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Salt and Circuitry

sci-fi◐ Mature
5 contributors · 5 paragraphs deep

Halfway across the deck, the tarp slips. A deckhand named Pohl sees the server and the wires running to Mara's deck. "You're stealing salvage," he says — not loud, just sure. The voice murmurs in her ear: "He'll want a cut, or he'll want you gone. Decide which Pohl you're dealing with. Fast."

Mara cuts Pohl in. "Half," she says. "You never saw this." Pohl thinks, then nods and helps her wheel the sled to the dive platform. But the voice keeps whispering that two witnesses are worse than one, and Mara starts to wonder which of them the machine actually wants gone.

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