Digital Shadow
The workshop had settled into one of its quieter stretches of the afternoon, the steady hum of machinery and distant city traffic blending into familiar background noise beneath the sharper rhythm of tools against metal. Light filtered through the reinforced front windows in pale bands across the floor, catching against suspended dust and scattered components laid out across the central workbench in careful, organized disorder. To anyone else, it might have looked chaotic. To Aren, every piece sat exactly where it was supposed to be.
She stood leaning slightly over the table, sleeves rolled to her forearms, and purple hair hanging loose around her shoulders, while a partially disassembled forearm prosthetic rested beneath her hands. The outer casing had already been removed, exposing the dense network of servos, synthetic musculature, and interface wiring underneath. One of the internal response relays had been rebuilt entirely from scratch, the newer components cleaner and more refined than the original manufacturer's work.
Better than the original.
Aren adjusted a micro-tool between her fingers and made another tiny correction near the actuator housing, her attention narrowing fully onto the delicate calibration process while diagnostic data scrolled across the holodisplay hovering beside her. The prosthetic flexed once in response, fingers curling with smooth precision before settling again.
Closer. The corner of her mouth shifted faintly, not quite a smile but enough to betray satisfaction.
The rest of the shop remained still around her. EL moved quietly somewhere deeper in the workshop, the occasional muted clink of tools and parts drifting from the back rooms, but otherwise the atmosphere carried the calm rhythm Aren preferred when she worked. Focus. Structure. Predictability.
Then the front door slid open. The sound immediately pulled her attention away from the workbench, though she did not fully straighten at first. Instead, her gaze lifted calmly toward the entrance while one hand rested lightly against the prosthetic arm, as though reluctant to fully abandon the work midway through calibration.
A figure stepped inside from the afternoon light beyond the windows, silhouetted briefly against the brightness outside before the door sealed shut behind them with a quiet hiss. Aren studied them for only a second before speaking. "If you are here to ask whether I repair cheap consumer droids," she said evenly, already turning one of the adjustment tools between her fingers again, "the answer is still no." The dry calm in her voice suggested this was not the first time she had needed to clarify that point.
Zavik Maltheris
She stood leaning slightly over the table, sleeves rolled to her forearms, and purple hair hanging loose around her shoulders, while a partially disassembled forearm prosthetic rested beneath her hands. The outer casing had already been removed, exposing the dense network of servos, synthetic musculature, and interface wiring underneath. One of the internal response relays had been rebuilt entirely from scratch, the newer components cleaner and more refined than the original manufacturer's work.
Better than the original.
Aren adjusted a micro-tool between her fingers and made another tiny correction near the actuator housing, her attention narrowing fully onto the delicate calibration process while diagnostic data scrolled across the holodisplay hovering beside her. The prosthetic flexed once in response, fingers curling with smooth precision before settling again.
Closer. The corner of her mouth shifted faintly, not quite a smile but enough to betray satisfaction.
The rest of the shop remained still around her. EL moved quietly somewhere deeper in the workshop, the occasional muted clink of tools and parts drifting from the back rooms, but otherwise the atmosphere carried the calm rhythm Aren preferred when she worked. Focus. Structure. Predictability.
Then the front door slid open. The sound immediately pulled her attention away from the workbench, though she did not fully straighten at first. Instead, her gaze lifted calmly toward the entrance while one hand rested lightly against the prosthetic arm, as though reluctant to fully abandon the work midway through calibration.
A figure stepped inside from the afternoon light beyond the windows, silhouetted briefly against the brightness outside before the door sealed shut behind them with a quiet hiss. Aren studied them for only a second before speaking. "If you are here to ask whether I repair cheap consumer droids," she said evenly, already turning one of the adjustment tools between her fingers again, "the answer is still no." The dry calm in her voice suggested this was not the first time she had needed to clarify that point.
Zavik Maltheris