Inventory Is a Form of Therapy (Allegedly)
The maintenance bay welcomed them back with the emotional warmth of a concrete bunker.
The hatch sealed.
The dreadnought stayed quiet.
Nobody died.
Blake counted that as a win.
He floated there for a long second after they crossed the threshold, hands braced on the bulkhead, breathing too hard for someone who technically hadn't been running.
"…Okay," he said. "Everyone do a systems check. Preferably one that ends with 'nothing is on fire.'"
Gunny rotated his shoulders, armor plates shifting with a faint vibration. "Armor integrity at ninety-six percent. Structural damage minimal. Emotional damage nonexistent."
Blake squinted at him. "You were on fire ten minutes ago."
Gunny waved it off. "Character building."
Elenor checked her HUD, calm as ever. "Suit nominal. Ammunition expended within expected parameters."
Booth's reply came a beat late.
"I am alive," he said, like he was surprised by it. "Which is… new. Also I think my left knee actuator is buzzing."
"That's fear," Blake said. "It does that."
They moved deeper into the maintenance bay, toward the temporary staging area Aubrey had established inside the dreadnought itself. Floodlights powered by portable units cast hard white shadows over stacks of salvaged components.
Home, for now.
An actively hostile, ancient warship kind of home.
Blake loved his life choices.
Aubrey Takes AttendanceAubrey's voice threaded through their helmets, calm and unreasonably composed.
"Captain, your biometric readings indicate elevated stress levels. I recommend hydration and a rest period of no less than—"
"No," Blake said immediately. "If I stop moving, I will think."
"An understandable concern," Aubrey replied. "However, your survival statistics improve markedly when you sleep."
Gunny stepped into the light as small repair bots swarmed his scorched armor, cutting, welding, and replacing plating with brisk efficiency.
"I won," Gunny said proudly.
"You caught on fire," Blake said, poking a blackened dent in Gunny's chest plate. "Again."
Gunny looked down at the damage. "Victory involves heat."
Blake sighed and placed a hand against Gunny's armor. His Repairman ability flared softly, metal flowing and smoothing, sealing damage like it had never happened.
"There," Blake said. "You're fixed. And you are not allowed to solo ancient murder machines without asking."
Gunny considered this.
"…Request acknowledged. Compliance unlikely."
Blake pinched the bridge of his nose. "I regret giving you autonomy."
"No you don't," Gunny said.
Blake hated that he was right.
The Loot (Or: Why Booth Is Smiling and That's Concerning)The engineering salvage lay spread across the maintenance bay in neat, glowing clusters, tagged and catalogued by Aubrey's drones faster than Blake could process.
Power regulators.
Stabilizer cores.
Control matrices.
Interface boards with serial numbers that suggested people had died protecting them.
Booth hovered nearby, hands twitching.
"This is good," Booth said reverently. "This is really good. None of it's restricted enough to get us shot on sight, but all of it will sell clean. Especially if—" he glanced at Blake "—it's repaired."
Blake stiffened. "Carefully repaired."
"Gently repaired," Booth said quickly. "Respectfully repaired. Like… emotionally considerate repairs."
Elenor folded her arms. "How much are we talking?"
Booth swallowed. "Enough to justify staying on Selene longer than planned."
Blake felt the familiar knot of anxiety tighten.
Staying longer meant exposure.
Exposure meant attention.
Attention meant problems.
He looked around the bay again—at the piles of tech, the repair bots, the dreadnought walls looming around them.
"…Okay," he said slowly. "We sell selectively. No floods. No miracles. Fen moves the goods so it looks normal."
"An optimal strategy," Aubrey said. "Fen's continued honesty correlates strongly with fear."
Gunny turned slightly, just enough to cast a long shadow across the salvage stacks.
"Want me to remind him?"
"No," Blake said quickly. "No intimidation. You just… stand there."
Gunny smiled. "Intimidation is passive."
Aubrey Ruins the Mood (Again, But Correctly)After the last crate was logged, Aubrey spoke again.
"Captain, I must raise a logistical concern."
Blake sighed. "Of course you must."
"If you intend to continue selling repaired items," Aubrey continued, "our available scrap reserves will be depleted rapidly."
Booth nodded reluctantly. "He's right. Repairs eat raw stock fast."
Blake leaned back against a crate, staring up at the dreadnought's ceiling.
"So," he said tiredly, "our best source of free scrap is…"
"The ship you are currently inside," Aubrey said calmly.
Blake closed his eyes.
"…I hate this ship."
Gunny looked around the maintenance bay, then toward the deeper corridors of the dreadnought, visibly pleased.
"I like it," he said.
And that was when Blake realised—with deep, soul-level exhaustion—that they weren't leaving the graveyard anytime soon.
They were moving in.
__________________________________
The One Where the Dreadnought Refuses to Be EmptyThe dreadnought did not appreciate being called home.
Blake could feel it.
Not emotionally—he wasn't that far gone yet—but mechanically. Power rerouted in ways that were just a little too deliberate. Doors opened a fraction slower than before. Lights lingered on a beat longer than necessary, like the ship was watching them move.
He hated it.
"This place has opinions," Blake muttered as they moved deeper through the maintenance levels.
Gunny rolled his neck, armor servos humming softly. "Good. Means it's still alive."
"That is not comforting," Blake said. "At all."
Booth stuck close again, scanner clutched like a holy relic. "For the record, haunted warships are not standard salvage."
Elenor glanced back. "Neither is an AI that argues with you, a walking tank with anger issues, or a civilian who can tell metal to behave."
Blake opened his mouth.
Closed it.
"…Fair."
They reached a sealed auxiliary corridor branching off the main engineering spine. The signage was half-melted, but Aubrey's overlay filled in the gaps instantly.
CREW SUPPORT — MARINE COMPLEMENT
Gunny slowed.
Just a fraction.
"That's Marine space," he said.
Blake felt his stomach drop. "As in…?"
"As in the kind of place where people don't evacuate first," Gunny replied.
Booth's scanner pinged again.
Once.
Then again.
His face went pale.
"Uh," he said. "That's… that's not right."
Blake turned. "What's not right?"
Booth swallowed. "I'm getting a life sign."
Nobody spoke.
The dreadnought stayed silent.
Gunny was the first to move.
Stasis Is a Lie We Tell OurselvesThe corridor beyond was colder. Not metaphorically—actual temperature drop. Frost feathered along the edges of armored panels. Emergency power hummed faintly through conduits that should have been dead for a century.
At the far end, recessed into the wall, sat a stasis unit.
Intact.
Active.
Blake stopped dead.
"…No," he said softly. "That's not—"
"It is," Aubrey confirmed. "The unit is operational. Power draw is minimal but stable."
Elenor approached slowly, weapon lowered. "Status?"
Booth stared at his scanner, voice barely steady. "One occupant. Human. Vitals nominal. Cryo-stasis duration approximately… one hundred and two years."
Blake felt dizzy.
"A hundred years?" he repeated. "That's—he's been asleep longer than my entire life back home."
Gunny stepped closer, reading the faded markings on the unit.
"Private," he said. "Sebastian Bates. Dominion Space Marines."
His jaw tightened.
"Unit insignia matches this dreadnought's complement."
Blake swallowed. "So… he fought here."
"Yes," Gunny said. "And didn't get to leave."
The stasis pod's indicator lights pulsed softly—green, steady, patient.
Blake stared at it.
Then looked at Aubrey.
"Is it safe to wake him?"
A pause.
Longer than usual.
"There is always risk," Aubrey said carefully. "However, extended stasis beyond rated duration increases neural degradation. Continued dormancy is no longer optimal."
Blake ran a hand through his hair inside the helmet, breathing too fast again.
"So our options are: wake him and maybe break him… or leave him asleep forever."
Gunny turned slowly to face Blake.
"That's not an option," he said flatly.
Blake nodded.
"I didn't think it was."
The Worst Alarm Clock in HistoryThe stasis cycle disengaged with a low vibration that Blake felt through the deck. Frost sublimated into vapor, curling around the pod like breath.
Blake stood too close.
Elenor gently nudged him back. "Give him space."
"I am giving him space," Blake said. "This is just… emotionally unsafe distance."
The pod hissed.
Locks released.
The front plate slid open.
Sebastian Bates did not wake up screaming.
Which Blake took as a minor miracle.
Instead, the man inside coughed—dry, reflexive—and sucked in a sharp breath like someone surfacing from deep water. His eyes snapped open, unfocused, panicked.
Gunny was there instantly, kneeling, one armored hand braced on the deck in clear view.
"Easy," he said. "You're safe."
Bates' gaze locked onto him.
Uniform.
Armor.
Rank markers.
Recognition cut through the fear.
"Gunny?" Bates croaked.
Gunny's jaw clenched.
"Yes, Private."
Bates' breathing hitched. "We… we held the line. Did we—did the evac—?"
Gunny didn't lie.
"The battle ended," he said. "You did your job."
Bates sagged back against the pod, relief and confusion warring across his face.
"How long?" he asked.
Blake answered before Gunny could.
"A bit over a hundred years."
Bates stared at him.
"…I want to go back to sleep."
Blake snorted despite himself. "Yeah. That tracks."
Welcome to the Future, Sorry About EverythingThey moved Bates to a medical alcove—portable, functional, terrifyingly barebones. Aubrey handled vitals with clinical efficiency, feeding data straight into Blake's HUD whether he wanted it or not.
"Neural activity stable," Aubrey reported. "Muscle atrophy present but recoverable. Psychological shock… expected."
Bates sat on the edge of the cot, wrapped in a thermal blanket, staring at his hands like they might belong to someone else.
Gunny stood nearby. Silent. Present.
Blake hovered awkwardly, then finally spoke.
"So. Uh. Hi. I'm Blake. This is… not your ship anymore. Sorry."
Bates looked up slowly. "You in charge?"
Blake opened his mouth.
Closed it.
"Regrettably, yes."
Bates considered this.
Then nodded once. "Okay."
That was it.
No screaming.
No accusations.
No existential breakdown.
Blake stared. "That's… it?"
Bates shrugged weakly. "I woke up a century late on a dead warship. You didn't shoot me. Seems like a win."
Gunny let out a low, approving hum.
Elenor smiled faintly.
Booth exhaled like he'd been holding his breath for ten minutes.
Blake felt something settle in his chest.
Another responsibility.
Another person he couldn't abandon.
"…Welcome aboard," Blake said quietly.
Bates looked around at the dreadnought walls, the unfamiliar armor, the strange mix of people.
"…You got food?"
Blake laughed.
And just like that, the dreadnought claimed another survivor.
__________________________________
Recovery, Recycling, and the Ship That Wouldn't Let GoPrivate Sebastian Bates slept for sixteen straight hours.
Aubrey monitored him with the same quiet intensity he usually reserved for reactor stability and incoming threats, which Blake chose to interpret as approval rather than looming concern. Medical readouts scrolled across Blake's HUD whether he wanted them or not.
Vitals stabilising.
Neural activity normalising.
Psychological shock: ongoing, expected, honestly unavoidable.
Blake hovered at the edge of the med alcove for a while, arms folded, watching Bates breathe.
"…A hundred years," Blake muttered. "That's just cruel."
"Time rarely consults ethics, captain," Aubrey replied. "However, Private Bates' recovery prognosis is favorable. His psychological resilience exceeds baseline expectations."
Blake snorted. "He woke up, accepted the apocalypse, and asked for food. Marines are built different."
"Yes," Aubrey said. "And trained extensively to compartmentalise catastrophe."
That… tracked.
Gunny stood outside the alcove, arms crossed, posture rigid but unmistakably protective. He hadn't said much since they'd brought Bates aboard—just stayed close, like a very loud, very dangerous guard dog waiting for permission to relax.
"He'll be fine," Blake said gently.
Gunny didn't look away from the door. "He will."
That wasn't optimism.
That was a promise.
Work Continues (Because It Always Does)With Bates resting aboard The Aubrey, the rest of the crew returned to the dreadnought's endless, spiteful corridors.
Repair bots skittered ahead of them, small and medium units hauling scrap, slicing panels free, cataloguing usable material with ruthless efficiency. Aubrey coordinated it all flawlessly, routes updating in real time as security systems sulked but remained dormant.
Blake followed along, hands glowing occasionally as he reinforced joints, freed seized mechanisms, or smoothed structural cuts where bots had been forced to brute-force old metal apart.
He felt… useful.
Terrified.
Anxious.
Sweaty.
But useful.
Booth jogged beside him, glancing nervously at every shadow while rattling off component assessments.
"Okay, so this section is mostly power distribution," Booth said. "Good scrap density, nothing flashy. Sellable, but boring. Which is perfect."
"I like boring," Blake said fervently. "Boring doesn't try to kill us."
Gunny snorted from ahead. "Give it time."
Elenor climbed onto a raised gantry, scanning a row of stripped mounts. "Cargo is filling fast. We'll need another transfer run soon."
Blake nodded. "Aubrey?"
"I am reallocating internal storage," Aubrey replied. "Additionally, the removal of the inner hull has increased available volume significantly. You may now fit approximately everything you keep insisting on collecting."
Blake winced. "You're still mad about that?"
"I am not mad," Aubrey said coolly. "I am disappointed. And inconvenienced."
Gunny looked over his shoulder. "Sounds mad."
"I assure you," Aubrey replied, "my emotional state is vastly more complex than that."
Blake rubbed his temples. "We're arguing semantics inside a haunted warship."
"Yes," Aubrey said. "And yet, here we are."
Private Bates Wakes Up to the FutureWhen they returned to The Aubrey hours later, Bates was awake.
Sitting up.
Stretching stiff limbs.
Staring at the ceiling like it might explain itself.
Blake stopped in the doorway. "Hey."
Bates turned his head. Blinked.
"…This isn't the medbay," he said slowly.
"Nope," Blake replied cheerfully. "Different ship. Different century. Same basic panic."
Bates absorbed that. Then asked, "Did we win?"
Blake hesitated.
Gunny answered from behind him. "You held the line."
Bates nodded. That was enough.
"What now?" Bates asked.
Blake shrugged helplessly. "Now we salvage an ancient battlefield, sell parts to farmers, and try not to destabilise the local economy."
Bates stared.
"…Sir?"
Blake smiled weakly. "You'll get used to it."
Bates looked down at his hands again. Flexed his fingers. Then looked up.
"You need help?"
Blake felt something warm twist in his chest.
"…Yeah," he said. "Yeah, we do."
The Dreadnought Watches Them LeaveAs the latest cargo transfer completed, The Aubrey pulled slightly away from the dreadnought's hull—just enough to reposition, just enough to breathe.
From the outside, nothing changed.
Inside, the dreadnought's systems continued to tick along in quiet irritation.
Sections stripped.
Security downgraded.
Ancient war machines repurposed into raw materials and second chances.
Blake stood on the bridge, staring at the tactical overlay of the ship they were slowly dismantling.
"We're not done here," he said quietly.
"No," Aubrey agreed. "Not even close."
Gunny cracked his knuckles.
Booth checked inventories.
Elenor plotted routes.
And in the medbay, a Marine out of time adjusted to a future he never planned to see.
The graveyard wasn't finished with them.
But neither were they finished with it.