"Again," Ash said, and reached for the ladder.
Hale planted the feet and set his boot across the lowest rung. "Up. I've got you."
Admin turned his face to the ceiling like a man trying to read a storm. The seam above the landing bowed another millimeter and squealed, the sound of two old plates remembering how much they hated each other. A new whine spooled up past the first—same breed, different pitch. Another battery winch had decided to test the roofline.
Ash shouldered the ladder under the new bow and climbed. Heat lived up there, old and stale. He hooked his elbow through a rung and reached to the next manual dog—half-seated, lying about its conviction. The clevis had gone oval; the toggle had too much opinion.
"Shim," he said.
Nono flipped a compartment and offered a thin slice of steel. Ash fed it into the hinge line, tapped with the small hammer until the dog's teeth found plate. The roof answered with a complaint and then a grudge-filled settle.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Improvised fix: shim + dog lock. Difficulty: mid. +50 Mechanic XP / +100 Basic Mechanical Repair XP.
He slid the ladder a handspan, eyes on the seam. The line nosed through—this one tipped with a snap shackle, head no bigger than a thumbnail. It probed, found purchase, and tugged.
"Brains?" Hale asked.
"Not exposed," Ash said. "We cut the head instead."
He eased the Silver Stag up through the inspection grille, muzzle only. Selector to long-range. The shackle showed for a heartbeat on the pull, metal bright in bad light. Ash let a breath run out and pressed.
The round clipped the pin. Metal spit. The shackle popped open and the line whipped back across the roof with a spiteful hiss.
[SYSTEM PROMPT]Field disabling shot: line snap shackle (long-range). Difficulty: mid. +200 Mechanic XP / +300 Basic Mechanical Repair XP.
"Next dog," Hale said.
"Brace first." Ash climbed down. "Angle—short. Chain. Wedges."
They threw a quick knee brace under the new bow—short angle from truss chord to a column ear, chain looped and turnbuckle wound until the metal sang. Ash drove two shims under the angle's foot and spiked it through a pre-drill that had been waiting years to matter.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Emergency brace: short diagonal + chain tension. Difficulty: mid. +50 Mechanic XP / +100 Basic Mechanical Repair XP.
Admin yanked the smoke-hatch cord for good measure. The flap thumped and locked; air changed its mind and sat still.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Facility override: smoke-hatch confirm. Difficulty: simple (higher-tier). +10 Mechanic XP / +15 Basic Mechanical Repair XP.
The roof's tone dropped half a note. The winch whine on their right died, somewhere out on the skin; a man up there cursed softly and crawled away.
"Tag it," Ash said. Admin looped a red LOCKED—ADMIN strip through the new turnbuckle. Nono pinged approval.
They held still long enough to let the steel decide whether it was done complaining. It was not. Something heavier than a man scuffed across the far run and made the seam ripple. A third line tickled the next bay over and tried talking the roof into a new shape.
Ash looked at Hale. Hale looked back. The look said we can do this all night and we shouldn't.
"Last one," Ash said. "Then shop. They're probing for free."
"Go," Hale said.
They shifted the ladder. Ash climbed. The next dog had never been seated. He could feel laziness baked into the hinge from a year when men had thought the roof would hold forever. He hooked the washer, slid the shim, and hit the toggle with the heel of his hand. The dog bit. The truss voiced an older, truer note.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Facility maintenance: dog lock (simple). +30 Mechanic XP / +50 Basic Mechanical Repair XP.
The line in this bay had a different trick—hook-and-plate claw that tried to slip under the seam itself like a locksmith. It fished. It found a lip. It pulled.
Ash didn't try the control pack. He waited for the claw to present a sliver through a hole in the seam and shot that instead. The claw warped; the lip let go; the line went slack, then skittered away like a snake choosing a new hole.
[SYSTEM PROMPT]Field disabling shot: seam hook/claw (long-range). Difficulty: mid. +150 Mechanic XP / +200 Basic Mechanical Repair XP.
"Done," Hale said. "We leave before they learn."
"Lockouts," Ash said. He dropped, set a shear pin in the nearest crank, wired a NO tag in Nono's shaky block letters, and checked the padlock with two fingers. Admin drew a fast map of the brace geometry on his notepad because paper could hold a memory when men were tired.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Panel control: lockout/tagout applied. Difficulty: simple. +5 Mechanic XP / +10 Basic Mechanical Repair XP.
They moved off the landing into the cooler artery back toward the shop. The haven's hum had settled—generator honest, lights steady. In the walls, the wind tried the seams and failed to get in.
"Count it," Hale said as they walked. "How close?"
Ash ghosted a glance at the blue in his sight. "Close." He let the number sit in his head instead of his mouth.
Admin's radio stayed quiet long enough to be suspicious. Then: "East Gate steady. West exterior—unknowns withdrawing along the fence line. Nightshade patrols visible at distance."
"Of course they're watching," Hale said. "They like to arrive the second after you do the work."
"Work pays the bills," Ash said.
"What bills?" Hale asked, dry.
They took the last turn. The shop door waited with its bad hinge and its good habits. Hale set his palm to the wood, listened, then gave Ash a nod. Inside, the floodlight put its hard square back on the bench like it had never left.
Ash set the Silver Stag down and let his hands find the queue—carbines, sidearms, the Chain E-Saw, all the need of a bad day. Hale killed the sheet metal blinds. Admin stayed in the doorway like a man guarding a fire.
"Back to it," Hale said.
Ash was already there. He broke the first carbine, corrected a whisper of yaw in the mag catch, and seated a spring that had lost its memory.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Component service: mag catch + spring. Difficulty: simple. +5 Mechanic XP / +10 Basic Mechanical Repair XP.
He swapped to a second, dressed a bolt face with a stone so fine it could fix a mirror's mood, and snapped the extractor home.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Component service: bolt face/extractor. Difficulty: simple (higher-tier item). +10 Mechanic XP / +15 Basic Mechanical Repair XP.
He cleaned a third, fast and honest. The bench hummed. The blue bar edged forward like a tide that cared about numbers but not about men.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Repair complete: simple. +5 Mechanic XP / +10 Basic Mechanical Repair XP.
Ash tagged the weapon, reached for the next, and paused with his hand over the Imperial slate in its foam. He hadn't turned it on since the night it had died, but the image of VEHICLE SYSTEM and Titan Legion lived behind his eyes like a map that wanted a finger.
Hale watched him not touch it. "Later," Hale said.
"Later," Ash agreed, and chose the next rifle instead. "We keep the lights on. We keep the door honest. Then we learn to ask bigger questions."
Admin made a small sound that was almost a laugh and wasn't. "Bigger questions will arrive without invitation."
"They usually do," Hale said.
The floodlight flickered once, as if agreeing, then steadied. The haven's hum didn't change. Outside, the roof stayed quiet, or at least the noise didn't confess.
Ash reassembled a receiver and felt the selector click into short and long with a certainty he'd earned. He racked, dry-fired into the trap, listened, and nodded to no one.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Functional cycle (bench): success. Difficulty: mid. +50 Mechanic XP / +100 Basic Mechanical Repair XP.
The bar crept. The arm hung. The work went on.
Hale leaned in the door and watched the corridor the way men watch rivers. "You realize Nightshade will call this 'cooperation.'"
"They can call it what they like," Ash said. "The paper says thirty days. We'll use them."
"And after?"
"After, we don't let the paper invent a leash." He set down the rifle and picked up the next. "Or we cut it."
Admin's radio coughed once. "Message for Vale," a tired voice said. "From the desk: inspection delayed. Nightshade liaison—'returning with authority.' "
Hale's mouth moved a centimeter. "Translation: they're writing a bigger word."
"Then we write ours," Ash said. He slid a final pin and felt the receiver seat like it had always meant to be there.
A small scratch ran across the shop roof—just a mouse of a sound after the night's larger ones. They all looked up anyway. Nothing pressed. Nothing bowed. The noise passed like a thought.
Nono beeped once, as if to mark the moment and file it where it could find it later.
Ash set his palm flat on the bench. "Next."
He reached for the tool—
—and the floodlight took a breath, then another, and held. Somewhere deep in the haven the generator turned over a new cycle and settled. The room felt, for an inch of time, like a thing that might forgive.
[SYSTEM PROMPT] Shop status: stable. External variables: monitoring. Recommendation: continue priority queue and reinforcement checks.
He lifted the next carbine onto the mat and the world, so briefly, chose to wait its turn.