Page 155 of Red Scale Daddy
“Your hands are steady,” he says.
“They usually are.”
“Even after loss.”
I tighten a connector into place. “I have work.”
“And when the work ends?”
“It will not.”
His gaze remains on me, heavy and thoughtful.
Good.
Let him think he understands the shape of my survival.
Let him believe I have chosen usefulness because grief has nowhere else to go.
Let him rely on my hands.
Let him open doors because he wants what I can build.
I seal the modified casing and rise slowly, wiping residue from my gloves. The simulation updates with the installed parameters, and the drive’s rhythm shifts beneath our feet. The late third pulse tightens. The heat signature smooths. The deck vibration settles into something marginally less dangerous.
The engineers see it.
Throgg sees it.
He looks at me differently now.
“You have purchased another day,” he says.
“I prefer to think of it as selling you competence at an insulting discount.”
“You will survive here longer than most.”
“I intend to survive longer than you.”
A Reaper guard steps forward.
Throgg lifts a hand, stopping him.
“You have chutzpah, Roma Larson.”
“My father called it being a pain in the ass.”
The words escape before I can contain them.
For the first time since I was dragged aboard this ship, I feel his absence and Dux’s absence strike the same internal place from opposite directions. My father is close enough to find. Dux is gone enough to destroy me if I allow the thought to finish.
I do not allow it.
Throgg studies me, perhaps hearing the fracture under the sentence.
“Return her to supervised quarters when she is finished,” he says. “She works again in four hours.”
“I need rest if you want continued accuracy,” I say.
