The Long Forever. Eugene Lambert

more excited.

      ‘Techs are flown out from the Core worlds to check it out. Historians too. Turns out this thing is an ancient spaceship from the Long Ago on Earth. They reckon it set out over five thousand standard-years ago, in the middle of the Troubles, carrying a whole load of refugees. The drive tech back then was crude, early dee-eem, crawlers compared to what we’ve got now. And they didn’t have cryonics. I guess that’s why they built it so massive – because generations of settlers would have to live and die on board before they got here.’

      Sky shudders. ‘Like being in the camps all your life.’

      ‘They must’ve been desperate, for sure. The historians knew a few Ark ships were fired off, but this was the first ever to turn up again. Only while it’s been crawling through the big cold empty of space, completely forgotten, we’ve survived the Troubles, improved our drive tech and spread out into the galaxy, leaving it behind. And then one day it finally catches up with us when it arrives here.’

      I can’t help gasping. ‘But why here, so far from Earth?’

      Murdo shrugs. ‘The ComSec scientists think something happened during all the fighting that threw it off course and into deep space. Its AI was set up to scan any star system it passed for a human-habitable world, so it kept on going and going until it sniffed out this place.’

      ‘Fighting?’ I say, twitching. ‘What fighting?’

      ‘You’ll see in a bit. The settlers only made it four generations into the trip, then wiped themselves out.’

      ‘It wasn’t some accident?’

      Murdo lets out a grim little laugh. ‘Nah. They found barricades and other obvious signs of combat. The bodies were ferried down to that planet and buried. Big ceremony. So you could say they made it to their new world.’

      ‘Not what they’d hoped for though,’ Anuk says.

      ‘No. Anyhow, the Combine guys slapped a preservation order on it, so the mining guys got frag all and were mad as hell. There was talk of hauling it back to Earth using a wormhole jump-tug, but talk’s cheap and jump-tugs aren’t. In the end, they patched her up and fitted the place out as an orbital trading platform. She’s been here ever since.’

      The Ark looms ahead of us now. It’s a weird-looking cylinder, all lumps and bumps with masts sticking out supporting arrays of flat panels. The damage is visible, great rips in the hull down at the bottom end. Mostly it just looks ancient.

      Murdo slows us to final approach speed. I’m wondering how we’ll find our berth when a drone vessel whips out to meet us. It spins around and projects a big glowing sign behind it.

      Nagasaki Maru, Deck 0, Bay 11.

      ‘Fancy,’ Sky says.

      Murdo follows it in. Hangar deck zero is the lowest of several lit-up slots cut into the Ark’s hull. Immediately below it is torn metal and dark gaping holes. Murdo tells us these lower wrecked decks are called the ghost levels.

      ‘Does anybody go down there?’

      ‘Not since the ComSec techs left. It’s open to space.’

      As we close in on the Ark I realise just how immense the derelict is. It soon fills our forward-view panels.

      ‘Huge, huh?’ Murdo mutters.

      For someone who hasn’t flown a star freighter for years, he does a great job of sliding us inside hangar deck zero without hitting anything. The drone leads us past dozens of docked spaceships, many busy being loaded or unloaded. We arrive at our assigned berth, a gap between two larger freighters. A large circle on the deck flashes our adopted name. There’s just enough room for Murdo to nudge in forward before spinning round to face out again, which seems standard. As he sets up our landing hover, the drone ship kills its follow-me sign and nips off.

      ‘Nothing to it,’ Murdo says, as he powers down his controls. But the sweat running down his face and the slump back into his pilot seat give the lie to this.

      ‘Won’t they expect us to unload our cargo?’ Sky asks.

      Murdo stirs himself. ‘Nope. See, that’s why Nagasaki Maru ’s such good cover. Free-traders often don’t carry booked cargo. If we’re asked, we say we’ve swung by on spec, to see if we can trade what we’re carrying.’

      ‘We don’t tell them it’s darkblende though,’ I say.

      Sky rolls her eyes at me. ‘Well . . . duh!’