The Doctor
#2 of The Suit
I lay on the floor of the testing chamber and close my eyes, but the vision of the world didn't go away. I tried to block it out and eventually the world faded around me becoming indistinct. I don't know how long I lay there, the suit presented me with a clock but I didn't want to focus on it. It was some time before I finally opened my eyes and stood up, the suit moving with me as if it were part of me. The door to the locker room had been highlighted and I slowly made my way there, my legs like jelly.
"Activating stabilization. This should help you walk better. The test says a team of crew members would normally be here to lift us on a gurney but since they are not we must do our best." As the suit spoke the legs became stiff and seemed to provide me with walking power. "This facility was shut down according to the documents I read. I'm surprised that this suit was still here." I groaned. "Indeed. I have been sitting on the testing rack for more than eight years waiting for someone to initiate the test."
I grunted and slumped down onto the bench in the locker room next to my stuff. "So what do I call you?" I asked the suit before leaning back against the wall. "You can call me Rikr. I am a Symbiotic Power Suit designed by Doctor Kevin Tate. I am designed as a force multiplication system designated for the army. Though as you said the project was shut down and we have since been mothballed." There was a hint of pride, then sadness as the voice spoke. "I am now your Power Suit." I nodded, though I don't know why, I shifted my muzzle to the left and stopped remembering the funky water. "The water is pure, no additives are being added now that part one of the sync is over." The suit spoke in response to my apparent trepidation, so trusting it I took a sip of the water and moaned as the pleasant taste of filtered spring filled my mouth. "I detect your backpack holds quite a lot of electronic equipment, including a mobile phone, several cameras, and some security hardware. One moment while I connect to everything."
The suit chimed as my camera feeds appeared, the screen for my cellphone appeared, the contents of my external drive, my security crackers, and more, then they all vanished pushed to the side of the field of view where they were out of focus. "What did you do?" I ask.
"I transfered all essential operations to my own systems. I have copied your phone OS and data, and I have changed my transmission and reception hardware to mimic those from your phone. Your cameras now feed to me instead of your external hard drives, and your security tools have been uploaded and processed by my systems." I grunted in frustration. "Next time could you at least ask me before you do something like that." I stood up again grabbing my bag of clothing and mostly useless equipment now and stood up. My legs were a little more solid under me and I walked from the locker room back into the corridor. "Command staff and research staff quarters are in the admin block." The AI pointed out as we walked slowly out to the main door of research which opened before me without an access card. "Have a good morning Colonel Hayden." The door chimed in it's cheer robotic female voice.
"I took the liberty of updating base files and providing you clearance to everything in the base." The AI in the suit pointed out. "External communication lines are inactive and I can not use your cellular connection to connect to military servers, so nothing has gone beyond base computers yet."
I grumbled as I stumbled my way to the admin block. I was tired, what ever the suit had done or was doing to me right now had totally drained me. I passed through the empty cubical farm and headed to an unmarked door the suit told me was the quarters block, opening the door I walked through a recreation room, it was in a state of chaos, looking like whoever was here last just threw everything around. There was a poster on the wall opposite the door that read "Do your part! Keep the facilities clean and pick up your trash and organize the recroom." Passing the poster I headed through a cafeteria the only thing in there was a package of sponge cakes filled with cream. They still looked fresh and edible surprisingly.
The next door lead to a split corridor, the suit told me to take the left split and I followed it to the end, there was a door here that opened at my approach, once I was in the door slid shut and the lights came on revealing a spartan but clean sitting room with two doors. "The bedroom is the left door, restroom is the right. These quarters belonged to the previous facility commander so they are spacious and well protected, we can rest well here."
I grit my teeth, the AI was annoying me but I dropped my pack on the floor near the door and trudged my way to the bedroom, what happened after I don't remember.
Some unknown time later I'm awoken by a voice, not the voice of the AI but the voice of someone arguing with what sounded like a machine. "Marvin you absolute fool! Is he still alive at least?" Came the first voice. "Yes he is doctor. Suit vitals indicate he is quite alive, and healthy. The firmware updates have, as I simulated, solved the issues involving death from stress." Came the second more robotic voice. "That isn't the point Marvin! This project was abandoned by the military and you know I hung up my hat! These things were killing our test subjects!" The first voice came back as I finally opened my eyes to darkness, the helmet was still encasing my head but a second later vision returned as the AI provided me access to the suit visual sensors.
"I advise you not move yet, there is a new person in the room along with a primitive AI driven robot. They don't seems to have noticed you have woken up yet." The AI whispered to me. My vision changed to a hidden surveillance device in the room I was in, there I was laying on my back on the bed of the facility commander, there was a tall humanoid robot and a tiger with a graying muzzle and tired eyes.
"Yes I understand that doctor. But I was able to recruit outside help to fix the code in the guise of creating a game. I used crypto to pay them and anon email accounts to arrange the work. May I remind you sir that you programmed me to get this project done at all costs. Even when we left I continued to work on it." The robot's voice filled my ears as if I was standing right there. "Yes I understand what I programmed you to do." The tiger rubbed his face.
The suit whispered to me again. "Facility documents indicate this is Doctor Kevin Tate, the creator of the Symbiotic Powers Suits, my creator. The robot is Marvin an assistant to Doctor Tate. I feel that it is safe to let them know you are awake now." I sighed quietly and raised my hand from the bed to touch my itching neck, but of course the suit was in my way. I sat up. "Doctor he is awake." The robot said. "Yes thank you Marvin." The doctor said, frustration evident in his voice.
"Hello, Chester?" The doctor said turning to me as I sat up. "Uh yeah, that's me." The look on the doctor's face went from frustration to relief and back to frustration. "Look, you are inside an experimental prototype armored suit. Right about now your neck is probably itching like crazy." The doctor sat on the bed next to me. "What your suit is doing is installing the Collar, which is a fancy band of electronics made using bio-glass and carbon that allows you to connect to the suit from a couple hundred miles away, and it looks like Marvin made some upgrades to it, apparently you have pretty much the whole electronics suite of the suit in your neck." I flexed my neck a bit trying to feel this collar. "What the hell happened to me." I said hoarsely
"Well you see. You broke into my former lab, and managed to get caught in a testing cycle for an experimental armored suit. Don't worry though you should be able to get out of him soon. Probably by morning." The doctor held up a hand. "One second I brought you something to eat and drink. Lucky me they didn't remove these trial units from storage. See right now the face plate can't open." Doctor Tate grabbed two bottles from the table when he brought them closer to me details appeared in the HUD.
Bottle 1: Menu 10 Banana Strawberry Meal Replacer
Bottle 2: Purified H2O
"We designed these so you don't have to exit the suit somewhere that there might be a biological hazard, radiation, hard vacuum, or really anything the suit is designed to protect you from. They slot into a special port under your chin." The doctor held up one bottle and pressed the tip under my chin, there was a pop as gases hissed from the bottle and then the suit AI chimed. "Meal Bottle connected, any contamination between bottle and suit has been cleared. Water reserves are zero point five percent suggest connecting H2O bottle after to refill my reserves." The AI said as I pulled hard on the straw sucking the creamy Banana Strawberry fluid into my mouth and savoring the highly artificial taste. The taste reminded me of these cheap smoothies the school would give out when I was a kid.
"What time is it?" I ask the Rikr. "7:45PM, you were asleep for the entirety of the day." The suit said realizing my next question. "Ok Doctor Tate. Where do we go from here?" I asked the older tiger.
"Well first of all we need to wait for the suit to finish up with you. Then I need to reprogram it so it doesn't call out to military servers when it gets back online." He scratched his chin in thought. "Beyond that I guess it's up to you now. I don't have a particular agenda."