Asteroid Blast Door

A very large structure of some kind occupies most of the interior of asteroid …. The blast door which once served as this structure's only entrance still can't be opened, but a passage has been dug from the other side of the asteroid.

Drills have so far been unable to penetrate the thick outer walls of the structure, but this method still seems to afford the best chance of gaining access. Despite their age, the blast doors have proven nearly invulnerable.

A hole has finally been drilled through the outer walls of structure inside …. The interior is a vast command center or bunker of some sort, littered with the decayed remains of thousands of dead aliens.

Sifting through all this to gain a clearer picture of what exactly was going on inside this asteroid will take considerable time.

This asteroid once served as the hidden capital of a relatively large interstellar empire that dominated this section of the galaxy several thousand years ago. From this fortified command center, the ruling elite along with thousands of military and civilian officials administered the empire while safe from the violent reprisals their harsh policies often inspired.

Contact with the rest of their empire seems to have been handled exclusively through encrypted subspace transmissions and a single freighter which made periodic visits to resupply the base and transfer personnel.

From what can be pieced together, it appears that the resupply freighter collided with the asteroid due to a thruster malfunction. The resulting explosion damaged the blast doors and destroyed the asteroid's subspace transmitter, permanently severing all contact with the outside world.

Trapped and with no hope of rescue, the asteroid's inhabitants slowly succumbed to starvation or suicide. The last logs of their single surviving subspace receiver confirm that their empire, suddenly bereft of its capital, descended into civil war and anarchy.