Page 15 of Red Scale Daddy
“I implied the galaxy thinks so. You corrected the galaxy with your face, which was educational.”
Dux remains standing near the alcove entrance, half turned toward the room, as if he can monitor every patron while also interrogating me by existing nearby. “Why you?”
I frown. “That is not a useful question.”
“It is if you answer it.”
“I designed the ship.”
“Because nobody else would?”
“Because nobody else could.”
Loklo whistles softly. “Modest.”
“Accuracy is not arrogance.”
Dux’s eyes catch mine. “Sometimes it wears the same coat.”
I dislike how quickly he answers. Most large men in bars rely on intimidation because wit requires maintenance. Dux uses both, which makes him worse.
I open the compad and bring up a sealed file. “My father specialized in adaptive systems. He believed that ships enteringunstable environments should behave less like fixed architecture and more like living organisms, constantly redistributing stress, power, and thermal load. His last transmissions contained fragments of an emergency adaptation protocol that was never included in the official report.”
Loklo’s expression loses some of its play. “You have the transmission?”
“Pieces.”
“How did you get them?”
“I was twelve when he vanished,” I say. “I was not dead.”
Dux’s brow shifts. “That’s not an answer.”
“It is the answer you are getting.”
The truth is too large for this table. Too old. Too embarrassing in its rawness. A child in bare feet outside a locked office door, listening to adults decide which lies were gentle enough to tell. A girl with red hair and shaking hands copying restricted files while her mother cried herself sick down the hall. Years of hiding grief inside competence because competence frightened people less than hope.
I do not tell them that.
I show them instead.
The compad projects a palm-sized component into the space above the table: a drive-ring stabilizer, rendered in precise layered detail. Not the full assembly. Never the full assembly. The stabilizer rotates slowly, exposing the crescent-shaped braces and braided micro-conduits that make most engineers either frown or lean closer.
Loklo leans closer.
Dux frowns.
Predictable.
“This is one of six external correction fins tied directly into the ship’s stress-response system,” I say. “The fins alter micro-positioning during gravitational shear events before thehull experiences dangerous torque. Standard ships react after deviation. Mine anticipates the beginning of deformation and shifts load before the structure commits to failure.”
Loklo points at a cluster of conduits. “That junction is too thin.”
“It would be if it were carrying primary load.”
“It isn’t?”
“No. It carries interpretive data from the strain sensors.”
