"Bring it."
The engineer moved. A half-second is a house you either build or die outside of. Her finger cut down; the driver sang; the field bit.
Four. Hard, exact, gone.
Vegeta didn't blink. Ribs locked, breath boxed and stored where it wouldn't rattle; knees straight but not stupid; tail countering like a second spine. The spike hit the bones, checked his name tag, and left.
The room fell back to baseline like an apology he didn't accept.
[SYSTEM: Micro-burst 4.0g captured. Sample duration 0.48s. Integrity—acceptable.]
The engineer's eyes flicked once—graphs, mounts, ribs. "Clean," she said. "Again."
"Again," Vegeta said.
She didn't wait for permission he had already given. "Three… two… now."
The field punched and withdrew. A flick of iron at the bridge of his nose reconsidered drama and sat back down. Ankles reported; authority stamped the log.
The clerk exhaled like he'd been keeping air for someone else. The lock light stayed hard red, proud of its job.
"Pairs," the engineer said. "Baseline between. Three-point-two hold for five; pulse to four for half; back to three-point-two for five; pulse again. We do six pairs."
He shifted half a foot left at baseline, as the System had suggested earlier; the room noticed. "On your mark."
"Mark," she said, and the band obeyed.
Pulse. Hold. Pulse. Hold. He met each bite like a handshake he collected, put away, and didn't brag about. Breath: in on rise, ribs boxed; out after fall, short and useful. By pair four his right knee forgot to act like it had ideas. By pair six his forearms wrote a quiet ache that didn't request attention.
[SYSTEM: Cadence stable. Suggestion—stance offset right for pairs 4–6.]
He slid right half a foot on the next baseline. The plate liked the honesty.
"Last," the engineer said. "Pulse."
It came. He met it. The room didn't grow bigger. It grew exact.
The hatch thumped—a courier's knuckles, hopeful. The lock didn't offer opinions it hadn't been asked for. The clerk tapped his ear and spoke like a man pretending calm. "East pad reports hull secured, rails being laid. They request our mount pattern in—uh—'idiot-proof.' Their word."
"Send the spec," the engineer said, eyes on her numbers. "And the insult. They need both."
Vegeta stepped off, then back onto the plate without entertaining the lie of rest.
"Ladder," the engineer said. "We write a corner. Baseline three-point-two; pulse to three-point-eight for one; hold three-point-six for ten; pulse back to four for half; return to three-point-two for ten. Twice."
He set his feet. "Do it."
"Three-point-two," she told the harness. "Up."
The room pressed. He put his hands where they belonged—loose fists, elbows breathing distance from ribs, weight forward but not begging.
"Pulse three-point-eight," she said. "Now."
He caught it, stowed it, returned to the business at hand. Ten seconds at three-point-six wrote neat lines down his spine. No music from the ribs. No complaint from the collar. Good.
"Four," she said.
The spike arrived and left like a debt paid in exact currency.
"Again," she said. "Second ladder."
They walked it again. Baseline obedient. Three-point-eight precise. Three-point-six honest. Four a knife you put back in its sheath without taking your eyes off the room.
[SYSTEM: Ladder integrity—good. Forecast—sustained 3.6 holds × 30s viable with paired 4.0 bursts × 0.5s (≤4 reps).]
The clerk—because he was brave in the way of men who didn't notice it—spoke while they breathed. "Prince—Command left a 'courtesy' window for a call in ninety-six hours. The shipyard wants to know if you intend to sleep."
Vegeta didn't step off. "I intend to work."
The engineer didn't look up. "We all do."
He almost smiled. "Good."
She set her stylus against the display's edge, thinking in straight lines. "You want your number," she said. "Four-point-one."
"Yes," he said.
"Quarter-second overshoot," she said. "Only once. Under a hard kill. We're not writing trophies; we're writing a room that doesn't lie."
"Trophies are for funerals," Vegeta said. "Do it."
She made the bay smaller with two words. "Pre-charge."
The driver hum thickened like muscle. The ribs settled deeper into the idea of being ribs. A hairline tremor ran through the collar and then stopped; the bolts remembered respect.
"Baseline three-point-two," she said. "Up."
The plate took him. He rolled his shoulders, then not at all. Eyes front. Weight through the mid-foot. Tail countering—not decoration, instrument.
"Three-point-six for ten," she said. "Verify structure."
He held. The room agreed. The clerk tried hard not to breathe on anyone. Outside the hatch a cart squeaked, somebody swore softly, the world continued to think it mattered.
"Ready," the engineer said. She hovered over the switch a breath longer than she had to—not fear; discipline. "You feel anything wrong, you say 'out.' I cut regardless."
He didn't waste a word.
[SYSTEM: Overshoot armed—target 4.1g; ≤0.25s. Consent reconfirm?]
"Consent," he said.
"Three… two…" she counted.
"Now," he said, not waiting, because the room had learned his voice.
Her finger dropped.
For a quarter-second the universe corrected him. Four-point-one is not a weight; it's a verdict. It read his spine guilty. He appealed by existing like this on purpose. The verdict blinked and became precedent.
Cut.
He didn't move, because moving would let the body pretend it needed permission. The field fell back to the hold they'd set. His nose thought about leaking and mindfully declined. His right knee remembered its job and kept it.
The engineer's eyes stayed flat. "Again is not today," she said. "We have the sample. We will use the sample."
He nodded once. "Then drag it behind us."
"We will," she said. "Pulse pairs—back to work."
They wrote four pairs, then two ladders. The clerk fetched water like a man contributing to a war he couldn't see and held it at arm's length; Vegeta sipped because dehydration was a lie you sold yourself when you wanted to feel dramatic.
[SYSTEM: Micro-burst library updated. New protocol available: Overload Primer (sample-g ≤ 0.5s, paired with 3.6g holds). Accept?]
"Queue," he said, and the System learned patience.
Minutes stack like plates when you hold them right. The bay hummed at a key that made sense to steel. The hatch light kept doctrine. Outside, the east pad texted its anxieties; inside, the engineer wrote answers in bolts.
On the third ladder, second pulse, a quiet tick sounded at the far brace—small as a knuckle cracking. The engineer's chin flicked; a tech was there with a wrench before the tick could decide it had been interesting. Tightened. Silenced.
"Good," she said. "Cut."
Vegeta stepped off and back on without insulting the lesson with rest.
"Now four-point-one again," he said.
"No," she said. "You got it once. We build around it. I'm not gambling frames or joints to make a number feel loved."
He looked at her, not at the panel. "Quarter-second at the end of the next ladder. Then you own the cut."
She stared back a beat longer than comfort and exactly as long as respect. "Quarter. You say 'out' if your knee whispers."
"It won't," he said.
"It might," she said. "It gets one whisper. Not two."
The clerk cleared his throat like a man playing a dangerous instrument very quietly. "Shipyard says they'll have the hull wired in four hours. They request a 'Prince-approved' signature on the mount plan so they can stop being scared of their own boss."
The engineer didn't turn. "Take the plan in my hand. It is the approval."
Vegeta glanced at the paper and at the hand that held it. "Send it."
The clerk fled to the comm, blessed to have orders that could be accomplished at a panel.
"Back on," the engineer said. "Baseline three-point-two. Up."
He let the field arrange him. The bones knew their lines now; the muscles knew the sound of the cue. The air stayed where told.
"Pulse three-point-eight," she said. "Hold three-point-six for ten." They did. "Pulse four," she said. They did. "Second ladder," she said. They did.
The last hold hung like a note an orchestra agreed on.
"Ready," she said at the switch. "Quarter-second. Four-point-one."
"Bring it," he said, quieter than last time, as if noise would make the universe feel special.
[SYSTEM: Overload Primer—single overshoot engaged. 4.1g ≤ 0.25s.]
Her finger hovered, an inch of future. The driver hum deepened. The ribs settled one more millimeter into truth. The collar remembered why it had been born.
Outside the hatch someone tried the handle and got doctrine for their trouble. Inside, the air waited for its job.
The engineer met his eyes, got his answer, and began to lower her finger.