Talking Your Way Out Of It

Talking Your Way Out Of It

“Explain it to me one more time.”

Bart Daniels took a deep breath.

“I was cleaning the electronic equipment with compressed air. It was going well, so I upped the stream slightly. The onboard canister sprang a leak. Before I could shut it down it, it exploded. No one was injured, including myself, you’ll be happy to know.”

Captain Atlas Corbin looked out through the nearest porthole slit.

“Except we are now free-floating through an unknown part of space with no engine, limited oxygen and a sizable hole in the side of our ship, The Wayfarer. What do you intend to do about that?”

“Whatever you order me to, sir.”

“I’d like to order you to step through that breach in the side and get lost!”

“It’s got the temporary patch across it that automatically deploys when the skin of the ship is breached. I can’t talk my way out of this, it seems, so I will do my best to fix it!”

Corbin stared at him.

“You know, for a cyborg, you seem to make a lot of errors.”

“Perhaps my circuits are faulty or need maintenance, sir.”

“No time for you to go offline now! Survey all parts of the Wayfarer and give me a detailed Maintenace and Repair Report asap!”

Bart saluted, turned and went out the doors. He puffed out a breath that was a relieved whistle. Moving quickly, he headed for the Transportation Room.

“I think my spying mission is over! I won’t be sorry to get out of these cyborg trappings and let my skin breathe. I ‘ve found it restricting not to be able to do so. I must report in person or none of my people will believe me!”

He activated the mechanism and was gone.