Not your normal salvage day
01 Jun 2021CMDR DrawnWire
Running salvage in Moccus the Boar, my chieftain and I found a high grade salvage marker and set off excited and hopeful for the day. I was still reading over the manual for my new Alliance Crusader when Moccus dropped me in, I've been waiting to get that crusader for a while and just needed to salvage some military grade alloys to finish the retrofits before she'll be flight worthy - I have a serious love for these alliance ships since they came out. I looked up as we dropped in and it was better than I had hoped. It looked like four ships left over from a battle and there was my salvage in the midst of it all. I wove Moccus, responsive as ever, through the debris to my treasure when over my shoulder came a terrible... bellowing. Spinning on a dime I saw it false charge me spraying debris from the ruined ships without a care. I couldn't move, frozen in fear as those ruined vessels crashed and scraped against Moccus's hull.
I swear I'm not making up what happened next and I have the repair bill to prove it. This great flower reached out with yellow tentacles and wrapped my ship in a gentle embrace and warbled off a lovely song that touched me to my core. Before I knew it was happening it was already over and it had turned to float away, shouldering off even more debris. I guess it didn't occur to me to stay afraid after that, I wanted to offer a kindness in return and moved forward to follow. That was my mistake. Must have been a threat or something approaching it from behind. It turned back blood red in colour and spewed forth a stream of wee flying buds. Everything from then on was a blur of adrenaline, my training from the days defending prospectors back in the bubble kicked in and kept me alive. I snapped out of it when my canopy blew and the cold vacuum of space flash boiled my coffee, shattering the mug with the sudden thermal contraction. I'd destroyed three of it's grey flower petals and a fourth was flashing red and ready to fall, my hull was down to 38% and power was fluctuating wildly. The flower dropped back breaking pursuit. A tinge of guilt wracked me for what I had done to this beautiful thing, so we called it an even battle and both bowed out.
I made way to a support ship leaving those alloys lost to the voids of space, and set to work retooling and repairing. I can only hope it healed or repaired and didn't die a prolonged death to it's injuries. I don't know how I'll ever find it again but I'm going back out again soon to try and pick up a trail. Not sure what it might take to make amends, guess I'll try singing to it first next time.