From their conversation so far, Ves knew that Calabast was absolutely a tough customer. Negotiating with her from a disadvantage would never work out well for him if he pushed too far. This was why Ves had carefully sought a worthwhile question to ask.
His request shouldn't have touched Calabast's bottom line. The value of this piece of information was inestimable to Ves, considering that he had no hope of joining Major Verle's inner circle. After all, he was not a careerist mech designer who signed up to the Mech Corps for the long run.
In fact, this information shouldn't be particularly valuable to Calabast, because many players already knew what was going on. Leaking the truth to one more person hardly changed the board.
