Greed and Death

Posted on Thu Jun 18th, 2026 @ 8:52am by Captain Daegan Baas

1,786 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Monsters are real
Location: Deeper in unexplored space
Timeline: MD 1

A continuation of events following: https://valkyrie.harperhold.com/index.php/sim/viewpost/29

...Dropping the conduit it's rattling echoed in the bay as she collapsed in tears, her face in her hands. A few moments later the sounds of flesh moving caused her to drop her hands slowly from her wide, tears stained, eyes. The lighting failed and her scream was cut short; transformed into gurgling spasms as she was stabbed thought the throat by a boney protrusion.

Power eventually failed aboard the Nhialic and it began to drift with the rest of the wreckage. It's systems failed one by one, lights flickered, it's heat bled of into space and everything went cold. As the cold deepened what should have been dead slept.


[Weeks later aboard the salvage ship - Yvern]

H'ral scrambled up to the bridge as fast as she could once her mate had cried out over the com. Pushing through the other crew that had also wanted to get a look she looked out on the scene before her. Floating out in the middle of no where was a completely intact vessel and a second ship that was beyond repair but would bring a good haul...they were salvagers after all.

Looking out the window, "Well Cap looks like your hunch was right...again."

From behind her...a chorus of replies rang out...

"The Captain ALWAYS knows where the big hauls are."

"The Cap never fails."

"I'd trust her hunches over the best sensor probe any day or night!"

Grinning she let them carry on for a time but had to interrupt. "All right, all right. Any life signs?"

Her pilot looked back with a smile. "Not a one, and the engines are cold."

She raised her hands to quiet the new shouts of excitement as they started. "We got work to do people. J'lal, G'zan, T'rew, K'jon, K'dow and D'pek suit up and round up the larger debris and stow it in the cargo bays. After that we'll tractor the ships in and head home to the salvage station. Once underway we can transport over and begin inventorying. I want full scans for any hazardous material and everything appraised before we get to the station. If that other ship is intact and operational we will stake our claim, hire some more hands and double our operations."

All that work meant long hours for everyone but with the chance of a second ship, for free, it meant higher shares for everyone so there wasn't a single objection. "...I don't want us to have to do anything but put our feet up and watch the station's knuckle draggers offload while we sip Velosian ale and count our profits...the first round is on me!"

Within the hour the debris had been swept up by the EVA teams and secured the cargo bays of the salvage ship. It wasn't long after that the biggest part of their haul was tractored in and maglocked into position. Now that they were underway, they were getting power modules hooked up in case their new acquisition was completely with power.

K'dow and D'pek were busying themselves looking thought the various pieces of debris on their respective set of cargo bays as G'zan, T'rew, J'lal and K'jon had gone over to the ship they had in tow to see if it was operational and to appraise any cargo.

The Yvern was on a programmed course while everyone got to work. Some of the debris had remains of biomatter and it was isolated. Whatever the remains had been, now that it had had the chance to thaw, began to shift as fluids and flesh began to join here and there within and on the debris.

It was K'dow that first noticed something odd, nothing more than a thin spotting on a what had once been an engineering console. He'd written it off as random contaminant until he spotted it on more chunks of flotsam. "Hey, Cap, what you make of this?

H'ral had come down to look at the collection herself and came over to see what K'dow wanted her to check out. Picking up some of the debris to inspect it she dropped it as it seemed to move towards her hand.


[Aboard the ship being towed]

J'lal and K'jon moved from area to area looking for items of value but stopped cold as they turned into the next corridor. Blood splatters and drag marks went the length of the hall. "Holy Mother...happened here?" He looked to J'lal to say something but was interrupted by a sound from up ahead. He turned with a start but nothing moved.

They were about to write it off, but the sound came again. Soft. Oleaginous. The sound glistening oil might make as it slicked over a dirty puddle. It sounded organic, almost undulating. J'lal looked at her companion, then down the corridor again. "Is anyone there?" she called out, not really wanting an answer.

K'jon worked his light back and forth down the corridor. He had expected decompression damage, scorch marks from weapons fire, conduit ruptures...that kind of thing but all they found was body parts, blood splatters, and blood trials. Ignoring the sound, passing it off as nerves, “I'm not hearing anything. Let's check the engineering section and get out of here."

Even as they worked their way it had been immediately obvious that this was the prison transport Nhialic that had been reported missing. That meant no salvage claim for the cargo nor the chance of keeping ship. They could tell that the cells had been occupied. All the cells were still locked down but they had been ripped open and there was blood everywhere. Whatever had happened here had been a massacre, but were was everyone?

“Well the Regency is going to want their ship back lets get out of here. They can try to figure out what happened themselves.”

“You know they are going to detain us...probable interrogate us as well.”

K'jon tapped the side of his helmet. “Been recording everything so we are in the clear.”

J'lal let out a nervous breath of relief and was about to reply when a roar echoed down the corridor followed by the beating on a security door at the end of the corridor. As they hurried away from whatever was following them no one on the Yvern was answering their call “We need to find G'zan & T'rew!”


[Yvern]

K'dow and D'pek had watched their Captain turn grey as they tried to get her to the med-bay. Tendrils, from what had been their Captain, erupted from her body wrapping around both of them. They desperately fought to free themselves as they frantically watched as their captain's body became disjointed and splayed opened like a giant mouth.

D'pek screamed in pain as she thrashed and clawed trying to free herself.

K'dow pulled managing to partially free himself only to see that the flesh had been ripped from his arm.

Their arms that had been wrapped around their captain were both being absorbed, consumed by whatever their Captain had become. More tendrils shot out wrapping around various parts of their bodies as they were pulled in towards the maw. The screams became distorted howls as the three mutated and fused into a single bloody multi-limbed abomination.


[Prison ship - Nhialic]

K'jon had watched J'lal get attacked and ripped apart only to see her splayed and disjointed body rise and trail off in search of who knows what. K'jon had cowered in fear not daring to move even when alone. When he finally did try to move his leg was asleep from hiding. When he tried to wake it up he bumped the cart he had been hiding behind and sent several items clattering across the floor.

His head darted around looking for anything that may have heard the noise as well as to find any way out. Moving as quickly and as silently as he could he headed out into the corridor to try and get back to the docking port. His leg was finally waking up when he stopped cold, looking back, hearing the howl from behind him, something must had heard the noise from earlier. Whatever was happening it sounded like the room he'd been hiding in was being destroyed. He hurried, all that noise was going to attract more of those things.

Hearing more noise he turned, backing his way through the next junction. He never saw the creature towering behind him but at least his death was faster than the others the creatures grotesque maw enveloped and severed his head clean off. K'jon's lifeless body slumped to the floor in an ever widening pool of blood.


[Salvage Station 3 - 11 days later]

The Yvern, still towing the prison transport, had crashed into the massive salvage station at full cruising speed. The impact had knocked the station from its position and had set it adrift. Those sent to deal with the crash had been the first to succumb while others tried to stabilize the stations position.

Even though everything had been locked down a ship tried to rip itself from the docking bay as its crew tried to flee only to explode as fuel lines ruptured.

As panicked crew ran to try and find a place, any place to hide, the station director had managed to activate a quarantine beacon. Unfortunately, all that guaranteed was that no one was coming to help. His only hope that his warning message would keep others away keep them from the same fate. Securing himself in his office he could her the screams of victims and the howls of the creatures over the stations communications system. He sat and watched as the creatures kept trying to break through the partition between his office and the outer area. There was no way to tell anymore whether they had once been his crew, their families, random traders, customers, or salvagers; not that it mattered now.

As the partition began to fracture he swallowed hard. His tears from the loss of his friends had left dried streaks on his face. As the fractured partition became a hole and as that hole became wider and wider he lifted his disruptor to his head. His hand passed over the image of his daughter one last time before he closed his eyes pulling the trigger; sending a burst of plasma energy through his skull.

His suicide didn't stop the creatures. His partially headless body was infected and thrashed about as it mutated into a grotesque version of what it had been. Not long after it joined the rest of the creatures until there were no more screams.

 

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