"Are you sure? We want you intact, the Project is your baby after all."

"I'm sure. Some things you have to see for yourself."

"If I change my former answer to yes, will you stay behind?" Amy can't look him in the eye.

"No," James says, and gently grips her shoulder.

Personal history. Who cares. Nick doesn't. "All aboard that's coming aboard by five PM."

Amy sighs. "Why wait? We're all here now. Let's get started."

"I have shopping and tinkering to do first. Going to put that enhanced targeting chip we found on my rocket launcher."

"See you at 5, then." She goes to look at what Madison is doing.

James watches her go a little forlornly. 

He then turns to Nick. "Need a hand?"

"I can probably handle it, but it's as good a time as any to show you my workshop and see if anything looks useful for the project. Sure."

"Excellent. Lead the way."

Out they go. Here's a quick tour of his very nice zeppelin. He's made a lot of minor improvements and a few major ones over the years. And here's his workshop. The synth is still hooked up to his terminal, but he heads over to another bench where the rocket launcher and a lot of circuitry is laid out.

"Hello, what have we here?" James goes over to look at the synth. "Very curious. Haven't seen one this intact before. They usually stick to the Boston wasteland."

"Don't touch that. I'm still deciding what to do with him."

James lifts his hands above his shoulders. "Cross my heart. What decision is there to be made?"

"Turns out this one... Rebelled or something. Could be interesting to see what he thinks. Maybe figure out a way to make more of them rebel and weaken the Institute a whole lot."

"You're deciding whether to revive him or not?" James asks the question like the answer should be obvious.

"Correct."

"Lots of bots, not a lot of humans. You enjoy playing God."

"Bots aren't people. I wrote half their brains and they're incredibly stupid. Synths, though..." Shrug. "I'm not quite sure. But if you're going to insult me to my face you can get out of my ship. Right now."

James raises his hands again. "Amy says we need you. I trust her. I don't have to like you. You don't have to like me either."

He turns away from the synth, seemingly ready to lay their disagreement aside.

"...Fair enough."

Rocket launcher! The targeting chip is a neat predictive aiming package. Getting it to talk to the ship's scanners will make it even more effective.

James, while not hugely familiar with weaponry, knows plenty enough about circuitry to be a significant help.

"Some of this pre-war tech is pretty amazing. Looks like it has a way to talk to missiles, too, if I made missiles that will listen. Seems expensive for single-use weapons though. Maybe if you put a mini-nuke on them it'd be worth it."