ON: YSS Miharu, Multipurpose Bay Starboard
It was getting late, but it wasn't really that late. The Daisy armors had been fetched, of course, and the parts for them had been scattered around the makeshift workshop in something resembling organization. There were tools. There were parts. There was work to be done. And, sitting in the middle of it on a metal crate-turned-workbench, there was a single sprite, waiting for her older sister.
The older sister — Ichigo — soon arrived, wearing her dirty, orange-paneled jumpsuit uniform, a pocket full of tools and cropped jet hair mostly sticking to her face or her head from working on the power grid. She blinked at the organization of it all; she had thought they would tackle one armor at a time. This would be much more efficient. "Way to go, imoto-san!"
Yuzuki smiled suddenly and looked over at the armors. Yea, they were pretty cool to look at, weren't they? They could get them done tonight, if everything went well. Yuzu looked back at Ichigo. "There's another way to do it?" she asked, a little jokingly. Out of all the crew, it seemed impossible to be anything but friendly with Ichigo. Picking a tool belt from the mess spread out behind her, Yuzuki passed one to her sister. "Where do you want to start?"
Ichigo took up one of the spanning tools and examined the parts before them. Yuzuki had divided them into the three main groups — actuators and muscle parts, electronics, and the frame parts. Most of the work was actuators, with some added components for the M6-1C units' Compact Sensor Suites, and then the frame bits. She took one small box of actuators for a Daisy's arms. "Actuators first."
"Hai," Yuzuki said as she slipped down from the crate. Arming herself similarly, she moved directly to one of the power armors. For a few moments she stared at it, pondering precisely where to begin before finding a decent starting point. Putting the actuator down, she moved the arm of one of the power armors, examining the joint where they'd be installing the addition. Without pilots, the suits were just heavy dolls. Yuzuki pondered, trying to find a way around it now that she was thinking about it, but there wasn't much else that could be done, really.
"We're going to have to remove some of the armor."
Ichigo nodded, approaching the armor Yuzuki stood next to. It was being hung on a mobile rack that could be pushed around the floor, making it easy to work on from any angle. She rubbed the upper arm of one of the armors, then at the actuators she'd pushed into a cargo pocket. "You're right. Anou, here. Yes, here." Ichigo had removed a small circular spanner and reached between the "collarbone" and shoulder blade of the armor. A sharp CHAK! and the top of the upper arm plate popped up some. "There."
Immediately, Yuzuki took the upper armor plating, and set it aside. The floor would do, for now. They definately had enough space here, at least. "What measurement is that?" Yuzuki asked, indicating the spanner.
"15 millimeter," Ichigo said. "Most of the Daisy was designed with 15 millimeter in mind, with a few 10-millimeter bolts included. It's better than the Mindy, which has seven or eight different sizes."
"Right," said Yuzuki, already headed back to her makeshift workbench. She grabbed two or three spanners, shoved them in a pocket along with a good, old-fashioned flathead screwdriver, and headed to the second armor. Ichigo knew how to do this. And Yuzuki knew how to do this. Time was wasting. With little ado, Yuzuki reached up and undid the magnetic bolt which held the second armor's upper arm plate in place, and the found the corresponding bolt for the lower arm. After it was bare, she began removing the suit's original actuator.
After the fact of the mechanics was through, this was really just repetative labor. They would install the actuators for the arms, then lubricate the joints, then replace the legs, then of course the oil again. Armor back on, AIES-booted and brought online for auto-compensation, and the suit was theoretically 'done' from this point of view. They could be tested later. Right now, all that mattered was that all the actuators were in place, so they could start on some of the other modifications.
Ichigo smiled at the pace they took. She held a can of the special "oil" — a polymer and hemosynthetic lubricant specially designed for KFY products — over her shoulder and nodded. "Good. This should theoretically decrease reaction times by nearly 25 percent. Now we must replace the electronics in the 1C sensor suites."
"We have the panels for that right?" Yuzuki asked, snapping the last peice of armor back into place and tightening the associated bolt. Looking over her shoulder, she scanned the multi-purpose bay where they had set up their makeshift workshop, looking for the associated crate. She hadn't brought them out, exactly, since it was essentially a bunch of small electronic grids and chips. Ah. "They're over there," Yuzuki said, indicating a crate a little off from their workspace, among a bunch of other crates. "I'll boot this last one up. Can you go get a hoverplate and move that over here, onee-san?"
"Yes!" Ichigo replied in Yamataian. She zipped away briefly, then came back with the hoverplate and crate.
Yuzuki closed the panel she was working on and stood up, wiping off her hands with a rag. When she thought her hands were alright (even though they weren't, really), she walked over to the crate, punched in the appropriate numbers, and removed the lid. Then, she brought out a small, foam-like, paper-thin sheet and sat it on the workbench. There were two more similar sheets on this layer, and they contained a number of chips and electronic componants that had been packed very carefully.
As Yuzuki did that, Ichigo began working on each armor's right thigh armor panel. She would bolt them off, as she had with the other plates for the actuators, then replace it easily with a panel that included a built-in holster for the Armor Service Pistol.
The young sprite carefully took one of the sheets of chips and pealed it, letting her sister handle the holsters. Yuzuki wasn't thinking very much about what she was doing. That wasn't to say she wasn't doing her job correctly - she was. It was just that, in the back of her mind, some part of her brain was doing something else entirely.
She took the chips to the first Daisy in line and lifted off the ground, very slightly, bringing herself comfortably level with the panel on the back of the armor's helmet. It took a little feeling around beneath the back lip of the armor, but eventually she found the bolt that held the whole rear panel in place, and disengaged it. Pushing the flap forward, she examined what she was dealing with. Then, very carefully, she began to work a few of the old chips free.
Ichigo was done in only an hour. The panels were replaced, and out a panel seemed to spring to holster the weapon it was designed for. She stood up and looked at Yuzuki, who had just pushed down the last panel on the final helmet she had to modify. It always took time to replace the chips. "Now that we finished that ... we test!"
"Test?" Yuzuki looked down at the machine that she was now, quite haphazardly, straddling. Sure, they were fixing them, but... "Really? We can test them ourselves?"
"Of course we can," Ichigo said with a big, goofy smile. "We're technicians and pilots!"
This was a new concept to Yuzuki. She looked back down at the machine with the growing suspicion that she was about to get in trouble for something. Whose power armor was this? Well, they were all standardized, it didn't matter, did it? "Anou, Onee-san... what are we going to test them on?"
"Nothing. We don't need to shoot anything. Just move around in them and stuff." Ichigo moved one on a mobile rack and had the armor open up for her to get into.
Yuzuki watched Ichigo going about preparing her power armor, still contemplating. After a couple of moments, she reached down and opened the power armor she was sitting on. "You are sure nobody will care?" she asked as she floated down in front of it, already undoing her orange panels. The idea was already in her head. The answer to the question really didn't matter at this point.
"Not at all!" Ichigo replied, taking off her jumpsuit and folding it neatly on the ground with her undergarments. She then stepped into the armor backwards, legs first, and pulled it up by the hips. The lower half clasped around her.
Yuzuki's actions mirrored her sister's, though she didn't manage to fold her clothes quite so neatly. On the inside, Yuzuki was harboring the lingering feeling that she only fixed things, and now she was progressing to something else. Something new. Sure, it wasn't going to be for very long, but still. It was something.
Ichigo's arms stretched out and into the arms, which also clasped and tightened around her. The chest rose up with the back to meet together around her, sealing her within the armor tightly. All that was left was the helmet.
Yuzuki pulled the armor up around her to the point where the warm hem-stat material could more or less finish itself and then looked over at her sister. "Where are we going with it?" she asked, "Just around the bay?"
"We have to. We're going faster-than-light right now." Ichigo picked up the helmet of the blue-grey armor and stuffed it on her head. She popped open the covering armor "visor" to reveal her face as the helmet clicked into place. "We just have to test the basics."
Picking up her own helmet, Yuzuki fixed it onto the armor, but instead of opening the visor, she left it closed. The armor, sensing that it was now occupied, powered up the SPINE interface and the world suddenly became a lot more open. Yuzuki observed the bay from a much more enlightening perspective. "What we just changed?" she asked, somewhat redundantly. "There don't seem to be any problems with the normal systems. Got anything we can try the sensors on?"
"Sure. Use your sensors on me. You're inside the 1C unit — you have a different sensor package than I do. Switch between the different systems and make sure they all function."
Yuzuki shifted through the sensor arrays. The bay shifted colors. "Infared," she said, listing it off, "U-V, the night vision should be working, and... the O-T-S is working perfectly. And you show up."
Ichigo nodded. "OK. Now to test physical strength." Ichigo held out her hand, as if she were firing some magic bolt at Yuzuki. "Take my hand, then push. I'll rate your armor."
Their hands clasped. For a moment, Yuzuki strove.
Ichigo visibly winced, but she held firm for a few seconds. "OK, good!" She didn't let go of the hand, however. "16 percent improvement. Now for stability. I'm going to push down on your arm. Ready?"
"Ready," echoed Yuzuki, who braced herself.
Ichigo pushed up from the hand, as hard as she could.
The angle was awkward, but Yuzuki resisted Ichigo for as long as she could. Then the armor creaked faintly and Yuzuki actually began to feel it in her own arm. Flinching slightly, that was the end of Yuzuki's resistance. About three or four seconds.
Ichigo nodded. "Perfect. A 6 percent increase in stability. That will help with shooting the Mk. II LASR. My hand strength increase was only about 7 percent, which is what we needed. Arm stability increased by 4 percent, also acceptable."
"Right," said Yuzuki, who released Ichigo's hand. The heavy armor clanked on the iron paneling of the multipurpose bay as Yuzuki took a few steps, then stopped. "The sensors," she said after a moment, "Are picking up movement." With a hand, she pointed upwards, directly over her, towards the crew quarters on the upper deck. Then to the bridge, then elsewhere. "It's very precise. I don't know how to tell if it's an improvement to range, though."
"Switch to active detection, and ask the armor to theorize how far it can project. That will have to do for now." Ichigo took a breath, then began performing a series of martial arts sets she recalled from the Miharu's memory.
Yuzuki did. She ran the tests. "An increase in range," Yuzuki said, after she had received the information, "At least eight or nine percent, if not ten." The armored sprite turned and watched Ichigo for a moment. Then she asked, "Do you spar, with any of the other crew?"
Ichigo stopped after a moment, and shook her helmeted head. "No ... Nimura-onee-chan is much better than I am. I was only testing the general movement of the armor, which seems improved by about 9 percent — all we can ask for, really."
Standing there, pondering, Yuzuki ventured, "We could..." before stopping to consider what she was suggesting. Government property? No. No, absolutely not. But then again, what could it hurt, really? Where else would she ever get the chance? After a small mental conflict, she gave it a miss. "Anou, I suppose, of course, we are finished."
"Mm!" Ichigo reached for the helmet and slipped it from her head easily following a few clicks. "But now we have given the pilots a better chance of survival."
"Hai," answered Yuzuki, taking her helmet off as well and placing it under her arm. Was she disappointed? Just a little. Just a little. Well, it probably wasn't her place, anyway. "It's a good system, I think. But isn't it strange? The nomenclature on these actuators say they're for Mindy's, but Shosa-san ordered them, anyway. Do you think she knew they'd be reverse-compatable?"
"The Shosa is strange," Ichigo said simply. "I do not understand her! I will ask the Juni, neh?" Ichigo stepped out of the armor and placed it back on the mobile rack, which would be put back into place later. She picked up her clothes, the slightly slimy feeling of her skin not bothering her.
Without further comment, withdrawing into her own personal thoughts, Yuzuki removed her armor and reassembled it on the rack. Then she picked up her clothing and folded it a little more properly. It felt a little weird, going back to a regular perception just like that. A little more than off-putting. When she had finished, she held her clothing against her chest and bowed a little to Ichigo. "Thanks a lot for your help, onee-san."
"Thank you, imoto-san!" Ichigo said with a bow in return. She smiled and looked at her sister. "Race to the showers!"
END
It was getting late, but it wasn't really that late. The Daisy armors had been fetched, of course, and the parts for them had been scattered around the makeshift workshop in something resembling organization. There were tools. There were parts. There was work to be done. And, sitting in the middle of it on a metal crate-turned-workbench, there was a single sprite, waiting for her older sister.
The older sister — Ichigo — soon arrived, wearing her dirty, orange-paneled jumpsuit uniform, a pocket full of tools and cropped jet hair mostly sticking to her face or her head from working on the power grid. She blinked at the organization of it all; she had thought they would tackle one armor at a time. This would be much more efficient. "Way to go, imoto-san!"
Yuzuki smiled suddenly and looked over at the armors. Yea, they were pretty cool to look at, weren't they? They could get them done tonight, if everything went well. Yuzu looked back at Ichigo. "There's another way to do it?" she asked, a little jokingly. Out of all the crew, it seemed impossible to be anything but friendly with Ichigo. Picking a tool belt from the mess spread out behind her, Yuzuki passed one to her sister. "Where do you want to start?"
Ichigo took up one of the spanning tools and examined the parts before them. Yuzuki had divided them into the three main groups — actuators and muscle parts, electronics, and the frame parts. Most of the work was actuators, with some added components for the M6-1C units' Compact Sensor Suites, and then the frame bits. She took one small box of actuators for a Daisy's arms. "Actuators first."
"Hai," Yuzuki said as she slipped down from the crate. Arming herself similarly, she moved directly to one of the power armors. For a few moments she stared at it, pondering precisely where to begin before finding a decent starting point. Putting the actuator down, she moved the arm of one of the power armors, examining the joint where they'd be installing the addition. Without pilots, the suits were just heavy dolls. Yuzuki pondered, trying to find a way around it now that she was thinking about it, but there wasn't much else that could be done, really.
"We're going to have to remove some of the armor."
Ichigo nodded, approaching the armor Yuzuki stood next to. It was being hung on a mobile rack that could be pushed around the floor, making it easy to work on from any angle. She rubbed the upper arm of one of the armors, then at the actuators she'd pushed into a cargo pocket. "You're right. Anou, here. Yes, here." Ichigo had removed a small circular spanner and reached between the "collarbone" and shoulder blade of the armor. A sharp CHAK! and the top of the upper arm plate popped up some. "There."
Immediately, Yuzuki took the upper armor plating, and set it aside. The floor would do, for now. They definately had enough space here, at least. "What measurement is that?" Yuzuki asked, indicating the spanner.
"15 millimeter," Ichigo said. "Most of the Daisy was designed with 15 millimeter in mind, with a few 10-millimeter bolts included. It's better than the Mindy, which has seven or eight different sizes."
"Right," said Yuzuki, already headed back to her makeshift workbench. She grabbed two or three spanners, shoved them in a pocket along with a good, old-fashioned flathead screwdriver, and headed to the second armor. Ichigo knew how to do this. And Yuzuki knew how to do this. Time was wasting. With little ado, Yuzuki reached up and undid the magnetic bolt which held the second armor's upper arm plate in place, and the found the corresponding bolt for the lower arm. After it was bare, she began removing the suit's original actuator.
After the fact of the mechanics was through, this was really just repetative labor. They would install the actuators for the arms, then lubricate the joints, then replace the legs, then of course the oil again. Armor back on, AIES-booted and brought online for auto-compensation, and the suit was theoretically 'done' from this point of view. They could be tested later. Right now, all that mattered was that all the actuators were in place, so they could start on some of the other modifications.
Ichigo smiled at the pace they took. She held a can of the special "oil" — a polymer and hemosynthetic lubricant specially designed for KFY products — over her shoulder and nodded. "Good. This should theoretically decrease reaction times by nearly 25 percent. Now we must replace the electronics in the 1C sensor suites."
"We have the panels for that right?" Yuzuki asked, snapping the last peice of armor back into place and tightening the associated bolt. Looking over her shoulder, she scanned the multi-purpose bay where they had set up their makeshift workshop, looking for the associated crate. She hadn't brought them out, exactly, since it was essentially a bunch of small electronic grids and chips. Ah. "They're over there," Yuzuki said, indicating a crate a little off from their workspace, among a bunch of other crates. "I'll boot this last one up. Can you go get a hoverplate and move that over here, onee-san?"
"Yes!" Ichigo replied in Yamataian. She zipped away briefly, then came back with the hoverplate and crate.
Yuzuki closed the panel she was working on and stood up, wiping off her hands with a rag. When she thought her hands were alright (even though they weren't, really), she walked over to the crate, punched in the appropriate numbers, and removed the lid. Then, she brought out a small, foam-like, paper-thin sheet and sat it on the workbench. There were two more similar sheets on this layer, and they contained a number of chips and electronic componants that had been packed very carefully.
As Yuzuki did that, Ichigo began working on each armor's right thigh armor panel. She would bolt them off, as she had with the other plates for the actuators, then replace it easily with a panel that included a built-in holster for the Armor Service Pistol.
The young sprite carefully took one of the sheets of chips and pealed it, letting her sister handle the holsters. Yuzuki wasn't thinking very much about what she was doing. That wasn't to say she wasn't doing her job correctly - she was. It was just that, in the back of her mind, some part of her brain was doing something else entirely.
She took the chips to the first Daisy in line and lifted off the ground, very slightly, bringing herself comfortably level with the panel on the back of the armor's helmet. It took a little feeling around beneath the back lip of the armor, but eventually she found the bolt that held the whole rear panel in place, and disengaged it. Pushing the flap forward, she examined what she was dealing with. Then, very carefully, she began to work a few of the old chips free.
Ichigo was done in only an hour. The panels were replaced, and out a panel seemed to spring to holster the weapon it was designed for. She stood up and looked at Yuzuki, who had just pushed down the last panel on the final helmet she had to modify. It always took time to replace the chips. "Now that we finished that ... we test!"
"Test?" Yuzuki looked down at the machine that she was now, quite haphazardly, straddling. Sure, they were fixing them, but... "Really? We can test them ourselves?"
"Of course we can," Ichigo said with a big, goofy smile. "We're technicians and pilots!"
This was a new concept to Yuzuki. She looked back down at the machine with the growing suspicion that she was about to get in trouble for something. Whose power armor was this? Well, they were all standardized, it didn't matter, did it? "Anou, Onee-san... what are we going to test them on?"
"Nothing. We don't need to shoot anything. Just move around in them and stuff." Ichigo moved one on a mobile rack and had the armor open up for her to get into.
Yuzuki watched Ichigo going about preparing her power armor, still contemplating. After a couple of moments, she reached down and opened the power armor she was sitting on. "You are sure nobody will care?" she asked as she floated down in front of it, already undoing her orange panels. The idea was already in her head. The answer to the question really didn't matter at this point.
"Not at all!" Ichigo replied, taking off her jumpsuit and folding it neatly on the ground with her undergarments. She then stepped into the armor backwards, legs first, and pulled it up by the hips. The lower half clasped around her.
Yuzuki's actions mirrored her sister's, though she didn't manage to fold her clothes quite so neatly. On the inside, Yuzuki was harboring the lingering feeling that she only fixed things, and now she was progressing to something else. Something new. Sure, it wasn't going to be for very long, but still. It was something.
Ichigo's arms stretched out and into the arms, which also clasped and tightened around her. The chest rose up with the back to meet together around her, sealing her within the armor tightly. All that was left was the helmet.
Yuzuki pulled the armor up around her to the point where the warm hem-stat material could more or less finish itself and then looked over at her sister. "Where are we going with it?" she asked, "Just around the bay?"
"We have to. We're going faster-than-light right now." Ichigo picked up the helmet of the blue-grey armor and stuffed it on her head. She popped open the covering armor "visor" to reveal her face as the helmet clicked into place. "We just have to test the basics."
Picking up her own helmet, Yuzuki fixed it onto the armor, but instead of opening the visor, she left it closed. The armor, sensing that it was now occupied, powered up the SPINE interface and the world suddenly became a lot more open. Yuzuki observed the bay from a much more enlightening perspective. "What we just changed?" she asked, somewhat redundantly. "There don't seem to be any problems with the normal systems. Got anything we can try the sensors on?"
"Sure. Use your sensors on me. You're inside the 1C unit — you have a different sensor package than I do. Switch between the different systems and make sure they all function."
Yuzuki shifted through the sensor arrays. The bay shifted colors. "Infared," she said, listing it off, "U-V, the night vision should be working, and... the O-T-S is working perfectly. And you show up."
Ichigo nodded. "OK. Now to test physical strength." Ichigo held out her hand, as if she were firing some magic bolt at Yuzuki. "Take my hand, then push. I'll rate your armor."
Their hands clasped. For a moment, Yuzuki strove.
Ichigo visibly winced, but she held firm for a few seconds. "OK, good!" She didn't let go of the hand, however. "16 percent improvement. Now for stability. I'm going to push down on your arm. Ready?"
"Ready," echoed Yuzuki, who braced herself.
Ichigo pushed up from the hand, as hard as she could.
The angle was awkward, but Yuzuki resisted Ichigo for as long as she could. Then the armor creaked faintly and Yuzuki actually began to feel it in her own arm. Flinching slightly, that was the end of Yuzuki's resistance. About three or four seconds.
Ichigo nodded. "Perfect. A 6 percent increase in stability. That will help with shooting the Mk. II LASR. My hand strength increase was only about 7 percent, which is what we needed. Arm stability increased by 4 percent, also acceptable."
"Right," said Yuzuki, who released Ichigo's hand. The heavy armor clanked on the iron paneling of the multipurpose bay as Yuzuki took a few steps, then stopped. "The sensors," she said after a moment, "Are picking up movement." With a hand, she pointed upwards, directly over her, towards the crew quarters on the upper deck. Then to the bridge, then elsewhere. "It's very precise. I don't know how to tell if it's an improvement to range, though."
"Switch to active detection, and ask the armor to theorize how far it can project. That will have to do for now." Ichigo took a breath, then began performing a series of martial arts sets she recalled from the Miharu's memory.
Yuzuki did. She ran the tests. "An increase in range," Yuzuki said, after she had received the information, "At least eight or nine percent, if not ten." The armored sprite turned and watched Ichigo for a moment. Then she asked, "Do you spar, with any of the other crew?"
Ichigo stopped after a moment, and shook her helmeted head. "No ... Nimura-onee-chan is much better than I am. I was only testing the general movement of the armor, which seems improved by about 9 percent — all we can ask for, really."
Standing there, pondering, Yuzuki ventured, "We could..." before stopping to consider what she was suggesting. Government property? No. No, absolutely not. But then again, what could it hurt, really? Where else would she ever get the chance? After a small mental conflict, she gave it a miss. "Anou, I suppose, of course, we are finished."
"Mm!" Ichigo reached for the helmet and slipped it from her head easily following a few clicks. "But now we have given the pilots a better chance of survival."
"Hai," answered Yuzuki, taking her helmet off as well and placing it under her arm. Was she disappointed? Just a little. Just a little. Well, it probably wasn't her place, anyway. "It's a good system, I think. But isn't it strange? The nomenclature on these actuators say they're for Mindy's, but Shosa-san ordered them, anyway. Do you think she knew they'd be reverse-compatable?"
"The Shosa is strange," Ichigo said simply. "I do not understand her! I will ask the Juni, neh?" Ichigo stepped out of the armor and placed it back on the mobile rack, which would be put back into place later. She picked up her clothes, the slightly slimy feeling of her skin not bothering her.
Without further comment, withdrawing into her own personal thoughts, Yuzuki removed her armor and reassembled it on the rack. Then she picked up her clothing and folded it a little more properly. It felt a little weird, going back to a regular perception just like that. A little more than off-putting. When she had finished, she held her clothing against her chest and bowed a little to Ichigo. "Thanks a lot for your help, onee-san."
"Thank you, imoto-san!" Ichigo said with a bow in return. She smiled and looked at her sister. "Race to the showers!"
END
