A Cold Fate[Open RP Thread, Ship Internal Oriented]

[Taneru]

The Barrier. Untold billions of tons of frozen ice and rock, wrapped in a cold shroud of water crystals spanning dozens of lightyears, all alone in the night.

In the eight centuries since the first landings, it has never been fully charted, and while its sheer size is one of the mains reasons preventing this, it is not the only one.
Pirates stalk the clouds like hungry spectres and miners, corporate and independent alike, jealously guard their claims with a ferocity born of greed and paranoia.
Static landmarks are nonexistent and the fog of the Barrier itself prevents the use of the stars as points of reference.
Beyond the hum of lonely waystations, beyond the trade lane and jump gate network that ties the houses together like a string of tiny fires in the endless night, lies the silent heart of the deep Barrier; a place where only the desperate and the mad willingly go and where the ever-present cold of the surroundings seems to creep into the cockpit no matter how much one adjust the environmental controls.

This is not always a completely silent place, however, and this is one of those times.
A faint whisper echos through the darkness; a signal, weak but steady, from somewhere deep within the cloud. In only a few systems was the signal strong enough to be detected: Baffin, Coronado, Cortez, Manchester, Magellan...
Not many would pay it much heed, or recognize the signal for what it was, but a few would.

It was a distress signal.

Something was out there.