Three days passed in a haze of anticipation and unease. The signal grew stronger as they approached, resolving into something almost musical—a repeating cycle of tones that seemed to carry an odd emotional weight. Chen found herself humming along with it during her shifts, the pattern lodged in her brain like an earworm that wouldn't die.
When the object finally resolved on their forward scopes, it was nothing like what they'd expected.
"Sweet mother of..." Varga whispered.
The ship—and it was a ship, despite its alien configuration—hung in the void like a fossilized sea creature. It was enormous, easily three times the length of the Magellan's Hope, with a silhouette that suggested organic growth rather than engineering. Curved surfaces swept back from a central ridge, and what might have been engines flared at the rear like the tail of some deep-ocean leviathan.
But it was the color that struck them most. Not the gray of human ships, not the white of corporate stations. This vessel was a deep, burnished bronze, the color of old blood, with streaks of black where something had scarred its hull.
"Holy shit," Dmitri said. "That's not human."
"No," Saito agreed quietly. "No, it is not."
The signal was coming from the alien ship—that much was certain now. Their instruments showed it emanating from somewhere near the vessel's midpoint, a steady pulse that had probably been broadcasting for centuries.
"Captain," Amira said, her voice tight. "I'm reading an energy signature. Low-level, but definitely there. The ship still has power."
"After how long?"
"I don't know. Decades. Centuries. The alloys I'm reading don't match anything in our databases. This thing could be a thousand years old."
Saito stared at the alien vessel for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was calm, measured—the voice of a captain who knew that panic was a luxury he couldn't afford.
"Mr. Volkov, bring us to station-keeping, five hundred meters off their port side. Mr. Webb, assemble a boarding party. I want to know what we're towing before we hook up to it."
"Captain," Webb said carefully, "shouldn't we wait for Corporate instructions? This is... this is first contact. We're not qualified."
Saito turned to look at him, and for just a moment, the mask slipped. Webb saw something in his captain's eyes—fear, yes, but also a terrible curiosity that he'd never noticed before.
"Corporate already knows about this," Saito said. "Why else would they send a tug to these coordinates? They knew what we'd find. They just didn't bother to tell us." He turned back to the viewport. "We're going to take a look. Then we'll decide what to tell them."
The Magellan's Hope maneuvered slowly toward the alien vessel, her thrusters firing in precise bursts. As they drew closer, details emerged: a hull that seemed almost scaly in texture, ports that might have been windows but were too dark to see through, and a massive gash near the vessel's belly—a wound that had penetrated deep into the ship's interior.
The signal continued its mournful pulse.
BEEP... pause... BEEP BEEP... pause... BEEP... pause... BEEP BEEP BEEP...