“Looks like a standard commercial colony ship.” Aoba noted. “The ID Beacon seems to be burnt out, but the chassis is a P 500 model 3 with some pretty standard aftermarket modifications. Probably about six hundred years old. The emergency signal doesn’t really have much info in it, though.” “Should be fine just to go in, then.” Ten replied. “Basically none of the commercially available weaponry from that time period can get through modern personal shields, so even if there’s anything hostile on board we should be fine.” “Unless there’s a strange life form with claws that negate personal shielding.” “That has happened exactly once in the entire history of the Salvage Corps, and that turned out to be a bioweapon lab disguised as a colony ship.” “I’m just saying, it’s demonstrably not impossible.” “Shut up and deploy the pod, Aoba.” “Deploying pod, sir.” “And don’t call me sir.” “Just as you say, ma’am.” “…I can’t wait for partner reassignment.” Aoba stuck her tongue out as the boarding pod sailed through the empty space between their hauler and the ancient colony ship. The correctional thrusters easily aligned the pod with one of the airlock hatches, and the nanomotile docking gel quickly configured itself to integrate with the old-fashioned mechanical docking system of the ship. A quick system hack later and the exterior hatch of the airlock opened up, allowing Ten and Aoba inside. Walking up to the access panel on the inner wall of the airlock, Aoba waited for the universal connection cable on her wrist computer to change its shape so that it could interface with the long-obsolete USB C port. As she interfaced with the ship’s computer, she couldn’t help but grimace. “Damn. This shit is pretty dire. I’m seeing partial or total failures in like half of the computer systems. The central database is fully down, mission log and parameters are gone, there are glitches in the purification systems and environmental controls, the medical database has suffered significant damage… Cryogenics seems to be fully operation, though, and it’s reporting more than four thousand properly preserved crew.” “Well that’s a blessing. I hate finding ships full of corpsicles. That shit is just bleak.” “I mean, it’s still better than when refrigeration fails entirely. Nothing stinks quite like a leaky cryo-pod full of corpse juice.” “Please don’t remind me. That was easily the second worst mission we’ve been on. Are we safe to enter?” “Should be. Air filters aren’t fully operational, so it might smell a bit, but everything indicates fully breathable air with no harmful contaminants.” “All right. Open her up.” “Opening her up, your majesty.” “Aoba, I swear to God…” But he didn’t get any further as the interior airlock opened and they were hit by an overpowering smell of cooked meat. To Ten, who occasionally splurged on lab-grown meat for special occasions, it was merely overwhelming. To Aoba, who had never eaten meat in her life, it was downright nauseating. She almost retched as she frantically grabbed for the breathing mask on her belt and brought it up to her face. “Powers above, what is that smell?” “Cooked pork, I think.” “This is what pork smells like? How could anyone eat something that reeks like this?” “It’s usually a lot milder. I can only assume the associated scent particles are among the things that the filters can’t handle, and it’s been building up over time.” The two of them proceeded through the corridors of the ship. Everything showed signs of wear, but there was no sign of actual neglect. Everything was clean and well-maintained, suggesting impeccable upkeep and maintenance. But as they proceeded through the empty corridors, Aoba became more and more unsettled. “Hey, Ten…” She said, her voice muffled by the breathing mask. “What is it?” “The ship’s computer didn’t show any kind of animal husbandry facilities on board.” “Of course not, less than one in a thousand colony ships were set up for ongoing animal husbandry.” “And when ships like these carry packed provisions, it’s almost always nutritional powders.” “What’s your point?” “How exactly did a ship like this end up with enough meat on it to make the air smell like this?” Ten grimaced as he followed that line of thought. “I was a lot happier before you asked that question.” “Set shields to full?” “Set shields to full.” The buzz of the personal shields grew louder as they kept moving through the empty corridors, but just before they got to the central section of the ship, where all the important systems and facilities would be located, they noticed that one door wasn’t quite closed. The door led to a room marked ‘STORAGE 13’, and the reason it wasn’t properly closed was because some small, white thing was wedged in the doorway. Feeling somewhat apprehensive, Aoba pushed the ‘open door’ button. As the door opened, the two could only stare in silence for almost a full minute. “You know… I was hoping it would be literally anything else.” “Literally anything else would have been nice, yes.” In the storeroom, piled in a massive, messy heap that filled most of the available space, was a huge amount of human bones. Skulls, femurs, ribcages, spines, even the tiny little bones in the hands, all shoved into the storeroom with no apparent care. “Did you notice the…” “Yes Aoba. I noticed the nicks and scratches. Someone carefully cleaned these bones with a knife before throwing them in here. They were butchered.” Silence fell once again as Ten seriously contemplated just bailing on this mission and pretending it never happened. But Aoba’s face was slowly creasing into a confused frown. “Hold on a second…” “What is it?” “The ship reported that 4786 of the available 5000 cryogenic pods were fully operational with active scans showing the continued viability of the occupants. But there’s gotta be thousands of skeletons here. There’s no way this is the crew.” “Hey, you’re right… You don’t think someone’s been luring in boarders with the emergency beacon to eat them, right?” “That beacon barely carries four light years, and it’s out in the middle of fucking nowhere. There’s no way. Besides, all the skulls are identical.” “Huh?” “Look at them! Other than the knife scratches and occasional impact damage, all of them look exactly the same. They must have been mass produced somehow.” “You think they’re fakes?” “I don’t know, but something is weird about all this, and I’m getting to the bottom of it.” “You do realize I’m in charge of this mission, right?” “Fine, you give the order, if it makes you feel any better.” Ten hesitated for a moment longer, then sighed deeply. “Let’s get to the bottom of this.” Aoba sketched a hugely exaggerated salute. “By your orders, captain.” “…You know what, I’m gonna let you have this one.” The two progressed to the central section of the ship, opening the door to the assembly hall that also served as a hub between all the ship’s critical systems… and found a naked woman sitting in an armchair that had clearly been moved there from a residential suite. When the woman noticed them, her face lit up with a huge smile. “Oh! People! That’s great! I was hoping some people would show up! Do you have any calcium? I’m running out of calcium.” Ten and Aoba shared a glance, silently debating who was going to take point in what seemed likely to be a very strange conversation. In the end, Ten pointed to his mission supervisor insignia, and Aoba sighed deeply before turning back to face the naked woman. “I’m sorry, who are you?” “Maintenance Technician Amelia Golden. It says so on the badge of my uniform, but I don’t wear my uniform a lot. Even my best uniform has a bunch of holes in it already, so I only wear it for maintenance work that requires protective gear. Wearing a protective suit on bare skin isn’t very nice.” “Are you… The only maintenance technician?” “I think so. There might be other maintenance technicians in cryostasis, but I can’t access the crew roster, so I don’t actually know who the people in stasis are.” “Shouldn’t you have some idea of the crew roster if you’re part of the crew?” “Should I?” Aoba studied Amelia’s expression for a moment, but she saw nothing but a sort of cheerful bemusement written across the woman’s features. With a small sigh, she decided to change her line of questioning. “Why do you need calcium?” “Well, the ship’s recyclers are partially offline. They can handle soft tissues fine, but they can’t recycle bone. And the ship’s calcium stock is down to eight percent.” A picture started forming in Aoba’s mind, and she hoped against hope that she was wrong. “What are you using all that calcium for?” “To run the cloning device.” Aoba took a deep breath before continuing. “Have you been… butchering and eating your own clones?” “Oh, yes. You see, the organic reconstitution device broke down a long time ago, and the hydroponics bay still works, but all the plants have succumbed to some kind of disease except the lettuce and tomato. And eating nothing but lettuce and tomato just isn’t nutritionally sound.” “So you’re eating… yourself?” “Well, the cloning device isn’t doing so well either. The only program I can get it to run is the full body replacement template.” Aoba knew a lot about medical and technological history, so she instantly recognized the term. Full body replacement was a process where a clone of a person’s body was grown, but the cerebral development was stunted to only include the parts of the brain that were essential to keep a body alive. The brain of the patient was then transplanted to the clone body. Before the invention of medical nanomachines, it was considered the closest thing to a cure-all. But of course, it had its own limitations… “What do you think, Ten?” “I think this is a fairly standard rescue operation, despite the… oddities. We’ll rig this antique with a superluminal drive and bring it to the nearest planet with a Salvage Corps space dock large enough to hold it.” “What’s a planet?” Amelia asked curiously. Ten and Aoba turned to stare at the naked woman. After a moment, Aoba spoke. “A planet is a large object orbiting a star.” “What’s a star?” Aoba gawked at the naked woman, once again noting the cheerful bemusement writ large across her face. Somewhere in the back of Aoba’s mind, a suspicion started to form… “Amelia… Could you lift up the hair on your forehead?” The woman obediently ran a hand over her forehead, lifting up her bangs to reveal the skin beneath. And more importantly, revealing a thin, perfectly straight line of scar tissue running all the way across her forehead before vanishing beneath her hairline. “How many times…” “How many times what?” “How many times have you performed a full body replacement?” “I don’t know. The readout on the automatic medical system says the procedure has been performed 341 times, but I don’t know if those were all me.” “Three hun… How often do you replace your body?” “A lot. The medical system isn’t working very well, so a lot of its functions don’t work like they should. So if I break a bone or pull a muscle or twist my ankle or hurt myself in any other way that makes it hard for me to perform maintenance, I have to replace my whole body. But it’s all right, because I’m always cloning new bodies to eat anyway.” “Tell me, Amelia… Are you having problems with your memory?” “Yes! I forget things all the time. But it’s all right, because the employee manual tells me everything that a maintenance technician is supposed to do, so if I forget, I can just read it again.” “Do you remember anything at all that isn’t written down?” “Well, I remember the things that I do all the time, like how to cut the meat and fat and skin from a clone and cook it. And I remember talking to you two. You told me what a planet is. But I didn’t really understand your explanation…” Ten looked between Amelia and Aoba with a confused frown. “Aoba, what the hell is going on here?” Aoba sighed. “This woman’s brain has been alive for much longer than her body. Possibly the whole six hundred years since the ship was first launched. But she doesn’t have any nanomachinery to preserve cognitive function.” “Are you telling me that she’s been keeping this ship running for multiple centuries while suffering from severe cognitive dysfunction?” “What does cognitive dysfunction mean?” Amelia asked cheerfully.