You are (Not) the Heroes IC

Sunset listens to the instructions, and then excuses herself to a more secluded area to replace her costume with the bodysuit, keeping her mask on to conceal what little of her identity would've been visible when she returns. Then, following the instructions, she steps into the suit and lets it close around her and power up.

The suit slips on smoothly, and even if she leaves the face-plate off, the suit covers enough of her body that only the front of her face would be visible. It fits surprisingly well, and even before the suit has powered on the movement feels surprisingly natural. Once the power is on, she hears a chime go off, and after a few moments of electronic beeping and whirring a soft, robotic female voice speaks up, seemingly from all around her at once.

Welcome, Test User. All systems are operational. Security check disabled. ALEXA personality online. Suit is ready for operations.

The weight that the suit has on Sunset immediately eases up, and if she has the face plate on a HUD will appear, with vital stats and other important information displayed. The movement is fluid and feels like she's just moving normally, but she can definitely feel a whole lot more strength in her limbs than before.

"Suit functions are activated by voice command. If you want boosters, simply say 'boosters', or if you want the concussive wave generator then just say 'blaster', so on so forth." Lexicon explains.

"Whoa... that's so cool! Miss Sunset, you look like a superhero!" Dove exclaims excitedly, before stopping for a moment and considering what he said. "Err... more... like a superhero? Uh, not that you didn't look like a hero before..."

He shakes his head, before continuing to say enthusiastically, "Well, what is it like? Are you super strong? Can you shoot lasers now?!"

Crimson couldn't help but glance at Dove, a playful little look on his face as he considered poking fun at him a little... but decided against it in the end. Instead watching Sunset's test run, Crimson felt a question prod at his brain for a moment before turning to their dragon host. "Out of curiosity, barring whatever safety measures you've put in place to prevent someone from stealing a suit for their own purposes... If a Peacekeeper and a Spec Ops suit to go against each other in combat while controlled by ponies of similar skill who would the smart money be on to win?"

Lexicon considers Crimson's question for a moment. "At base level the Peacekeeper SOLUS suit is designed to have better general performance, as it largely will be used as-is. Given a specific scenario, however, the Spec-ops LUNA suit allows for more specialization as additional modules can be attached. The repulsion module can grant quasi-unlimited flight, for example, or concussion missiles and such for more high-impact combat potential. If the LUNA suit is ill-equipped, then I would say the SOLUS suit is superior, but if the LUNA suit has a combat oriented module installed... If I were a betting drake, then I would pick the LUNA suit.

Assuming the ponies wearing the suits are fighting fair and not cheating, that is.

Sunset walks around for a second, letting herself get acclimated to wearing the suit.

"Alrighty," she says when she's done. "So what're ya gonna have me do here?"

"Target practice, perhaps?" Gaia suggests, looking around. "Or, a sparring match? That would really showcase the suit's capabilities, would it not?"

Considering the dragon's answer and understanding the logic behind it (after all, anything that is tailored specifically to counter something is going to have a large advantage), Crimson turned to look around at the team before glancing at Gaia... and deciding to speak up. "Well... If anyone is going to be a punching bag, it might as well be me. I'm sure I've done something to make Sunset want to hit me recently." Chuckling lightly, he deciding to jokingly add "Unless anyone else wants to step up?

Daff leans forward, ears perked, even as he chews on his lower lip at Crimson's volunteering. Who wouldn't want to see evil-bucking armor in action! But on the other hooves....

"Are you sure?" he asks Crimson. "You got hurt pretty bad not very long ago..." he says with embarrassed concern.

"If getting himself battered makes him feel better about his actions, then who are we to stop him?" Gaia smirks, pausing for a moment before adding, "Anyway, I can patch him up if he gets too hurt. I don't see the harm."

"I got no objections to this plan."

Sunset blinks away the grin on her face, and adds, "Be a fight with him in his element, 'n' me still learnin' my way around mine. I did put this thing on to see how it'd play out if we ran into a villain in one out in the wild."

"Excellent," Lexicon says, snapping his claws. Immediately the room begins to shift, large blocks rising out of the ground and fitting together to take the rough shape of a back alley - A narrow corridor enough for three ponies to fit (or one Gaia in chimera form), with 'dumpsters' and 'crates' and other such obstacles, all formed from white blocks. "This should work for a realistic combat setting."

(Assuming she hasn't been wearing it before,) the faceplate hisses and locks around Sunset's muzzle, momentarily plunging her into darkness. Sunset hears the voice again in her ears, New environment detected. Initiating surround-scan.

Then the plate comes back to life with a vivid image of the surroundings, complete with all sorts of additional data and HUD features.

"It's built with the best LexiCon resistant materials, so you won't have to worry about breaking anything."

(Roll initiative???)

Blinking a little as the room actually shifted around in order to create what appeared to be a back alley (complete with 'dumpsters' and 'crates' for extra effect) just at the click of their host's claws, Crimson couldn't help but chuckle a little to himself as he walked over to enter the 'testing field' proper. Lexicon sure liked his theatrics, that was for sure.

Looking over at the now fully armored Sunset, Crimson tilted his head a little as he frowned. There was something about having a faceless, armed and armored police force that worried him a little... but that wasn't his concern at the moment; Right now it was time to see what sort of damage he could do to this thing (and in turn, what kind of harm it could do to him in return). He did consider hamming the whole 'villain' thing up for the fun of it, going full monologue mode and everything, but in the end he decided to skip it. After all, monologues were saved for heroes, not faceless police goons.

Without warning, one of his spice balls was slipped into his hoof and thrown right at the face plate of the armor with the accuracy and force of a professional baseball pitcher, the small orb exploding in a burning red cloud of dust on contact with the metal... which would also have the side effect of turning the part of the alleyway around Sunset red as well. "Too slow Sunset." He taunted playfully.

Actions and Abilities:

Status:

When the red mist clears, Sunset is just standing there, seemingly unperturbed.

"No grand speech telegraphin' what you're about to do? You're learnin'. Suppressin' Fire."

Sunset SOLUS Stat Block:

Combat:

Status:

Suppressing Fire. The voice - apparently an onboard AI system labeled ALEXIS - repeats the order, and plates slide open around Sunset's shoulders. After a brief moment of charging up, accompanied by a high-pitched whine, a salvo of kinetic blasts shoot forth, forcing Crimson into cover and reducing his offensive ability.

Not making grand, heroic speeches wasn't the only lesson that Crimson had forced himself to learn since the teams engagement with the ice wielding trickster god. As the guns in Sunset's armor popped out, Crimson was already darting for the cover of a nearby 'dumpster'. Granted a few of the bloody things managed to clip him before he was able to get into cover but it was a lot better then getting hit by all of them. His back to the 'dumpster', Crimson removed a gumball that he had been working on; He knew it would work, but now was as good a time to field test it as anything.

Without exposing himself to oncoming fire, he lobbed the gumball over his cover and in the general area that Sunset had been in. It exploded into a blue mist in mid air that descended from above onto Sunset's armored form (and to some extent, the area around her). By itself, the mist did nothing; When combined with the mixture of his first gumball however the reaction was... violent. The red and blue mists seemed to combine into a purple sludge... that seemed to be smoking as it tried to eat its way through the metal of the armored suit!  

Actions and Dice Rolls:

Status:

Sunset watches as the defense icon on her HUD turns red, warning that the suit's defenses are disabled.

"Concussive Blast."

Combat:

Status:

As the blast fired from the suit seemed to turn in mid air in order to swerve around the cover that the dumpster was meant to provide, Crimson was caught completely off guard and took the full blast. With a pained gasp, he had to grit his teeth in order to force himself to endure the pain. Once it had past, he quickly started to sort through the gumballs he had, reminding himself of what he had at his disposable and preparing himself for the next exchange.

The purple goo seemed to stick to the armor, bubbling away as if it was still trying to eat its way through the armor it was stuck to, but lacking the bite needed to get any further. While it might not have done any damage, it made up for it by getting everywhere, clogging up the suit and hopefully its weapons.

Actions and Dice rolls:

Status:

Another red indicator flashes a warning about weapons malfunctions.

"Hmm. Suppressin' Fire again."

Lexicon's suit was losing to gumballs. Sunset wasn't feeling all that impressed.

Combat:

Status:

As he was forced to remain in cover as bullets flew around him, Crimson looked at a gumball that he had been working on for a while now. It had been an experiment that he had been trying to get to work ever since the battle with Low and Sunset had started crashing on his couch and to his credit he had actually made quite a fair bit of headway with it; Now was as good a time as any to see if it was ready for a combat trail.

With a deep breath as he prepared himself (and kept any nagging thought of second guessing to himself), Crimson flicked this gumball into his mouth, chewing and swallowing it quickly. The effect took a few seconds to kick in, but when it did it was hard to miss!; The dumpster was thrown back as Crimson exploded with raw power, an aura of some kind of red energy surrounding him as he let out what sounded let something between the growl of some kind of primal animal and a yell used by martial artists. Without warning, he moved. While it wasn't anywhere near the speeds that a speedster like Filly Second it was still a major improvement from before, Crimson becoming... well, a crimson colored blur as he dodged passed the suppressing fire in order to close the distance between himself and Sunset.

The first blow was thrown at Sunset's side, quickly followed by a physical barrage of strikes that truly had that legendary Earth Pony strength behind it with the intent of breaking the mechanical toy that Sunset was wearing.  

Actions and Dice Rolls:

 

Status:

Sunset spots a few things on her HUD that she honestly should have thought to use earlier...just in time to see Crimson charging at her.

"Adaptive shields!"

The suit diverts all available power to its adaptive shielding in time to absorb Crimson's onslaught.

"Jet Boost! Suppressin' fire!"

Sunset peppers Crimson again, and then uses the suit's jets to rocket forward at him for a followup tackle.

Combat:

Status:

Crimson blinked a little as his blows seemed to make contact with a shield of sorts. It wasn't the strongest of shields, but the damn thing was enough to divert enough of his blows away that what should have been a killing blow instead merely caused damage. This also sadly left him completely exposed to the full brunt of Sunset's counter attack, his forelegs rising up to try and protect his face from the barrage of bullets... which also left him exposed to the fact that Sunset decided to RAM him.

As he flew backwards, he skidded along the ground in a great deal of pain, the red aura he had before fading as he honestly had to force himself to his hooves again. Considering everything that he could do in this situation and what he had seen Sunset be able to do with that suit, it was clear he only had one course of action. "I give."

"Wonderful! Absolutely wonderful." Lexicon claps loudly as the sparring match comes to a close. With another snap of his claws, the room starts to return itself to normal, plates rearranging themselves back into the generic blank room it was before.

"I must say, your quipment is fascinating," he says to Crimson, giving him a (light) pat on the back. "Are those gumballs home-made? Absolutely ingenious! I don't suppose you'd be willing to part with a few for research purposes, would you?"

The suit around Sunset buzzes as it powers down from active combat mode. Processing combat data... producing evaluation of combat performance... would you like a report?

"Yeah, sure. Why not?"

The more data Sunset gets from the SOLUS armor, the easier it'll be to figure out how to counter it in real-world combat. Well, in theory, at least.

Crimson was thankful for the pat on his back being 'Light'. He was barely able to stand as it was and he didn't know if he could keep standing in the face of a normal one.

Still, as he was asked about his gumballs he couldn't help but shake his head. "Can't tell you. Tricks of the trade and all that." Looking over at the now powered down suit of armor, he couldn't help but chew his cheek in thought for a moment before deciding to give his honest opinion on the thing. "I won't say that I got a perfect understanding of what the suit can do, but I get the impression that it's designed around the idea of keeping the user alive and in the fight for as long as possible while slowly bringing whatever is fighting it down via bug bites... I also don't think I actually got a fair demonstration of it's abilities. I can't help but feel that Sunset's natural ability to ensure that any shot she takes hits a very painful target surpassed the weapon targeting systems and thus pushed the effectiveness of it's weapons far beyond it's normal limits."

Glancing over at the rest of the team, he couldn't help but grin as he called out "So who lost bits?"