The hospital workshop had windows too high to show the street. Morning light fell across the wall in pale rectangles while Juno photographed the device from four directions. The sealed tray lay on a cleared bench, far from the equipment used for patient care.
Rusk had obtained the room on condition that no live gate apparatus be connected to the hospital supply. Juno had brought an isolated power unit for the reader and kept it off while she worked. The device itself required no activation to open. It had already been damaged enough.
Eli signed in beside Kellan and Sera. The independent observer, a licensed instrument examiner named Havel, checked the seal before Juno touched it. A workshop technician waited near the vise, holding the room’s tool register.
“Anything you borrow stays on the sheet,” she said.
Juno showed her the small cutters. “These are mine.”
“Those too. If a piece goes missing, I need to know whether it belongs to you or a respirator.”
Her name was Len. She wore her badge backward so it would not swing into moving machinery. Juno recorded the cutters, the light and the fragment trays before beginning.
The first cut followed the existing break. She stopped after a few millimeters, photographed the edge and asked Havel to confirm the position against her diagram. Eli had expected the work to be delicate. He had not expected how much of it would consist of putting the tool down before doing the next small thing.
