Outrun – Cyberpunk LitRPG

Chapter 148

Chapter 148Thanks to the blueprint at the back of the black book I pulled from the speakeasy’s safe, I knew exactly where I needed to

I returned to my apartment, almost immediately getting to work. I had a plan, but I needed a few things before I could get into motion. The first thing I did was go ahead and order that poncho I’d been looking at. It was perfect for my purposes.

For its three presets, I made one a desert camo with a wash of yellows and browns, one an extremely simplistic urban color scheme that’d blend into most places within the city, and the last a bright, eye-catching white. It should be able to blend into any environment I found myself in, except maybe one of the few oases in the Outlands. The white wasn’t for blending in as much, though I had a few other plans for it.

After that, although it pained me, I decided to scrap my armor. It was cool, but I’d been thinking about this more and more recently; the armor wasn’t nearly as effective as I had hoped it would be. 'Course, I didn’t scrap it entirely. It was still my Mr. White disguise. I did take everything out of it though, including the Drop Chutes.

It hurt a bit as I disassembled the armor, but I knew better than anyone how poorly it actually worked. It wasn’t adaptable enough. Getting an Optical Camo Module would help in that regard, but even then I was better off just using normal clothes that blended in better. And I could hide more varied equipment under normal clothes and still appear as a civilian for the most part.

The main issue is that it lacked adaptability. Having a blackout suit of armor was fine for corpo enforcers and the like that had millions to waste on equipment that’d only be useful one out of every hundred missions, but for me? Not ideal. I needed something that could work and that I could wear in almost every situation. I’d thrown too many eggs into the armor’s basket, as is. I was only hamstringing myself.

Simple clothes with hidden gear under it was the ideal route for me, not this modulated armor with a dozen different attachments I’d been going for. Unfortunately, the rule of cool wasn’t always the best rule. It sucked, but moving on was for the best in the long term.

And getting around in the armor was a bitch and a half. I know mercenaries aren’t exactly rare in Aythryn City, but wearing full voided-out armor like that tended to draw the eye. And it was a set of heavy armor, which drew the eye even more than the typical vest and pads. Even if I repainted it, it would still be too much. Heavy armor just wasn’t for me.

I reworked the stealth body suit, slimming it down a bit more to be a skintight undersuit to be worn under normal clothes. Its thermal and soundproof fibers were still fine, and it was easy to cover it up with a layer of normal clothes.

Next came the Drop Chutes. They were the most important part I wanted to work with, especially considering Plan A in the back of my head. I had an idea for them, though I didn’t immediately get to work. Instead, I drew everything out in a notebook several times, checking proportions and various measurements to see if my idea was even plausible.

Basically, I wanted to integrate the Drop Chutes into my backpack. It would drop my carrying capacity by quite a bit, but a bag would be entirely inconspicuous and draw a lot less attention than having five thruster-looking things sticking off my back. That, and it would be quite easy to throw on a backpack compared to the full armor approach I’d been using.

It took quite a bit of time to get everything set up right, but by the end of various cuts and careful sewing, I had it all set up. My bag now looked like it had five spikes sticking out of it, which gave it a bit of a punk look that could easily be written off as stylistic. Especially in the city.

I went back through, anchoring the chutes carefully into the bag and wiring them all up to the central battery I plucked from the back of my old armor. The bag had a convenient laptop pouch I repurposed into a battery storage. I packed it full of the thermal absorbing padding to help with the heat. I also went ahead and added a bunch of ports to the battery, turning it into a micro charging station for various devices.

After that, I took apart the screen built into my gauntlet, turning it into a standalone pad. It was rather easy since I originally just secured it with bolts. It had been quite effective attached to my wrist, so I reworked it into simply being held on and connected with straps. I adjusted the electrical system to be a quick plug so I could disconnect and connect it to the system quickly.

I’d like to get it set up to be able to connect directly to my data jack so I could control it all mentally, but that kind of programming was far above my head. Maybe in the distant future.

I made about a dozen other adjustments, carefully nitpicking everything and reverting my rebreather back to its mask form. Once I finally got everything set up I looked over my handiwork.

Part of me hated to admit it, but it looked good. The stealth capabilities were far superior to the armor, and it would blend in way better. And best of all, everything was entirely modular. If I didn’t need my Drop Chutes but still needed my rebreather? I didn’t have to worry about it and could just take my mask and leave the bag. Ultimately, I’d be a lot more comfortable, and better off without the armor.

Of course… that just left getting shot. I’d thought the armor was a good idea for a reason, and this was the main one. For now, I’ll go back to wearing my crusade vest under my jacket, but for the future? I should really start looking into an upgrade. Maybe some kind of clothes with ballistic weave wouldn’t be a bad idea? Or Subdermal armor… but I was iffy on that one. Sure it sounded nice, but it had a way of locking up mobility and I’d heard it was extremely uncomfortable.

And it's not like I got into fights all that much. My best role in a fight was lurking on the outskirts and pew-pewing from afar like what I did at the Mortas Motel, not taking shots at the frontlines.

I could think about it later though. It was really about time I started finalizing my plans though.