With a hiss and a whir of bolts, the repair bay slowly slides your new hatch into place. It's an unexpectedly good fit, the one taken off of the Ocelot slotting in with only a few rough edges needing to be shaved away.
The connection to its systems isn't as smooth, but after a lot of back and forth between its onboard controllers and the Primary Control System, as well as some trial and error on your own part, you manage to work out the kinks to open and close the hatch, and address the monitor built into the it.
The edges of the monitor are just barely not quite as flush with the ones around it as the old one was, but it's within a centimeter or two. Still, so long as the video feed from your visual sensors goes through, the small seam between the displays shouldn't cause much trouble for the pilot.
At this point, more suggestions are passed upward from the black box of processing beneath you. You postpone them for the time being, since your pilot is still involved in making changes to your systems, tapping away at your newly installed monitor while you translate his motions into actual requests for the repair bay.
The first thing he does is test out adding and removing a couple pieces of external armor. Once he's familiarized himself, he starts to dig in more, sifting through menus.
He looks through the current status of a number of your parts, repeatedly commenting in surprise on how you have large sections of underutilized internal space beneath your armor. That definitely fits with the data you have on Comet frames being prototypes with missing internals due to being released too early.
“So, these new arms have these, but why are they over here...?” he mutters as he nearly presses his face to the screen, deep in thought. “How does this work anyway?” Frowning, he presses on where it lists the Long Range Radio Scanner installed in your new left arm.
You guess what he's wondering about thanks to his mumbling, and toss out a window beside the one he's looking at, with the information about that system.
Long Range Radio Scanner – Detects radio waves over long ranges. Good for increasing communication range, and can map out surrounding environment to some degree. Works most effectively with a dedicated Radio Communications Unit for better signal detection.
When you check on the system, you find that while you aren't picking up any transmissions, it is outputting a map of the surroundings as described. It's not a pretty bad one, but you recognize the sparse rectangular shape as the hanger around you. You display the rough approximation onscreen, which your pilot briefly considers.
“Let's try...” he mutters, and goes back to tapping away at your central monitor, displaying repair bay's menu. He first has you request to remove the Long Range Radio Scanner from your arm, then has it put into your head. In the space that clears, he has one of the fuel storage tanks listed among the hanger's inventory put into your arm instead.
When the system asks what kind of fuel feeds to use, he scratches his head between the options of 'local' and 'distant.' After a minute of indecision, he chooses local. The other fuel storages throughout your frame are also described as local, so that's likely why.
“Not sure about that last part, but looks a little more symmetrical now,” he notes. “And I wonder, does that radio work better in the head?” He has to wait to find out. The buzzing arms are still in the process of reconnecting the wiring in its new location, nestled inside the small armored section of your head, just beneath the visual sensors.
When it does finish and you bring up the map it's providing, it is noticeably more well defined. Still not very good, but better. Not having the sensor buried deep inside your armor and other systems understandably helps it pick up on radio waves better.
Your pilot pokes around a little while longer, but doesn't immediately change anything else. So, you present him with the last major option for changing your frame: your legs. Gathering up all the necessary data, you display it onscreen. You also include your current legs, to give him a frame of reference.
Part
Comet
Badang
Kitsune
Elaran
Octagon
Ironside
Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
Location
Comet
Inventory
Inventory
Inventory
Inventory
Inventory
Weight
22 tons
26 tons
32 tons
27 tons
31 tons
45 tons
Sized For
9 meters
9 meters
9 meters
10 meters
10 meters
11 meters
Speed
Medium
Medium
Fast
Medium
Medium
Slow
Armor
Medium-Low
Medium
Medium
Medium
Medium-High
Very High
Hardpoints
12
8
10
10
6
10
Sockets
12
4
24
12
10
8
Internals
Paired Maneuvering Gyroscopes (2), Fuel Storage (2), Reinforced Internal Structure (2), Small heatsink (2)
Paired Maneuvering Gyroscopes (2), Fuel Storage (2), Small Heatsink (2)
Maneuvering Gyroscope (4), Fuel Storage (4), Heatsink (2)
Paired Maneuvering Gyroscopes (2), Fuel Storage (2), Electronic Defensive Countermeasures (2), Particle Dispersion System (2), Heatsink (2)
Paired Maneuvering Gyroscopes (2), Fuel Storage (2), Ammo Storage (2), Wireless Weapon Charger (2), Reinforced Internal Structure (2), Small Heatsink (2)
Maneuvering Gyroscope (2), Fuel Storage (2), Inertial Dampener (2), Reinforced Internal Structure (2), Heatsink (2)
It's a lot of information to take in, so you give him time, while going over it all yourself. It's a little trickier than the arms were, since it covers both legs and their attached feet. Even though when you do a full rundown of your own system, each of those parts is addressed separately.
It's fine though, each set of legs is mostly symmetrical anyway, with nothing bigger than a change in weapon holsters from one side to the other. It still leaves the question of which would be most beneficial to use. Even ignoring the comparison between your current legs and those available, they're already pretty of beat up after those earlier fights.
But, which to use...?
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