>>5846410"Yeah, fuck it." You chuckle. "What are they gonna do, complain? My master chief cosplay is sick."
Cracking open the sealed crate, you find your very own set of heavy Mk.II combat armor.
It looks a lot like the others, but with some heavier plating, thicker skinweave, more sensors and so-on.
Stepping into the crate, the assembler immediately gets to work bolting your armor on around you, which gets you to thinking.
"Hey, Sanig. What happens when the power runs out? How are we supposed to get ourselves out of these things?"
"What are you talking about, kid?"
"I mean, aren't we gonna get stuck?" You question.
"Nah, kid. They're a bit heavy, but you'll still be able to move normally even without the servos active. I kept the weight down as much as possible for these."
"Sweet. What's it rated for?"
"We tested some early pieces with a few rifles from your armory. The titanium plates only stopped up to 5.56, but but your fancy-ass carbon plasteel even deflected armor-piercing .308, with some damage."
"It's called Carbor, old man."
"I'm not calling it that." Sanig huffs.
"Carboranium." You smirk.
"Don't try me, kid."
"Oh, what are you gonna do, gramps? Kick my ass?"
As the assembler finishes it's work on your armor, you drop down out of the crate with a heavy thud.
The armor must weigh several hundred pounds, but after a quick test, you feel light as a feather.
You throw a few punches, then follow it up with a high kick that sails way over Sanig's head.
"Not with with baby on. Damn, what'd you do to it?"
Sanig crosses his arms with a grin.
"Like i said, i kept the weight down as much as possible. Half the savings were thanks to your ridiculous blend of plasteel. Besides that, a lot of tuning went into the computer suite."
You wave your arms around and grip your fingers while pacing back and forth.
"There's practically no disconnect between action and reaction..."
"You're welcome, kid. Lot of sleepless night went into those skinsuits, y'know. Direct nerve interface, closer to a prosthetic than anything. But the real magic is in the suite, like i said."
"What's it do?"
"It's got a VI neural network built in. It'll learn from your nerve impulses over time, and start to move before you do. You'll actually become faster than your own reflexes."
<span class="mu-i">["You are welcome, Captain."]</span> SHODAN chimes in.
"Hey, thanks. Both of you."
"No problem, kid. As much trouble as you get yourself into, we gotta keep you alive somehow. Can't lug that thing around everywhere either."
Sanig points his thumb over at the huge crate containing your Mk.I power armor.
Yeah, it's big... really, really heavy. And it runs on a micro-antimatter reactor. Something you can't actually get more of right now.
These Mk.II suits aren't as heavy-duty, but they run on solid-state supercapacitors. You can charge them off a 110v wall outlet if you wanted.
Actually...
"Say, Sanig... before we go down, can you make an adapter for me real quick?"
