They arrived at the bay with a few minutes to spare and found that the entire area had been meticulously set up by the previous shift, in preparation for them to arrive.

There were two exoskeleton suits laid out on the tables, each with a different array of mechanical equipment on them. One looked to be the standard Mecha Mechanic suit, as Max had expected, but the second appeared to contain a variety of medical tools, like syringes and bone saws.

“Sweet, one of us gets to play mad doctor.” Nico joked, looking over the second suit, while the researchers scuttled about the room.

“Just wait in the chairs off to the side while we finish our data analysis to make sure they are safe to power up. There is coffee if you need it, as well as food.” A young woman with a clipboard told them, indicating a spot in the corner of the area.

Max still had the smell of spice on his breath, and one of the researchers who walked by smirked at him. “First day is it? I didn’t think there was anyone here I didn’t recognize. For future reference, the Lab brings two meals a shift to us, so nobody eats breakfast outside if they work in the Testing Lab. The lines for the restaurants you saw this morning are the design and programming teams, or the night shift grabbing something on the way home.”

“That’s valuable information to have. We were kind of dropped in without much detail, other than a time to report for duty.” Max thanked her, making the researcher blush.

That wasn’t an expected reaction, so Max looked at her a little more closely than just the essential details and noticed that she was barely old enough to have finished the academy, and was local to Comor, without a system. Max already knew that those who weren’t used to the physical changes that the system brought tended to be overwhelmed by those who had undergone them.

It was said that Kepler had the most beautiful people, but that was almost all down to the System’s interference. After the initial rapid growth, it deemed acne, skin blemishes, and excess weight as unnecessary, so it discarded them all. Even if Max ate ten thousand calories a day, his body would simply stop absorbing them after it had reached the upper limits of what it had deemed optimal energy storage. It also increased the energy density of body fat during his and many other Pilots’ upgrades, so that it didn’t compromise their form.

He would have to get used to the looks eventually, and the crude gestures that Nico was making, suggesting that Max should ask the youthful researcher about a little extracurricular fun after their shift.

The researcher in question didn’t notice her suggestion, but a few of the others did and gave the girl an envious glance. Max ignored them and turned an annoyed glare on Nico, who was playing innocent, pouring out a dozen cups of coffee for the staff of bay 29.

Nico was an amazing Executive Officer and an even better friend, but her ideas of what constituted normal and moral behavior simply weren’t compatible with Max’s sense of how things should be done.

He wondered if it was something to do with his past life since he felt such a strong sense of morality and justice lingering in those memories, but Nico did seem even more open and forward than the rest of the people around him, though not always by much.

“Who takes coffee flavored coffee and who needs stuff in it?” Nico asked once the cups were full, making the researchers laugh.

“See, this is why you need veterans in the lab. Remember when the other Pilots started? They had never even had coffee before.” One of the staff joked, making both Max and Nico give him a horrified look.

“Who has never drank coffee? and how does that even happen?” Max asked, genuinely curious.

“They sent them to us straight from the Academy’s Special Forces training. They hadn’t been on a single mission, all they knew was school, and the Comor Academy doesn’t serve coffee, because it’s known to stunt growth.historical

“See, there’s the problem. The System will compensate for that, so the Kepler Terminus Academy serves coffee in all the cafeterias, even if the first years don’t drink much of it. Plus, it is in every single ration pack. Even if they had been on a few field trips, they should be familiar with Coffee Instant Type K.” Max informed them, while the team came to get their coffee, with some adding cream and sugar, and some adding liquid shots that Max suspected were the Cyborg Nutrition Supplements.

Taken by humans, they were a huge overdose of nutrients but designed to be relatively safe, but they gave a long-lasting energy boost, keeping the workers awake for hours. If they were taking them at the start of their shift, the researchers must be getting pretty burnt out.

“Already with the energy drinks? Didn’t your shift just start?” Max asked, watching the staff hold their coffee with a look of reverence usually reserved for lovers.

“We didn’t go home after the last one, since the designs for the Exoskeleton were coming in. We’ve been here all night getting the parts made and prepped for this morning’s testing, but we spent the overnight in the upper floor labs.” The team leader explained.

Nobody here had nametags, so Max was going to have to ask later, or read their minds to find out who was who. Not that it was truly important in the immediate sense, but building camaraderie was important.

By the time the coffees were finished, the two suits had undergone final checks and were deemed safe to be equipped and activated.

“I will go first. Even if it blows up a little, I should be relatively safe.” Nico offered, stepping towards the tables.

“Good, good. Explosion-resistant test pilots are an amazing idea. We should see if we can get that feature added to the Pilot suits.” The team leader agreed, nodding her head, and making the frizzy mass of brown curls bounce.

The first test was obviously going to be the [Tech Adept Toolkit v3]. Max politely didn’t ask what happened with versions one and two if three was the first one deemed safe for human testing, but with a bit of help from the team, the exoskeleton easily adjusted to perfectly fit Nico’s frame, and powered up. A glowing blue ring of light from the plasma cell power module lit up on the back, showing that the suit was operational, and the arms came to life, moving to a neutral position just behind Nico’s shoulder line.

There were a series of simple tasks set up on the end table, designed to test the functionality of the arms since the frame itself was more easily tested. Nico activated the anti-gravity plating and hovered for a minute, narrating the trim change needed to make the suit smoothly hover, then glided to the far side of the bay.

The torch, welder, and shears were easily tested as functional, then the variable socket pincers and their extension beam, and finally the clamping claws were tested for accuracy in pressure. The adjustments were accurate to intentions within one gram, at least they were when Nico was using the suit, but that did raise the question of how accurate the neural link controls would be with anyone else using them.

Nico wasn’t hacking the suit, but her Innate Talent made controlling the device second nature to her, precision was never going to be an issue unless there was a problem with the suit, which was mostly assembled from precision instruments in the other labs.

“Success. We have success. Every basic function works as intended, the power augmentation and flight systems are all within parameters, and the neural link is working flawlessly, without any major input lag. They did an amazing job on this design, I’ve never seen a first test so successful.” The young researcher who blushed when Max thanked her earlier nearly screamed.

Max looked into her mind for her name, to save himself the trouble of asking later, finding that she was called Anna, and didn’t have another name, as she was raised as an orphan by the Military. When she realized how loud she was, she blushed again, highlighting the freckles on her face before she hid it in her hands and took a few deep breaths to calm herself.

“It’s good to hear such enthusiasm for your work so early in the morning.” Uncle Lu called from the catwalks above them, where he had been making his morning rounds when he heard the victory shout.

“Send me the test results and I will send the design back upstairs so they can make tweaks and modifications. Oh, never mind, you already did. Thank you, Major Nico.” With that, Uncle Lu was gone again, and the team helped Nico out of the suit before sitting down around a table to write their reports.