Fox
So much for getting there early," Volana smirked, prying her gaze away from the screen with the planet to shoot Fox a grin. "Guess we will have to ask about naming privileges later, yes?"
With a shake of his head and a lopsided grin of his own, Fox silently followed behind Volana as they made their way toward the hanger. Pausing at the lift doors for moment to take in the sheer breadth of Orbital designs and colors, Fox let himself stare for a few more seconds before moving on in search of his mech.
Dwarfed by the proper orbitals around it Fox's
Outrider was tucked back in it's bay, not even close to filling the space allotted to it. As he made his way over, Fox was met by an older woman in UN fatigues and a pair of work overalls. Tossing Fox his helmet, she leaned to one side and offered a dry grin.
"Have a nice nap, Kid?"
"Like a rock. How 'bout you Sarah?" Fox replied with his 'actual' voice, both hands catching the helmet. The engineer in question, Sarah Copeland, stepped back in mock surprise.
"He speaks! We in serious mode today?"
"Don't know yet. The day is still young." Fox signed back cheekily, his helmet tucked under one arm. Groaning, Sarah turned to face Fox's Exo-Frame as the young man stepped up to join her.
"Sitrep?""Nothing out of the ordinary. Regular tuning aside, you've got an ablative heat shield & chutes for the drop; booster pack for breaking orbit."
Pausing for a moment, Sarah snapped her fingers.
"I did actually have enough to enough time to hit the booster with smart paint and get it synced with stealth suite. So on the off-chance there are actually angry little green men down there, you won't have to ditch the pack for full stealth.
Outrider's all warmed up and ready for ya."
"Excellent work, Ms. Copeland, as always.""Kid."
Giving his engineer one last nod, Fox slipped his helmet on and pulled himself up to the open cockpit of his mech's chest. Strapping in, he brought the Exo-frame out of rest mode; the mech thrumming slightly as all of it's systems came fully online. As he went through the pre-launch checklist with practiced ease, Fox paused at the stealth systems.
...Always better safe than sorry... Opening a short range broadband comm, Fox spoke up.
{This is Fox in Outrider. Testing stealth systems in 3, 2, 1.} With that, the smart paint shifted from the clear cut UN blues and whites to the grays and metallics of the hanger itself. A translucent field shimmered into existence around the Exo-Frame a couple meters from its surface; bending light around the mech and rendering it little more than an unidentifiable mass from the outside. Emissions control and sensor baffling came online next, further obscuring it from any other sensors. Launching one of his raven drones inside the field, Fox gave the smart camo a once over.
...Looking good. No odd detection patterns... Moving the drone out through the field, the stealth suite automatically opened a micro hole in the field, allowing for continued laser guided control. Giving the outside of the field a quick inspection and finding no issues, Fox disengaged the the stealth suite and returned the drone to it's docking port.
{Test complete.} With the pre-launch check done, Fox stepped out of mech bay in the
Outrider and into the hanger proper. Queuing up for launch behind Adam's Skyhammer, Fox's Exo-Frane was dwarfed by the Orbital, not even coming up to it's waist.