45 – Mobile Tailor

45 – Mobile TailorWe were quite a weird group if I was being honest, I walked first in nothing more than my bodyglove and a belt on my waist fearlessly, behind me walked Selene with her fancy pistol held at the ready and last came in the mismatched form of the three meters tall mechanical Arachne that was Zedev. His shoulder-mounted mechadendrites held an assortment of weapons at the ready and he used his large war axe to steady himself as he walked. "Are you sure you don't want me to make you armor?" I asked again, Selene was far too unprotected only in her frayed clothes in my opinion but she didn't want to let me cover her in bio-armor. "Yes," she said with a twitch of her eyelids, "I'm sure I don't want you to cover me in a chitin exoskeleton." "I could make it look like your previous armor? or maybe even slimmer if you want?" I tilted my head without looking back, "I could make it feel the same too." "Agreement: I'd advise about enhancing your protections Captain." "See, even Zedev is agreeing," I glanced at him appreciatively, "I can heal a lot but if you get your head blown of that's a bit too much even for me, you know the Webway is rumored to be flooded with Demons and Drukhari, this is far from a safe place and both might get the jump on us before I could protect you." "Fine," she said with a heavy sigh, "please make it feel like normal armor." "Leave it to me," I exclaimed with a wide smile as I spun around, "now, close your eyes for a bit, it'll only take a second." She obediently did as I asked which made my smile widen a bit further as I held my palm in front of her chest, a mass of smooth white tendrils burst out of my chest and wove themselves around Selene. In less than a second they took on the shape of the centimeter-thick armor I've been working on for the last ten minutes — more like a month with how much I sped up the processing speed of my Mind-Cores — it was ingenious in my opinion, I mimicked the way different organisms lived in symbiosis in some Tyranid Bio-forms and connected to each other via nerves. The armor took shape, it was designed more like what I remembered Eldar Howling Banshee armor to look like than Imperial powerarmor but I liked the agile design much more. It covered her like a second skin but it was made from the organic armor I assimilated from the Hive-Tyrant, it connected to Selene's spine with microscopic, hair-like tendrils that read her nerve signals and would allow the armor to assist her in moving around just like an extra set of muscles would. My favorite part of it was the psychic channels that ran through it like a web, I could channel my soul energy through it and the armor would become even stronger than before. Not to say that I could move Selene faster than she could react with the armor covering her as I was connected to the armor telepathically like it was a drone. "Done~," I sang as I knocked on her chest plate, "here," I handed her the helmet part too, "it'll meld with the rest if you put it on." I stepped back once and ran my gaze over her as my hand came to rest on my chin, I might have gone a bit overboard with the armor but Selene was quite underpowered compared to even Zedev so this'd be a good equalizer. The design could use some work still but I was satisfied for now, the helmet was quite ugly in my opinion, it was mostly spherical with a dark faceplate that'd let her see through it like it wasn't even there so it'd work but it rubbed my aesthetic self the wrong way. The armor was one single cohesive unit with the parts around her joints turning flexible only when she wanted to move, it made her look like she was some sort of mannequin as the armor replicated each curve of her body. I gave myself a mental tap on the back. Good job me. "What is this?" she looked down at herself with wide eyes, "you said you were going to give me armor, not a bodysuit." "It is an armor," I pouted exaggeratedly as I turned my face away from her, "I can channel my psychic power through it and enhance it even further but even as it is I doubt anything less than a plasma bolt is going to hurt you and I'm sure it'd keep you alive even from that." "Really?" she looked down at the shiny white carapace doubtfully. "Why are you so doubtful?" I looked over the armor again, "Is it because its not like, ten centimeters thick and looks like a blocky monstrosity?" "May I?" Zedev asked as he hovered around Selene with tangible interest shining in his eyes. "Sure." Two mechadendrites extended from under his tattered robe and started scanning the armor without touching it. "Entirely organic, how is it connecting to her nerves?" "It has hair thin tendrils that connect to her nervous system along her spine," I answered as the Magos started to buzz in excitement or something similar. "This thing is alive?" Selene asked with a grimace. "As much as a tree is alive," I shrugged, "you could also treat it as an extension of my own body." "Your body?" she looked at me then at the armor, "will you feel when it gets damaged?" "No, I didn't include pain receptors or anything like that," I shook my head, "though I was tempted to include a somatosensory system on the inside of it." "A what?" "A collection of nerve endings responsible for organic's sense of touch." "Oh," Selene said dumbly, "oooh," her eyes widened and she glared at me, "don't do that." "I didn't," I said placatingly, "the only sensory input I'm going to get from the armour is an alert when its either damaged, attacked or something like that." "Alright," she said as she got to stretching to check her range of movement and jumping left and right to check its mobility, "Holy Shit!" she exclaimed as she punched the wall and the rock shattered into dust under her armored fist. "Feel free to praise me," I puffed out my chest. "Average power armor could have accomplished the same." "Can you make average power armor here out of thin air?" I asked. "Negative." "Then shut up," I mock glared at him, much to the Magos' confusion. "What do you think?" I asked with a smirk once the woman was done with her tests. "It's much more flexible than any other armor I wore," she said as she raised one of her arms above her head, "it feels weird to be abele to do this." "The goal was for it to feel like a second skin and help you keep up in the fights to come." "Well I don't know exactly how resilient it is yet bet I think its both faster and stronger than any armor I had before." "Of course it is," I nodded, "Still, its far from perfect so I'll continue to improve upon the design." It'd be also useful to me, I could keep my current humanoid Form while also enjoying benefits of the other Forms to some extent. Eldar were fast and agile fuckers already so that didn't need much boost but they were soft and squishy as any flesh and blood being so the armor would come in handy. "Thank You," Selene said with a deep look into my eyes. "You're welcome," I smiled back, "it looks good on you, though I should add maybe some accents to it or maybe a cloth tied around your waist, what do you think?" "A powerarmor doesn't have to look good," she rolled her eyes, "but thanks for the compliment." "Oh but it does," I said sagely, "there is no reason it shouldn't look good if it's not to the detriment of its effectiveness." "I suppose," she shrugged, obviously uncaring of this vital subject. "Alrighty," I clapped once, "let's get back into walking, we aren't going to get anywhere like this." After I got two affirmative nods I spun on my heels and started walking again, the silence of the eerie hallway was only interrupted by Selene's chitinous boots striking the stone ground and Zedev's mismatched pointy feet striking it in a calculated rhythm. I, of course, didn't make any sound as I walked but I took this moment to finally check out the place with all of my senses. My more natural sense told me I was in a normal underground tunnel but my more esoteric ones were much more confused. My eyes turned pure white as soul energy flooded them and I could finally glance through the semi-material boundary of this tunnel, at the same time I pulled on my connection to my soul and searched for my body as I knew the Webway to be is some sense in the Immaterium. I couldn't see much with my enhanced eyes as I only glimpsed at a cascade of iridescent colours flowing all around this tunnel chaotically. My soul-sight was a bit more successful, at first I noticed nothing but when I carefully followed the thread towards my body which instead of phasing into realspace a bit after leaving my soul, now ran into the distance. I sort of dragged my soul along the thread as it floated out of my ocean of soul energy, a tendril of it extending to follow along me as I floated towards the dark water below but I stopped when I was still a fair distance away. My soul extended its hand and touched a shimmering wall that semi-phased into existence on my touch as soul energy caressed its edges. I could feel my body close to me now, separated only by this dimensional wall. I didn't try to force my way in, I didn't know how that'd affect the Webway and I also didn't want to hurl my two companions into the emptiness outside of this somewhat safe sub-space. My body's enhanced sight also noticed an abundance of white taking the place of the chaotic mix of colors on one part of the wall and for a moment my body and soul made eye contact. The moment came and gone as quickly as a blink as the wall once again shimmered out of existence on my souls side and the cascade of colors once again washed over any clearing on the side of the wall that I'd made. I slowly retreated back into the protective embrace of my Pool of Souls with my soul as I stopped channeling energy into my mortal eyes as well. Pool of Souls, sounds weird, but Sea of souls refers to the Warp so I can't call it that, damn it. Why does the Warp have like 6 names, all of which would perfectly for my little puddle? Soul Pool, sounds dumb but lets go with that for now. My mind might be enhanced beyond mortal comprehension now but I still had a hard time making sense of the experience, just staring into the eye of my soul was weird but combined with the somehow hidden and shielded Webway standing between the two was even more mind-boggling to me. I was trying to come up with answers, simulating 4th and 5th spatial dimensions or how bends in space could result in something similar to the Webway but I still knew far too little about the Immaterium and its intricacies to figure out how one of the masterpieces of the Old Ones worked. To that came the weirdness of seeing my soul from an outside perspective, when I looked down at my soul from a first-person perspective it looked just like my real body without colors and a bit translucent but to my physical body it looked entirely different. It was an androgynous humanoid form shining in an overpowering white light, so much so that I couldn't make out anything beside the vague shape of it and just looking at it made me feel instinctive awe. Since it was my own soul, feeling awe at the sight of it felt weird but what I wanted even more now was to...reunite with it, in a sense. A soul's place was inside a body but my own soul just floated around. What would happen to my Soul Pool if I summoned my soul into realspace and possessed my body with it instead of puppeteering it from another dimension like I was doing now? I huffed in annoyance, I really wanted to pick the brains of an Old One about these sorts of things, literally. I crossed my fingers.