Mech Pilot who makes sure they're strapped into something so weird that it'll be impossible to mark a kill tally for.
"Of course, we've done plenty of field testing," Oak brush off Ailish's concerns before they have a chance to be unnerved, "And all the simulations work great."
Ailish shakes her head silently, knowing that it was far too late to change anyone's mind but feeling compelled to at least get her worries on the record.
Oak settles in comfortably as the sludge binds to them. Prototyping is early enough that the substance hasn't been through branding yet. The chemists refer to it the biochemical agent with a serial number. Oak has become attached to just calling it the sludge.
The sludge attaches to their body. Making it so Oak was able to breathe through it was surprisingly easy. Getting their skin to breathe through the sludge was harder, but they got there. It touches every part of Oak and they swear they can feel it humming appreciatively as it takes shape. Oak insists the sludge must like this too, as it forms a human shape. Borrowing from Oak, standing upright, and matching their pose as they give a thumbs up.
Ailish can't see the gesture from the comms room, but she can hear it in Oak's voice, "Don't worry. I can't promise I'll come back in one piece. But I can promise I'll make it back alive." Ailish's groan serves as Oak's signal to march out the blast doors.
Outside the battle is cacophonous, but the sludge is a comfortable cocoon. They hear nothing except what Ailish relays to them. She sees a dizzying amount of detailed battle info, but filters all but the most pressing alerts. The truth is the sludge repels most threats, concerns and distractions. Like water off a duck's back. All except-
"Oak! 7 o'clock, move," Ailish yells over the comms. Oak is fast but moving the form of sludge takes getting used to. And rather than drop, they make the mistake of turning first. Giving them a good view of the beam cannon burning a line through the air. As sluggish as Oak is, the beam cannon is slower, because it doesn't need to be fast.
"Oh s-" is all Oak can get out before the beam fills the iridiscent substance. It glares blindingly before separating in two chunks, the top half sloughing off while the legs wobble and fall. Ailish swears, yelling fruitlessly into her mic. The top half of Oak is on the ground but unresponsive.
Their bottom half lays elsewhere and their legs twitch. As they do, the sludge also twitches. Then, it stumbles back to its feet. The semi transparent substance glows, obscuring the interior as it shifts and reshapes, reproducing the full silhouette of the figure that had been there before. Inside, Oak has also regrown themself entirely. Flexing muscles that didn't exist a moment before. They reach down to the figure still on the ground, another completely regrown figure that gets to its feet with a wobble, steadied by its twin.
"Jesus fucking Christ" Ailish spits out with horrified relief, "It actually fucking worked- and now I have to deal with TWO of them."
Only one of the Oak's has a comm unit, but they reply, "We can do a full report later, but uh, we don't both need to fill one out do we?"
Before Ailish can answer, yet another beam cuts bursts forth. One Oak falls to the ground quicker, their unstable footing proving an advantage, but the other gets sliced right back down. The Oak still standing gets back to their feet, watching the bisected Oak regrow.
"Scratch that- we'll have to decide how many reports are needed when we get back. You might want to requisition some new sleeping bays, in the mean time we'll have to just share with amenable crewmates."
"Ahuh," Ailish sighs as she's already drafting up her resignation letter.