The repair she would not sign

At the end of her shift, Iset took the crooked brass bird from the top of her locker and tried once more to make it stand. Its feet had been cut from the same strip of scrap. One was evidently more ambitious than the other. She bent it with a pair of fine pliers, set the bird down, and watched it fall on its beak.

“Improvement,” said Tovan from the next bench. “Yesterday it fell backwards.”

Iset put it away. She could align a carrier coupling within the thickness of a grain husk. The bird had occupied nine evenings. Her nephew had requested something that looked as though it might fly; she had produced something that looked as though it had recently been dropped.

Outside the workshop, South Reach's grain wagons queued beneath lamps that lit only the loading apron. The road beyond remained dark. Since the cooperative had purchased a second route, every small saving had become somebody's visible inconvenience.

Iset understood those calculations. Her own armour carried a charcoal shoulder plate bought second-hand and a bronze forearm cover she had repaired twice. Under its protected inset, pale tissue moved with her breathing. She disliked the way customers watched that movement and then looked away, pleased with themselves for remembering she was alive.

Tonight she wanted to finish early. Her application for a station workshop of her own was due at the end of the week. Three more clean service reports would give her the record the appointments panel expected. She had already chosen where she would put the benches.

The carrier on Bay Two

Tovan wheeled the coupling assembly beneath the work light. The load collar had a bright crescent along its inner edge. Iset passed a probe over it, then repeated the measurement with a hand gauge. The second instrument made a less forgiving noise against the metal.

“How long?” he asked.

“It should have come out last month.”

“That's not what I asked.”

She knew. His niece had a seat reserved on the next crew transfer, after six weeks covering an understaffed receiving station. Taking the carrier out of service would cancel that transfer before it cancelled paid freight. Nobody had written that priority on the workshop wall. Everyone knew it anyway.

The replacement collar was listed at the northern store. Released against an approved service order. The service order required an arrival slot. The arrival slot required a carrier certified for the journey.

Iset enlarged the diagram on her bench screen. The circles were very tidy.

“We can limit the load,” Tovan said.

“Not enough.”

“There's an allowance for reduced duty.”

“There's also a crack.”

He leaned closer. His amber lenses caught the work light in three small reflections. For a moment she thought he would dispute the reading. Instead, he lowered the assembly onto a padded block with extraordinary care.

The dispatcher arrived carrying the manifest in one hand and a replacement kettle in the other. The workshop's old kettle had failed that morning; he had remembered. It made what followed more irritating.

He asked whether the carrier could move empty.

Iset showed him the measurements.

He asked whether it could move slowly.

She showed him the measurements again.

“I am required to establish the available options,” he said.

“You're required to stop asking when one of them breaks.”

He set the kettle down. “Sign the withdrawal, then. I cannot cancel a departure on a conversation.”

Her name would sit above the lost capacity, the cancelled transfer and the late clinic delivery. Nobody else's would share that particular box.

She signed.

A serviceable part

By morning, the workshop had acquired an audience. Dev Arlen waited beside the open door in a coat still carrying ridge dust. He operated the cooperative's expensive independent route. He had brought a compatible collar salvaged from a retired carrier, wrapped in an old blanket.

“It passed inspection when they laid the hull up,” he said.

“Then the hull should be very pleased.”

“Can you test it?”

She could. She could also lose the rest of her shift doing so, and the part would still lack the northern store's release record. Her approval covered installation, not the substitution of a component from outside the service account.

Dev held out a receipt. The receiving clerk had stamped it so hard that the paper had split.

Iset looked at the collar. Someone had cleaned the outer surfaces for sale and left the inaccessible grooves filthy. She felt a brief professional affection for whoever had done that. At least the dirt would not lie about where the part had been.

Tovan brought another lamp without being asked.

They found no crack. They found wear within the limits for a shorter inspection interval. They also found a mismatched retaining fastener, replaced at some unknown point by someone who had probably been in a hurry very much like theirs.

“We change that,” Iset said. “We test it under load. Then someone gives me written authority to use it.”

Dev swore. “By then I could have driven north.”

“You still can.”

“The clinic freight is already on my carrier.”

“Then don't unload it to make this easier for me.”

He went outside. Through the doorway she heard him telling a customer that the ridge departure would run as booked. He sounded angrier making the right decision than most people did making the wrong one.

The appointment

The charter supervisor spoke to Iset through the office screen. He did not threaten her. He explained that an unlisted part introduced an exception, and an exception required supervision beyond the authority of a station workshop. A candidate for independent workshop command should appreciate that distinction.

She had expected the sentence. Hearing it still made the room seem smaller.

“I'm asking you to supervise it,” she said.

“You are asking me to accept responsibility for another supplier's work.”

“For my tests.”

“For their material.”

She turned the screen towards the bench. Beside the recovered collar lay the failed one, tagged and measured. There was no useful way to arrange them that made the choice respectable.

Tovan waited until the connection closed before speaking.

“You could withdraw the request.”

“And put the broken one back?”

“No. Leave the carrier here. Let the office find the part. Your report would still be clean.”

That was the offer she had wanted someone to make. She could do her job correctly, protect her application and leave the rest to the people paid to administer it. The clinic would receive its freight by the ridge. The transfer crew would wait. South Reach would pay another day's idle charges. None of that would appear as a defect in her work.

Iset sat down. Her shoulder plate clicked against the chair.

“Get the test weights,” she said.

Two names

The supervisor authorised a limited installation after the dispatcher agreed to record the substitution against his own station account. It took until evening. The permission covered six journeys, with inspection after each, and did not refund the idle charges.

Iset refused to sign the completion until Tovan's name had been added beside hers. He had performed half the tests. He looked at the second signature box for a long time before using it.

The carrier left the following morning. His niece's transfer had already been reassigned; she would wait another four days. Iset's application returned with a request for further evidence of administrative judgment. The workshop she had pictured went to someone else.

There was no ceremony about any of it. The new kettle leaked around its lid. Dev brought back the blanket and asked whether they could look at his steering linkage next week. Iset quoted him the full rate. He paid the deposit.

Before going home, she opened her locker. Tovan had left a small wooden base beside the brass bird, drilled for its uneven feet.

She fitted it, and the bird stood.

Her nephew would notice the base. He would probably ask why a flying thing needed one. Iset wrapped it anyway, leaving the beak uncovered so it would not puncture the paper.

Then she put six inspection dates on the workshop calendar. The first was tomorrow.