Page 77 of Red Scale Daddy
“I am not talking about moving the ship.”
“No.”
“You don’t know what I am suggesting.”
“You are suggesting we leave the ship and relocate to more defensible terrain while assessing environmental threats.”
He flashes teeth. “Look at that. You do listen.”
“And the answer is no.”
“Roma.”
“No. The ship is life support, transportation, communications, shelter, and the only reason this missionremains viable. I do not abandon the center of operational necessity because you feel watched.”
He turns toward the ridge again, and this time the humor leaves his face entirely. “I am not asking you to abandon it. I am asking you to stop standing in the open beside a wounded machine that announced our arrival with a crash trail visible from orbit.”
“Orbit is not relevant on an asteroid of this mass.”
“Do not flirt with technicalities when I am making sense.”
“I am not flirting with anything.”
“That is a shame, but not our main problem.”
The wind gusts harder, carrying a stream of dust that pings softly against my face shield. I taste metal again, this time through the filter, a faint mineral ghost on my tongue. The environment is unstable. Radiation pockets. Low pressure. Unknown atmosphere retention mechanism. Probable magnetized mineral lattice beneath the crust. Possible electrical interference in weapon systems and ship sensors.
Unknowns multiply.
I hate multiplication without clean variables.
“We repair,” I say.
“We scout.”
“We repair first.”
“We survive first.”
“This is surviving.”
“No, this is you trying to drag the plan back onto rails that are currently bent into jewelry.”
The words strike too close to the damage display still glowing on my wrist. I pull up the next diagnostic rather than answer too fast.
“The mission window remains intact,” I say. “The anomaly cost us time but not failure. If we complete repairs efficiently, wecan recover part of the loss through a higher-burn transfer after ascent.”
“Higher burn on damaged systems?”
“Calculated higher burn.”
“That sounds like a bad idea with math perfume.”
“It sounds like physics.”
“It sounds like control panic.”
I stand so quickly the repair kit strap slides off my shoulder and hits the rock with a dull metallic thud. “You do not get to rename disciplined response because you dislike structure.”
