“Reactors dead, artificial gravity is fried, this ship is toast… You sure this is the place?”
“Positive, we got an SOS signal from here, every station in the galaxy received it.”
“Odd, they started to strip the Messiahryte out but left some of it behind… Were they interrupted?”
They floated through the derelict ship carefully, using the powerful magnesium white spotlights on their weapons to light the way as they floated through the wartorn hull. There had been heavy fighting within the ship, the walls and doors showed significant damage from high calibur physical weapons and energy weapons, once molten but now cooled scars carved through the metal interior. Every room they passed showed the same story, vicious last stands, brutal executions, a story that unravelled itself in a predictable way to these men. The ship's defenders had been overpowered and systematically demolished by high grade weapons; it was a methodical assault too, no stone unturned approach.
Their hover jets were casting a fiery blue light over the various floating corpses and debris as armour’s propulsion systems kept them moving through the maze-like corridors of the vessel. Their armour was knight-like, if a knight had a fully sealed suit of powered armour, jet propulsion systems, complex multi-layered shields with kinetic converter tech and a full suite of environmental support systems to protect the user… but they were prepared for a fight none-the-less.
A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Yet the ship yielded nothing, aside from corpses and battle damage. Another day, another pirate assault, presumably. Surrounded by nothing but stars and corpses, the team considered leaving as their search continued, the occasional creak of the chilled hull would leave them feeling erry and unwelcome.
Suddenly, the captain stopped, signalling for the team to wait as they hovered towards the bridge in the darkness.
“Something alive ahead, two signatures.”
They raised their rifles and fired a flare down the corridor, lighting the place up a vibrant green.
They waited patiently. It wasn’t the U.C’s style to take risks. The signature was very slowly approaching, drifting from one side of the bridge to the other. Slowly, but surely, whatever it was made itself known by passing by the broken door…
“Is… is that a crib?!”
The soldiers advanced forward slowly, hoverjets synchronised and pushing them through the airless void, the captain decided to speed up and floated up to the object delicately, peering through the glass front of the sealed crib pod. As the team gathered around the object to inspect it, the squad-leader noticed something else floating through the bridge that greatly alarmed him.
“HQ. You’re not going to believe this. We’ve located the source of the signal. We’ve got two unidentified Meddalcorph infants and a Chosen Black Star capsule- Status: Used.”