You wake because the cold woke you — the drift-berth has been failing for hours, and so has everything else. Amber warnings crawl across dead consoles. The keeper's chair is empty. The station is a lantern strung between two inhabited systems, and its light has gone out.
On the long-range board, a single contact is inbound through the dark — and it is calling.
Everything you need is on this deck. Nothing here needs a code you don't earn.
You log the contact and take the empty chair. The relief is real, it is close, and it is running dark toward a light that isn't lit. Whatever happened to the keeper, the station is yours now — and so is the choice they left behind.