A VAC suit is a spacesuit worn in vacuums by spacefarers in space, and inhospitable environments. Each nation has its own variants of VAC suit with the United Nations and Martian Congressional Republic militaries having VAC suits incorporated with light armor for their personnel. It is common for companies to provide their staff with VAC suits such as Pur’n’Kleen Water Company having a standardized Canterbury suit. However, many Belters wear their own personal VAC suits with the badges of ships they previously served on.
Environment suits
The cheapest and most common spacesuit, found by the dozen in emergency lockers on every ship and station. The thin suits are airtight and have integrated short-duration air bladders and rebreathers, but provide little radiation shielding and are prone to tearing. Environment suits are designed to help wearers survive in an area of failing life support long enough to rescue or repair, although inn extreme emergencies they have been used for treks across the surface of Mars and asteriods in the Belt in search of shelter.[1]
VAC suits
Heavier vac suits have corrugated joints connecting hardened plastic segments, helmets with thick transparent faceplates, and connections for separate air-supply units. Despite vac suits’ bulk, regular wearers complain they’re poorly insulated for use in space. They do have integrated magnetic boots and communications rigs, along with water tanks and food supplies running to dispensers inside the helmet. They’re also easy to repair, with some vac suits passed down from one generation to another among Belter mining families.[2]
Form-fitting suits
More expensive, modern spacesuits are as light as the riot gear worn by law enforcement and just as tough, with heating and cooling systems sewn into a body sleeve worn beneath the impact-resistant segments of outer shell. Also in the inner sleeve is a sensor network that provides data for a medical data feed shown on a HUD inside the helmet, as well as to other members of the wearer’s team. The suit gathers information from environmental sensors in the outer shell to monitor temperature, radiation, and local atmospheric conditions, projected on the HUD alongside overlays of technical specs for a ship’s maintenance crew, or geological survey data for scentific scouting team. Display of this data along with other suit systems is manipulated via chin controls, as well as blinks and other eye movement. The most expensive suits are custom-sized and tailored for their wearers.
