[center][h1]Jetpack: START![/h1][/center]
[center] A collab with [@Rultaos] and [@iTem][/center]
Harrison was working in the kitchen, cleaning up, putting things away, etc., when he heard Stryker broadcast about a meeting in the war room. He finished up and ran up the stairs to score a chair while he could. He managed to nab one and spent the remaining time reading the files he “acquired” from the Arbonne mission. With all the new members and stopping at Helios and fixing the ship, now was as good a time as any to catch up. When Stryker started the meeting, Harrison closed the files but kept the Focus active, though not recording. As the new recruits were introduced properly, he marked their names in his banks. [color=3399ff][i]Sadayet Kotaiki, Kotse Wilks, Ryan Rosk, Korb, Mazie, Pax, and Henry. Neat.[/i][/color] After the introductions were done, Harrison turned his attention to Stryker laying out the plan, taking notes. When the three men from the Alliance showed up, he thought one thing. [color=3399ff][i]They’re going to screw this up.[/i][/color] He promptly nicknamed them Morons One and Two and Head Moron (in parenthesis, of course). After the meeting, he went back to the kitchen to do a once-over and make sure everything was definitely put away. Meanwhile, the designs he’d thought up were bouncing around in his head. [color=3399ff][i]Let’s see. Most of the crew isn’t very science-y. Koren would probably help, he knows how to do stuff. Benny would probably be good too, he’s good with explosives.[/i][/color]

 Having made up his mind, Harrison first sought out Koren knocked on his door and presented his idea rather simply. [color=3399ff]“Hey, I’m gonna build jetpacks in the lab. You should probably come with to make sure nothing explodes and blows a hole in the side of the ship. Coming with?”[/color] Not waiting for an answer, he continued down to the lab. The Juz’ had settled to daydreaming after they were shooed off of the war room. So Harrison loudly knocking on his door was more than enough to startle the Juz’ into reality. But since Harrison never bothered to wait for a response, Koren decided to gather his tools and wordlessly follow the man who seemed more than eager to pound and shout at the lab doors.

Benny was about to settle into tinkering with his gear when the lab doors opened and he instinctively pointed the wrist laser mounted on Skelly at the doors. He only slowly lowered it when he saw it was Harrison at the entrance. [color=B8860B]”Wot the feck do ye want?”[/color] Benny asked. Harry entered and knocked on the wall before speaking, [color=3399ff]“Hey, I know we don’t know each other [i]super[/i] much but I had a crazy idea that I thought you would be perfect for. Waist-mounted jetpacks. Yay or nay?”[/color]

Benny looked at the man quizzically, sizing up if they were serious or not. It seemed like they were, and Benny had to let out a loud laugh at the ridiculousness of the sudden request. [color=B8860B]”If ye want help dislocatin’ yer pelvis, I could prep a concussion grenade and strap it on yer waist. Would be much faster than the jetpack idea.”[/color] He replied sarcastically. The blue-skinned Juz’ that he knew to be Matija’s friend followed Harrison shortly afterward, eliciting a small, almost inaudible groan from the bombsmith.

[color=7B68EE]”So where do we work again and who are we building it for?”[/color] Koren asked with his usual flat tone despite his actual mood saying otherwise.

[color=B8860B]”Ask Mr. Physics 101 dropout over here. Look, if ya two wanna fly then at least come up with somethin’ that won’t kill ya within seconds o’ firin’ up tha’ ignition”[/color] He said, standing up to walk closer to them. [color=3399ff]“Oh, that won’t be much of a problem. I already have some designs and blueprints that I threw together.”[/color] At this, Harrison looked at the nearest holo-projector and displayed his plans. They displayed blueprints of the concepts with to-the-third-decimal precision. It’s a simple design: two jets attached to either side of a fuel tank/attachment point with flow lines and regulators to control the amount of fuel being used. There are several things Harrison just couldn’t figure out, though. Mainly, how to have enough fuel in a tank to allow a person to stay up on the side for several seconds without being weighed down (though there were notes about minor antigrav plates being a possibility) and how to refuel the tanks fast enough that one could continue past the first discharge. [color=3399ff]“But it seemed like you two would be the best fit for this considering that rockets like this are not unlike contained explosions. But if you don’t want to fly across the city at 30-35 miles an hour, be my guest.”[/color]

Benny looked at the designs Harrison showed them and inspected the details of the diagram. It made physical sense in terms of functionality, thrust, and the flow of fuel through the small engines. Though the clear flaw in the design was still there. [Color=B8860B]”You’ll need more than a belt if ya wanna fly with this thing. Getting pulled around by the waist is a great way to break bones with this. You’ll need some kinna’ harness. Plus a bigger fuel pack if ya want the thrusters ta’ do more than be a glorified parachute”[/color] he said, running the numbers in his head. Having maintained and driven his own small spacecraft for a while before being pulled into the Revenant, he knew a thing or two about fuel consumption and maintenance. Though it was more of the dirty and improvised kind of engine maintenance as opposed to anything truly reliable.

[color=3399ff]“I understand the harness, that makes sense. I don’t know how I didn’t think of that. There is a problem with the fuel pack.”[/color] Harrison walked up to the projection and scaled the tank’s size up. After sliding it for a second or two, the weight indicator turned red. [color=3399ff]“The tank reaches a certain size, then it needs antigrav plates to not weigh down the runner. This, in and of itself, is fine. Antigrav plates take a decent amount of power. Although… If the pack was wired into my shield suit, I could power the plates at the cost of, say, half power? Yeah… Yeah, that could work!” [/color]

	While the two men talked, the Juz’ tried to read the diagrams and inspected everything that he could. He even remotely copied the diagram on his holo-watch without waiting for permission in order to take the thing apart in peace. Thankfully, it didn’t take long before he could finally make some headway on improving the design. 

[color=7B68EE]“Use Solidified Prometheum. SolProm units are more expensive but it’s lighter and it won’t screw user momentum and orientation, unlike liquid fuel. It’s also easier to make SolProm heating units.”[/color] Koren maneuvered past the two men to use the projector. He found it easier to compute on a larger screen with two hands than on his watch. He copied the original design before shoving it to one side and changed the variables on the other. [color=7B68EE]“Retain fuel tank volume… lower fuel weight by 48%... no, 30%,”[/color] he mumbled. [color=7B68EE]“...divide these… and… ah!”[/color] The Juz’ clicked his tongue as he appreciated his work. He placed the original and his own modified variant side-by-side and glanced at Harrison. [color=7B68EE]“68.923% increase on fuel capacity, and longer air-time at the cost of increased weight. Weight needs more balancing but should be within safety parameters. Refuelling SolProm is easier and I have designs in mind for it. But as Benny said, we need to consider safety protocols. Consider Matija’s suit as harness baseline, if she lets us, an exoskeleton for strain distribution and kinetic dampeners, and your AG as auxiliary thrusters.”[/color]

[color=3399ff]“Holy hell, I knew you were an engineer but, wow. SolProm, I would not have thought of that. The exoskeleton and Matija’s suit should be relatively easy to make. Get some scrap metal, sand, and various schematics and we can fabricate them as soon as we get the materials. I’m gonna go see if we can get that Alliance card that SAL had earlier.”[/color] Harrison retrieved his fab-pack and dropped it off at the lab, explaining the way it worked enough that they could use it. He went off to find SAL to convince him to give the card (or steal it, either way). After hearing from the robot that [color=00ff00]“it’s with the head meatbag,”[/color] Harrison went to the cargo bay and checked the manifest on the wall for scrap metal. He found an appropriate crate and strapped on the mag-lev lifters. With great difficulty, he got the scrap crate to play nice with the elevator and door. [color=3399ff]“So, good news and bad news. Good news, we could work on the exoskeleton and harness now. Bad news, Stryker has the Alliance card. And since he’s in the meeting, we can’t get it from him. So, I think we’re done for right now. They said the targets will be here in a week, right? So, I’m gonna call it for today.”[/color]