Mille offered them a little nod, putting the tablet down. Displayed on the screen there was a likely less-than-legally obtained sketch of another engine block, which he seemed to be tracing parallels to the roughly drawn diagrams of another.
"Well... Where do I start... So, this ship was left to me by an old friend that... Well, didn't leave much of a trail behind as I'm still looking for them. I used to work in Denver in some salvaging shipyards and they're pretty much the one that made me dream about going out to see the stars one day, you know? So..."
Pausing for a moment to take a deep breath, he'd limpy lay his left hand up on the table.
"Not sure if you've ever seen a Claymore but it's similar to the ship you mentioned to me that you had, the Kali. Except it's... Bigger and heavier, but similar in structure. Seems to be one of the first of its generation and I can't quite pinpoint the origin of its engine block... If anything it seems that the block was custom made by Jackson using parts from every house."
"He tuned it to be highly efficient but it was pretty much in almost total disrepair when I first found it, barely able to use Mox pellets without melting down the combustion chamber."
Mille would bring another diagram up on the tablet, showing some schematics from a combustion chamber of Rheinland origin with fuel injectors that matched Kusari A-J design.
"To my understanding you were looking into making the design of your engine more efficient, right? So I think the answer might lie here somewhere. A more robust design would allow you to mount more powerful thrusters on a lighter ship, but you would most likely sacrifice the stability of secondary mounts when you intend to have all that power being pushed to thrusters..."
Once introductions and formalities were out of the way, the two got into business. Halpert moves his food in front of him and starts to hastily eat his meal without any regard for table etiquette. All the while Mille explaining what her papers and tablet showed, Halpert nods along.
"I don't know too much about engine blocks, only that I've replaced mine with a HNP-Class design. It's of Rheinland origin so I assume the schematics could easily apply? Forgive my naivety here."
Taking a brief moment to take a couple more bites, he continues.
"As for hardware mounts, all Starflier vessels have their weapon mounting points disabled. Not sure how much power that frees up. Could go without the countermeasure mount... I have to stress that the Hyperspace Beacon remain unhindered in terms of powerdraw."
More bits of food hit the table as he continues to hastily eat.
"Once I finish my food, we could go see my ship in person. Can I have permission to inspect your Claymore-Class vessel?"
The young pilot didn't seem to mind that, taking a bite out of a cereal bar himself without thinking much about it.
"HNP... Short for hybrid nuclear pulse, right? Yeah... The block itself is a border world engine but it was slowly converted into a hybrid of that method of propulsion with other proprietary parts from the other houses and corps... Don't worry thought, we can go have a look down in the docks... Just... Mind some of the exposed wires on the cockpit, I was still going through some of the routing."
Mille would bring a hand to his cheek, thinking for a second before raising an eyebrow.
"Beacons... Forgive me but I've not been flying for too long, I only have a little bit of experience with the jump drives and cloaking devices but I've never really used those... Don't they use their own power systems as they draw power from some proprietary power cells?"
"Hybrid nuclear pulse, that's right. If we can try increase it's performance without deforming the Kai-Class' hull, that'd be great. That ship is fragile enough as it is."
Once the power cells were mentioned, Halpert had a puzzled look.
"I have a compartment full of these cylindric looking things. Maybe that's what you're talking about. Not quite sure how the Hyperspace Beacon works, all I know is I press a button on my dashboard and it just works. Whatever happens inside is unknown to me. It seems you have a better idea of how the internal systems work. Let's get down to the docks and see for ourselves."
The two pilots make their way to the docks, both ships were located a fair distance away from each other. Halpert motions for Mille to walk towards her ship while he heads to the dockmaster.
"Hey, has my ship finished repairs?"
"Yeah, why?"
"Need Pulsar relocated to be next to Myrtle."
"Consider it done. Gonna tell me what happened out there?"
"Be patient."
"One of these days, Halpert..."
"Yeah, yeah."
The dockmaster pulls up the docking clamp array and selects Halpert's ship. With a keystroke, a waypoint is placed with a pathway leading to it. As Halpert walks towards Mille's ship, the docking clamp is seen sliding across the overhead rails, stopping at an adjacent spot to the Claymore-Class. The clamp gets lowered and the ship gets released, all the landing gears hitting the ground with the suspension preventing any damage. Halpert stands next to Mille, looking at both ships.
"You weren't lying, Myrtle looks to be Pulsar's big brother."
"I'm not quite sure as to how those cells themselves work as I'm particularly new to that tech but you're right, let's get down to the docks."
Mille follows Halpert, offering a nod towards the Dockmaster while heading to his ship. Waiting for the clamps to release the Pulsar, he'd simply tap the side of the Claymore before adding something.
"Extra powercore worth of ass... Heh."
Chuckling, he would walk around the Pulsar for a few moments, inspecting it and having a closer look at the thrusters.
"Well, you're certainly right... Whoever designed the claymore must've had a bone to pick with something much bigger than it... If you do want to climb inside the Claymore, I only ask that you try to be a little careful. Jackson made a few modifications such as having the weapon grouping system directly attached to the main flight stick and that thing is... Sensitive at best. Wouldn't want to punch a hole in the dock now, would you? With that out of the way, which fuel do you use for the Pulsar?"
The cockpit was slide open exactly as his own ship. Climbing into the cockpit, he notices that the flight controls were almost identical to Pulsar, minus the modifications made. After being satisfied simply examining the interior, Halpert jumps off, stumbling a bit as he lands. All the while Mille was speaking.
"Pulsar uses Kusarian fuel for the engines, their own mix of H-Fuel and some other stuff I can't pronounce. The coolant, however, is whatever is available as we fly around. Probably the reason why the engine's performance varies."
"That so huh? Well, the engine will accept every fuel type but according to my tests engines using that tech seem to make better use of Mox... As for the coolant... Could probably start by using a higher quality one on a loopback to an external radiator, that way you don't really have to exchange it... Anyway, I could probably spend all day talking about the weird modifications in place but I assume we should probably have a look at the Pulsar's engine block and thruster mounts."
Mille walked over to the Kali again, inspecting it closely.
"This might be a long shot but, I wouldn't suppose you have the original schematics for the Pulsar and its engine? Although I'll be honest, given what I've seen HNP seems a little uncommon... Don't suppose it's stock, is it?"
"My ship's original engine block was replaced a long time ago, although..."
Taking a step back and looking to his left, in the distance behind a pile of crates lay three identical Kali-Class light fighters. Remembering his conversation with Seabourne, he managed to acquire more Kali-Class vessels. The sounds of welding and sawing could be heard, but from where Halpert and Mille are standing, they're muffled and unintelligible.
"Luck has it that there's three more ships just like mine, over on the other end of the docks."
He raises a fist and points with his thumb behind him.
"Could ask the techs if they kept any of the original hardware. If any of it is just laying around, could be useful."
"Good thing you have spares but I was wondering if that engine was stock because honestly, the Myrtle is the only other civilian ship I've seen with this type of propulsion... The only similar thing I've seen was something from the Gallic blackmarket, CNO-X, if I recall... Was hoping to get my hands on the schematics of an engine with this propulsion type to make it easier for us to understand and alter it, but I think this may be a trial and error thing."
Mille brought a hand to the back of his head, looking down for a moment before sighing lightly.
"Well, one thing we can do for sure... If you have no intentions to use weapons with the Pulsar, removing the alternators and converters that supply and connect to the hardpoints should free us a lot of space for us to at least add some custom propellant injectors... Granted, it would be good to have a spare or broken down engine that is exactly like yours for us to tinker with before doing permanent modifications to your ship. Do you have any R&D sectors that are properly isolated for testing these things around here?"
"Well, the Aquaree, Loneos and Orcus have the same hardware as the Pulsar, minus the beacons since it takes forever to fabricate those. Let's go have a chat with the techs."
The two pilots make their way to the other end of the docks where the welding and sawing can be heard loudly and clearly. Turning the corner around a mountain of storage crates reveals a small team working on an Albatross-Class transport. Components of every kind are scattered across the floor whilst the ship itself has panels removed to swap out internal pieces.
"Sup, techs."
The closest worker stops their welding to turn their head and remove their faceshield.
"Halpert? What are you doing here?"
Halpert sways his hand out to introduce Mille.
"Got a guest on board, they would like to talk to you about the HNP-Class engines we have for the three Kali-Class ships."
The worker points a finger at both pilots.
"Have both of you got clearance from the dockmaster to be in this area?"
A slight shrug comes from Halpert.
"Uhh, yes?"
The worker turns to Mille.
"Good enough for me. So, what do you want to know?"