Page 61 of Red Scale Daddy
“That is excellent.”
“Would you call it beautiful?”
“No.”
“Liar.”
I glance at him. “I do not require aesthetic validation from a man who called emergency foam an angry pastry bag.”
“I stand by that assessment. The foam can save lives and still look ridiculous.”
The outer sensors flicker as a filament of charged dust strikes the shields. Across the canopy, nothing visible happens, but the display shows the impact in a brief silver scatter, a ghost rain against our defensive field. The ship answers with a small reconfiguration. Energy transfers along the port array, then returns to equilibrium.
Dux notices.
His amusement fades at the edges. “That was fast.”
“I told you she was built for this.”
“You told me a lot of things.”
“And now the relevant ones are being proven.”
He looks from the display to the canopy, then back again. “She holds herself well.”
The words settle strangely in the cockpit. Not praise for me, technically. Praise for the ship. That should make it easier to accept. It does not.
“She does,” I say.
The Lamplight crosses into the next distortion layer. The hull gives a deeper shudder. My harness presses briefly against my shoulders as the inertial dampers adjust, and the air takes on the faint copper taste that always accompanies field strain at high sensitivity. Not actual metal in the atmosphere, only the body translating pressure through nerves and old fear. The lights flicker once. My displays remain stable.
Dux’s hand closes around the armrest but does not reach for anything.
Progress.
I initiate the full stress diagnostic. “Recording initial approach performance. Shield displacement below predicted variance. Frame stress seventeen percent under maximum safe threshold. Thermal buildup nominal. Adaptive ballast responding within tolerance.”
Dux studies the hull map on his limited display. “You are enjoying this.”
“I am confirming performance.”
“You are enjoying confirming performance.”
“That is an efficient form of enjoyment.”
He turns his head toward me, and even without looking directly I feel the weight of his attention. “You know, most people smile when they enjoy something.”
“Most people also fail to notice when a poorly maintained cargo hauler lies about shield wash.”
“Fair.”
I adjust our course along the projected corridor. The route ahead appears as a narrow thread through a field of invisible violence, updated every second by live data and nine years of modeling. The Lamplight rides the edge of a gravitational fold with grace that makes something loosen beneath my ribs. I built this. I dreamed it, calculated it, rebuilt it, paid for it in sleep and blood and every easy future I might have had. Nowthe ship moves through conditions experts told me no private vessel could survive, and every green light on my display is an answer to every man and woman who ever told me grief had compromised my judgment.
Dux’s voice enters that thought like a boot through glass.
“This is good work, Roma.”
My hands still for less than a second.
