Free Last of the Immortals (The Jessica Keller Chronicles Book 3) by Blaze Ward

even.
    “Oz?” Jessica asked. It was not a nickname she had heard before, but obviously things were a little more relaxed down in the engineering bays.
    The chief engineer nodded at her with a prim little smile. He reminded her of nothing so much as a mother hen overseeing a brood of bright, chirpy chicks.
    “It is indeed a rare thing,” he began, “when either the operations or capital budgets allow my department the freedom to exercise a degree of artistic liberty and autonomy in our work, at least on a scale such as this.”
    He gestured expansively at the mess around them. His team had taken over an entire section of the bay, with all of the fighter craft stored vertically along the walls in their little racks, like bottles of beer cooling in the refrigerator.
    “Here,” he continued, “there were no budgetary constraints worth mentioning. Indeed, with access to two complete fleet weapons packs, plus a few items we were able to effect trades for with the ground crews, I believe we have introduced two lovely new catalog items into the Mischief folder that Imperial Admiral Wachturm will not be expecting, simply because, while he may make a study of young Moirrey’s work, this represents an entirely different methodology of cognition about the vagaries of warfare.”
    Vilis Ozolinsh had been born to one of the wealthiest and highest–profile of the Fifty Families that provided the governing backbone of the Republic. He should have been a line officer, or a Senator.
    Jessica realized at that moment exactly what it had meant to her future that he had instead fallen in love with engineering as a very young man, instead of the traditional command track. He would have been a good Command Centurion. He was an excellent engineer.
    If his family connections had managed to stick him out on the distant frontiers, so as to not have to think about the black sheep of the family, a lowly engineer, all the better.
    He had been there when she needed him.
    His smile gave him away. Butter would not melt in his mouth right now.
    “What have you done, Oz?” Jessica asked, wrapping her head around this new person.
    If his own folks could call him by a nickname, his commanding officer could make the effort as well.
    He had a smile like Moirrey’s. Jessica wondered who had originally picked it up from the other.
    “With unfettered access to a full two weapons packs,” he preened, “we were able to color well outside the lines, to quote one of Moirrey’s favorite sayings.”
    He started walking towards the nearer of the two, Jessica, Moirrey, and the rest of the engineers trailing out behind him like a school of remorae trailing a shark.
    “Each pack contains almost all of the components necessary for a vessel with a truly competent machine shop, such as ours, to repair almost any type or degree of damage to a standard transport shuttle.”
    He tapped the little ship with one hand, almost a loving caress as he spoke more to himself than to his audience.
    Jessica suppressed a snort. She had seen what her truly competent machine shop had managed, especially when they had committed two separate pranks on 2218 Svati Prime during the Long Raid , what historians and writers were starting to call Keller’s Raid , despite everything she could do to dissuade them.
    “In the past, that has not been of any great note, simply due to the limitation that Auberon neither carries such craft, nor has space for them during her everyday operations.”
    Oz turned and fixed her with a hard smile. Predatory. Indeed, a shark in calm waters. She had never seen him thus.
    It was an exciting development. She hoped.
    “Here, I was struck by an interesting notion of Imperial tactics from my Academy days.”
    “Go on,” Jessica said. The less she spoke, the more he would.
    “Indeed, Commander. Thank you,” he said. “Normally, an Imperial vessel launching missiles will either target them to engage a class of vessel, such as our dreadnaughts, or aim