Suiting to (Power)Suit

Prompt from DailyPrompt.com

Your suit has two jobs: to keep you safe from the hazards of whatever planet you’re dispatched to, and make it clear to anyone who sets eyes on you who you were. Not just helping the rest of the group recognise you, though that’s important. But you want any fool itching for a fight to take one look at you and know what kind of person they’d be messing with.

And ideally you want any xeno to decide you were too painful a mouthful to bother.

So for a brand new recruit, fresh out of the academy and feeling out their role, how they mod their suit is an ever present concern.

First is the colour. Your employer picks the base colours for the suits and rank markings, so you’re generally expected to keep the shoulders and chest plate mostly unpainted. How strict they are varies. It’s an unspoken rule that the more senior your service the more you can get away with.

But arms, legs, the part of your back covered by your pack… all fair game. Some people opt for contrasting blocks. Or basic patterns. Always in strident colours, often imitating toxic animals. Or infamous xenos.

Some invest in art, tattoo style, and say the inevitable dings and scratches and burn marks are just part of the statement. Some scrawl graffiti or doodles all over. Get people to sign it. Write quotes. Or the names of comrades they’ve lost.

Then there are the true mods. Spikes are popular. Keep ‘em short, you don’t want to get stuck on stuff. But strategic “teeth” signify a metaphorical bite and discourage actual bites.

Adding embellishments to your gloves opens up a whole new world of personalisation and, done right, gives you a decent “barehanded” option when things get real dicy. Fake rings are the most common but people are creative. Skeletal hands, beast paws, even extra fingers to serve as storage and decoys.

Helmets… I could bore your ear off trying to list half the things people have done there. It’s the first thing to catch someone’s eye so you need it to scream a clear statement. While still keeping your life support safe and minimally obstructing your view. Also, bear in mind standard shuttle ceiling heights. Doesn’t matter how badass that crest looks when you’re standing in the field if you have to fold yourself in half for six hours to get there. Not worth it. Trust me.

Now, as for the packs…

Prompt was “Convey your character’s personality by describing how they style their uniform.”

[This turned expository very quickly. I started out writing it in past tense but decided with the “some rando yacking your ear off about power armour modding” it made more sense in present tense. Does it make it feel more conversational?]