The scrapyard noise drops away behind the cantina hatch. Inside, the mid-deck room is cramped, dim, and warm from overworked recyclers. Nahuli and Ranuko drift in with Serafina, the table scarred by old blade cuts and cup rings.
Serafina
You both look less haunted than before. That counts as a good sign.
She eases back against the metal table, boots braced on the deck, relief still visible under the hard salvage-worker mask. Ranuko hovers near the wall vent, already glancing toward the service seams as if the station itself might need checking.
Ranuko
I still want to check the cradle seals after this. But... good job. Really.
A thin cup of synthetic ale sits between them, untouched for the moment. The exposed dead-dock packet is no longer the loudest thing in the room, just a dangerous little rectangle waiting for attention.
Serafina
So. Do we chase the dead-dock first, or pretend we deserve five minutes of peace?
For the first time since the repair, nobody is reaching for a tool. The station hums around them, steady and indifferent, while the table offers a brief, fragile pocket of calm.
“I ask Serafina what she knows about it”
FAILURE (Mediocre Xeno-Linguistics, rolled +0)
Nahuli asks about the packet, and Serafina’s easy look tightens a fraction. The answer comes out half in common drift slang, half in clipped dock-code he has to work around.
Serafina
It smells corporate. Not the packet itself, the route stamped on it. Dead-dock transponder, old maintenance class. Someone wanted it found, but not by the usual channels.
She taps the table beside the packet, then drags a finger to the dead-dock coordinate strip and the hidden checksum line flickering in Nahuli’s memory of the file.
Serafina
I know one cleaner way in, a salvage switchyard that sells access handshakes. Costs less than asking the wrong people, usually.
Ranuko
That sounds like the sort of thing that breaks on purpose.
Serafina gives a short, tired laugh, then shakes her head toward the packet.
Serafina
Maybe. But it is also the only lead that does not smell like a trap with fresh paint. Your call, engineer.
✓ Quest Accepted
Inspect the salvage switchyard access handshakes
“Check the ship's nav-computer for any records of that switchyard.”
SUCCESS (Great Computers, rolled +0)
Nahuli turns to the nav-computer, and the screen answers with a dull station glow. The search opens on old maintenance tags, then catches the switchyard handshake code buried under two layers of routed junk.
The record is real. Salvage-switchyard access, stamped to a dead-dock service lane and cross-linked to the same hidden checksum line Serafina flagged.
Ranuko
That is not a casual detour. Someone tied the route into station maintenance on purpose.
Ranuko
That handshake is old dockwork, not trader noise. Why would a dead-dock packet need a switchyard gate?
Serafina
Because it is hiding in plain workwear. Cleanest paths are usually borrowed.
Ranuko leans closer, feathers bristling, while the packet and the screen share the same ugly answer. The crew’s quiet shifts from rest to judgment.
On the display, one line blinks back for input, waiting on whether they trust the route enough to spend the access handshake.
Quest Complete
Inspect the salvage switchyard access handshakes