Excursion

"Mainframe secure. warm up the drive, I'll be inside in just a moment."

[Right, we're also long since cooled down enough. I'll mark this spot in our log so the guild can send someone by for recovery of the dead.]

Knowing the situation Mike was sure River didn't mean that last part, if the guild ever found out about this wreck they would start asking questions about the sole missing life raft. Still, taking this sole survivor and keeping them hidden was also a massive risk for Mike and River, if they were ever found to carry an alien around it wouldn't be that much of a leap in logic if the pilot's guild or the Solar Empire declared them 'enemies of mankind' for aiding and abetting an enemy of mankind. Heading back into the Wyrm and entering the airlock, Mike continued to think about the challenges going forward.

(The real fucking issue is that the Solar Empire and other factions have been caught off guard facing an unknown hostile, so in response, they've started swinging blindly at all unknowns without warning… All it takes is one false move, one misread intention and we'll have an extragalactic war on our hands while we need to come together to stand against the crystals, and possibly even some precursor remnants.)

"Okay, let's get out of here. We're punching directly to hyperspace Hanna."

"Right."

Warning Hanna as Mike strapped himself into the operator/co-pilot seat, River lit up the afterburner as Mike punched in the coordinates for their jump.

"Commit for jump?"

"Yeah, cords punched in and locked. Go."

On Mike's confirmation, River committed for the jump and punched the Wyrm into hyperspace before letting go of the stick and stretching in an attempt to drain some of the tension out of her body. Switching gears at the first chance he got, Mike started looking up the details of their destination.

"Okay next system is in open anarchy after all of its stations were destroyed by those crystals, I don't expect to be able to refuel, nor given the time to scoop so, we'll save that for later. We will be hunting though, so be prepared for that Hanna."

"Be prepared for what exactly? You two executing refugees for their bounties?"

"Yeah, that it exactly, good thing we're on the same page. You might not like it, but the fact your research is partly funded by the pilot's guild means you ought to have accepted that a while ago. Life isn't fair and just because we're not pirates doesn't mean we're good people."

Not really taking with Hanna's apparent hypocrisy and overall worsening mood, Mike pointed out just how complicit she herself was in the violence. While the idea of a galaxy constantly torn with pirates, black operation teams, eugenics and a wealth disparity bordering on the criminal made for a great game, living in this reality had made Mike realise how fucked up it was, but having already stained his hands in blood from the get-go there was no other way from him out of this nightmare than trough it, although this was most likely his avatar's way of handling things more than his.

"Things can't stand the way things are, that is the only reason I personally took this job. First contact can change a lot of things around here, but don't think for a second that you're somehow above us just because your hands aren't drenched in blood."

Coming down harder on Hanna than he perhaps should have, Mike made the researcher speechless as she left the cockpit, presumably heading back to her bunk.

"So, what's wrong?"

Having long since realised there was another reason Mike was coming down on Hanna, River seemed annoyed that she had to deal with it but still nevertheless broached the subject.

"... So the life pod had a glass screen where you could see the occupant… Their face was frozen in fear."

In that reflection and expression, Mike saw his own fate if he had taken so much as a single misstep, Mike understandably was a little annoyed when the cargo he was currently transporting started acting like she wasn't playing by the same ruleset and with the same potential consequences he was.

"... I see."

"You know I am happy to be here, getting to ride out my wildest fantasy with you."

"But?"

"But a small part of me really wants to return home… Like I blink and suddenly I wake up with a hangover and suddenly I don't have to worry about extragalactic first contact and preventing a full-blown first contact war, just exams and when to do laundry."

"Then why don't we just dump both the scientist and the extra cargo? The way I figure we could both make for pretty good pirates, that way we wouldn't have to worry about all these existential issues."

Already knowing Mike's answer to her question, River nevertheless still offered Mike an easy way out of their current predicament and away to escape from all their responsibilities.

"No way, I won't exactly say 'in for a penny, in for a pound', but at this point seeing everything through to its end will be way more interesting. When everything is done and over I say we find a way to roll around in the lap of luxury for at least 10 years."

While a selfish motivation such as getting rich might be typical for bounty hunters, River had long since realised it was just a convenient excuse Mike was using for himself, in reality, he was nothing more than a child who just wanted to play around with all the different things the life of a bounty hunter and pilot had to offer.

Over the next couple days, the Wyrm would travel from system to system collecting bounties throughout the Solar Empire while heading in the general direction of the galactic centre. This much had become Mike and River's standard operating procedure, but they were about to break from that norm with a planetary landing. Although Mike and River could have resupplied before using planetary settlements or even undertaken missions to raid surface pirate installations on remote moons and planetoids, Mike had rationed they weren't in any position to conduct surface attacks in a ship as small as the Scorpion due to the added difficulties of flying within a gravity well, trade was likewise not really an option as most heavy industries had long since moved into orbital stations and never really returned to any sort of surface installation due to the massive advantages of variable gravity construction.

In that case, Mike and River would have to pay for the fact that goods had been shipped to the surface of a planet instead of just buying them at their place of manufacture.

"This is what we're after, scans from a recent survey show this crystal craft relatively intact after crashing, an intact sample like this is rare so we aren't going to risk moving it."

Showing a relatively grainy surface scan with a larger crystal that appeared to have crashed, Hanna explained why the reason why she had needed to abandon her dear lab.

Now that their client had pointed to exactly where she wanted to go, it was Mike and River's job to get her to the surface and back out safely.

"Right-o, no surface installations nearby, surface grav around 0.7 G and no large ground clutter either, so no landing restrictions to speak of. I say we land 2 clicks out to avoid degrading your sample, then you and I track to the target on foot while River keeps eyes on us and the airspace from above."

Marching on the surface of a planet had its own issues, but the absolutely worst-case scenario was the Wyrm getting attacked while still on the ground, due to its weight it would take a few too many moments for its drives to spin up and doing that time it would be a sitting duck.

"In case any bandits show up we're bolting immediately, not only because I'm a coward but because that's what we were hired to do."

"... Okay, there's no data that's worth dying for I guess."

Slightly reluctant Hanna was forced to agree with Mike's reasoning, figuring she could continue to work as long as she was alive she believed there was no quantity or quality of data worth her own life.

Looking back on this moment, Hanna's future self would want to kick her for how naive that thought was.

"Punching out in 5… 2… Here we are."

Exiting supercruise and returning back into normal space about 20 kilometres above their target, River started spiralling down towards the mostly rust-coloured surface of the planet while Mike and Hanna took a closer look at their target using the Wyrm's sensors.

"... No visible disturbance at the target, seems like we're the first ones here."

"Right, of course, we are. The scan was classified immediately, there was no chance of a leak."

"I'm not talking about human contact, we don't know if the aliens have recovery efforts as we do. River, watch out for the gravity, think two more steps ahead than normal."

Flying inside a significant gravity well for the first time, River was doing admirably, even more so after Mike reminded her to watch out for her rate of deceleration.

"Gear is out, surface radar is picking up no significant clutter so we're ready for touch and go in 30 seconds."

Already fully depressurised and suited up, both Mike and Hanna were ready to leave their seats and head out the very second River touched down. Unbuckling his seatbelt while making sure to brace, Mike remotely opened the Wyrm's airlock all the way before getting out of his seat and leading Hanna out. Grabbing his rifle on the way out Mike covered for Hanna as the Wyrm lifted off again.

"Right, 1.9 clicks to target. Let's go."

"Yeah, just give me a second…"

Using her wrist-mounted display, Hanna launched multiple fist-sized drones from the back of her vacuum suit. With her sensor drones deployed Hanna gave Mike a nod as the two of them started their quick trek towards the crashed crystal.

"You seem very comfortable with that."

Hinting at Mike's rifle, Hanna was surprised at how comfortable Mike was with a military-grade smart rifle that wasn't really something pilots would normally be using.

"Well, I've done a bit of hunting with my dad back in the day."

While Mike really meant what he was saying quite literally, the word 'hunting' had taken quite a different meaning after mankind left the earth behind.

"Right, of course, you have."

Thinking back on the countless hours he had trekked through the forest and fields in the countryside with his dad, Mike couldn't help but think there was something wrong, like something in the back of his head was screaming about something he couldn't quite understand. If it had been anywhere other than doing an EVA where speed was of the essence while protecting a VIP, Mike would properly have called the entire thing off, but as he didn't have any logical reason he continued pressing on, although only after switching the safety on his rifle off and contacting River.

"How is it looking from up high?"

[No contacts, so quietly.]

"Get ready, I think there's something off about all this."

Glancing to space above Mike was only able to spot the Wyrm due to a marker on his internal heads up display, but even from such distance, it was clear that River had long since also learned to thrust Mike's gut.

[Wilco, I'm moving in a bit closer then, but from what I can see up here that crystal is long dead, no signals or radiation of any kind appears to be leaking from it and it has long since gone ambient.]

Closing in on the crystal 'corpse' its size quickly became very apparent, just like the Wyrm Mike had to cane his head up just to see the top of the half-buried crystal. As Hanna started her analysis of the corpse she quickly went quiet to concentrate, leaving Mike with nothing to do other than constantly check their surroundings all the way out to the horizon.

"Okay, I'm about done-"

Right as Hanna was about to finish up communication cut out without warning.

"What the fuck!?"

Checking his system Mike found his entire vacuum suit was powered down, same with his rifle and as Hanna's drones started dropping out of the sky he realised what was wrong.

"Fuck, EMP!"

With his systems fried Mike instantly leaned on his backup and drew his pistol before swapping magazines. Firing a series of flares into the sky as he sprinted towards Hanna about 10 meters from him Mike finally realised what had been nagging in the back of his head all this time. Back in his early youth, Mike's dad had dragged him out on his hunting trips so he didn't stay inside all weekend, doing those trips Mike's dad had talked a lot about hunting which Mike wasn't really interested in, but one of those lessons seemed to repeat over and over inside his head now that he had finally realised it.

'Although it isn't the case here where we live, hunting is a dangerous pastime as we intrude upon nature and plays by her own rules. Remember Mike, if you ever come across a kill in the wild, don't stick around, there's a good chance whatever brought it down is still nearby.'

Grabbing Hanna by the hand, Mike ripped her away from the crystal corpse in a desperate attempt to open up the distance, but the unlucky pair only made it about 50 meters before a tear in spacetime just above the crystal corpse started opening.

The real hunter was back for its prey, and it wasn't about to share it with any scavengers.