Warriors feast, soldiers dig. 

His centurion had told him that. Had beaten that into him. That there was more to war than merely fighting and celebrating. A soldier needed to be master of many skills. You could ask him about any skillset, be it sweeping floors, cleaning toilets, or hunting big game.  Est Idoneum Bello, he would say. It is suitable for war. And so he took that to heart, serving four years in the Ultimus Legiones, before serving another two years and being redistributed into the Onocentauri to serve the remainder of his second tour. His centurion was right, he had done plenty of digging. But he had learned how to fix ion carburetors, re-weld titanium plating, repair the jet propulsion on a laburturi and a subterlabori vehicle. He could reprogram a automaton or an Onocentauri mecha. 

And he could clean a shitter with the best of them. 

The Screo III he had been working on for the better part of a week ignited, blue flames flaring out of its engines as it softly lifted off the ground. The owner, an older gentleman who once worked for the administratum, had treated the ex-soldier with some light, customary scrutiny. He had come in to check twice that week if the repairs were going smoothly, and had called this morning. Only half an hour ago did Tiber finish the piece, replacing the coolant system and repairing the shot hydrogen valve, giving the keys back to to the man who was surprised a 'barbarian' was so well versed in the mechanical arts. Tiber just took his money and let him go, returning to work on his old armored junker.

Tiber's great grandfather had been a renowned warrior, accounted with the taking of twenty seven imperial skulls in his career as a Ventati life-taker. Had he lived to see his grandson emigrate to the Empire, and to see his great grandson serving in the roman war machine, he would have begged the brutish tribal gods to tell him why his bloodline had been so tarnished. Tiber wondered if he could have understood his family was starving, or that if the old man perhaps would have thought it better that way. Better to die than to kneel to the romans, maybe. He didn't know. He had not known much different than this.  

He set about welding the 10x30 adamantine to the 'junker,' it's skeleton held aloft by chains like some great cyclops caught in a trap. Flames leaped from the welding torch, lightly beading upon his reinforced apron, light reflecting off his visor. The money he had grabbed from the old member of the adminastratum would hold him for a few weeks, and the army had seen fit to grace him with a balanced pension and this spit of land. But he didn't want to stay here forever. He hated to admit it, but he was restless. For the better part of a year he had worked as a mechanic, adding a small wing to his home, and had even taken up a bit of gardening. He could do the former two, but he wasn't blessed by Ceres like his neighbor, Sabatine. He had only had a few conversations with her over the past season. Their eyes spoke more than their words. They could tell without having to ask they were both veterans, likely retiring as principes around the same time. He remembered whistling provocatively at her orchard just a handful of weeks ago and she told him to take a picture, it might last longer. She had been gracious enough to surprise him with a basket of apples on his front door just last week. No note, but he hadn't needed one. 

She was cool. He hadn't expected to find anymore veterans of similar age on the planet, particularly so close. 

A foot kicked the thick fueling tube that snaked across the shop floor, bumping into the back of his combat boots. Tiber made a small glance behind him, and then turned the torch off and lifted his visor. Despite his barbarian heritage on his father's side, he had the sun-tanned skin of a roman like his mother, though he was uncharacteristically tall, standing an inch over six feet. His hair, close cropped in the army, had been allowed to grow out into a thick head of black hair. He had the beginnings of a goatee but it hadn't quite ripened yet. 

"Sabby? What can I do you fo-" He started when he saw her there, having deliberately placed her foot on the tube to get his attention. She didn't seem concerned, but something in her eyes relayed to him they needed to talk. He removed the apron from his statuesque form and tossed his torch to the ground. "Trouble?" 

If she nodded, he would indicate to come into his office. The central area of the repair shop was immediately connected to the back office, behind a one-way, slug-proof window.