Tiber caught the bottle and took a swig in one, fluid motion. The beer tasted malty, he thought. Just his style. He rubbed the back of his forearm against his mouth and cleared his throat. "Good stuff." 

"Got plenty," she said, placing a hand on the table and taking her own sampling of the brew. They shared a second of silence, acknowledgement in their eyes. Two soldiers having to get back at it. She was attacked, he lost his place, but they were both tired needed to enjoy a cold one for a quick second. They were exhausted, as much as they didn't want to admit it. But Tiber wasn't ready to hit it just yet, and he doubted Sabby did either. 

"Hey so, got any flood lights?" 

"Yeah, why?" 

"How about, since this is your place, I go out and check the guns to make sure they don't need any extra parts, and you can grab us some dinner real quick. I'd rather switch places, but I doubt you'd want me rifling through your cupboards-." 

She snorted before he even finished, grinning and waving his concerns off. There were still some areas of the empire with antiquated ideas of gender and their roles in society, and the barbarians certainly thought that way. Obviously Tiber wanted her to know he didn't share those ideas. Apparently she knew immediately, and saw his suggestion was just pragmatism. If they didn't get some grub in them, they might collapse, and it [i]was[/i] her house. "Sure, skipper. Let me know if you need anything. Might be able to scrounge some stuff up around here." 

They bumped their bottles together in a 'clink' and went off to their respective tasks. Tiber stepped outside, and even as his eyes got accustomed to the dark, the flood lights went up and illuminated the assault ship. He opened the back and rummaged through his crates, fishing out the multi-tool, a combination of a torque wrench, arc probe, and fusion cutter. The other three tools he needed were, unfortunately, not together. The power calibrator and the tuning stylus he found in about ten minutes, but the macrosander couldn't be found. Not too bad, he probably didn't need it immediately, anyway. 

Tiber slid under the body of the carrier, finding the main gun barrel and opening the bottom hatch. "Alright, what do we got here? Standard high-energy particle-beam. Sounds about right." He started to work, removing three wires of the circuitry to reach the power cells and inner workings. "Two twenty terawatts, looks like. Not bad. Uh, rotator needs some more oil. Power pack is half capacity..." 

It took about twenty minutes, and he was happy to see the weapon was still operational, though not up to standard. He wouldn't sell it to anyone but an enthusiast, but even if it wasn't like new, it would fire. It could probably rip through two inches of steel plating if need be, and maybe more under focused fire. If he had to guess there was around sixty laser bolts in capacity, around 40% of its usual number of shots. He coughed out dried dust that drifted out of the opening he'd made, and rolled out from under the gunboat after sealing it up again.     

"How's it look?" Sabatine asked, standing in the doorway. Tiber closed one eye to better focus on her with the lights beaming in the face. 

"I'll tell you inside. But it could be worse." He assured her. "Got another beer?"