Snippet #2819592

Vex was never sure if there was something to fix or if Zae just liked to pull things apart and put them back together. Issue was she was currently tinkering with his installed digestive tract, the rubber tubes and wires hanging loose out of the maintenance hole in his abdomen while she dug around his insides. It felt similar to someone rooting around in your mouth after a numbing shot- the majority of his internal organs in that area were mods, so there weren’t many human nerves to react. Either way, it wasn’t a comfortable visual, especially as she turned and yelled at Sari with her arm still elbow deep. He wanted a shot, but he’d already attempted to steal her drink once- resulting in a rage of swearing as the alcohol poured through his body and out the tubes she was working near. She’d stolen his flask and he’d had to settle for a cigarette, balanced between tight lips as he scowled across the mess hall.

“You fuckin’ finished yet?”, He tapped the smoldering embers onto the floor and shifted minutely, adjusting to see if she’d made any progress or was still fucking around, “Your drinkin’ away my alcohol ration and you didn’t even tell me what’s wrong down there”

“Who said anything was wrong?” Zae looked up, giving him a wink before she went back in. Her fingers had stretched around the tubing, keeping it sealed as she moved it aside to reach in further. The further she had to extend her mass, the more dense her extension would become making sure she’d be able to maintain the integrity of her appendage.

When the hunk of metal first came on board, Zae had practically salivated over his mods and tech. He was like her own personal doll - even if it took an emergency for him to let her take a look. Networks like this were delicate, it took a professional eye to properly maintain it. Zae could see a glitch in thumb movement and narrow it down to a frayed wire in his spinal cord. It was easier just to tell Vex he was broken than actually explain what needed fixing.

“I’ll sit here all night if you close up the stomach and let me have a drink” He grumbled and exhaled, making sure to send his smoke downwards towards her smirking face. It wasn’t like he wasn’t used to Zae’s ongoing fixation with his upgrades, she just usually wasn’t pulling apart his stomach and stealing all his alcohol at the same time.

With everyone crammed together in the mess hall, Vex basically had the night off. Generally, he was either training the newer members or loitering around whatever group was on deck, making sure everyone stuck to their assigned tasks. He was fairly sure no one was going to try anything tonight, with a storm raging and everyone stuck together like space sardines.

“Stop moving and maybe I’ll finish sooner,” Zae gave him an incredulous sneer before taking another swig of his bottle, realizing she was getting near the end of it. “I’m almost done.”

Her free hand grabbed what appeared to be a pen from her utility belt then lowering inside of Vex to her tangled web of appendages below that were holding his innards in place. Despite having drank the bulk of both her options she still moved with the precision of a surgeon. A bit of smoke unfurled from inside him as the pen cauterized the split coil of one of the binders between the flex rods.

She could tell by the way he had turned to look at her when she called his name after they'd all quarantined below deck that something was off down there. It could have gone on long enough without being an inconvenience, though the mechanics around it overcompensating for it would cause his tech to degrade more quickly. As much as Zae loved keeping his leftovers when he upgraded, it pained her to see him so easily discard her work at the moment it became inconvenient.

“Alright,” Zae said as she began to close him back up, tucking her pen back into her utility belt. “That was fun wasn’t it?”

Vex stretched immediately, the mechanized joints of his body crackling back to life with the whirrs and coughs of weathered steel. The things that needed to be fixed stayed fixed- the weapons built into his arms, the hydraulics in his legs, and his newly installed spine. He oiled daily and charged every night, but otherwise Vex was pretty shit at maintenance. Luckily his job on the Regulus paid well and came equipped with its very own mechanic- who happened to be obsessed with his robotic parts and accepted outdated mods as payment. Zae was good too- noticed shit that he just chalked up to a bad night's sleep. Even now the tightness in his neck was disappearing.

“Fun for you” he reached for the discarded alcohol and gave a groan of annoyance at it’s empty contents, “You didn’t even let me get a shot in before finishing this off. Please tell me you got an extra bottle stashed away”

Zae scratched the side of her neck, too drunk to pull off a sheepish expression. She never really put much thought into saving alcohol or where it might come from, it was just there - until it wasn’t. Luckily her kind didn’t experience withdrawals like other humanoids, but Zae was significantly less pleasant with a hangover than she was cruising between a .3% blood alcohol level. After all adrenaline burned through any kind of impairment she might have within 20 seconds so it usually wasn’t much of an inconvenience.

“I mean…”, She flashed a look over to Wes, scooting in closer as she lowered her voice. “We are in the mess hall….where rations are kept.”

The cyborg focused on the cook on the far side of the room, crouched next to that twig of a cabin boy and leaning far away from their violent puking. He was glad they’d stationed themselves far away from that mess.

“He is looking very preoccupied at the moment”, Vex cast her a lopsided smirk, “You make sure he stays that way and I’ll make sure we are set for the storm?”

Zae gave him an all too toothy grin, then looking back at Sari. “Oh that’ll be no problem.”