Back to the Drawing Board

[Sarge Potteiger]

Two days.

Two days of being confined to the barracks gym, armed guards stationed outside to keep others from coming in. He left for food, the bathroom, and to sleep. But if he was awake, he was in there, sweating his way through an amount of exercises that no human should ever be subjected too.

His body went to bed each night screaming in pain, and his sleep was blissfully heavy. Not a single thought could penetrate the total exhaustion he forced upon himself daily. But if he was to accomplish his goals, he was going to have to go to war.

That meant he and [member="Ayden Cater"] needed to talk. Between his old suits of powered armor and the beskar he wore now, they should be able to come up with something, and so he'd put in a request to see the Lord Protector. Sarge had never requested Ayden for anything before, which likely should have been a clue something was up.

By the time he got around to showing up, though, he'd likely find Sarge resting between exercises, gulping down warm water and wiping sweat from his body. "Armor, Ayden." He says, staring into the mirror on the far wall that gave perfect view of the glass door to the corridor.

"I need armor. It's gotta be big, and it's gotta be powered. And I'm going to need to talk to the fella we pulled from the palace. I need to know if there's a way to imbue Force Light into a blade through old Dathomiri magicks or something."

The man wasted no time. "Also, I'll need a repurposed bolter."

 

[Ayden Cater]

[member="Sarge Potteiger"], [member="Ember Rekali"]

Ayden knew what troubled Sarge, perhaps better than anyone else. He had seen the glances and heard the quick exchanges. It didn't take a mind reader. Some one else might have considered him insane, that what he wanted to do was impossible. But Ayden of all people had no right to try and pass judgement like that. He had asked the impossible of Sarge, and time and time again the man had come through for him. Sarge had been there at the Corellian's lowest and stuck by him the whole time. The least he could do was do the same for the man.

When he made his way down to the gym, he found Sarge doing kickboxing exercises with weights on all of his limbs. They looked heavy. When Sarge made his demand, his request, Ayden didn't even bother asking what for. He knew. "Armor won't be any trouble. Anything you need is yours. Weapons, armors, gadgets, ships; it's all at your disposal." He didn't think Sarge had a ship that would have been rated for a mission like this. Ayden had a few in mind though. "As for our guest, I'll have to track him down. I'm not sure what he knows, but I'll ask all the same."

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

[member="Ayden Cater"]

"It'll need to be big." He says with a grunt, leg coming up so his shin could contact the hanging bag. The impact echoed through the room. "Big enough for a wrist mounted bolter. Double barrel. 60 rounds, 30 pulls of the trigger." His eyes looked to Ayden, even as he settled down and began peeling weights off his limbs.

"It'll need magnetized boots, a battery in a pack on the back in a secure housing - preferably with some sort of backup solar collection method in case it runs dry or low - we can protect the power cables with the armor itself. Those that can't be protected should be thick enough to absorb a good deal of damage before degrading. I also don't want significant loss of performance should that occur."

He was asking for the galaxy. "And from my original armor, I want something that can monitor the body and inject me with bacta and the like should the need arise. Obviously there won't be room for much but it's better than nothing. The boots will also need the function of being able to magnetically lock onto things, just in case I wind up in vacuum."

This time, he stood back and rolled his shoulders, cracking his neck and shaking himself out. "Also, it'll need a new interface for one of your AI's, a comm unit capable of breaking orbit and the best HUD we can build. If at all possible, I want something that can amplify Force Power - I don't care if it's one use only. It can be an addition to the armor if need be, something for what I'm going to do and that's it."

There was a sigh. "Also, I'll need a halberd made, preferably infused with Force Light - that's obviously not in your power to do. I can requisition the phrik for the blade and shaft from the Republic, so that shouldn't be a problem. As for the armor, you can melt down my beskar and make an alloy of it with something else for the best protection we can find. Study that prototype suit if you have to."

Lifting his attention back, he gave the man a hard glare. "I don't want stealth. I want war."

 

[The End Narrator]

A beeping noise would emanate from one of the holotransmitters in [member="Sarge Potteiger"]'s bag at first, an incoming message from an unknown source. The beeping noise would then begin to multiply on different frequencies, a little trick she had learned from her sister and her ingenious ways with slicing. It wasn't meant to be nefarious, just meant to encrypt and occupy multiple channels at once, as not to be interrupted.

The transmitters would continue to beep, something that would be fiercely annoying in a man of his position. Should he choose to ignore them, it would jump to the next one and continue until he finally picked up.

Persistency was something she knew best...

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"Bloody karkin' 'ell, who's this? Persistent lot." He grumbles and rummaged through the pack he'd left on the ground, hefting out a holo unit and tapping it with a frown, black eyes glaring at whoever was on the other end of the line.

"Who in the name of the sweet bloody nine Corellian 'ells are you and what do you want."

[member="November Sinclair"]

 

[Ayden Cater]

"You know, there's a saying on Corellia. I'm sure you've heard of it. 'You break it, you bought it.' Now I'm sure you don't want him sticking around and bothering you at all hours like a pathetic kath hound, so why don't you put him down and we can talk more."

Ayden nodded while listening to the list of requirements. This wasn't a hard task. He'd made similar suits for Sarge for decades. The main Protectorate battle armor was based on some of the earlier prototypes that Sarge had worn and used. It was times like this that made Ayden stop and think about how similar and different the two men were. Cira's death had affected them both very deeply. But whereas Sarge was a barely-contained maelstrom, Ayden seemed to barely register it.

"You sure do know how to sweet talk a girl."

In fact, he seemed to barely register anything since coming back from Coruscant.

"So are you going to give me a name to call you by?"

"Ayden. My name is Ayden Cater."

"Won't be a problem." His voice sounded flat in his ears while he watched Sarge do everything in his power to not tear apart and destroy everything in sight. For the first time in a long time, Ayden didn't have a plan. There was no clever strategy, no neat little trick to turn the situation around. Cira was dead. "How soon can you get the phrik?"

"By the way, Sarge will be working for you as well. Might want to get the locks changed."

"A pleasure doing business with you, Mr. Cater.... now kindly see yourself, and your pet... out."

And it was his fault.

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[The End Narrator]

"Who am I? Well, you should know that by now if you are who you appear to be..." A voice proceeded her shimmering image, it took a moment for the actual feed to come through but when it did a bluish figure of a blonde haired woman stood before him, adorned in her unique armor. She proceeded to sit down in a chair, from an unknown location and cross her legs at the knee, right over left. "So, you're the one known as The Sarge." She looked down at her right hand, examining the glove for a moment. Her left would withdraw a wicked looking knife and begin picking away dirt from the glove. "You know, working up a sweat like that isn't going to do much for pain you know..."

She knew potentially the last line would get some type of response, potentially one that could be violent. No matter, it would gain his full attention either way and that was the point. She knew of pain, maybe not as much as he was suffering but she knew of it.

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"Sinclair." He says with a deadpan look and monotone voice. "What do you want." He wasn't in the mood for chit-chat. "Already put the requisition form in, boss." That was clearly not directed at [member="November Sinclair"], but it was clear in the way his eyes glazed over that he likely wasn't giving her more than the merest hint of his attention.

He could still hear that huskily accented voice of hers...

“Who are you?” ​

​

And then the response that was so typical of him.

"Me? Oh, nobody."​

But somewhere at the back of his mind came Ayden.​

​

"If my kicks were that easy, I could just as easy choke him myself. But then again, I think he's enjoying it coming from you more than he would me."​

​

And with his response, they'd set their relationships for the months to come.

"Ya know boss, I think you're right; I do like it more. Sadly, though, if her's got any colder I might find myself becoming a necrophiliac."​

​

That was all it took, his face fell, his eyes grew heavy. That predatory hunch to his shoulders now came from too much pain to bear, and as his chest rose and fell with hesitant breaths, he looked back up as if realizing he was on holo.

"Really isn't the best time, Sinclair."

 

[Ayden Cater]

"Nothing ever pleases you, does it? I ask you for things to do, you get mad. I make something for myself to do, you get mad. Does anything not get you mad?"

Ayden stood there, faintly aware that Sarge had answered him. His mind was doing that thing he hated where it liked to bring up the past in the most painful ways it could. It was what drove him to drink so much after Elara's death.

"Alright, all-in-all, not my brightest plan." Ayden admitted sheepishly before diving back into the room as droids poured in from the shattered window.

Now hers would rest on his conscience too.

'First the shutters, then the jump... Not a good day for me.' He thought to himself as Fondor's wind rushed by. Dimly, he was aware that she had gone and followed him out the window. Maybe she wasn't too bright either.

For a heartbeat, Ayden considered jumping again. To what benefit, since he did not have a means of slowing their fall, he wasn't sure. But as he resigned himself to her possible demise, he felt her signature in the Force change. It wasn't like a light going off or on suddenly. It was subtle. As the shuttle leveled off, he saw why. She had wings! "Oookay... Definitely didn't have those before."

So much had changed. How many times had she almost died? Fondor? Cardea? The Oubliette? She had made it a trend to nearly die, or disappear and let the galaxy believe she was dead. He had grieved for her once. Of course, he had refused to go to that funeral. He had been so sure that she was still alive, it wasn't until he had taken over as Lord Protector that he let himself believe that she had died. Then, on Eriadu, she had come back.

And now she was gone again.

Somewhere in the back of Ayden's mind, something started to crack. A tiny little giggle filled his head, girlish and quite mad. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad to play a game with the One Sith. After all, games were fun. And they made him feel so much better. Just as quickly as that mad thought came, it was gone and Ayden seemed to not have noticed that lapse in judgement.

 

[The End Narrator]

"It never is, is it Potteiger?" She waved her knife hand around before resuming picking the dirt out of glove. "I have a proposition for you, and I don't think you'll refuse it." She pursed her lips and folded the knife back up calmly. "I can get you intelligence, codes and access to where you desire to go..." She motioned with her hands. "I'll even give you a secure frequency to live feed and communications chatter." She nodded softly.

"I'd invite you to the party, but it's a black tie event and..." She eyed him up and down from the holo, leaning in close. "You don't exactly look the type to wear a black suit and tie, ya know?"

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"Did it once. Was hard to find a suit that fit." He was still monotone, mind elsewhere. "I don't want to know what you're doing. But I'll take whatever help I can get."

Looking up, he paused. "You OK, Ayden?" He knew that look.

[member="Ayden Cater"]
[member="November Sinclair"]

 

[The End Narrator]

November raised an eyebrow and leaned back into her chair. "Don't want to know...or don't care?" She motioned. "Big difference considering where you're headed, you'll need to care and have some drive." She motioned again. "Pity, I never got to work with ya, I heard rumors you were a decent shot..."

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"I've plenty of drive you vile queen." He sneers, glaring angrily at her. "I've that's all you've gotta say then comm me the karking stuff I need and leave well enough alone."

There was a pause. "Arrogant sack of kark."

He cut the line. To say he wasn't in the mood was putting it lightly.

[member="November Sinclair"]

 

[The End Narrator]

November smirked as he cut the transmission.

In turn she finished up the frequencies and various items and left a nice little "Feth you too." At the end of it all, along with a smiley face and sent them his direction.

Hopefully, it would all be over soon.

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Ayden Cater]

Ayden shook his head and blinked a little. The stress of all this was definitely getting to him. He looked over at Sarge and gave a mirthless smirk. "Yeah. I'm good. I'll go get started on getting some prototypes up for your new armor. Should be ready for you in a day. The sooner I can get that beskar and phrik, the faster this'll get done. You know where to send it." With that said, he turned and started walking off. He still had all the old schematics for every armor he had made for Sarge, so adapting them to the new specification and adding in all the requested features wouldn't be difficult.

It helped to have something to do now. Idleness was the devil to Ayden. As long as he had clear goals and objectives, he'd be fine. The trick was finding a new one after the old one was done. For now, he had a Mandalorian witch to talk to.

[member="Sarge Potteiger"], [member="Ember Rekali"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

Sarge gave a nod as the man left and went back to his exercise. He slept unusually peacefully that night, the slumber of a man driven by a cause he felt was righteous. He hadn't been able to go to bed though until Sinclari's show was done. And when he awoke, he did something he hadn't done in years. He shaved no just his beard clean off, but his trimmed his shaggy hair down so low that looked like a recruit fresh from Boot.

Having given himself a long look in the mirror - and a shower to get all that karking hair off his body - he found himself staring into a man who at one point might have looked much younger. His boyish features, however, had been replaced by burn scars that crept up his neck like vines, a saber wound across his throat and a chewed right cheek from shrapnel.

Greyish veins stuck out below his skin, but for once he didn't give a single flying kark about that. Adjusting his belt, making sure it was centered properly, he left his room with purpose to his stride and a defiant cast to the hard set of his jaw.

The R&D Wing of the Spirit was massive, but it didn't take long to find [member="Ayden Cater"] and the prototype schematics that had been cobbled together. The Beskar was already here, but the phrik would take longer. Perhaps he could enlist Ashin to forge his weapon.

He was using every contact he had, it seemed.

"What have you got for me, Ayden."

It felt good to be back in uniform.

 

[Ayden Cater]

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

"We start off with a basic body suit." Ayden gestured to a flat table with a total explosion of armor plates, gadgets, and technical readouts. "Armorweave threaded between titanium-durasteel mesh over a thermal insulator. It'll stop anything short of sustained contact from a lightsaber. Includes a full-head hood for complete vacuum sealing. You ditch everything else and jump out an airlock and you'd be safe from exposure for at least ninety minutes. Assuming you don't ditch your air." He moved on from the bodysuit to a small canister and hefted it. "This is your lifeblood. Two canisters of compressed bacta; one on your left thigh, the other on your right bicep. These will help patch up any minor wounds you take. In addition to these, you'll have two more canisters situated opposite of them. These will have an elastic protein polymer. This will feed into the same system that will distribute your bacta. This is the heavy duty stuff for things that punch through your armor. It'll stop any internal hemorrhaging and numb the pain. It'll also keep your organs in place for a short time. If you run out of this, you will literally be a dead man."

He set the canister down and kept moving down the work bench and picked up an oversized fist. "You wanted big. It doesn't get much bigger than this." He tossed it to Sarge to let the man feel the weight. It was easily the size of his head and weighed considerably more than any human would comfortably be able to. Around the wrist area were five hooks that led into the fist. "This is a variation of a Mandalorian crush gauntlet. Its got a crush force sufficient to warp anything you can get it around. You also won't directly control it. These hooks here," Ayden looped each of his fingers through it in demonstration. "You pull this and the gauntlet will respond in kind."

"You're looking at a strength amplification factor of at least four, maybe five times your normal limit. A reinforced spinal column and frame will let you lift ten, fifteen times your weight. Microfibers and a liquid crystal layer will see to all of that. Won't be as vulnerable to ion strikes, but if you get hit with any strong sonic frequencies at close range, it could destroy the crystal layer and then you're gonna be in trouble. Not enough to lock the suit up, but enough that a quick target could get up on your back and find a joint to stab you in. Which is why I'm including an electric discharge in the suit for defense. I stress defense because you've got one, maybe two good bursts in this thing."

"Your HUD will include all the normal goodies; MFTAS, motion and life form sensors, automatic polarizing faceplate, comlink, external lights. If something happens and it gets damage, you can eject it. Clasp is on the nap of the neck. Reinforced, so it's the last thing that ought to be damaged on the helmet." Ayden patted it several times while he continued down a very impressive list of gadgets and capabilities. "The AI datachip will rest in there too, so try not to let anything happen to the helmet. A short-range wireless transmitter and receiver will facilitate data transfers. A stealthier option is the normal scomp link in either index finger."

Now it was on to the good stuff. "Alright. You've got two forearm mounts. On the right, we've got your boltgun. Disassembled it and built it around an ejectable mount. Magazine is self-contained. Thumb this switch here and the whole rear box will eject. Reloading is just as quick and easy. On the left arm, you've got a missile launcher. Micromissile ordinance, enhanced with baradium. Significant damage, but you've only got two shots in a magazine. Now you do have magnetic plates on your thighs and back to carry extra ammunition. Alternatively, I've got several shields from the Mk II/H. You could take one or two with you for extra defense. Last option I put together for you..." Ayden picked up a rectangle-shaped mount about as longer as his forearm and pressed something on the underside. A pair of emerald lightsabers shot out the length and hummed before being deactivated.

He looked at the assembled gear and looked back at Sarge. "I've got the standard extra fare too; grenade bandoleers, mines, magnetic boots, fusion cutters; all sized appropriately for the armor. Power plant is secured along your back. All cables are bundled and shielded. Beskar plates will cover basically everything not a joint." Ayden finally sighed as he finished his list. "Only thing I'm still working on is something to amplify your Force powers, one shot or no. Everything I've found so far is either wholly ineffective or lethal at the levels we'd need. But I'm still looking."

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

"How in the sweet name of the nine Corellian hells did ya manage this?" He knew [member="Ayden Cater"] and sleep didn't quite mix, and frankly the man may as well be a giant stim pill with legs and arms. Talk about a bad infomercial on the holo at 0330 in the karking morning.

Hefting the gauntlet, he stared at it while Ayden rattled off a lengthy series of... well, everything a man would need to become the ultimate war machine. He'd asked for it, and he'd gotten it. But he'd underestimated the speed with which these things could be acquired, made, or even thought up.

He'd forgotten, in the course of living in his own mind, just how massive the Spirit was, and just how many people here wanted to make the next big thing in modern warfare. This was it. This was going to be the big leap forward for the Protectorate.

A suit of armor so impressive, so mobile, so downright terrifying and expensive that there could potentially be only one. But that's all there was for a prototype. One. Then things would be toned down to an inexpensive level as expertise was accrued and military technology could advance again.

The military industrial complex, you cheeky queen.

His eyes widened, not unlike a child discovering a candy store for the first time, or finding he had the arcade all too himself. There was a fire in those black eyes of his, a fire of excitement; a fire of purpose. Looking up at Ayden, he gave a grin.

"The suit will be thick enough we won't have to worry about beskar plates. Melt down my old armor and turn the beskar into the cables, since they're underlying the armor anyway, that'll form an impressive secondary layer of defense with what little beskar I do have."

Mandalorian armor only covered the important bits. It wasn't stormtrooper armor, all clunky and cumbersome. "We can probably scavenge parts from the prototype suit, but I won't need the sabers. I don't use sabers to kill." Strange for a man like him. "I can probably contact my old friend Ashin, see if she'd be willing to forge the halberd I'll need. What body modifications will I need for this suit?"

"Only problem; micromissile on right, bolter on left. It's more natural firing from my left wrist than my right. And we'll need special ammunition for it; the bolter, that is."

 

[Ayden Cater]

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

"He had help." A light voice chimed in before a figure appeared. Definitely female, the holographic figure stood there with an obvious smirk. "He just likes to think he can do it all." The AI had a bob cut to accent her features as she stretched and looked up at Ayden. "You didn't always pull all-nighters in the foundry before me, did you?" She didn't even wait for Ayden to respond before she laughed. "I know the answer to that, but it's still nice to ask."

"No, she'll not be pairing up with you." Ayden answered with a small smirk of his own. He took a moment to bring up a small list on a pad and handing it to Sarge. "No major modifications. Nothing unusual for long deployments. Catheter and biosign readers will need to be set up. I'm sure you'll love that." He chuckled and moved on. "Dexterity is not an issue. These things are on modular arm mounts for a reason. Switch them around and you'll never know the difference. As far as the beskar goes, how do you think I got enough to make all these plates?" He gestured to the full assortment of plates on the table before he paused and slapped his forehead.

"Right. You don't know. Let me show you." Ayden picked up the armor plate that looked like it would have gone on a forearm. "You can't see it, but there's a seal that runs right along here," he gestured with a finger where, if one looked hard enough, one could see a slight shift in the metal coloration and pattern. "Suit has a number of sensors that run to each plate mounting. On a signal, they'll fire off a series of nanocharges. The top plate." To emphasize his point, Ayden plugged the plate in to a model mount and tapped a few commands out. A second later and there was a sharp crack and the topmost armor plate slid right off to reveal a second one beneath it. "When I said beskar, I was only half-honest. The core plates are beskar. The outer plates are a durasteel-titanium alloy, same one we use to construct our starships. It won't stop a turbolaser mind you, but it'll take more than just a simple swing of a lightsaber to cut through the plates."

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

Sarge eyed the AI, the thing chipper and far more friendly - in a non-homicidal-maniac-sort-of-way - than the Red Queen. "Where's mine?" He asks, head turning back to the armor as he was given further rundown. "Put the plates back together and get the boys going."

There was a firm nod of his head. "We need to take it for a test run."