Salvage
by Clare L. Deming
The ghost ship hung in silent splendor, festooned with steel antennae and coppery solar arrays – a passenger liner, lost from contact a decade past. Information scrolled across instruments – no survivors, of course, and minimal salvage potential. The Company would require me to verify that and recover personal effects for any remaining family.
I leaned back, pushed my fingers through long black hair, and sighed.
“Mommy?”
Eleanne tapped my elbow and peeked at the ship’s pyramidal outline on the display. She had fallen asleep at her tutor console just before we arrived in system.
“Yes, Eli?”
“Does this mean we’re going home soon? It’s almost Christmas.”
Floating blue numbers indicated a date based on the movements of a planet Eli had never seen. I had told her that we’d return to Starbase after one more haul.
“You said we’d have a tree this year. You promised.”
“I know.” I tried to calculate how long this operation would take.
The ghost ship drifted out from behind the shadow of an asteroid. Metal glowed with ruddy warmth amidst bleak vacuum as the tip of the ship came in line with the red dwarf at the center of the system.
Eleanne screwed up her face and stared at the display with renewed intensity. “Look, it’s just like a tree!”
I snugged my daughter’s small frame close to my hip, envying her innocence. I’d hold the image of her Christmas tree close when I explored those cold corridors.
“Yes, I suppose it is.”
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Clare L. Deming wants to be an astronaut, but since NASA hasn’t let her in yet, she is left exploring stars, planets, and fantastical places in her stories. Her fiction has appeared in Utopia SF, Space & Time Magazine, and Perihelion SF. She also blogs about fencing and writes book reviews at www.claredeming.com.