Nico waited for Max to get his thoughts in order and explain. She had looked over everything, but she didn't recognize that ship from anywhere in any memory. Nico was familiar with a number of World Ships with similar designs, but Creeping Night wasn't a name that she knew.
She listened carefully as Max explained everything that happened in the flashback, and how the ship in front of them related to that situation, as it had been destroyed days before the last stand, when space around the planet was still contested between the two forces, before the barrier had been placed over the surface, keeping both sides out and preventing further imbalance in favour of the Energy Beings.
"So, somehow it ended up here? You know, if the star system that it was in was among the ones that were here during the final battles, when they were smashed into nebulae, then it might have been thrown who knows how far before it hit something large enough to kill its momentum. It's had long enough to have crossed half the universe even at less than light speed, if the estimate of when the planets here were destroyed is correct." Nico suggested.
lightsΝοvel That made more sense than Max would like to admit. If it had run into something solid at this location, it could have been virtually stopped, while the other object would have been thrown away. It would match with the current situation, as well as the dilapidated state of the world ship.
"So, what do we do now? Do you know how it works? Unless it's a coincidence, a long-lost Alliance ship with the same name, then you should have some knowledge about its drive systems, right?" Nico asked.
Max nodded. "Yeah, I know a thing or two about that series of World Ships. I spent a lot of time touring the Empire inside one of them after the battles ended."
Nico smirked. "You have no idea how happy you just made the staff. They're going to be overjoyed once we get inside and get to work inspecting this relic. The only real concern is that it might be a floating tomb. If it's full of bodies preserved through the years, there will be a lot of discussion about what to do, and we don't know what species they're going to be from.
Introducing new extinct species to the Alliance is going to lead to plenty of questions that we don't have answers to. In fact, the similarities between this relic and the design of their vessels will cause issues no matter what. Pulling massive vessels made by unknown species out of nowhere isn't going to be as easy now that we've got a working relationship with them."
While they were talking, some of the crew had come in, wanting to talk to Nico, and had overheard at least the last part of the conversation.
"I have an idea. Everyone knows that Terminus Trading Company can make Colony Ships in a matter of days, since you did it while making the android armies. So, if we patch this thing up and bring it home with us, we can just tell everyone that we made it. They won't know any better, and they can't prove otherwise.
I mean, that will work if we can figure out how this thing operates well enough to get the power back on. I don't know if the Cutter can even make what it needs, but there has to be a chance, right?
Or we could retrofit it. It's not like we're getting anywhere in a hurry." She suggested.
"Unless it's full of thousands of bodies from the last occupants. It was destroyed in battle and not mothballed and forgotten." Max reminded her.
"That is a good point. We could hold a proper Reaver funeral for them all, but that would take forever, even with the Androids helping."
Max and Nico shared an amused look while Nico calculated how long that would actually take. Given the sixty kilometre spherical diameter of the ship and the distance to move the bodies, with the force that they had, not more than two months. Less if the ship had been sparsely populated.
"Yes, that might be impractical." Max eventually agreed.
"So, are we going to go inside and take a look?" The team member asked with a pleading look that she had obviously been practising for just this sort of situation.
"Yes, we are going in. There is an open cargo bay door that leads to an intact bay. We will enter there and secure it with the Cutter's shields so that we can work and start trying to connect to the World Ship's power systems and bring at least some corridor lights online so we can see what we're doing." Max informed her.
"Perfect, I will go tell the others to start getting ready. Good thing we have a load of small drones, they can spread out and map the interior of the ship for us while we are getting everything working. Once we have a map of the hallways and open areas, we will have a much better idea of what we're facing during this salvage operation."
They definitely hadn't given up on getting the ship working well enough to bring it home with them. They would be legends among their peers if they managed to salvage and refurbish a World Ship.
Most of the Tech Nomads renovated derelict pleasure yachts as their home, but a World Ship was on an unheard of level of Tech Nomad Salvage. The humans in the team were all Reavers, and salvaging an abandoned ship was how almost all new Reaver Companies began, and how many of the smaller ones expanded.
They wouldn't give up on this prize easily either, as the Commander and team that salvaged a ship had first dibs on it by Reaver law, and they all knew that Max and Nico didn't need the ship, so there was a greater than zero chance that they might get to make up part of the Command team for the Creeping Night.
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