What human being would survive being in the general vicinity of a character who passively steals the lifesblood from the area around him, and a guy who's basically a walking death machine? What human being would try getting close to them? 

No news crew was described in the general area, and a large portion of the civilians who were there died.

And again.

Even if you do recover General Freedom, what exactly are you going to do? Float around space with a comatose superhero in your ship until Skallagrim gets back in an indeterminate amount of months?