The Vargr and the Chamax (Pirates of Drinax)

The Harrier connected smoothly to the ancient station with a soft thunk that seemed far too civilised for the situation. Docking clamps locked with a creak, and a hiss of atmosphere suggested the airlock was either sealing or sighing dramatically.

The crew assembled at the hatch, suited in gleaming boarding vacc suits that gave the misleading impression that someone, somewhere, knew what they were doing. They were rated for hard vacuum, radiation, thermal extremes, and absolutely no known spectral entities.

Quinn tried to crank the outer airlock open. The handle fought back like it had opinions. On the third try, it gave up. The hatch opened with a groan that wouldn’t be out of place at a retirement home.

A burst of tinny music blared from overhead speakers. The Sindalian anthem - proud, pompous, and rendered in the quality of a ceremonial kazoo being played underwater. It cut out mid-flourish, possibly from shame.

Quinn tilted his helmet. “Historically accurate. It always ended like that.”

The corridor beyond was dark, weightless, and resentful. Panels floated. Dust drifted. Somewhere, a chair turned lazily as if watching them. Mag boots clunked as the crew advanced.

Scarred-Snout growled low. “The air smells wrong.”

“You can’t smell anything in that helmet,” Maltz replied.

“I remember smells,” Scarred-Snout said, unbothered.

The walls bore the scars of hasty repairs, panicked vandalism, and someone’s brief experiment with wood panelling that now looked like it regretted everything.

Beneath it all, the original Sindalian flourishes still lurked. An empress pointed haughtily at something unseen. A starship, gaudy enough to cause offence, swooped toward an enemy fleet. Every battle scene carved like someone had too much time and not enough restraint.

A closed iris door loomed at the end of the corridor. Caitlin raised an eyebrow. “Shall we?”

The iris hissed open at her approach, revealing what might once have been a mess hall. Tables floated or listed drunkenly. Three were still bolted in place. Two held ancient tableware, one of which included what might have been a last meal or a really long-standing artistic statement.

Near one wall, a vacc suit floated, crumpled and scorched, the chest caved in and acid-burned. Not fresh. But not ancient either.

“No power signatures," Quinn reported. "No life support. Trace atmosphere. Partial gravity active in the next chamber. Another flicker on his console. “Distress call’s been boosted through the station’s transmitter dish. Smart."

"No ghosts on sensors. Yet.”

Words had been scratched into the far bulkhead with something sharp and increasingly desperate. Lines overlapped. Some trailed off mid-letter. The longer one stared, the worse it looked.

THE VOICE ON THE RADIO THE GHOST IT’S COMING IT’S COMING IT’S COMING

Caitlin stared at it. “Lovely. We’re in a haunted palace with a plumbing problem.”

Shifty floated just behind Maltz, limbs tucked close, wrapped in the sleek contours of a Hiver-pattern vacc suit with a harness full of tools, samples, and several compartments Caitlin had explicitly told it not to use. 

The Hiver's voice purred through the shared channel in its usual sultry register. “Do remember to scan for salvageable equipment. Preferably before the horror begins. And ideally before anyone panics and starts breaking things I might want.”

“I’ll make that my top priority, right after survival,” Caitlin promised.

Maltz frowned at the flickering lights. “This place is giving me hives and I don’t even have skin allergies.”

Another iris door floated half-open, leading into a chamber where a massive portrait loomed on one wall. Scowling from a throne built from the remains of starships. Emperor Galba VII, draped in enough regalia to bankrupt a subsector, sat frozen in brushstrokes, staring somewhere past morality.

“Galba the Mad,” Quinn said solemnly. “Crowned himself five times. Once while already wearing the crown.”

Scarred-Snout snorted. “He does not look mad. He looks hungry.”

“Don’t we all,” Caitlin replied. “Right. Let’s see what else this floating mausoleum’s hiding.”

The next airlock wheezed open, revealing a chamber that had clearly given up on being a room and now just aspired to be a cautionary tale. The atmosphere inside was technically air, in the same way lukewarm tap water is technically soup. Enough to carry sound. Not enough to inspire confidence.

The gravity here was patchy but holding. Crates and tools lay scattered, not floating. A chair rested at an angle near the wall. The lighting was poor, which helped hide the worst of the mess.

“Someone’s been nesting,” Caitlin muttered, nudging a bundle of food wrappers across the floor.

Behind a stack of crates, half-concealed and fully miserable, huddled a Vargr in a suit that had clearly seen better times. One gloved paw gripped a power coupling like a teddy bear substitute. The suit was dented, the visor scratched, and something had been patched with what looked suspiciously like chewing gum and optimism.

Shifty’s undulated closer, the voice from the voice-box velvet and unhelpful. “Note the lack of valuable items. I recommend poking him gently.”

Quinn ignored that. “He’s alive. Barely. Vitals weak. Ten minutes of air left if that regulator’s telling the truth.”

Maltz squinted. “That regulator is held together with hope and possibly duct tape.”

The Vargr stirred. His eyes fluttered open, light blue and bloodshot. He stared at them through the fogged visor, chest heaving with thin, wheezy breaths.

Then he spoke, in a whimper that had been through far too much and was considering retiring entirely.

“Chamax…”

And with that ominous syllable of pure narrative tension, he passed out.

Scarred-Snout cocked his head. “That was either a warning or a curse.”

Quinn’s voice came over the comms with the serenity of a man discussing fire safety while the room burned behind him.

“Chamax. Predatory xenoform. Possibly bioengineered during the Long Night. Tracks by smell, sound, and neural activity. Dissolves prey with acid. Drags bodies into lairs. Operates solo, thankfully. Unless it’s the nesting kind. Then it gets worse.”

There was a short pause.

“Extremely dangerous. Not known for good manners.”

“Right then,” Caitlin said, crouching by the Vargr, “we’re taking him. Nobody says one-word horror riddles and then gets left behind. Quinn, do your thing.”

Quinn stepped forward and, with the casual efficiency of someone lifting a particularly floppy bed-sheet, scooped the unconscious Vargr into his arms.

“Vitals stable. For now. Air’s a priority. And possibly counselling.”

Caitlin hesitated, torn between the arc-field sword at her hip and the stagger laser rifle slung at her back. Slicing the monster in half sounded appealing. Not letting it get that close sounded wiser.

She drew the rifle. Practicality, for now. Her officer’s cloak billowed in the patchy gravity, giving her the dignity of a war goddess who had dressed in the dark.

Maltz checked the load on his gauss rifle with the casual air of someone who had definitely read the manual, ignored most of it, and then added a few improvements.

Scarred-Snout had also drawn his autorifle. His tail was twitching slightly, which meant something was either about to get shot or offered diplomatic terms with bullets.

Morwen was already ahead of them, laser rifle ready, eyes sweeping the shadows for anything that moved.

And Shifty... well, Shifty just produced something from its suit’s compartment that might have been a sensor or just a potato.

They moved as one. Grim. Professional. Entirely too well-armed for a rescue mission that had begun with a haunted airlock and a whisper.

Somewhere behind them, another door groaned. Metal scraped against metal as the manual controls turned, haltingly, manipulated by something that clearly wasn’t built for finesse. The lock released with a clunk, and the door slid open.

The Chamax emerged, moving with deliberate force. It braced against the frame and launched forward, limbs extending, acid drool trailing in fine droplets behind it.

There was a moment of silence.

And then the shooting began.