Rifts Up Close: EBA-130 Body Armor

By Tim Willard

The origin of modern body armor lies in the space race. With orbital facilities becoming a reality in 2033, the Mars landing of 2019, and the advanced space projects going on by various mega-corporations and the governments of a multitude of nations, the standard "soft" spacesuit was showing a larger and larger percentage of failure under the harsh conditions of space and the dangerous rigors of extraplanetary work.

In 2026 Virgin Spaceways unvieled their new "harsh environmental protective armor" which provided protection from typical hazards, and could actually resist conventional, 20th Century weaponry. It could even protect the wearer from single shots of the M-31 Rail Gun! This suit was quickly labeled "Space Armor" by the press, and Virgin found itself besieged by requests for the suits for use in the orbital workyards and by security firms from around the world.

The race between armor systems and armor defeating munitions was back with a vengeance, with improvements in munitions outpacing armor which then outpaced the munitions, and so on.

In 2095 the NEMA Future Warfighter Program held armor trials for personnel environmental body armor, with the advances in hyperalloys and synthetic plastics of the last decade promising to make lighter, more mobile, and stronger suits of environmental body armor available to NEMA troops.

At the end of the 2095 trails, the Dragonhide Armor LLC was chosen, not only for its superior protection values, but for its internal systems, which consistantly outperformed the competition. The armor was manufactured in their Dayton OH plant, with the electronics being provided by Litton/Intel computer manfacturing, and many other parts being subcontracted to a whole slew of companies. The armor was assembled in Detroit Michigan, Butte South Dakota, and 50 miles northwest of Reno Nevada. In addition, Dragonhide Armor LLC provided NEMA with 8 micro-fabrication units that promptly vanished.

Dragonhide Armor LLC offered a revolutionary flexi-plate system that protected the abdomen and offered full abdominal mobility without sacrificing armor protection, finally solving the problem of the abdomen being the most vulnerable part of environmental body armor. It had long been known that the sniper sweet spot was no longer the nape of the neck, or the armpit, but rather the center line of the body armor, where there was nearly no armor protection. As NEMA and UN forces often came under sniper attack during peace-keeper missions, the Dragonhide "Soldier Mobility System" promised to reduce fatalities and injuries even further. The underarm, neck, back of the knee, elbow, ankle, and wrist were protected by a modification of the SMS, making shots to those areas ineffective, protecting the soldier from sniper attacks even further. This was a major concern with the appearance of the mysterious JA-9 and JA-11 rifles.

The armor itself featured light polyceramic plating, molecularly bonded to resist high energy particles. The plating could easily handle kinetic impacts up to 5000 foot pounds of energy without damage (For comparison, the venerable .50 Cal M2A2 GPHMG has 3000 fp) or even surface marring. In addition to armor plating, the suit had tiny solar power collectors no bigger than the head of a pin scattered through the suit to absorb power for the armor from the sun. In the event of an energy weapon hit, the micro-fuses blew to keep the energy imparted to the armor from effecting the suits power storage systems. Total armor thickness, including all sub-layers and internal system layers is a remarkably thin 1.75 inches.

Beneath the plating is a layer of molecular circuitry that kept track of the integrity of the armor and was tied into the suit's computer, as well as a layer of piezo-electric crystals that generated energy for the suit via the wearer's movement, including breathing.

The next layer was a nanofluidic gel that helped disperse the kinetic energy from heavy duty strikes, namely the new GR-65 14.1mm rail gun released on the market by the Ugandan weapon manufacturers, and the 15mm rail gun released by Iranian weapon manufacturers. This gel was manufactured in the Virgin Orbital Industries zero-G "exotic materials" manufacturing plant, and shipped back to Dragonhide LLC.

The next layer was another layer of armor, only half the thickness of the primary armor layer, designed to protect the wearer if the first armor layer was breached. This layer was also molecularly bonded and engineered to resist radiation. The layer beneath that was an armor lattice that allowed components to be added to the armor to enhance its combat effectiveness.

The next layer contained neoprene padding, to keep the armor from chafing the user. The neoprene transferred liquid in only one direction, away from the wearer, collected it, and used the pressure of the wearer walking to operate manual pumps to force the sweat through a water purifier. The now-purified sweat was placed in an emergency container for secondary, emergency, drinking water. There was also a food paste dispenser, with the storage area located just above the right collarbone of the wearer. The wearer could pull nutrient paste through the tube and into their mouth by sucking on the tube, so that a wearer could eat while wearing the suit in a hostile environment. The paste is nasty tasting, thick, and coats the mouth with a greasy, foul aftertaste, but it is nutritious and will keep the wearer fed with the necessary vitamins, nutrients, calories, and carbohydrates to fufill the battlefield requirements of nutrition for up to 72 hours.

The wearer attached the waste removal system to their body upon donning the waist section, allowing the user to wear the body armor for up to 72 hours if necessary. Waste collection discs can be removed and replaced by the wearer without breaching the suit's environmental seal. It will take the wearer approximately five minutes to swap out the waste collection discs, but a second person can do it in less than a minute, due to the angle.

The back of the armor had six modular rails, to allow the attachment of mission specific equipment, standard load carrying devices, or the addition of up to six air supply tanks to the back of the armor. (Each tank weighs 10 lbs and contains 5 hours of air) The US military had plenty of modular combat equipment that could be added to the back of the armor, from high powered battlefield communication/network hubs, to 66mm mortars, to heavy weapon energy packs, making this an important part of the armor.

The communications antenna array is built into the armor along the biceps and shoulders of the armor, meshed into the molycirc layer and having "external receptors" the size of a pinhead replacing every other solar collector. This antenna array is tied into the helmet surface antenna and the armor's communication system. Integration of the communications broadcast/reception array with the armor itself kept the communications system from being targeted by snipers, and ensuring that a minor mishap would not put a wearer out of communication. (The crash of the Hopi Hovercarrier in Oman during the 2054 Oman/Yemen War, where a NEMA Omni-Team was put out of communication due to their communication arrays being damaged was a painful lesson to learn)

An 80 decibel loudspeaker system is built into the upper right shoulder, and is normally kept within the armor to avoid damage. However, the loudspeaker can be deployed in less than 10 seconds via internal systems, and does not significantly lower the armor's protection. The speaker can either be used by the wearer, or used to broadcast verbal input from the radio communications.

The upper left shoulder has a built in optical link the size of a small box of matches. (Note: Research into cameras have shown they can be as small as a quarter with excellent detail) The camera is shock dampened and contains passive and active nightvision molycircs. The camera burst feeds the information gathered every 5-20 seconds, the compressed burst containing the video footage of the entire time. This usually returns to a mobile command post, for overview by gathered officers, mission commanders, and allows instant advice, mission objective alterations, or commands to be fed to the troops in the field. However, since signal triangulation is a big part of the digital battlefield (some missiles can home in on continuous radio signals) the feature can be disabled, and the information be gathered afterwards from the built in Battle-ROM storage WORM (Write Once-Read Many) crystal storage array. In addition, the wearer of the armor can use the feed from the camera, displayed on the HUD instead of the view through the visor, if the visor has been coated by an impenetrable material.

The visor contains embedded active and passive nightvision circuitry, the suits internal battle computer can clear dust, snow, ash and other airborne debris from the wearer's vision. In addition, it can outline threats, show video feeds from other devices in small windows at the top of the HUD. The internal environmental charge is showed as a percentage in the upper right, the armor's intergrity is shown in the lower left as an overlay with color coding. The information data window is on the left side of the screen, and is often used to show the Rules of Engagement, the local customs, local laws, ID profiles of targets or important people. The BaTN map is often shown in a window on the right side of the visor.

The internal headset can translate Spanish, English, Russian, German, Vietnamese, Chinese, Korean, French, Portugease, Swahili, Afrikaan, Farsi, and Finnish with 80% accuracy to any of the other listed languages, allowing the NEMA soldier to communicate with local authorities and population.

With cybernetics becoming safer and more common, NEMA plans on having cybernetic data-jacks become standard issue to all personnel in 2099, to allow data to be directly downloaded to wearers, as well as improve battlefield operations. Currently, datajacks are only pre-required by power armor pilots, but the benefits are too great to be ignored, and limited field tests have shown that datajack equipped troops are less likely to develop information overload, or psychological issues based on the desire to have a multitude of information available from developing.

The wearer can operate on filtered air indefinitely, or upon internal environmental systems for up to five hours. The internal environment is controlled by the armor's computer system, which engages the internal systems automatically if the surrounding atmosphere contains non-filterable hazards or if the armor's filters have suffered 60% or more degredation. The computer monitors the wearer's biometric data, and increases available oxygen to the wearer in order to ensure that the wearer has enough oxygen even during high exertion. Air pressure within the suit is increased during high activity to help prevent the psychological feeling of suffocation that environmental systems can bring.

The armor normally brings in fresh air to help ease the wearer psychologically, and state of the art NBCR (Nuclear/Biological/Chemical/Radiation) detectors will automatically seal the suit and switch over to full environmental protection. However, the filters can handle most of the more common chemical weapons, as well as fallout and most of the larger biological agents, including weaponized smallpox, anthrax spores, and the like, meaning the suit just uses its filtering system and alerts the wearer to the biological or chemical hazard.

The suit is insulated and temperature controlled, allowing the wearer to ignore such environmental hazards as fire, smoke, and freezing temperatures. The computer system can humidify the air in dry climates to provide comfort for the wearer. When the suit is fully assembled and the wearer activates it, the neoprene lining inflates slightly to ensure the armor is a perfect fit and that the wearer is able to be cushioned from impacts by the armor's systems.

Built into the right chest is an IRMMS kit to provide emergency medical care for wearer's who sustain injury due to fall, massive kinetic energy hit, or other serious injury. Despite the suits many features, it cannot protect the wearer from extensive falls farther than 50 feet, and a 200 foot fall is almost always lethal.

The computer system of the armor is tied into the Battlefield Tactical Network, allowing the wearer to make updates, access new information, and send/receive orders over the tactical net. The left index finger contains a laser target designator/laser communications emitter, to allow the wearer to either laze in guided munitions or use the laser communications device to make it more difficult for the enemy to locate and triangulate on radio emissions or listen in to the battlenet.

With the constant advances of the digital battlefield, the suit also has to have a low thermal/energy profile, and be able to provide EC(C)M systems to the wearer. The ECM package allows the wearer to spoof most sensor systems and targeting systems, and the ECCM package enables the radio to break through enemy radio ECM. In case of emergency, the wearer can open the air system filters and shut down all energy systems on the armor in order to move "full stealth" and have zero energy and almost no thermal signature.

The Battlefield Tactical Network Interface is built into the helmet, and into the left forearm (or right forearm if the wearer is left handed) of the armor. In addition, many of the suits have a helmet dataplug allowing wearers fitted with a cybernetic datalink to use the systems "hands-free" during wear. The biceps of both arms contain three "dataplugs" allowing weapons or modular armor components to be integrated into the suit's combat computer system.

The suits IFF beacon is a queriable beacon, responding only when it recieves the correct ID heading on the query signal, to avoid enemy forces from homing in on a constantly broadcasting beacon. The beacon has its own power supply, kept constantly charged, that is good for up to 14 days before it will lack the power to broadcast at least one return signal.

During the Cataclysm, this armor saw extensive combat use. Some users fought at least twice every 72 hours for over 15 years. The armor's ability to have the plates replaced individually instead of the entire armor having to be replaced made it an invaluable asset on the Cataclysm theater. By year five the nanofluidic gel was out, and the armor's wearer got banged around a bit more than usual, but the armor held up. The fact that the nanofluidic gel could not be manufactured in a gravity well prevented more from being manufactured during the Cataclysm Years.

During the Second Dark Ages, these suits were literally used till destruction, until not a single piece of it was left. Even so, every now and then scavengers and prospectors would find the odd suit cached in the ruins or in the middle of nowhere.

Rifts-Earth time this armor is considered a legacy item. The few suits that remain are either in museams, held by families who use it as proof of their family lineage, or keep it as a showpiece. Those armors are never repaired, the damage they've taken left as a mute testament to the wearer's brutal struggle for survival. General Ross Underhill has a suit in his personal collection that has iridescent patterning on it from energy strikes fusing the coating of volcanic ash to the armor plating. The breastplate and across the back reads "UNDERHILL, F." and the armor has NEMA Major rank on it and in the onboard IFF beacon.

Recently, someone dumped almost three hundred of these armors, in pristine condition, on the Black Market. The CS is intensely interested in who might have found that much armor and weaponry from NEMA times.

Weight: 12 lbs
Available Sizes: 5' to 6' 4"
Mobility: Good
Availability: Exclusive to NEMA
Manufacturer's Cost: 22,000 Cr
Wholesale Cost: 50,000 Cr
Manufacturer's Recommended Price: Not for Sale
Black Market Price: 75,000+ Cr
Wilderness Price: 20,000 Cr