Now was not the time to panic. Samus had been taken by surprise, and caught off-guard. But she did not make it this long in the bounty hunting business by losing her cool too quickly.
There was no way to close out of this outfit selection menu. She had ten options in total, each corresponding to a different outfit, and each providing different... what were those? Stats? Stats were a good thing, more often than not. Stats were relative comparisons of quantifiable performance data. If Samus Aran was going to be saddled with this soft, impractical body, however briefly, she would make sure its performance could compensate for its disadvantages.
In all likelihood it was reasonable to assume that she could take the suit off, or that there would be a protocol to do so laying around here somewhere and she just could not access it from this menu, which she could not exit without choosing one of the options.
A preliminary examination put most of the stats between twenty and fifty. Most of the outfits offered trade-offs over the default option's balanced approach. There were also letter-marked extra stats and other things that Samus lacked context for.
'But do they all have to look so indecent? Boob windows and thigh gaps in plate armor?'
"Mmm, so many of these outfits look so naughty."
Did she really just say that out loud? Damn, the nanites must have gotten into her vocal nerves, or worse, her brain. Her entire personality was at risk of being overwritten but Camilla-
But Samus, but Samus was not going to give up yet. She would just have to choose an outfit quickly and then try to take off the whole Skinsuit before she got any more 'into character.' So, she blink-clicked the Legendary Heroes; Alluring Darkness option. It had the best-looking stat picture out of the gate. There may be consequences for her choice later but that was a problem for future Camilla-
'Future Samus! I meant to say future Samus.' Camilla thought to herself.
The problem was getting worse, but before she could act on it further, she noticed that the Skinsuit was building her outfit. The Legendary Hero option was an elegant, if unsubtle, shoulderless dress colored principally in vibrant shades purple that varied between light and dark. Gold patterns danced across The dress did come with a collar, black with a gold pattern, and a cowl, purple with a gold border, secured to the rest of it by a sparkling golden sash that trailed down from the left side of the cowl (incidentally in the same place as the strip of fabric that secured the right sleeve of the dress and made it more than a glorified glove) between her more-than-ample bosoms where it was secured by a tie just above the black, gold-patterned corset.
Interestingly, the dress did incorporate some armor. Predictably, none of the armor protected her most vital areas. Beneath her purple thigh-highs, revealed for all to see thanks to the outrageous high-low cut of the skirt were a pair of heavy but not too ornamented grieves and, of course, high-heeled sabatons. There was also an impressively sized fauld over the bustle of her skirt. If nothing else she wouldn't get her feet taken out from under her, or bifurcated at the waist. And the tiara, a pair of gold-tipped horns that curved up above her temples linked by three twisting pieces of beautifully polished black metal that danced around each other and shot up like spears before dipping down again and meeting with each other over her forehead was probably heavy and well-built enough to at least get in the way of a blow aimed at her head. "Long enough for me to punish any naughty children that try." Camilla vocalized, her voice dripping sultry dominance like honey as she flipped through her Bewitching Tome for emphasis.
'Wait, where did you come from?' Samus thought, too confused by the sudden appearance of the grimoire now floating above her hand to notice her last vocalization. It was a black leather-bound book, embellished with purple gems and silver stars, all of which dominated by the large ornamental flowers decorating the top right quarter of the front cover like a gold-wrought effigy of the frosting on that one piece of birthday cake that all of the k1ds at the party want. And now it was just floating there, above her hand and turning its own pages in time with the movements of her fingers.
Most forms of nanotechnology did not work nearly this fast, and the ones that did, that she could think of at the moment, needed some fuel to convert at the atomic level. Gaseous matter simply lacked the raw number of particles necessary in a given space, and if the nanites started scrapping and stripping themselves for parts the whole colony would start losing mass and energy too rapidly to continue function.
And this tome, was there an electromagnetic, or perhaps gravitic tether that she had missed? Was it a control menu for the suit? Where did it come from? Why hadn't any sections of the floor been dug out for material? So many questions, but she could solve those when she got out of her suit.
Why wasn't it working? Samus sped through every mental command she could think of to either shut the suit down, or bring up a menu that would let her. Nothing. In response to a sharp wave of her hand, Camilla's Bewitching Tome turned through every page, with not a single menu or pop-up to be found.
Now might be a good time to panic.
Wed May 22 21:11:55 2024
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