The Rebel Flare - Part 2 (Short Story)

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Relatively slim pickings, all around. The Nion System was a fairly sparse region. There was one gas giant, Blet, which held its orbit on the outermost edge of Nion. It had a small ring of wreckage orbiting it. San 'anata; disaster, in the Scooshan tongue.

In the far distant past, the Scooshan government, with the help of the Alid, decided to build a large space station, whose sole purpose was to mine gas. Being so far from the sun was said to make the job easier than most other systems. The main issue to contend with was a lack of solar energy and the fight against the cold. Both of those problems were overcome.

The station was named Teg-Grum, an amalgamation of two words which both meant the same thing. Alid; Teguro; to extract. Schooshan; Natagrum; to harvest.

Anyone roped into working the station, however, had a different name for it. The Black Ice.

Incident reports were filled out daily. Rather than incidents, they should have been called what they really were. Death notices.

Blackouts were frequent and would last for hours at a time. In the span of a few hours, the entire station would freeze, as would the workers who weren't quick enough to get to their chambers. Working The Black Ice was known to be a death sentence, and only the craziest of people would even consider the danger wage to be worth the risk. It was an irony, that a gas mining station wasn't able to use its stock to power their substations.

"The Black Ice," Kay's voice echoed around Bantan's mind, as he stared out the window beyond the scan he was running on the debris field.

"No readings," Bantan said, as his eyes darted back to his monitor. "Blet hasn't pulled any wayward cruisers to her for us."

"None that haven't already been picked clean, anyway," Kay said, as he pushed back on his chair and kicked his boots up on his desk. "Well, guess we'll just cruise to Schoosa, and hope we come across something."

The hours passed by slowly, and there was nothing. Not a bleed, not a sound, not a distant flash of a skirmish, nothing. Kay fell asleep after an hour, but Bantan stayed awake; and stayed vigilant. He hoped for something; anything. He would never wish for an ambush, but in the back of his mind, he asked for it. Anything to stave off the boredom; anything to break up the wait.

A bleep sounded, which distracted him from his thoughts, and he checked the monitor.

One dot in the distance. Readings suggested there were no life forms.

Bantan directed the ship toward whatever it was; judging by the readings, it was large, but there was no other information apart from that. Looking at Kay, he decided to let him sleep. There was no need to wake him up for what could potentially be nothing.