Motoko certainly puts you through your paces.
You must have run the simulation two dozen times. Every time you mess up, she sends you back to the beginning with a harsh lecture on what you did wrong and how it might affect the people around you. You tried your best to take everything in, but it's a lot. Motoko maintains her frosty, business-minded demeanour the entire time.
After another failed attempt at clearing the course you groan and lean back against the wall. It's a good thing you've been training your body recently, or you'd be completely wiped out already. Motoko walks back down from the metal walkway that criss-crosses the training space for observers to use.
"You're getting better."
"I don't feel like I'm getting better."
"Hm. That's the right attitude to have. People who think that they've learnt everything tend to get discharged for misconduct after a few months on the job."
You fiddle with your hands to try and limber them up again. Motoko watching a harem anime is a deeply humorous image to you, so you try to break the ice and learn a little more; "I guess even a serious person like you enjoys something silly from time to time."
She glares at you, "Silly?" The chill in the air makes you shiver. There was such a strong implication of threat in the way that she said that. It feels like there's already a gun being held to your head.
You roll your hands over each other, "…You know, the anime we're from."
Motoko allows the tense silence to hang for eight seconds exactly – before her mouth can no longer hold back, "Actually, Harem Hero is a critically acclaimed exploration of societies attitudes towards sex and romance-"
Motoko stops herself and covers her eyes with her forearm. She just exposed her power level to you, big time.
"Uh, Major?"
"I know what you're trying to do, but I'm not going to be coaxed into bed that easily – playboy."
"I was just making conversation."
"You don't have time to make conversation. There are real lives at stake, and it's your responsibility to go out there and make sure that nobody gets hurt, or at least to contain the damage they cause. The last thing you need to be worrying about is getting us into bed, even if that is the central conceit of the story."
It was frostier of a welcome than you'd received from the others. That was very much in line with what you expected though. Motoko had a warmer side, but it usually only showed itself when business had been taken care of. If you want to progress this relationship, you're going to have to show her that you can handle yourself in a fight.
"I get it. No funny business."
To belabour the point she continues, "And don't mistake my consumption of the series as a doe-eyed declaration of love for you. I don't know if you're half of the person that you were in that."
"Hopefully I'll prove that I'm… 100 percent of that version of me!"
That sounded a lot better in your head.
"Okay, enough small-talk, there's still more to learn. Let's clear some corners and avoid shooting the civilians this time."
"Alright."
Several more hours passed until Motoko was finally happy that you were competent enough to fire the gun without killing a score of innocent bystanders in the process. But competent and proficient were very far apart in her own words. She wasn't impressed, it was the bare minimum.
After criticising your ability to fight and shoot, Motoko turned her eye to the construction and function of your equipment. When you returned to the garage after hours and hours of intense spec-ops training she immediately sought out Lala and Mitsuru.
"What kind of armour design is this? It offers no camouflage, and there are no anchor points for extra equipment or climbing harnesses."
The answer being that Lala's technology allows you to instantly teleport anything to your location on demand. Motoko accepted that, but her harness comment was much more insistent. Urban combat sometimes demanded fighting vertically on very tall structures. Being able to rappel down the side of a building was something that Section 9 operators did on a regular basis.
"You can get the drop on the enemy and neutralise them before they harm a bystander." Motoko points down at the computer screen where a schematic of your suit is displayed, "If you attached mounting points here and here, the suit could be used in conjunction with rappelling equipment to scale buildings."
For everything else the pair tried their hardest to defend their personal pet project from her scathing insights, but there was little chance of success. They had to admit that she had some good points. Mitsuru's particular insistence that the armour was designed to be marketable elicited a less than pleased response from Motoko.
The spirited debate ended with Mitsuru promising that she'd implement some of her ideas to make the Herarmor better. For you, it was just the first part of a long day of training. Chun-Li's routine still demanded your attention. You grabbed a towel and headed into the gym while the girls talked.
-----------------
"Doctor, Doctor!"
Sundar called out into a cavernous laboratory. He had travelled deep into the bowels of their ship to try and locate the ever-elusive Doctor Gael; clutched in his hands was the clone cannon used by Faust's previous android warrior. The room was so large that his voice echoed through the darkness, beyond the light coming through the still-open door.
Doctor Gael was the man responsible for much of their technology. A foremost expert in the field of robotics, warfare and interdimensional materials. You wouldn't know him unless you found him because he rarely if ever left his laboratory space. A majority of the interdimensional empire didn't even know who he was, despite his position as the chosen heir to their wormhole technology and a trusted advisor to their supreme leader.
Pieces of twisted metal piled high surrounded him on all sides. Occasionally through the mayhem there was a workbench of clear space visible. How did he live like this? Sundar wondered. These were all the carcasses of old androids and abandoned military projects. For every idea that went into production, a hundred more were killed off before getting anywhere.
Sundar didn't like Doctor Gael, but he needed him to enact the next steps of his plan.
His calls were finally answered as a short man burst outwards from a pile of scrap metal. He had a huge, bushy moustache and a pair of thick welding goggles covering his eyes. He had pale skin and green hair, which almost made him look like a clown.
"Yes, yes! I'm here you damnable pest!"
He waddled over to one of the workbenches and hopped up onto a stool to peer over it. Sundar slammed the decapitated robot-limb onto the bench in front of him. There was only one part he was truthfully interested in though. He pointed to the gun. "I want you to modify this thing so that I can use it."
Gael adjusted his glasses, "Why? The report I received from Faust stated that it was not effective in combat – the scaling required to make it useful is beyond our means."
"That's because Faust is a moron," Sundar growled, "If he suffers from such a lack of imagination that he can't find a use for a cloning gun, that's his problem. I need it, because I have a plan."
Gael pulled it across the table and studied what was left, "Hm. It'll need a new power source… a trigger mechanism. I can finish it fast enough. Anything else?"
"An android, one who's good at long range combat."
"Ah! Now that won't need any extra effort. Talented snipers are my forte, if you will." Gael reached into his pocket and retrieved a small tablet. With the press of a button, a pair of red eyes glared from one of the scrap piles. Then the android burst outwards, revealing a very… unique design.
"…It's a cowboy."
The facile of a ten-gallon hat, leather boots and tassel on its arms and legs. There was no doubt in his mind that the android was a cowboy. "Yes, good eye! When I was designing it – I took some inspiration from the great sharpshooters of their history. Allegedly, these 'cowboys' were notorious gunslingers and criminals."
Sundar ignored the long-winded explanation. He already knew what a cowboy was. He'd been scouting the Earth for years. Still, the android did have a very dangerous looking gun attached to its left arm.
"It's equipped with the most advanced predictive targeting module I could find, from an old fighter craft. It can shoot an insect in flight from miles away, and it comes with a sophisticated ballistics and tactics package that allows it to fight independently without user control."
"It's almost like you read my mind," Sundar smirked. It was everything he needed and more.
"But what is this plan of yours? I can't sign off on anything without an explanation."
Sundar smirked and leaned in, this was his masterpiece.