Cavalon sighed. “I think a lot of times are better than when you’re pulling unstable elements out of functioning warheads.”
Her amusement dissolved and she squeaked, “Unstable?”
Cavalon bit back a smile. To be honest, it’d be relatively safe, assuming no random sparks. But it’d shut the girl up for half a second, so he considered it a win.
He let out a long breath, savoring the momentary silence. Despite his current irritation, he already had Emery earmarked as a useful contact. His three-month flight aboard the Mercer Royal Guard Luxury Cruise Liner had served as a lovely forced detox, but if he ever felt like having a bit of a relapse, Emery’d be the first person he’d go to. She might not be stashing vials of apex in her boots, but he could tell the type well enough. She certainly had the necessary connections, or at the very least a bottle or three of booze at her disposal. He wasn’t overly picky about his vices.
With how delightful life had been on this ship so far, that day would come sooner rather than later. He’d never been able to kick it for long before, why would now be any different?
Warner growled a string of what might have been curses under his breath as he continued to tap at the holographic terminal screens.
Cavalon pinched the bridge of his nose to stave off the headache sprouting between his eyes, leaning back to rest on the workbench behind him. Extending over the small counter sat the articulated arm of a repair cradle, which would—in theory—retrieve a selected missile from storage for repair, if they could figure out how to use the damn computer system.
He really, really hoped the acium they could gather from the missiles in storage would be enough. If they had to go around to the ones already in the launch queues all over the ship, they’d be doing this for a week. Though he wasn’t sure yet if that’d be better or worse than more endless mopping.
Warner grunted and turned away from the terminal. “It’s no good,” he rumbled, his gruff voice the tonal opposite of Emery’s crisp, pitched timbre. “Giving some fuckin’ error. Unless you happen to know what return code 485C means?”
Cavalon scratched the back of his neck. “Eh, afraid I’m a little rusty on my, uh … armament-maintenance software error codes. Who’s your missile specialist?”
Emery snorted a laugh that turned into a brief coughing fit, and Warner just stared impassively.
Cavalon let out an exasperated breath. “There’s gotta be some way to manually access the missile storage, right?”
Warner turned back to the terminal, tapping through screens. A few seconds later he gave a reluctant nod. “There’s this weird list of drone protocols…” He jutted his square chin toward a narrow grate along the bottom of the wall, opposite the workbench. “That’s apparently an access hatch for deploying automated repair drones. Could probably get in through that.”
Cavalon’s eyebrows shot up. “Automated?” That was one of his very favorite words. “Don’t suppose you still got a few of those drones lying around?”
Emery chuckled, her constant mirth beginning to redden her pale cheeks. “Even if we did, would you know how to program it to do whatever weird-ass thing you got us doin’？”
Cavalon pinched his lips together. She had a point. “All right, looks like we’ll be taking the hands-on approach.”
He crossed the room, kneeling beside the access hatch to pull it open, but it didn’t budge. Sucking in a breath, he grunted as he gave it another firm yank, making sure to keep his royal Imprints deactivated. After Rake’s comment about the morgue, he wanted nothing to do with “volatile interfacing.”
“This damn junk heap…” Emery slid away from the wall and slunk toward him. “Bet it’s rusted shut.”
He glanced back toward the workbench. “You guys got plasma knives around here?”