It transpired that they no longer wished to be Chosen, and thus had simply opted to take this opportunity to cut ties. All good things.
Now it was some hours later. The Trade Link console shone before him, a pane of light that filled his vision and turned the world around it into impenetrable black. He’d dropped every points-tag he’d gained into it, and had got to his highest total yet.
Trade Link Interface | User #53,217
Points: 104,295
To his surprise, this had completed a challenge.
Challenge Complete: Hoarder (1) - have more than 100,000 points in your Trade Link Balance.
A hand rose from the ground, proffering a singular reward. Nicolai took it slowly. It was a points-tag, but not like those he’d seen before. Thicker. Heavier. Still silver, but a more… dense silver.
The number on it was 30,000. A 30,000 points points-tag. A shiver of delight wove through him. Nothing more pleasing, he reflected, than the reward that is entirely unexpected. The Challenge had been marked with a (1), and unless he was entirely misunderstanding, that meant there would be a (2) at another points breakpoint. What would be a reasonable breakpoint? 200,000? 250,000? 500,000? 1,000,000? No way to know. It was something to keep in mind.
He slotted it into the Trade Link link and watched his number rise, and addition bringing him to 134,295 points. He shook his head at the sight, a dazed grin on his face. I just don’t stop winning, do I? He giggled madly and tapped through menus, full up with shopaholic glee and bottomless greed.
Skin Suit Mk.5 — 40,000
The Skin Suit was first developed in 2289, by GRECKON PLC. They developed the first Skin Suits for the outfitting of personnel engaged in hazardous work in the what was known as the Broken Lands.
The Mk.5 was developed in 2441, and was praised for returning to the same modular nature of the Mk.3. It is possessed of the same lightweight bullet proof armouring, bio-sealing, and active camouflaging capabilities as all previous Skin Suits.
Notable features;
Soft-Exo-Suit-Capability — the Mk.5 adheres tightly to the user, allowing its artificial musculature to merge with the users, enhancing their physical abilities. This feature is compatible with some, but not all, bionic limbs. Please check users manual.
Full Bio-System — the Mk.5 takes sweat and other bodily fluid as well as waste from the user, and recycles it. It also maintains a perfect seal around the users body from the outside, while inside the suit it is perfectly regulated for long wear. The suit can theoretically be worn forever and never removed with no ill effect, so long as the user maintains it and switches out its filters at the timing described in the manual.
Drug Injectors — It is capable of injecting the user with various drugs and chemicals to aid their function.
Atmospherical Analysis — the Skin Suit draws air from the outside and samples it, giving the user details on chemical composition of the air. This system is capable of recognising anything that might be of danger to the user or to the suit’s functionality. There are also analysis ports with removable sample collectors, which can be used to analyse liquids and solids.
…
There were more features, quite a list of them, but Nicolai knew all the details already. He tapped purchase and then confirm with significant satisfaction, before navigating to the next item.
Skin Suit Helmet (Mk.5) — 10,000
A helmet designed for use with the Mk.5 Skin Suit. When used with the Skin Suit is forms a complete seal, entirely separating the user’s body from the outside.
The helmet is formed of plasteel and nanoweave carbon fibre, and is capable of resisting significant damage. It also connects to the back of the suit to create a flexible neck-bridge system, which recognises when the user is undergoing dangerously rapid movement such as in a vehicular collision, and firms up to keep the neck straight and the head still.
The front of the helmet comes with two options.
- Camera-type full helm. In this version the entire helmet is one solid piece encasing the head, and is this extremely sturdy. The user views the world via cameras set in the front, top, back and sides, which can see in all typical visual schemas.
- Visor-type helm. This version is the same as above, but rather than being a single solid encasing it has a visor of reinforced nano-composite glass. As such it is slightly less protective. It allows the user to see with their own eyes, though they can still use the cameras on the back, sides, and top of the helmet. The visor can be swapped out with an insertable armoured piece, to regain similar protection as version 1, though at slightly less effectiveness.
Nicolai purchased it, too, opting for the second option. The cameras wouldn’t have the benefits of his Cultivators eyes.
Next he spent 15,000 points on a decent Neural Enhancer, which he purchased from his buy-back list as his current Tier 2 Market only offered Level 1 augments. The neural enhancer was just about Level 2, and he would’ve considered it a steal even at the price it would’ve been without his -50% buy-back discount, 30,000. At 15,000 it was a ridiculously good deal. The main benefit this Neural Enhancer held over a Level 1 version, was that it would not exhaust the user after use, which was the very limitation which had made the Chosen who’d had a lower level Neural Enhancer such easy pickings after Nicolai had waited out their use of it. After his encounter with the four Cyborgs and Gilvine he wanted something to help further speed him up. Alongside this he bought a Spine Jack for 5,000, something he performed with an empty mind and did not think on any further.
After that, he found another good deal and spent a further 30,000 on a low-grade level 3 bionic eye, once again from his buy-back list. Everything on the list was over a century out of date, but in truth weren’t too far off the current level. Humanity had been facing a bit of a technological bottleneck for the past century, mostly due to depletion of many resources. This had forced innovation to focus on different ways to make the same stuff, rather than the previous focus of developing new and better technology.
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This bionic eye had multiple lenses which could move independently of one another, and would go very well with Threat Analysis as a result; he would be able to track multiple objects within his field of view concurrently. One of the lenses provided high quality thermal, another had an excessively powerful zoom function which would allow him to see the hairs on a flies legs from five-hundred metres away, and the whole thing was setup with an advanced targeting system that, when he used the additional eye-wire that was installed in his wrist as an accessory to the bionic eye, would allow for very easy and accurate aiming. Alongside this was a projector which would allow him to project holograms of light; a function common to bionic eye’s which in Nicolai’s opinion was significantly underused.
He spent another 5,000 on a relatively cheap Processing Unit implant. This was a small brain implant which was designed to do one thing only: run data, crunch numbers. To Nicolai, it held a particular use. Such units were very good for running AI’s off of, such as his Modules. He restricted his thoughts on this matter, treating it as “just another upgrade” and moving on.
That left him with 25,000-odd points, so he spent the rest on a few things for the others (he had to give out something to fulfil his side of the “bargain,” though naturally he limited this as much as possible), then on a Cherubic Surgeon Permit and finally, the rest went on items to trade and ammunition.
He was prepared to spend all the points now, because he anticipated making far more quite soon. Maxine’s work forming the coalition was going well, and a gathering was anticipated to occur soon. At that gathering he would sell all he could, and then go to the Trade Link and buy more to trade, and return, and sell, and loop this until the gathering ended or those who came had bought all they would.
When the Trade Link opened he unveiled the Skin Suit, looking it over critically. A large item made of a dark, tough, rubber-like material, at least on the outside, which was quite thick due to its protective layers, and even thicker in many places, over vitals and joints, where it was fully armoured. The interior was different, more comfortable.
He put it aside, claiming the Cherubic Surgeon Permit, neural-enhancer and the bionic eye in their shiny boxes.
Fifteen minutes later Nicolai woke from the anaesthesia to see the Cherubic Surgeon who’d done the job giving him a jaunty wave before it disappeared in a flare of golden light. Reaching up, he felt the ridges of the Neural Enhancer rising from his upper back and lower spine. Just above this was the Spinal Jack, which was significantly smaller.
In his right orbital socket there was also a comfortable weight and presence. Previously, whenever he’d blinked his eyelid had collapse inward over the lack of an eye, which had been a disquieting sensation. Now, he had no right eyelid because it had been removed during the installation of the new eye.
He currently had no vision from that eye, one half of his world still dark, but after a minute spent setting up it his other new additions up, that had changed.
His vision transformed, the uncomfortable lack replaced by proper sight. It looked just as it had before he’d lost his eye, as the bionic was a type meant to work alongside a human eye. But, it also came with additional functions. The world flipped as with one piece of his vision he saw in thermal. Looking down he glanced at his hand, seeing it rendered black for hot, over the cold white of the stone below. The Trade Link’s odd wires were also black, though less so than his hand, more a dark grey.
He returned it to default then peered out the exit, over the bridge. His bionic eye zoomed in, an odd thing to experience when his human eye remained at the same zoom, but Nicolai didn’t struggle with it. He’d experienced this sort of thing before, and knew how to focus on one eye or the other, and even how to take in the sight of both simultaneously. As the zoom intensified he was able to see in total clarity, as though he stood before it, the ladder at the far end.
Returning his eye to normal, he looked to the Skin Suit. Nicolai tugged open the zipper seals, zipped the whole thing open, stripped himself nude except for the few things he wished to wear underneath it, then began the lengthy process of suiting up. This involved plugging parts of it, somewhat unpleasantly, into his nether regions, alongside carefully and perfectly adhering it at specific points to his joints and over his muscles, and finally, as it wrapped around his neck, slotting the connectors extruding from it into the BIS ports on the back of his spine.
Underneath he wore his newest and best fashioned Oma vest, alongside his rings on his fingers. Wearing items underneath the Skin Suit wasn’t ideal, as it interfered slightly with the Skin Suit’s body management systems, such as the sweat collectors.
Noting the problem he then went to the Trade Link and bought some additions, all quite cheap, with the few thousand points he’d held in reserve.
As the examine text had mentions, one of the more well-liked features of the Mk.5 was its modular nature. GRECKON had seen the wisdom in allowing various other companies to make Skin Suit compatible additions in response to endless niche customer needs. This had paid off very well for them, Nicolai knew, as it had made the Mk.5 the most popular Skin Suit to date, a similar situation as the AR-15 back in the modern age. As such the Mk.5 came with the ability to be perfectly altered to suit practically any desired function.
One of his purchases was a pair of alternate gloves. After pulling the connectors and clasps holding the originals in place, he removed them and pulled on the new ones.
The new gloves were slightly bulkier, and developed for a specific purpose. Being able to rapidly remove and redeploy the material around the fingers, for use in jobs where even the Skin Suit’s tactile simulation capabilities weren’t enough and people wanted to be able to touch things with their own fingers.
These Skin Suit gloves had little rails running along the back of his fingers, attaching at his joints with ring-parts. Nicolai watched as Skin Suit material ran along his fingers as though alive, closing over the tips, using the rails as a guide and connector. These finger parts were slightly thicker and tougher, necessary to contain the artificial musculature which they used to move.
Having his fingers free would be enough for him to charge the rapier and draw on Oma crystals, and these gloves fitted better around his rings. It should also aid Soul attacks slightly, though he’d found that gloves didn’t interfere much with things like a Soul palm strike.
The next item had him unzipping the top of the Skin Suit, finding some of the many ports within it which were there purely for the plugging-in of aftermarket items, and then connecting thin black wires to them. He fed these wires beneath his Oma vest, all the way out the other side and then plugged them into more ports, on his back and his chest.
These would allow the Skin Suits sweat absorbing and bodyheat regulating features to reach underneath the vest, in a way that hopefully should have none or minimal interference with his ability to absorb Oma. He considered this important because he knew the effect that having an excessively sweaty area beneath clothes could have. He didn’t want to experience any chafing or other skin issues, and measures like this were important to avoid such things.
He even worked out a method to connect Rejuvenating Orbs directly into the suit, which when added to the helmet’s breather, would allow him to breathe in the mist directly through the suit, and needing only a thought to cause a mechanism to pull and push the funnel. This particular element took quite some time, as he cycled through various aftermarket items looking for ones that could be modified to do the various jobs required.
Once done he put on a new tactical vest, a larger version which acted as a full-body harness over the Skin Suit, alongside a belt. Taken together he could attach all of his things to himself easily and accessibly.
Looking through the visor he found his view of the world very good, along with camera feeds to the sides and top of his vision showing further views.
He’d chosen to use the visor variant of the helmet because of his Cultivators eyes. Through the cameras he knew he wouldn’t be able to see Soul Sense, Symbiote use, and other spiritual happenings. The visor did hem his vision in a little which wasn’t ideal, but it wasn’t by too much and he would be able to see more mundane threats better than ever with the cameras.
He intended to integrate his Bionic Eye and the Neural Enhancer into his Soul, which he hoped would give his Bionic Eye the same Spiritual Sight his other eye enjoyed. From what he’d heard, this would be the case. A few with augments had gained Cultivation, now, and had spoken with Maxine on the radio on the matter of bionic eyes, mentioning that it seemed to work on them just the same as on everyone else, no limitations or lacks.
Overall, Nicolai was very pleased with the Skin Suit. Not only would it ease his future travel through the jungle, it also improved his combat capabilities by a decent margin. It would protect against light arms fire, cuts, stabs and crushing attacks. Through its perfect seal with his body and via its artifical muscles, it aided, strengthened, and stabilised every move he made, and it could even lock up to prevent his limbs or neck being broken.
With the Blue Hornet’s lightning wreathing his body, with the Neural Enhancer active, using the Pegasi rings, and now, with the Skin Suit, he knew that he would be able to reach new heights of speed and strength.
He closed his hand into a fist, hungry to try himself against the world.