“Are we ready?”

Remi looked at his pilot, who gave him the thumbs up. “We’re good to go, Cap’n,” she informed him. “Reactor is holding steady at ninety percent, engines are online and primed.”

“Weapons systems are up, Cap’n,” Slavko chimed in. “Ready to fire at your command.”

Thumbing the intercom, he hailed Engineering. “How are things down there, Mairead?” he asked.

“Boards all look good,” she assured him. “Just… try not to break anything.”

“No promises,” he chuckled, before growing serious as he activated the ship-wide hail. An alarm rang out across the ancient battleship as he activated the intercom. “General Quarters, General Quarters. All hands, man your battle stations,” he ordered, as the others immediately sat up straight with renewed fervor. He hadn’t warned them about the alarm, and generally, the Corsairs weren’t so formal, but being aboard this old battleship seemed to require it, somehow. There was an electricity in the air that had nothing to do with the drill ahead. Besides, keeping them on their toes was no minor consideration, given their ultimate destination, even though they were technically already at their battle stations.

Turning back to the bridge crew, he dialed it back down. “All right, you two… start your run.”

“Copy that,” Xuilan acknowledged. “Engines to seventy-five percent, beginning first leg… now.”

Tyr leapt forward, charging through the system like a tiger chasing down its prey. It wasn’t much to look at; a handful of useless worlds along with a scattering of equally unprofitable asteroids, but it would do for their purposes. Claimed by the Yanjai, a third-tier power, as well as nominal members of the Alliance, Remi was certain they wouldn’t raise too much of a fuss. It wasn’t as if they were staking a claim, after all.

Keeping an eye on the sensors, he watched as their velocity climbed. Putting Tyr through her paces was an absolute necessity, given her age and condition when they’d rediscovered her. Despite all the hard work they’d put into the old girl, bringing her back from the dead, the only way to know if their effort had paid off was to test her. That meant speed and endurance trials, gunnery exercises, the whole nine meters. He had to know what she was capable of if he was going to take her to Terra Nova.

There was a slight vibration in the deck plates as the ship accelerated, though less than what he would normally expect. It seemed her time on ice… pun intended… had kept her in better shape than her overworked and recently overhauled sister ship, Freya.

Good. Something told him he was going to need that edge.

“Coming up on the first turn,” Xuilan announced as they neared a bluish gas dwarf. “Commencing aerobrake maneuver… now.”

The crew was strapped in tight as Tyr fell towards the planet, with plasma wrapping the ship’s hull with flames as they skimmed its atmosphere. The old girl groaned as tidal stresses pulled at her, threatening to tear her to pieces, but as they completed the turn and rocketed out of its exosphere, the shuddering slowly dissipated. Toggling the intercom once more, he said, “Talk to me, Mairead.”

There was a pause before she finally responded. “Still in one piece,” she confirmed, “but I’m seeing signs of stress on the hull, and the secondaries have kicked in on the reactor. She’s feeling the strain, Cap’n,” she informed him, in disapproving tones.

“As long as she holds,” he fired back, returning his attention to the main viewer.

“Approaching target,” Slavko apprised him, as they neared the planet’s smallest moon. Little more than a captured asteroid, it was an unremarkable hunk of rock in an eccentric retrograde orbit, making it ideal for testing their guns.

“You may open fire the moment you‘re in range,” Remi informed him, monitoring the screen as the targeting reticles went active, tracking the planetoid.

“Aye aye, Cap’n, fire as she bears,” the gunner confirmed. “Torpedo and railguns are locked on target. Engaging… now.”

A pair of missiles streaked away from the ship, racing towards the moon, while a stream of projectiles from the railguns sprayed across its surface. The torpedoes exploded, sending plumes of rock and dust into space, though the explosions were decidedly uneven, a fact that did not go unnoticed.

“What happened?” the captain demanded.

“The torps were both duds,” Slavko explained. “I didn’t want to waste the good ones. I’m actually kind of surprised they detonated at all.”

“I see,” Remi said after a moment. “Good call,” he agreed, leaning back in his chair, mollified by the gunner’s explanation. “Any problems?”

“Targeting was a bit off,” Slavko admitted, “but this gives me the chance to recalibrate. I’ll get ‘em dialed in, don’t you worry.”

“Glad to hear it,” he nodded. “So, any problems anywhere? Anything at all?” he asked the crew.

“She’d holding together down here,” Mairead confirmed from Engineering. “We’re still dangerously understaffed for actual combat, though.”

“Helm responded well,” Xuilan agreed. “Maybe not as sprightly as Gyrfalcon, but then she’s a lot bigger.”

“Guns were up the instant I fired,” Slavko chimed in. “I agree with Mairead, but considering how short-handed we are? She did better than I thought she might.”

It was exactly what he’d hoped to hear, which of course made him instantly suspicious. Things going well was just an invitation to overconfidence, and in the Perseus Arm that would get you killed. Terrans had been the have-nots for so long that good news put them immediately on edge, waiting for the other shoe to drop. The universe had a perverse sense of humor and seemed to regard humanity as its personal chew toy.

Remi sighed and sat back in his chair. That was ridiculous, of course. The universe didn’t have it out for them, it simply didn’t care. Others did, and they’d gone out of their way to make their lives miserable, but that was changing as the Alliance grew in both strength and numbers. The scales were still far from balanced, but at least they were swinging in the right direction.

Other than the Yīqún, that is. They were still the joker in the deck.

“In that case,” Remi said, thumbing the intercom, “All hands, secure from General Quarters.” There was an almost palpable sigh of relief from the others as they concluded the exercise.

“Xuilan, set course for Terra Nova, one-half speed,” he ordered.

“Aye aye, Cap’n,” she acknowledged, adjusting course and velocity.

“Keep a sharp watch,” Remi urged, “because they’re out there… and they have to know we’re coming.”

Given their current flight path, traveling to Terra Nova would take the better part of a month. They passed the time by continuing repairs and exploring the various nooks and crannies of the ship. Some crates found within her stores held intriguing surprises; time capsules from the Terran Navy era, before its transformation into the Corsairs. They could make a small fortune selling off the various mementos, but strangely, that was the last thing on his mind.

And besides, why worry over a few paltry baubles, when the greatest prize of all lie ahead?

Still, it rankled him. He’d never turned up his nose at a deal before now, and the badges and insignias alone were worth their weight in protein. So why did the thought of making that trade leave him so unmoved? He should be salivating at the opportunity, but here he sat, staring at a container filled with the regalia of a long-dead Earth, and the only emotion he could muster was a profound sense of shame.

We stood for something once; he thought to himself; we weren’t just a pack of scavengers and opportunists. He plucked out a shoulder board with four broad gold stripes, the insignia of a captain. What would you think of the man who sits in your chair now? he wondered.

A buzz from the intercom interrupted his reverie. “Yes, what is it?” he asked, dumping everything back into the crate.

“Cap’n, could you come to the Bridge?” Xuilan inquired, an odd note to her voice. “We’ve picked up something on sensors.”

“Is it another ship?” he asked her, rising to his feet.

“I doubt it,” she answered. “The return signature is too small. But I’d be lying if I said I knew what it was.”

“On my way!” he shouted, already halfway out the hatch.

“What have you got?” Remi demanded as he took his seat on the bridge.

“Honestly Cap’n? I’m not sure,” Xuilan responded. “A signal popped up on sensors, but it’s awfully weak. I almost missed it.”

“What kind of signal?” he asked her.

“It’s a comm signal, but its power source must be almost completely drained,” the pilot clarified. “It keeps fading in and out like the transmitter’s failing.”

“Terran?” he asked hopefully.

“See, that’s the funny thing,” Xuilan answered, scratching her head. “The frequency it’s transmitting on isn’t one of ours, but the signal itself sounds a lot like a distress beacon… a Terran distress beacon,” she spelled out. “It’s hard to say for certain, the way it keeps fluctuating, but that’s how it feels to me.”

“All right,” he said after a moment, “then where’s it coming from?”

Xuilan grimaced. “Haven’t located the source yet,” she admitted, “which means it’s either small, hidden, or…” She paused, unsure how to proceed.

“Or… what?” Remi pressed her.

She swallowed. “Or… someone’s using it as a lure.”

That was an unwelcome and disturbing possibility. “Anything nearby that could mask the signal?” he asked her. “Nebula, planetary bodies, stellar phenomena, anything at all?”

“Nothing within range,” she confirmed.

“If it’s a lure, could be they’re masking their signal,” Slavko chimed in. “Might explain why we can’t see ‘em.”

“Maybe,” Remi answered, unconvinced, “but out here? In the middle of nowhere? The odds of anyone coming this way are pretty slim, not exactly the place you’d set up an ambush.” He rubbed his chin, considering the problem.

“Ease us in closer,” he decided at last. “Let’s see what we’ve got. Slavko, back her up. If it’s a trap, I want us to be ready.”

“Aye aye, Cap’n,” they both agreed, as Xuilan struggled to track down the signal’s source. With no local points of reference, it forced her to improvise, shifting Tyr’s position as she attempted to triangulate the beacon.

Twenty minutes later, they got their answer.

“Cap’n, think I’ve got something,” Slavko announced. “Finally popped up on my targeting sensors, and it’s no wonder it didn’t show before now. It’s little, whatever it is, about three or four meters long.”

“Definitely not a ship then,” Remi mused. “Think you can get us close enough to snag it?”

“I can get us within EVA range,” she agreed.

“Good. Let me know when you’re ready,” he told her, before hitting the intercom switch.

“Isi, meet me at the suit locker. Time to stretch our legs.”

It took Xuilan the better part of an hour to maneuver close enough for them to secure the object while Remi and Isi stood by in the airlock, waiting for the green light. Finally, her voice came over the radio.

“That’s the best I can do, Cap’n,” she informed him. “Looks like it’s sitting about three hundred meters off starboard amidships. I’d advise you to stay tethered, just in case.”

“Copy that,” Remi agreed, before signaling the purser. “You ready?”

“Ready,” Isi confirmed, as the captain began cycling the airlock. They both double-checked their tethers as the hatch slid open, giving them a tug, before switching on their helmet lights and searching for the object.

“There,” the purser sang out, pointing at an oblique angle from the ship. Remi peered in the indicated direction and was rewarded with a glint of reflected light.

“I see it,” he confirmed. “Here we go.”

Deactivating his mag boots, Remi pushed off, firing up the suit’s jet pack. Using puffs of nitrogen gas, the two men made their way toward the unknown object, careful not to build up too much momentum.

“Can you see anything?” Xuilan asked over the radio.

Sweeping their helmet lights across their target, Remi and Isi shared a look. “It’s metallic,” he confirmed, “maybe two meters by four meters. Looks like it’s tumbling slightly.”

“I think it’s an escape pod,” Isi spoke up. “Dimensions and configuration are about right for one.”

“Could be,” Remi said thoughtfully, “but we won’t know for certain until we get it on board.”

Minutes later, they landed, reactivating their boots as they anchored themselves on the object’s surface. “Well, if it is an escape pod, it’s not one of ours,” the captain commented.

“Lot of ships in the fleet that were built by someone else,” Isi reminded him.

“Good point,” Remi agreed. “Let’s get this thing secured and get it back to the ship.”

It only took a few minutes for the object to be tethered before they activated the motor on the other end. With a steady, gentle pull, it dragged them back to Tyr, pulling them into the airlock before the captain finally shut it down. As the lock cycled and the inner hatch slid open, he saw the rest of the crew waiting for them.

“You should be at your posts,” he grumbled.

“Come on, Cap’n, we had to see what you found,” Slavko grinned. “Besides, the scope’s clear. We checked.”

He muttered something under his breath but chose to let it slide. Truth be told, he was curious himself. Prying off his helmet, he stepped aside as Mairead approached with her tools.

“It sure as hell looks like an escape pod,” the Tinker commented, searching for a maintenance port. Her fingers found a catch and released it, flipping open a panel. Glancing at its display, she nodded in confirmation. “Yep, definitely a pod. Standard readout for onboard systems and…” Her voice trailed off as she double-checked the readings before letting out a sigh.

“Looks like we got ourselves a recovery, instead of a rescue,” she shrugged. “Power is all but drained, and oxygen reserves have been totally depleted. It’s been out here a while.”

“I’d still like to open it up and see what we’ve got,” Remi told her.

“Aye aye, Cap’n,” she agreed, getting to work as she plugged in a power unit and began recharging the system before finally stepping back. “All right, here we go,” she said, as a section of the casing slowly pivoted up, exposing the interior.

Inside lay a human female, their hands clutching some sort of device. Whoever it was, they’d been dead a long time, the body completely dehydrated and in the latter stages of mummification.

“Damn,” Isi commented, “must have been floating out here for decades,” as Remi knelt down beside it.

“There’s something… familiar about her,” he murmured.

“Don’t see how,” Slavko pointed out, “she likely died before you were even born.”

“Still…” Glancing at the corpse, he reached for the object she was protecting, trying to remove it from her grasp. There was resistance, the body had locked itself in place with rigor mortis even as he pulled harder… only to stumble back in horror as her eyes snapped open.

“... Remi…” the cadaver rasped.

His jaw dropped, as he recognized her at last.

“... Samara?” he whispered.