Not much choice

<snip>
‘So not all bad then,’ said Cass. ‘Right, let’s get ourselves cleaned up and start the scanners. There’s got to be something we can get fuel from out there.’
</snip>

"Anything on those scanners?" Jay asked, walking into the cockpit to take the controls.

"Not yet. I'm picking up the edge of an asteroid field ahead, but that's it." Cass replied. Her fingers slid over the buttons, but her expression didn't change.

"Fine, we head towards the field, and see if there's anything in there." Jay said.

"But aren't the odds of successfully navigating an asteroid field.." O'Malley began, but was cut off by both Jay and Cass at the same time.

"Shut up."

Jay picked up the radio on the control panel. "Hey, Jamie. How's the engines?"

A short burst of static replied, but soon resolved to a voice. "The fuel system is screwed, but I rigged up a direct feed instead. As long as we have stuff like this moonshine, we can keep going. I recommend firing bursts no longer than a second to get some velocity, and drifting."

"gotcha." Jay replied, put the radio down, and fired the thrusters for a second. The ship drifted through space, rather sedately. It was another day later that Pickman was on the scanners, and called out to everyone in what sounded like alarm.

"What, what's going on?" Jay said, running back in to grab the controls, ready to initiate evasive maneuvers.

"I'm picking up a distress signal." Pickman replied.

"Then why didn't you just say that, rather than yelling?" Cass asked, stepping up next to the console and relieving him.

"He's right. It's an old distress signal, on loop." She said, after putting some headphones on. "Life support failure, no other choice but to abandon ship." She said after listening to it a few times.

"we have suits. no problem." Jay said, and lined the ship up for another burst.

-------------------much, much later---------------

"Wow, it's huge." Jamie said, peering at it.

"That's what he said." Cass muttered under her breath. No one else seemed to hear it.

"If life support is all that's down, we might get lucky with the fuel system." Jamie said, as he looked over it. "The rear of the ship looks in better condition than the rest. There's asteroid impacts all over the place."

True enough, the huge ship, maybe even longer than the Blue Dwarf, sat nestled inside the asteroid field. It was big enough that as they watched, several huge asteroids smashed into the side of the ship, and left nothing more than a dent.

"I'm only seeing faint lifesigns onboard, probably not humanoid." Cass said from the scanner. "And the only safe docking bay is the one near the front, sticking out of the asteroid field."

Everyone sighed, knowing that they would have a long trek through the derelict to get to the parts they needed to... reappriopriate.

<tag. Ok guys, this ship is dead in space. It has no air, no power, and sections are open to space, and it's constantly being peppered with asteroids. It's a hazardous place, but we have to explore it. There's probably old signs of the past crew, and there may be other decent things to salvage, beyond the fuel system. Let's do this.>