is that you (or someone on the team) would have to understand the machinery well enough to be able to reassemble it. I also don’t know whether the large excavators you have access to are even designed to be disassemblable like that. Still, it might be worth looking into.
That´s an interesting thought! I´ll have to ask Kennett about that – I personally don´t understand enough of D’ni machinery, but maybe he can help with that.
I know, that they used a medium sized excavator for some of the cleaning up in Asheten mansion – maybe we should start with that one.
Thanks for the advice!