4.4
Part 4
After half a few seconds I gave her another prompt, "Well?"
"It's... classified," She said looking somewhat for a loss.
"Classified?" I questioned eyebrow shooting up.
"Yes, classified," she said, committing herself to that.
I considered probing a bit further, but I'd learned my lesson from earlier in the day, "Okay."
"Okay?" she asked surprised. "Just like that?"
"Well, sure," I said with a shrug. "I mean, cape life is literally about living and acting under a mask. I'm pretty sure you're entitled to a few secrets."
She didn't seem sure how to take that response.
"So!" I said giving her a way out. "If you've been out already, you've probably gotten a costume together already? I've been having some troubles throwing mine together. I'm trying a more armored approach, because, let's face it. Sooner or later everyone takes a hit."
"Yeah," she agreed at once. "I mean, if you're going to go out in a costume, you might as well make it practical right?" she added rhetorically.
"What I'm shooting for is a three layer approach," I began to outline. "Bullet resistance is a must. I can handle a hit a bit better than most, but it'd still only take some lucky mook with a nine millimeter to take me out. At the same time Kevlar is notoriously less effective for close in stuff, and a lot of cape action hits in those ranges."
"Yeah. I noticed that," she replied, shivering a bit.
"So, I'm backspacing a bit tech wise there. I mean it might be high tech, but Armsmaster, Gallant, and Kaiser walk around in plate armor for a reason. It's not that good against guns, but for melee combat? It works," I grimaced, "Well somewhat. Not going to let me take a hit from the Wunder Twins," I used the German pronunciation to clarify just who I was speaking about, "but might be an edge against more human range melee fighters, like Alabaster, or Oni Lee. Every little bit helps right?"
"Yeah but wouldn't that be really clunky?" she asked. "Bullet proof vests get kind of bulky even before you add more stuff on top."
"Well traditional armor has a padding layer anyway," I explained. "Ultimately, what I'm hoping to throw together is something like a good carbon steel breastplate over one of those better ballistic vests with the strike places," I listed. "Maybe some chainmail or one of those fancier Kevlar overcoats over top depending on what ends up being more useful," I added in.
"That still seems kind of cumbersome," she pointed out.
"It's less restricting than most people think," I stated knowingly. "And they do work. I mean there is a reason we wore this stuff for hundreds of years."
"I guess," she replied somewhat dismissively. "So where do you plan to get all this stuff?"
My turn to wince again. "Ah... well you can actually get most of this stuff over the counter, but it gets pricey." I admitted. "Plus you know, if I ordered the outer layer custom, the smith who took care of it would be able to ID me the first time that armor showed up in the news. So I was mostly planning to do the steel smithing part myself."
"And you can do that?" she asked me surprised. "Part of your 'instruction manual?"
"Nah, that part's mostly the internet and cheating with a built in blow torch," I admitted with a smirk. Then frowned, "I mostly just cut up some steel off the old dead hulls in the boat grave yard. Not the best material, but the best I can get on a budget."
She winced, "Well... Maybe I can give some tips on that."