"I need to go... do something," Maria informed the android before taking her leave as well. Neither of their newcomers seemed to be in any condition to be causing trouble, so Maria figured leaving them unsupervised for a little bit would be fine. Or at least she hoped it would be. The captain jogged her way up the stairs and to the catwalk, trying to decide what she needed to check on first and making a mental to-do list as she passed by the different rooms on the ship.
She needed to find out where the Judge had put their prisoners. It hadn't really been discussed in the moment, nor had she had the time to talk to him since, but she'd need to talk to those guys at some point. If by talk you meant beating them to within an inch of their life. The rest of the ship also needed to be looked over by an actual person; you never knew when a sensor would malfunction and not pick up on some damage somewhere. The whole ship was so damaged Maria was fairly certain they'd never get her completely fixed again. Though she wasn't doing that well to begin with, so it wasn't really that surprising that she needed some TLC. The crew would be in desperate need of a break too. They needed to get to the Glao dock, get the ship repaired, and give the crew a few days to recover. Oh, that was a load of credits that Maria did not want to see go, but she'd put it off as long as she could. It'd been months, if not over a year since the crew had rested properly or the Veritas had been in good working order, and it was definitely costing them. Maria was even thinking about perhaps trying to throw at least a small bonus into their paychecks if she could. Ansgar could get some new tools, Kai some herbs (though Maria wasn't convinced as to the legality of his wares), Andrea could buy some more figurines, and Kev-
Oh. Andrea.
Maria had momentarily forgotten the other tragic loss that day in amongst all of the other chaos. Andrea's body probably still hadn't even been collected. What was left of it, anyway. Heaving a large sigh, Maria gathered up her strength to continue on the catwalk to the now sealed off bridge. The alarms for a hull breach had stopped, meaning the blast shield had engaged and it was at least safe to enter, but the captain still hesitated before manually unlocking the hatch to the ship's bridge. She didn't want to see the charred remains of someone she lived and worked with. Unfortunately, this was also a part of the job she signed up for, and it was better that she have to do it than anyone else.
Inside there lay the motionless, battered body of their pilot. It thankfully wasn't charred as she'd expected, but it was still unnerving to see someone she knew gazing lifeless into the void, and Maria took a moment to close the young woman's eyes before lifting it up and beginning to carry it to Kai's infirmary. She didn't bother the doctor as she entered. He was busily tending to Teg, and he looked as exhausted as she felt. Andrea was lost to them now; there was no rush. She sat the body in the corner relatively out of the way, then covered it with a sheet to give Andrea some sort of dignity. Not that it mattered, but it made Maria feel better.
"How're they doing, doc?" She asked, referring of course to Teg and her first mate.
Collab with Eisenhorn It took Persephone a moment to find the catwalk that Maria had gestured to. She'd been distracted by the android's distress, and had forgotten the exact place it was supposed to be in, but after a second or two of jogging towards the direction she
thought the captain had indicated, the catwalk appeared and she went down it. It wasn't a very long catwalk, and almost immediately after going down it she could see the doorway that lead into the engine room where the engineer was supposed to be.
"Hello?" She called out, looking around "an angry Scotsman." What
was a Scotsman anyway? Was that some weird subrace of human? Were they
all angry or just this one? "I think I'm supposed to be looking for Ans... Uh-oh. Ans...ma? Ansma? No that's not it. Ansgar! There we go."
Of all the things that Ansgar was not in the mood to put up with, it was strangers wandering into the engine room calling out and sounding confused. Butchering his name didn't help either, and he finished what he was doing beneath the deckplate before shoving upwards, plate swinging on a hinge and flying open, the irritable mechanic that she was looking for popping out. What wasn't in view was the hand on his sidearm, though it was effectively a canon masquerading as a pistol, since he didn't even remotely recognize the voice at all. What he saw was, well, not expected, but he still narrowed his eyes and glared at the intrusion to his work. He hadn't been paying close attention to any of the comms, busy with trying to fix what he could prior to docking the ship, and he was not pleased with someone interrupting his work.
"W'o's askin' and w'at are ye bot'erin me for? As ye can no doubt tell, t'is bucket just got s'ot t' 'ell and back an' I'm the onl one qualified t' fix the bloody mess."
"Yeah I uh... I kinda got a front row seat. You guys were in some serious hot water, huh?" The cyborg didn't seem unnerved by his irritation, and carried on with a very casual demeanor as she glanced around the
wrecked tattered engine room. She then turned back to him.
"Hi, I'm Persephone! I
am sorry about taking you from your work, but I have a bit of a problem. There's an android in the cargo hold in the midst of a slight mental breakdown -don't ask- and his arm is kind of... not... attached. Also my fighter is literally falling to bits. See I can fix both of these things, but my tools are as shot as this engine room and I was hoping maybe you would have some spares that I could barrow? As kind of a, you know, thanks for helping you guys not get blown up? I'd give them back of course! I'd only need them for a little bit, and maybe I could even use them to fix my own tools."
She flashed her most winning grin after finishing that little spiel, pressing her palms together in a "please" sign.
"Oh nay, t'at wasn' 'ot water, oh not at all. Getting our asses shot off wasn't 'ot water in t'e slig'test, not at all! Ye were watc'in', course ye s'ould be aware..." He narrowed his eyes slightly as she glanced around the engine room, that was very much a work in progress at the moment. Between the attempted sabotage, then the pirates, it was a gods damned miracle the place was even remotely up and running. Still, even Persephone could tell that, the moment she mentioned an android, the scotsman froze and looked at her, dead pan but clearly unhappy. If before was irritated, he was about ready to march down there and start raising hell personally.
"W'o in t'eir rig't mind decided t'at revivin' a tin man was a
fucking good idea?! T'ose soddin' t'ings ain' not'in but trouble. Ah swear, ah ain' gettin' paid enoug' to put up with a
fucking tin man. Also, as ye can plainly see, yer bucket o' bolts ain' t' only t'ing fallin' apart rig't now. Course, ah say no, captain'll 'ave m' fuckin' 'ead...." Grumbling, and spitting curses to himself, the man hauled himself out from under the deckplates, all lean muscle and sweating from the exertion of digging around the literal and figurative guts of the engine room trying to get things as up to speed as he could, moving over to a section of the engine room that looked a bit more lived in than the rest, and had not fared well during the attack. Growling, he dug through some boxes and pulled a ragged looking toolbox clear, marching back and setting it by the open deck plate, reaching down to fish out the tools he had been using.
"'ere, ah'd say scrap t' fuckin' tin man, but t'ats beyond my call at t'is point. Clear out so ah can focus on tryin' to get shit workin', and rig s'it against tin man tamperin'. Fuckin' mad fuckers, t'e lot of ye..."
"Right..."
The cyborg didn't seem to pay him too much mind as he ranted with an increasingly more colorful vocabulary of expletives. She paid attention to him, of course, but didn't really seem to get offended or take it personally as he cursed and carried on with his condescending vent. She'd grown up with pirates after all. They were constantly drunk; screaming, cursing, arguing, insulting, and every other unpleasant form of communication one could stand to think of, so her metaphorical skin was rather thick, and she also understood that he was probably worked way beyond his abilities right now. This ship was way too large for one person to repair by themselves.
"Thanks. You know," she said, taking the tools from him, "once I get the uh... "tin man's" arm reattached, I could probably help out a bit with the repairs."
Continued mutterings and complaints aside, Ansgar would have supplied the strange visitor with suitable tools, and seemed to almost bristle at the idea of someone else getting in the way and attempting to 'help' fix up the ship. Oh hell no, if anyone was going to get this bucket up and running again it would be him damn it. Last thing he needed was to account for other idiots breaking things in an attempt to fix things. Just because she could patch up a scrap fighter didn't mean he trusted her to lay a hand on the engine room. Still, the offer would require some sort of response, and after grunting as he hauled himself back through a deck plate with his personal tools, planning to get back to work since he really didn't have time to be sitting around jawing with someone who was humoring a fucking tin man's needs. Nothing but trouble, those damned things were.
"Nay, not a snowball's c'ance in 'ell. Stick to yer scrap fig'ter and t'e fuckin' tin man. Ah'll not 'ave ot'ers runnin' around buggerin' t'ings up tryin' t' 'elp. Now if you'll 'xcuse me..."
With that he'd haul the deck plate back shut, and one could hear muttering, cursing, and the sounds of repairs being undertaken again. She'd been effectively dismissed, regardless whether or not she intended to have any further remarks on the irritable scotsman. He had no intents to play nice when he had far too much to do.
"Nice meeting you!" Persephone called as he disappeared again. It was a pity he wouldn't let her help, but oh well. That was his problem she supposed. Happy to at least have some functioning tools again, she skipped her way back to the cargo bay to start the task of repairing the android.
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