The eyes woke to the blinding lights and the ears were filled with a blaring message alarm.
She swore in surprise and shifted her eyes into the pillows. Dumb lights, she thought, clearly remembering that she had turned them off. They've been glitchy with her for the past few days, going on and off whenever they pleased, as though they had a life of their own. She needed to remember to get them checked – assuming she did have the free time when she did remember.
Now didn't appear to be one of those times to check.
She groaned and lifted her head off of the pillow, calling in a groggy voice, "Magellan, shut off the damn alarm and tell me who's the message is from." Please let it be one of my friends, she hoped, but was somehow doubtful.
"High priority message from Confederation Military board, offering job request," the A.I. replied from the comms in its normal, robotic tone.
Dang, I wanted the extra sleep. Oh well, job priorities first. "Fun," Jenosa said out loud, lifting herself out of the covers in her still semi-sleepy state. Damn, I could use some coffee right about now, she thought while stretching her limbs out to get her awake as much as possible.
Her body had a fine build and physique, and her body posture revealed that she kept herself well exercised and fit. Her red hair was a bit scruffy, as always, and there was the added factor of all of the hair making up her long, flowing ponytail that reached down towards her thighs. Those who knew her profession occasionally wondered how she did her job with such hair – and at the very most, why she never shortened it on her own time.
In all honesty, she'd preferred letting it grow on it's own; and that had been a habit since childhood. She never liked cutting or having her haircut for some reason, and rather enjoyed it growing long, and simply fashioned it into a pony when it became a pain. That, and it grew with a vengeance, and she found it pointless keep cutting it if it kept coming back faster than one can blink. Her hair got sliced and diced on missions as enough as it was anyway.
And no matter how hard one looked about her face and youthful eyes, you could never see a single sign, like a scar or cold look, which told you she was a bounty hunter. She had a face like any other ordinary pedestrian. It was mostly when meeting a contact did she reveal her professional attitude and this "Let's get this job done," added with a dash of adventure, enthusiasm on her missions.
Some people might even think her to be 'weak' with certain parts of her less "bounty hunter" attitude, such, as demonstrate only minutes before, her want for extra sleep. But she'd simply ignore them, knowing, to herself and experience, that strengths and weakness were both the same – all that mattered was getting the job done, staying alive with all your limbs intact, and getting paid.
It was the fact that there could be such 'go-talkers' and wannabe-fight-hers about the universe that she chose a more discrete but professional path. She didn't have to worry about there being too many eyes on her, considering that she could easily stand out in the crowd if people knew her face; or head, at that matter.
Despite her discretion, though, she couldn't stop the occasional vague words of her professional attitude from flying about; and after she complete a couple of difficult missions, they did. An ear catches wind of these words, and people with their own ideas start fishing the waters for her. It shouldn't be surprising that one particular contact that she worked for was, in fact, a Major for the Confederation Military, and was merely posting a few jobs to get her to poke her head out of the waters.
That was how she winded up working for the Military so often; if it was any client that appreciated discretion like they do, she had yet to work for them. God hell knows if there was anyone out there who enjoyed keeping his or her true colors in the shadows. They kept her true identity disclosed from her, and she disclosed everything she knew about them from everyone else. A fair deal for her added with a moderate source of income – good jobs weren't exactly apples in a tree.
Giving the final stretch, she walked over to a small, active consol within her room that read, as Magellan said, "High Priority Message from Confederation Military." "Well, lets see what chores Major Armitage and Commander Kozan have in store for me today," she said, to herself as she opened the message.
Decoding Protocol: 2A75E6
Attention: Jenosa Arma
Hunter Designation: Q4-75E1JA
Target: Confederation Research Lab 56, Planet Inos
Briefing: A distress signal was received 48 hours earlier from this high security research lab. Subsequent attempts to establish communication have proven futile. Request for a data retrieval mission. Meet at Brin-Talos station for further briefing of objectives and the coordinates of planet Inos.
Commander Kozan
Jenosa blinked, bemused, "Odd, what happened to my usual contact, Major Armitage." Major Armitage was the person who had gotten a hold of her in the first place, and it was him that usually briefed her on her missions. Never had she been told to meet at one of the military's stations. Usually the Military wanted to keep things as close niche as possible, sending a single person to brief her so as and allowing them to meet at one of their facilities, where valuable and harmful information could be stored.
Plus, Armitage gave her a lot of invaluable information. As funny as it seemed, he was of her more favorite contacts, as other clients were sometimes clumsy at giving the proper information that she demanded.
Then again, she thought, she'd probably meet the guy at the station itself, though it still seemed strange to meet him at one of their facilities; if anyone else, at that. She only mentally shrugged at the thought, not about to let a simple oddity to sway from not taking the job. Sometimes stuff happened.
Yet, a little voice was nagging her in the back of the head—many often say that when you get sent to a lab on a planet that no one's ever heard of, it's usually a bad sign.
Omen or no bad omen, she wasn't about to chicken out of what could be a possibly well-paying job. She had her A.I. set course for the station while she got dressed and ready.
Jenosa walked through the metallic hallways of the Confederation Military command center known as Brinn-Talos station. The station was basically a kind of HQ or outpost where intelligence of every outgoing Military project and action was connected to. The station was pretty big, and it made Jenosa wonder if this place had any weapon stations to defend itself. She didn't see any guns visually, but there could ones hidden, standing by to pop out and show that a floating space building can bear it's own teeth when needed.
She wore gray pants and a shirt that, combined, looked like a single jump suit. Their design made sure that they didn't look like bathing suit, with the lines running down the back and the belt-like strap for the pants, but the tightness could make some people think she needed a new sense of fashion.
Surprisingly enough, she actually liked these kinds of clothes, not because of the more professional they gave her in this place, but because of their flexibility. When it came to actual hunting Jenosa really didn't have much strength, and thus made up for it with her dexterity, acrobatics and quick tactical thinking, and these clothes gave her a lot of freedom others just didn't have.
That, and the material had some minor resistant to energy weapons, and more so to some physical attacks like knives. It wasn't heavy stock armor clothing that could withstand an entire magazine or battery, but it proved to protect her hide long enough for her to escape danger.
Making it easily to the receptionist room, she was expecting to see the beaming image of a military Major who was around his 40s with dirty brown hair, a short beard to match, and attentive that were locked like a scanner at the door way. Instead, she was baffled to simply a few technicians giving her side glances in their work, and probably wondering what a none-military person with the stance and air of a professional hunter was doing here; and, at the desk, a rather nervous secretary sweating as though he was having his own invisible shower.
Jenosa scanned the room and it's few occupants for any high-ranking military officer. There was none, and he couldn't help but feel that it would be most out of Armitage's style, as he always picked more public but private places; and yet she felt it strange that he should have at least been there to greet her. Something was wrong.
"U-umm, are you – would you happen to be designated hunter Q4-75E1JA," came the voice of the person she hoped it was not coming from. Indeed, her mind wasn't playing tricks as she saw the nervous secretary stand up and hold his nervous, sweaty face at her in a hopeful manner.
She made a bemused blink, and responded, knowing that they called her by her designation for security reasons, "Yeah, that's me," unless you haven't been told by Armitage about my hair doe. Something about a lab you wanted me to go check on?" she added. The Major always said her hair made her easy to spot and identify, even in a big crowd. IT wasn't like she added any of those fancy chemicals to, and generally disliked the idea of doing that anyway; all she did was let it grow, put it into ponytail and wash it from time to time like any good person should.
"Ahhh, good, I've been told to wait for you. P-please, c-come this way, we'll discuss the details and your currency in more private quarters," the secretary beckoned towards one of the doors near him. The man, instead of sighing relief as she expected him to in such a situation, where you were waiting and hoping for a specific person to show up, seem to only get more nervous, as though he was about to enter an exam.
This caused a couple of question to spark in Jenosa's mind, one in particular that yelled in a blaring voice was, Who the hell hired this guy? If they weren't going to speak through Armitage, they should have at least taken the liberty choosing a person who could do decent business. Anxiety and nervousness showed that you could be a liability to your assigned task, and this guy had 'liability' written all over him. Sending out a guy like him was what she called sloppy, and the military was meant to be anything but sloppy.
As she made her leave from the lobby, she couldn't help but notice out of the corner of her eye how much attention the technician was giving her than the broken conduit. Perhaps it had to do with who she was, that she was a hunter, or even her looks. On the contrary, she was never one of those trés sexy women, but some of her friends had sported that her face and hair could occasionally catch a man's eye. She had no clue what was so eye catching about herself; hell, in her childhood, her mom kept telling her hair was a mess and that she needed brush it – and she barely brushed it during the present.
Of course she made sure it didn't look like a hurricane had struck it, but she really just liked to leave it take whatever shape it wanted.
Hair tendencies aside, the man could have been interested for any number of reasons she thought up, even a combination. Yet she could not but help feel that when she mentioned the word 'lab' that the man's expression had changed from intrigued to worried. Perhaps she was just imagining things, as she wasn't really giving the man only a sliver of her attention, but the image strangely bugged her. She couldn't help but feel that the guy knew some "need to know vital information" for her mission.
Not that it mattered, as she was about to get the any vital information from this Mr. Sweat-a-lot—and if she didn't, well, screw the job.
Entering a kind of debriefing room, the man started slowly, "So, I assume your were given your objects in the message."
"'Course. Data retrieval of some kind. Mind filling me in on the juicy details," she said with an odd enthusiasm. Hey, you couldn't do a job if you didn't like it.
"Well, it's simple. I give you the coordinates of the planet, and you salvage whatever valuable data and experimental technology you can."
Jenosa frowned, "When I meant 'details' I didn't mean redefining obvious objectives, I meant giving me information that would be vital to the success of my mission. I wouldn't be a very useful bounty hunter if I was ran into a platoon of people while you knew about it; and mind you, I prefer to keep every limb in my body intact."
"Ummm, what kind of details?" the man said, becoming so nervous Jenosa thought he was going to create sound from his very with all his shaking.
She gave an irritated growl, having a difficult time in asking the man, "Why the hell where you hired to brief me in the first place?" Instead, trying to keep a good job opportunity open, she responded, "Ok, since I don't think a crash course would be the best option, I'll just ask you some question and you answer."
"Question one: Do you have any idea why the distress beacon was sent?"
The man seemed extremely hesitant in what to say. There was a brief silence before he simply said, "Ummm, no."
"So, you're telling me you have no clue in what's possibly went down on that backwater planet," she said, furrowing her brow. "For all I know it could have been raid by some space pirates, and they'd probably have taken everything, there for making my objectives pretty useless."
"Nono," the man responded quickly, "it's highly unlikely that the lab was attacked by a group. It's completely remote and in the middle of Confederation space; far away from the border."
"Ok, if you're so confident, then give me an idea – a possible suggestion – in what happened."
The man seemed to be unable to answer, almost gripped by some unknown fear. He then gulped and merely said, "I – I can't tell."
Jenosa gave an exasperated sigh. This briefing was taking way too long and was way too much of a pain in the ass for her; details and objectives were almost always given in a jiffy. IT was almost like this guy didn't want her to know something…classified. "Can you at least tell me what they're researching on?"
"I'm sorry, but that's classified information."
"Excuse me, but it won't be very classified when I get to it; or when it gets me in the hands of some maniac. This is the last straw sweaty, either you give me the information that I demand, or I screw the job."
The man, as if trying to find a solution to his predicament, looked all about the place, seeming obviously pressured; for what reason, Jenosa couldn't guess. It looked like a loosing battle, but then the man looked at the piece of paper in his hand, as though it was his final trump card. He unfolded it and revealed it to Jenosa's face.
It was her payment contract. At first, she was slightly irritated by this action, as she had no interest in taking a look at the contract yet, but a particular part of it had managed to snare her attention. She grabbed the contract to take a better look at the specific spot, her eyes giving a wide, incredulous stare. She read the rest of the contract, the fine print and even verified the signature. It was authentic to the core, authentic and almost enigmatic enough to be a priceless relic from an extinct race.
Her eyes turned to the man, his face nearly filled with a pleading expression. "This is a simple data retrieval mission, no?"
Only after a bit more discussion, the secretary, who was still nervous and sweaty, but had calmed quite a bit, told her she needed some very special, state-of-the-art mission gear before she left. Jenosa was quite curious to see what kind of gear she needed before she left. And more specifically…
"Wait, why does it seem like I require this gear before I land?" Jenosa asked.
"T-that gear, you'll need it to enter to the lab and deal with the-" the man cut himself off, as though he was worried about saying too much.
"Deal with the 'what'?" was probably what the redhead would have said, but she thought it was a waste of her time. When she saw how much the contract paid, there was no way in hell she was letting a massive money opportunity slip by her hands. Jobs like these were almost non-existent, which was an enigma that she just didn't feel fit in right, even for the military. It was like she was missing something in the big picture.
She didn't care though. The pay was big enough to overshadow the abnormality, and she had been in some tuff situation where details didn't completely help. Hell, so long as she was getting some kind of gear meant for this mission, she was fine doing the job without having most of her other questions answered.
As t hey walked down the corridor, it was like the true colors of the station were being revealed to her. The secretary office and lobby was only the tip of the iceberg, as Jenosa had never really gone that deep into the station itself what things were really like. Some regular, steel station walls, lights, doors, and a desk was all she witnessed on her few visits to the place; but in the core, it was as though the station had a beating heart.
In one section, she had to go through an area full of computers and other technological pieces; activation and computer consoles of all sorts were alive and active, constantly reading all sorts of sensor data, showing them with text, numbers, vertical and horizontal bars and all sorts of other shapes that blinked, flashed, shrunk and moved in an almost rhythmic pattern. Even machines and the lights they emitted pulsed as though they were essentially breathing life into the station and its gray lifeless walls who's hue matched that of Jenosa's clothes; so well, that, in her eyes, she could almost pass as a part of the space born building.
The hallways themselves were bustling with activity like a colony of ants. People were going to and fro, doing their assigned tasks, passing her and the secretary as they did, giving short glances of curiosity at her presence, knowing that she was not a part of this station's crew. A smirk of joy rose at the attention she was getting, knowing that most of these people had no clue she was bounty hunter employed by Kozan. It was almost comical how much the Military used her and yet the general lot of them knew squat about her.
Going through much of the station, Jenosa wondered if she might actually discover some skeletons in the Military's closet. She doubted it, and it wasn't like she cared. She wanted no part of some kind of military political scam, as getting caught in one could lead unnecessary, fatal head injuries. She just wanted to do the job, get paid, and keep living her own taste of freedom.
The finally reached a hallway filled with what appeared to be cryotubes on both sides. The only other person inside the room was a skinny technician who was taping one of the 'cryotubes'. He noticed the two and turned his head to them, greeting them, "Ahh, she must that professional bounty hunter that I was told to prep a suit for, no?"
The secretary nodded, saying nervously, "I suppose I'll let you two and the suit get acquainted."
"That indeed."
The secretary sighed in relief and left, his apperent-pressuring task having been lifted from his shoulders. Jenosa turned her attention to the technician in front of her, "So, where are these 'suits' that I need so much," she said in eagerness, anxious to see what this tech was all about.
The technician laughed, "You're standing in the room with them," he said, gesturing towards what she suspected to be cryotubes.
Jenosa blinked, bemused, and came more into the room, its atmosphere giving her an eerie sensation, as though she had stepped into an alien ship. Peering through the glass of one of the containers, her first glance made her think the guy was actually kidding her; it was only the fact that the body of the suit had no head and face that it made her realize she was actually staring at a manufactured piece of tech – tech that she had never seen before.
The suit looked like some kind of blue, rubbery wetsuit with light-blue lines etched parallel with one another on the stomach and arms; the lines looked to be a different material than the darker blue type, and it was as though they were almost giving off some kind of light. Sections such as the chest area, the forearms and almost the complete bottom part of the legs – making them look like a pair of boots – were donned with a pearl white, armor-hard material, and it looked as though the blue material was actual an entity wearing them like a knight would. One of the reasons why it looked like this was because, despite the material's appearance, the suit seemed to hold the shape of a humanoid man on it's own – and it was one of the reasons why Jenosa had first mistaken it as an actual guy.
As if he read her mind, the technician said, with a laugh, "Almost thought there was sleeping man inside there, didn't ya."
"Ya, you got me there. But why do you need to keep a suit inside a container like this? To keep it in mint condition?" she said with a drop of sarcasm at the end. "And why do I need it anyway?" she added.
He laughed again, "Well, what you're looking at here is a bio-suit – like one of those suits meant for biohazardous areas, which could be filled with a virus or disease or the like. And as for the reason why it's kept in his tank, it's meant to keep the suit charged and prepped for interface; the tank itself it filled with concentrated free-floating energy particles that we walk through every day, and those light blue lines on the suit, like a pore, take in those particles as though they were actually oxygen to it."
"Woah woah," Jenosa said with some surprise, "you make it sound like the suit's alive. Don't tell me I have to wear something with another mind connecting to my head."
"Ha! Not at all. Admittedly, most of the suit is made of a kind of organic matter, matter that probably isn't like our cellular structure but alive in a similar manner, and the energy that it takes in is meant to keep it from, well, dying out. But, in no way does the suit have a mind of it's own; it's more like any other suit – well, umm, a bit more than I suit I guess. You could almost put it like a biological add-on to your body; technically, you're its mind."
Jenosa eyed the suit, studying the detail of it, as if trying to find an ambiguous answer to an even more ambiguous question. "I guess that sort of explains the rubbery material. Still, it really doesn't look like any of those bio-suits that I usually see these days. I mean, does this come with a helmet, and what's with the arms and legs," she asked, indicating the white, plate material, or devices, on the limbs.
"Quaint, what the lab here deals with isn't an ordinary organic virus, and we have – umm – yet to develop a helmet that is suited to deal with this virus. As for everything else, well, you are going to wear the suit, so why don't you find out for yourself." The man entered a code into one of the side panels of the container and the glass slid upwards with an eerie, buzzing hiss.
Despite what the man had said, Jenosa could not help but feel that this suit had a sleeping purpose, somehow aware of itself and yet mindless at the same time, waiting in its dormant state for someone to fit their body – their mind – into it. Someone to fill in an empty spot inside of it and give it commands; for someone to finally use it and give a feeling of purpose.
Tentatively, yet curiously, she reached into the container to take the suit. Only halfway there did she feel a tingle sensation move all about her hand, stopping briefly at it; she then realized it was possible the concentrated amount of 'energy' stuff that the man talked about. Grabbing the suit by the armpits, she lifted out of the container; it was exceedingly lighter than she expected.
It was also warm, warm like a human's body, if not perhaps warmer. She knew that the suit hadn't been a in a cryofreeze chamber, but any person would expect a suit or other piece of material be at room temperature; she also remembered the bit about the energy that the guy talked about, and she assumed it was warm from being inside that container. In fact, the heat and texture of the rubbery part combine almost made it feel like she was touching actual skin.
Jenosa looked at the suit in her hands, unable to figure out how to put it on. There didn't seem to be any area, niche or hole where she could slip her body into it. She was puzzled at how anyone could get this thing on.
As if reading her mind, the technician said "Here," and put each hand on each shoulder of the suit, where there was a clip that appeared to be was holding the 'breast plate' together. He unclipped it, and then put his hands in the neck hole and stretched it – what at first appeared as a pipe-sized hole now became a hole near the size and width of her body.
The man bent down to allow her to put her feet in first, and slipping into the suit, Jenosa felt like she was going through the most surreal moment of her life – which, on a surprisingly near-future factor, it wasn't. The same tingling sensation that she felt in the container was also felt inside the suit, but it was ten times as that, as though the suit was filled with static that you could probably see flying about. This time, however, it didn't just make contact with her skin, it was sinking into her body, and it was spreading through out every cell of her body like wild fire –like a virus. Her shins were all the way in and it had already spread through her entire legs, with the top half only feeling a lighter dose.
She didn't let this stop her, though she slightly hesitated, with the man nodding his head in a manner that said, "Go on, it's completely safe." As she slipped the rest of it on, the sensation raced more throughout the rest of her body, and as soon as it reached the back where her spine was, it spread almost instantaneously; it even went strait to her head, brain and eyes. When the suit made contact with her back – not the skin of her back though – she suddenly found herself connecting to a kind of computer, or more to her preferable words, a creature.
The man clipped the breastplates back into place, and for a few seconds, she thought she would either have to teal with a very tight fit on her chest or find a new size, but the breastplate itself stretched outwards to accommodate for that problem. Even the neck area, which looked a bit tight for her neck, as well as the blue padding that fitted themselves like magnets on the skin of the back, side areas of her jaw, seem to mesh with her body.
She got up from the floor and flexed her body; she had no trouble moving at all. To her surprise, the suit was surprisingly comfortable, if not strange. Actually, it was not like she was actually wearing the suit, or any clothing at all – nor was it like as some people could describe other suits as a "second skin."
The suit, in a sense, was her skin, with only the plates and other white-padded material being like a kind of armor or hardened skin. She had the idea that she could do several other 'movements', like move an extra eye lash or leg, not that it was though she did; more like she could 'move' or 'command' unknown qualities and abilities her body had just acquired. Looking at the dark blue material and light blue lining, she couldn't help but get the idea that she had become an alien, which lightly disturbed her.
"So, how does it feel?" the technician inquired with a smile on his face.
"Well, there are a bunch of ways I can describe this, but I believe 'weird' is the best term. Although," she added, "there really isn't any pain, and, actually, it feels almost neat to move and even think in."
"That weirdness your feeling would happen to be the energy the suit's using to-"
"Interface with my body," Jenosa finished.
The man blinked a bit, "Quite right."
Jenosa made smirk, showing that she too could be quick and witty when she wanted to be.
"I'm little surprised that you don't seemed to be surprised that the suit uses energy itself to act as a kind of nervous system. Nerve cells send electricity as a kind of message throughout each other, but it isn't well know by anyone else for 'simple' energy to relate commands; study over condensed and complex energy creatures show us how this function works, but never has there a technology that uses the same principle in a biological person."
"Excuse me," scoffed Jenosa, "but I failed most of higher education subjects including 'science,' though I can assure that I'm not utterly brainless when it comes to obvious stuff such as electricity and such. Let's just say I wasn't really interested in keeping up with my courses; you guys can make up all sorts of stuff that can make the world loopy for all I care, so long as it doesn't bite me or an entire civilization."
"Which reminds," she added, "does this interface have any kind of side-effects that I have to worry about."
"Not at all," the technician replied with confidence, "the scientists at the lab have used these suits for quite a while, they've never complained about any dizziness or headache, nor have there been any kind of psychological changes."
Jenosa felt relief at hearing this, not just because it dampened her worries that the suit might potentially screw up her body, but also because this guy actually answered her question more directly. And yet, she couldn't help but feel that she was missing on a very crucial piece of information, but she just couldn't put it into a question.
"Now," came the technician, "you did say you wanted – ahhh, I see you already got a hold in activating the projectile gauntlets," he pointed out, noticing one of Jenosa's hands holding bright, light-blue sphere of energy in it, the gauntlets themselves emanating the same colored glow.
She was, in a sense, starting to get one step ahead of this guy. Having her worries lifted, she had a good hunch the interface wasn't probably just for a cozy outfit, and being curious, she decided to 'flex' those mysterious abilities. And low and behold she already found about these "Projectile Gauntlets."
The gauntlets gave her the idea that she had a cylinder wrapped around her arm, even under the impression that the entire suit was her body. In eyesight, though, it looked more oval-esque, nearly encompassing her entire forearm, thankfully leaving her hands free to move almost everywhere; and its shell was, of course, made up the hard white material.
The most notable detail, as if the weapon was supposed to be some kind of bejeweled relic, were these smooth, light blue crystals. Two oval ones were imbedded on each side of the gauntlet, which would be adjacent to the sides of the forearm, and when you looked into them, you could see that they were covering a small vent. A more spherical one was imbedded in the area that was possibly adjacent to the wrist, and it could be noticed that between the crevice of it and the shell that there were metal tubes or 'wires' connecting to it . Even under the gauntlet there were very small, pebble-like crystals precisely dotting the rim of the whole where her hand popped out of.
When she had initiated the gauntlets, it was like her entire body had inhaled air, and it buzzed with a much large energetic, tingling sensation; she guess that energy that she held in her hand was the 'exhale.'
She let go of the energy and is dissipated out of her hand like vapor. "I'm taking this gauntlet is some kind of weapon," she inquired.
"That it is," the man replied, "but unlike regular fire arms, it isn't one of those simple 'point-and-shoot weapons. Instead, you have to actually toss the energy in your hand like it was a baseball. It might be awkward at first, but you'll get used to it. Also, beware that the range for these shots are limited to a short distance, so don't expect to go sniping any time soon; and, finally, be wary of over using the gauntlets too much, as they'll over heat."
"You should note that, despite it's simple-looking nature, the suit has its own data base where you can store data such as maps and the important information that you'll be salvaging. The suit can actually show you this data via neural imaging, where it's actually like you see the data being displayed in your vision like you actually had a kind of HUD – of course, it's really just the suit sending data to the visual part of your brain."
"Bear in mind that this suit also has sensors on it, but pulling up the data wouldn't reveal you anything because it's just ones and zeros – you'll need an program or A.I. to translate for you. Aaaaaaaand you don't, again, have to worry about the interface because the method of how the suit operates is slightly different from that of regular electronics, so it won't be affected by EMPs of the sort and go on the fritz."
Jenosa stared down at her own self, blinking, and bemused at how more this suit was. If everything that the man said was true, and she was positive that this was the truth, then she was bearing her eyes at tech that was well above the usual standard equipment that she received or bought. She clasped a hand on one of her arms in an attempt to discern any kind of metallic hardware hidden within the blue, rubbery material. To her surprise, she could barely squeeze her own arm, less even jab what she felt like was her own skin.
The hell, she thought, incredulous at how stiff this material was, as though she was grasping a tree bark instead of rubber. How could this stuff be so hard, so armor-like, and still allow her to flex her arms and legs freely as though she had nothing on? Now this was something that just didn't make any sense in her own laws of physics.
At that instant, she realized something. Her eyes turned to the technician, a smile on her face, "This blue material, it isn't just to, well, protect me from bio-hazardous stuff, it's some kind of body armor, isn't it?"
"That it is," the man said with a nod of pride, "though I can't say it's built for war, the stuff is pretty sturdy."
"So, in other words, what I'm wearing here isn't just a regular bio-suit; it's a suit that's combine multiple platforms," she paused, "You cannot argue this isn't a prototype."
"That I can't. Y'know, for a person who probably failed science, you definitely have a intuitive eye for technology."
"Heh, it runs in the business," she smirked.
"In any case," the man went on, "there's probably more stuff that I could tell you about the suit, but you can probably find out yourself and have a program tell you what it is and how to do it. The suit functions with your mind as thought it were a biological part of you. Of course," he added, "I have to install a program first."
"Would it be possible for you to install a back-up version of my ship's A.I. into this suit. Having a program with more intelligence than a screw and the ability to speak would be real handy."
"Sure thing."
As he and Jenosa prepped to install her A.I., data of the facilities layout and such, played with more of the suit's functions, she couldn't help but feel that everything from the secretary to the pay check to even the suit were all aberrant. She normally didn't receive gear like this, and they rarely gave her any kind of special guns or ammunition, as they knew she could take care of herself, being the resourceful gal she was. Why did they need to give an experimental suit that was HAZMAT and combat suit in one? Why not just give her a regular bio-suit and let her deal with dangers on her own wit and weapons? What was in that lab that made it so important for to wear this suit?
These questions swam in her mind as she waited anxiously to depart for the mission and get that big money contract. She didn't bother asking anyone them, and knew fully well she'd would find out eventually.
Little did she know she was going to regret taking this job when it was too late to abort.