Elias sat quietly in the cradle of his ship's cockpit.
Under the dim white console lights, his breath fogged and vanished.
"This hunt is taking longer than it should."
He looked at one of his cracked auxiliary screens.
[74:34:09.05]
No movement.
He exhaled through his nose and leaned back into the restraints.
"Just a little longer. What a pain…"
It wasn't as if he missed company, but he found the task of waiting in dark silence for days on end mildly irritating. On this particular hunt, he was contracted to neutralize a pirate band causing 'problems' in the Gamma sector of the Solaran Empire. It paid well enough.
The hunt brought him to an asteroid belt on the edge of the sector, where he waited with the generator as low as possible to avoid detection.
The hours felt like days passing.
I need to pee…
Making his way down the ladder from the cockpit of his ship into a cramped hallway. He passed his bed, which was a double bunk space inset into the steel-grey corridor, and made his way into the tight bathroom.
After washing his hands and splashing his face in the tiny sink, he stood there. Listening to the sound of the water pump shutting off.
Staring vacantly into his reflection.
Stock still.
A thin, scruffy black beard had begun to grow over his scarred face. Not enough to hinder his helmet, shaving could wait. Dark rings framed his brown eyes, their bloodshot whites an unremarkable side effect of Chem use and too little sleep.
He ran a rough hand through his black hair that was irritatingly greasy.
Now tired of the lackluster view, he stepped back into the corridor, making his way back up the ladder and back into his seat— buckling in out of habit.
The shuttle he piloted was big enough to live in, yet small enough to be forgotten.
He was reminded of that fact as he watched the mural of stars and asteroids around him as they bathed in dim blood-red light from the distant star of this system. It was a breathtaking view, even through the glass that was now frosting at the edges.
It was as if the existence of something man-made in this scene just didn't belong, like he was trespassing in a god's domain.
~PING~
He looked down at his radar, as it shook him from the train of thought.
[unidentified light cruiser]
[speed moderate]
[est. generator output:
regular cruising levels]
"Well, what have we here?"
He felt his heart quickening in his chest.
It passed his viewing, but was still visible on radar. Slowly, pulling his Chem stick out of his field jacket's breast pocket, he watched the blip move through the asteroids.
Something's off.
~click~clack~tsst~
The familiar sound filled the silence of his cockpit. Not taking his bloodshot eyes off the blip, he took a long pull from the device.
The sickly crimson vapors left his cracked and dry lips—now curling into a wry smile.
His throat burned, vision sharpened, colors separated, chest calmed.
This stuff will be the death of me.
"Just not today."
Gripping the familiar controls and bringing the generator to a low idle, filling the silent ship with a low hum and mild warmth.
The ship crept forward.
His nearby query showed no signs of change. As he slowly brought it into view, he maneuvered his ship close to an asteroid. Letting the generator die down.
Elias was sure now. Based on the markings, battle damage, haphazard repairs that wouldn't fly for professional in a registered port, and the clearly visible armaments on the ship, this was indeed a pirate.
Why was it alone?
"Okay then. I'll bite."
Bringing his ship out from the cover of the asteroid, he activated the torpedoes.
[command override— RECEIVED]
[torpedo guidance—DISABLED]
[manual fire— ACTIVE]
[firing]
Three torpedoeswhizzed with bright blue towards the enemy vessel. In a patterned spread of where he estimated his enemy would be.
The cruiser slowed to turn around an asteroid formation, just as he predicted, leaving the port side wide open.
Generator readings began rising to combat levels, but they took notice too late.
All three connected with the port side of the ship, the surplus warheads in those torpedoes made quick work of the unshielded ship in a spectacular purple and magenta burst.
No sound was heard in the vacuum of space, and as quickly as the flash of light started, it dissipated. Leaving behind a mangled ship arcing with electricity. He jerked his controls to find a new position. Catching the view of the secondary explosion as the generator likely lost control, sputtering out rings of white and gold energy waves that quickly dissipated as well.
"One down. Now, where are the rest of you hiding? "
As if answering his question, two more blips appeared behind him.
[unidentified light cruiser]
[speed stopped, rising]
[generator output estimate— combat levels, rising],
[unidentified heavy cruiser]
[speed stopped, rising]
[generator output estimate— combat levels, rising]
He spun around and released flares, making it harder for them to lock on. Instead, his enemies released a volley of flak fire. Crude, but effective. Darting his ship between the asteroids and the flak, he maneuvered under the light cruiser.
[SHIELD DAMAGED 95% ]
[energy weapons charged & online]
The back of his ship opened up to reveal a powerful laser cannon capable of melting a shield. Locking all his sights on the second light cruiser, he fired the energy weapon.
His ship vibrated, screens dimmed, and a bright light filled the cockpit.
The target soaked up the white beam of condensed energy until its shields gave out under the sudden, immense load, leaving a glowing dot burned into the side of the ship.
Not fatal— yet.
Elias quickly fired six torpedoes that were locked and ready.
The thick flak took three off course, but the others connected with that same bright purple light.
Moving targets to the heavy cruiser, he pushed his throttle forward to get behind the 400-meter beast. The others were small fry compared to this one.
The flak thinned as he ducked behind an asteroid using a slingshot maneuver to get himself behind the enemy.
He locked his laser cannon onto the bridge…
~CRASH~
His surroundings deteriorated into a violent spin. Alarms blared in his ears, lights flickered, and the air had a sudden pressure change.
~smack~tss~
Activating the red-tinted glass visor on his suit's helmet, he sealed himself from the ship's compromised atmosphere.
(Emergency O2 in use: 59 minutes remaining)
Elias pulled himself out of the spin and dived rapidly downward to find a fixed railgun on an asteroid below him.
"There's the trap."
Firing the ship's auto cannon, he drilled down on the artillery piece as it released a mirage of sparks just when his belt-fed weapon came to a crackling halt as some mechanism snapped abruptly.
He wrenched the controls upwards to peel away from the asteroid—vision going black around the edges from the maneuver. Then, pulling the ship into a rightward climb to evade the range of the heavy cruiser.
The ship's guttural vibrations testified that she was dying.
A dizzying display of damage alerts cycled through Elias'sHUD and screens as he cleared them away.
[WARNING: SHIELD FAILURE ]
[WARNING: HULL FAILURE ]
[WARNING: GENERATOR OUTPUT FAILING ]
[WARNING: LIFE SUPPORT OFFLINE ]
He decelerated around an asteroid as he approached the wall-like formation, slowing the throttle down when the control sticks lost all resistance.
[ERROR: INPUT NOT RECOGNIZED ]
The screens went black.
"Shit."
The impact smashed the ballistic glass of the cockpit, sending the ship into a dead drift.
Elias, dazed, looked around desperately for some kind of bearing.
He turned on his helmet light. Sparking terminals and smashed gauges filled his view. Glass shards, cast loose, drifted through the cabin, glittering in the dark. The front of the cockpit was caved in from the impact. Any faster and he would have died.
He was still strapped in. Thanks to the Chem, he couldn't feel much pain. If he did, that would mean he was so badly injured the drug couldn't keep up.
He decided it wasn't as bad as it looked.
~inhales~
~exhales~
I am not dying here.
I need to get aboard that ship.
I need to move.
He drifted down the dark corridor, opened a locker, and pulled a spare flight suit and helmet free. He stuffed them into the cockpit seat without slowing.
From the top bunk, he grabbed his bailout pack.
Oxygen. Sealant. Tools. Ammo. Explosives.
The rest didn't matter.
The corridor ended in ruin.
The storage bay. If you could still call it that.
The floor had been torn inward where the energized round had entered. The ceiling was gone entirely, replaced by drifting debris and the asteroid belt beyond.
He glanced at the scorched wall and saw it.
Good. Still intact.
The torpedo autoloader's service hatch came free after a few hard tugs, revealing a single warhead sleeping quietly on the belt.
He cracked open the guidance module. No safeties worth mentioning. He repurposed a breaching charge and cold-wired it directly into the brain.
An arming light flicked to life.
Awake.
He exhaled slowly and sealed the hatch. The weapon stayed quiet.
I need a diversion next.
He killed his helmet light and glanced up at the void.
Then pushed up.
Gripping an exposed cable at the edge of the opening, pulling his head out first.
He paused.
Then pulled his torso.
Don't let go.
He breathed.
Then his legs left the ship, hovering above her hull.
He took a glance away from the ship, and he saw endless darkness.
Something gripped his chest.
Breath caught in his throat.
Untethered and ill-suited for a walk. He reached out, fingers hooking a seam.
The cold metal stung his fingers, then searched for his next hold.
Grip.
Pause.
Breath.
Move.
Repeat.
This was all he could think of as he moved along the metallic corpse. Centimeter by centimeter. Checking before releasing one hand before moving the next.
He reached the flare housing at the wing root and locked an arm through a structural brace.
For a moment, he stayed there. Let the shaking settle. Let the cold stop screaming.
Then he saw it.
A distant point of white light slid across the debris field. Slow. Methodical. A search drone. Not close enough yet. Not looking at him. But close enough to matter.
No time.
He tore into the flare cartridge.
Too hard.
It came free in his hands, lighter than expected. His arms jerked up with it, and for half a second, there was nothing beneath him. No pressure. No resistance.
He wasn't touching the ship.
Panic hit like a fist.
His arms flailed once, useless, the stars wheeling in his peripheral vision. Then instinct won. He dropped instead of reaching, slammed a forearm into the hull, fingers clawing for anything that would bite.
They found a seam.
He froze.
Didn't move.
Didn't correct.
Just clung there while his breath went ragged and loud inside the helmet. Short pulls. Sharp exhales. The suit heater whined, struggling to keep up.
Don't drift.
Don't push.
He counted breaths until his hands stopped shaking.
One.
Two.
Three.
The drone's light passed on.
Only then did he move again.
Fixing a thermal charge to the flare clusters, then setting it to remote activation. He braved a look towards the back of the vessel. Towards the cold boosters.
Grip.
Pause.
Breath.
Move.
Repeat.
He reached the cold booster and pulled himself along its length, then folded into the narrow space behind it, pressing close to the hull. Out of sight. Barely out of room.
The drone drifted closer.
Its light swept across the forward hull, lingering near the cockpit. Red bands unfurled and fanned outward, slowly and deliberately. Scanning.
Too close.
It would see the heat bleed from his suit's heating element. Thin insulation. Minimal shielding. Enough to survive. Not enough to hide.
He looked at the suit readout.
[External temperature: lethal.]
[Thermal regulation required.]
[Warning: loss of heating will result in rapid hypothermia and organ failure.]
He didn't answer it.
He killed the power.
The cold hit instantly. Not gradual. Not creeping. Like being plunged into ice so sharp it stole his breath. His body tried to inhale and forgot how. Short, panicked pulls followed, each one burning worse than the last.
The edges of his visor frosted over in seconds.
His fingers screamed. His jaw locked. His chest seized as his heart stumbled, confused by the sudden drop.
Don't move.
Stay awake.
The drone lingered.
Seconds stretched. His vision narrowed. Stars bled into white smears through the frost. Somewhere in his peripheral display, warnings stacked and died as systems shut themselves down.
Then the red light folded in.
The drone drifted away.
It had what it came for. A cold ship. A dead cockpit. No life worth reporting.
He waited three more seconds.
Then he slammed the suit's power back on.
Heat flooded him violently, painfully, and overwhelming. His muscles spasmed as sensation rushed back in. His breath broke loose in a ragged gasp, and he curled in on himself, riding the adrenaline dump as his heart tried to claw out of his chest.
He stayed hidden. Shaking. Alive.
A shadow loomed over the wreckage Elias hid himself in.
Sun-bright floodlights bloomed open, washing over the broken shuttle and bleeding into the booster housing.
~inhales~
~exhales~
The impact of the grapplers came next. Not violent, but absolute. A deep reverberation that traveled through hull, suit, and bone.
Debris drifted away as the ship moved again.
Not under her own power.
She was pulled forward, swallowed by the open hangar. Elias with her. Cargo now.
The jaws sealed shut with a hiss.
Gravity returned in waves.
Sound followed.
Warmth crept back in, slow and artificial. Just enough to make the space usable.
Boots hit the deck.
The voices of men could be heard as Elias rediscovered a sound other than his own breathing. Idle chatter about shifts and broken power cutters drew close.
"I'm telling you, man. A cutter is going to take forever to get into this thing—that mark."
"Yeah, I see it. Don't start."
"I'm just saying."
"You say that word, and something breaks."
"…Captain's still gonna want eyes on it."
"Good point. Send over a pic so we can get to work. "
"Aaand done."
The sound of power tools and metal cutting came to life.
It was time to move.
Elias pulled open his suit's wrist terminal.
[trigger thermal charge: YES/NO? ]
~TSSS~
A torch-like flame erupted from the left wing of the shuttle, quickly blooming into a shower of hot countermeasure flares that loosed themselves into the confined space.
"Fire!"
Muffled panic filled the hangar; alarms sounded as it sprayed yellow fire-retardant foam from all directions, filling the room with a haze of mist and smoke.
Coughing and swearing ensued as the fire died down.
Elias was already gone.
By the time the foam settled, he was in the corridors.
His boots clicked against the metal grating beneath him.
Dingy corridors of steel and exposed wiring became tight passageways, having to squeeze his body past hot pipes.
Pausing his advance, he saw a large junction box fixed to the wall, dozens of conduits branching from it like veins, disappearing into the floor and ceiling.
Charge set.
Remote activation.
He turned away—
The hatch behind him cycled open too fast.
A driver-shot wrung out.
A pipe burst behind him.
Metal screamed, and something punched into his left shoulder hard enough to twist him sideways. A spray of fragments ricocheted down the corridor as Elias pivoted on instinct and fired through the opening without seeing who stood beyond it.
The hatch slammed shut again.
Silence.
His HUD flashed a new alert.
[SUIT BREACH — LEFT SHOULDER],
[PRESSURE LOSS: MINOR],
[AUTOMATIC SEALANT REQUIRED],
Elias didn't look at the wound. He reached back, snapped the sealant patch from his belt, and slapped it over the torn fabric. The suit stiffened as the compound spread and cured, pressure stabilizing a heartbeat later.
[BREACH SEALED]
Blood was someone else's problem.
He waited one second.
Then another.
No return fire. No shouting. No alarms.
Silence.
keep moving
The corridor opened suddenly, wider than the rest. A junction.
Two pirates stood guard by a sealed door.
Elias tapped his wrist terminal.
The charge on the box went first—lights died, gravity hiccuped, the deck shuddered as the junction screamed and failed.
The walls hummed as the ship fought for a new equilibrium; guards left the floor, confused in the sudden change.
Elias fired once.
The first man went down without a sound, momentum carrying him into the bulkhead.
The second froze, half a breath too long, weapon still coming up.
Elias adjusted and fired again.
Gravity came back as two thuds sounded against the floor.
It was over before they could recognize what was happening.
The sealed door opened, revealing terminals spanning the walls with a diagram of the ship's arteries.
The Corridor Control Room.
Red lines across the pathways seemed to indicate a sealed-off corridor.
He was reaching for the controls when his mind became foggy.
He was due again.
When the visor to his helmet lifted, the smell of old machinery and oil filled his nostrils.
He reached into the breast pocket.
~click~clack~tsst~
Time to refill these as well…
The used O2 tank released with a hiss, dropping with a dull clank, rolling in the uneven gravity.
As he swapped it for the new one in his bag.
A crackling sound in the ceiling opened, causing him to flinch mid-task, then continued as he listened.
"Attention, all crew.
We have confirmed multiple fatalities in processing hangar zero-six.
This is not a drill.
The Judge is aboard.
Neutralize the intruder."
Clicking the suit's new power pack into place and sealing the visor shut, he appraised the terminal.
A forgotten emergency protocol stuck to the screen like a prayer for a dying ship.
A double-edged blade.
[ALL CORRIDORS: CLOSE/OPEN]
~beep~
The door opened behind him, and the door after that as well.
Confirming his theory.
A wry grin crept onto his lips.
He tapped his wrist terminal again. Listing a single available breaching charge.
The one wired to the guts of a military-grade warhead, hidden in his crippled shuttle.
Finger hovering over the button.
~click~
The ship rumbled.
Exhaling her precious oxygen into the void, air tearing through open corridors and ducts, then force slammed home. Bulkheads bowed and split as the shockwave sprinted down the hull. Gravity died mid-step. Men and tools lifted, colliding in sudden silence as sound arrived late and wrong.
The lights failed in pieces. Alarms contradicted themselves and went quiet. Somewhere deep inside, mass shifted, metal screamed, and the ship twisted just enough to break. Then there was nothing. No hum. No pull. The warhead didn't kill the ship. It crippled the spine.
Court's in session.