Boarding the orbital mining freighter Irian Jaya, Captain Nordstrom slid his reader card into the alien ship’s mainframe. While the 50 terabyte card transmuted the craft’s breathing cargo, he questioned the bosun’s mate.

“Your weight vs. mass doesn’t balance.”

“It’s cosmic dust” the creature mooed, “Or the pressure of sunlight warming our hull.”

Following the locator’s threading trail, Nordstrom ordered it to map a fast return route. just in case. After many chutes and ladders, he was within ten feet of his target. “Do you have a human aboard?” Captain Nordstrom demanded.

“It’s only a corpse, a natural death, it died in the Great Bidding Wars. I have proof!”

“Then produce the receipt, it wasn’t detected.”

The bosun’s mate presented a paper ticket, thin and rare, "We bid on this pawn slip, betting this body hasn’t been mined,we’ve staked our claim—

—calm down" Nordstrom sighed, “Next time scan your proof, and save me the time, I need to protect my hide, I’m worth more than your weight in gold.”