Marl, one of Alba Station’s premier salvagers, was practically licking her lips. Today’s haul was looking considerably larger than usual.
"Talk about a lucky break," she purred, tossing her long red hair back with a look of feigned annoyance. "I bet this thing is packed with live circuitry just begging to be plucked."
She maneuvered her ship toward the wreckage she’d snagged on a wide-area scan. Once she was at point-blank range, she fired up her BISHOP interface and pinged the derelict vessel.
"No response? And no registry either... Must be a smuggler or something."
Five years in the salvage game had taught Marl a universal truth: ships without paperwork were usually up to no good. Going unregistered meant you couldn't get insurance and you couldn't prove who you were, which was a massive headache. If someone was willing to take those risks, it meant the profit margins were astronomical—and likely illegal.
I just hope they aren't hauling 'live' cargo, she thought. Wait...
As she circled the wreck, a nagging sense of wrongness made her bring her ship, the Rockboy, to a slow crawl. She stared at the monitor, trying to place the irregularity. Then it hit her: the ship was missing something that every ship in this sector absolutely needed.
"Where are the guns? Did someone beat me to the punch?"
If another salvager had already picked the bones clean, there wouldn't be anything left but scrap. The hull looked pristine, but the lack of defensive hardware was highly suspicious.
The engine block is totally intact... Is there a salvager out there specializing in weapons? I haven't heard any rumors about a crew like that.
She accessed BISHOP again, skimming through her saved Salvage Permits. These documents, issued by the space station's Management Department, covered everything from vessel specs and ownership rights to the exhaustive list of taxes she’d have to cough up.
"Nothing. Who flies an unarmed ship these days?"
Marl pulled a face of pure exasperation. Probably some abandoned transport from a larger fleet, she figured.
"Left behind after a breakdown, huh? Poor thing. Don’t worry, I’ll give you a very meaningful second life."
Marl muttered to herself as she deployed the Rockboy’s mechanical arms, locking onto the derelict. A massive radar array extended from her hull.
"Executing Power Scanning."
Blue sparks erupted from the parabolic dish, bathing the wreck in high-energy waves. A stream of data began scrolling behind Marl’s retinas, filling her BISHOP interface with strings of information.
"Wait... what is this?"
Marl’s brow furrowed as she processed the data. Her expression quickly shifted from confusion to disgust.
"It’s empty... No, it’s worse than that! This ship is a total sham! It’s just a hollow shell!"
The data was a mess—nonsensical, inconsistent, and barely resembling the internal systems of a functional starship. A cold pit formed in her stomach. She didn't wait to think; she slammed the controls to retract the arms and radar.
"Wide-area scan!! NOW!!"
She practically screamed the command, initiating a low-fidelity, high-speed sweep. When three distinct blips blinked onto her radar screen, she knew she was in deep trouble.
"No identification signals? Are you kidding me? WIND!? It was a trap!? They used bait!?"
Marl hammered the ignition and scrambled into combat mode. Her fingers danced across the BISHOP controls, but she couldn't stop her hands from shaking.
I’ve never heard of WIND acting like this... Is this some kind of new strain? Should I report this to the Imperial Government?
For a split second, she reached for the comms to Alba Station, but then she hesitated. There was no time, and besides, who would believe a salvager’s tall tale about "smart" feral AI?
"I’m never going to make the Overdrive window at this rate... Turrets, online! Shields, up! Target the nearest threat!"
Two turrets emerged from the Rockboy’s hull, swiveling toward the incoming drones. Salvage ship turrets weren't exactly heavy hitters, but they were usually enough to swat away small pests. Judging by their acceleration, Marl assumed her attackers were light interceptors.
Suddenly, a massive red warning flashed across her BISHOP display.
[WARNING: OVERDRIVE SPACE RESERVATION DETECTED]
"Reinforcements!? Already!?"
Marl frantically sent a rejection signal to the reservation and slammed on the Warp Jamming device. But it was too late—the reservation locked in, and a violent repulsive force began to warp the space around her.
"What is even happening today!?"
With tears prickling her eyes, Marl opened fire on the WIND drones as they entered range. In a stroke of bizarre luck, the repulsive force from the incoming warp acted like a physical barrier, preventing the three drones from surrounding her.
"Jamming off!! Redirect all batteries to shields!!"
The drones retaliated seconds later. The void lit up with the brilliant blue glare of blaster beams. Marl managed to dodge the opening volley, but the drones were closing fast, and their accuracy was improving with every passing microsecond.
"Ugh!! Take that!!"
A violent tremor rocked the ship. Blaster fire splashed against her shields in a blinding kaleidoscope.
Finally, the Rockboy’s turrets locked onto one of the drones and spat out a sustained burst of fire.
"Come on! Just a little longer!!"
The shield battery levels were plummeting. Warning lights strobed across her vision as the BISHOP interface screamed for mercy. Just as her shields hit zero, one of the WIND drones finally erupted into a ball of fire.
"Eeeek!!"
Marl shrieked as a secondary explosion buffeted her ship. Fighting back the urge to have a complete breakdown, she began a frantic diagnostic.
[SPACE RESERVATION RELEASED: TARGET HAS EXITED DRIVE]
She looked up at the alert, her jaw dropping. On the main monitor, a colossal ship had just dropped out of Warp Drive and was barreling toward her at a suicidal velocity.
"W-What? A cargo ship? Is that... help?"
It was a brutish, boxy thing, all hard angles and no grace. She’d been expecting a chaotic, nightmare-fueled WIND vessel, but this looked like a standard—if incredibly ugly—freighter. She felt a weird sense of betrayal, though she wasn't about to complain.
"I’m leaving the rest to you! Target the long-range threats!"
The cargo ship didn't slow down or change course. Marl assumed they were just being heroic and taking the heat. Ignoring the groaning of her ship’s damaged armor, she focused her remaining firepower on the next drone.
"Go, Rocky! You can do it!! ...Wait, what? Hey! What is that idiot doing!?"
Marl’s eyes went wide as she caught a glimpse of the cargo ship’s thrusters. It wasn't slowing down. Through sheer, clumsy attitude control, it had lined itself up on a perfect collision course with a WIND drone.
"If they hit at that speed, they're both dead!!"
Shields were great for stopping lasers, but they were useless against a multi-thousand-ton hunk of flying metal. The WIND drone would be pulverized, sure, but the cargo ship would be turned into a pancake.
The cargo ship closed the distance in a heartbeat. Marl squeezed her eyes shut, waiting for the fireball.
"...What?"
She squinted at the screen. The cargo ship was still there, cruising along as if it hadn't just used itself as a kinetic slug. It was fine. Just... fine.
"That's some stupidly thick armor," she whispered, stunned. She shook herself and turned back to the final WIND drone. "Okay, I can handle this... Phew... I’m actually gonna live..."
As the last drone finally detonated, Marl collapsed into her seat, her limbs turning to jelly. Salvaging was dangerous, but she decided right then and there that she never wanted to do this specific job ever again.
"Owowow... Dammit. Please let nothing be broken."
Teiro clutched his bruised ribs and began digging himself out from under a mountain of supplies that had been catapulted across the bridge.
"Koume! Where are you? I found—no, that’s a spare part. Actually, I might need that later... Ah, found you. You okay, Koume?"
Teiro pulled the AI orb out from the wreckage and wiped a glob of leftover spaghetti off her casing.
"I am functional, Mr. Teiro. However, I find it deeply insulting that you mistook my sophisticated chassis for a personal pleasure device. I demand a formal apology and financial compensation."
"Yeah, yeah, I'll give you whatever you want later. How’s the ship? Did we get poked full of holes?"
Teiro carried Koume back to the console and jammed her cable into the jack. The external monitors flickered to life, zooming in on the impact site.
"...Wait, it’s just a dent? What is this thing made of? We were doing hundreds of kilometers an hour!"
Teiro stared in disbelief at the scrap metal stuck to the hull and the minor cosmetic damage to the exterior. Koume’s status lamp blinked rhythmically.
"It was significantly more than 'hundreds,' Mr. Teiro. Our relative velocity was 2,324 km/h. It is fortunate this vessel is so robust. Though, in the future, I would appreciate a consultation before you decide to use us as a battering ram."
"My bad," Teiro said, giving her a quick "sorry" gesture. He pulled up the sensors to check on the scrap-heap ship they’d seen earlier. "Oh, looks like they’re finishing up. Is that ship okay, though? It looks like a toasted marshmallow."
The other ship was scorched red in several places. Violent jets of fire were spewing from its hull where gas lines had clearly ignited.
"Unknown, Mr. Teiro. However, we are receiving an external transmission. Would you like to accept?"
Teiro froze. The concept of "outside contact" took a second to process. When it finally clicked, he let out a high-pitched "Waaaa!!"
"A call!? Like, a phone call!? Yes! Put her through! Hurry!!"
Koume blinked in silence for a moment. Then, a woman’s voice—decidedly more human and much more stressed than Koume—filled the bridge.
"This is the salvage vessel Rockboy, registration IB-4980. We appreciate the assist, though—"
"H-HELP US!!" Teiro screamed. "We don't have an engine! We’re just drifting! We’re gonna be space dust!!"
"...Huh?" the woman’s voice replied, sounding utterly baffled. "I’m looking at your Warp Drive right now. What are you talking about?"
Teiro realized he’d probably said too much, but his heart soared when he saw the other ship turning toward them.
"Oh, thank god... Look, I’ll explain the details later. Just... please help us..."
Teiro slumped to the floor, all the adrenaline leaving his body at once.
His hands were shaking so hard he had to sit on them.
Author's Note: My first time writing from a third-person perspective. It's interesting how much more freedom you get this way!