The voice assured them that the Top and Bottom positions were not tied to gender. "That being said, it might be easier for our intergender pairings if the lovely girls were the ones to take on the position of Bottom. I'm sure that all you guys in the room can understand?" the man added with a mocking tone. So, basically sexism. The hornier boys were cracking jokes and wolf whistling. The girls just looked disgusted. As a guy, Terry certainly could understand. Especially with the large visual aid on the wall of a busty woman in a tight plugsuit in doggystyle shaking her ass in the camera while in position. Being a female character here meant that he would be the one in such a compromising position. "Not happening." he said to himself firmly. Once both pilots were in position, the Top would engage the controls from the Bottom's waist. It was built into their version of the plugsuit. Convenient for the Top's use. Over the Bottom was a hanging monitor that showed the Top the Synchronization Rate between the pilots. While the Bottom keyed into neural pathways to turn it on and off, The Top operated.
Bottoms felt the giant mech as if it was their own body as it moved. Tops used that power to direct its movements and engage in combat. You needed both to pilot a MTM properly. Without a Bottom there, the Top would just be twiddling their thumbs alone in a metal giant. Without a Top there, the Bottom would turn the mech on, but be immobilized. Basically, the singular pilot would be a sitting duck for enemies. Terry remembered something. He saw that he had 2 randomly generated special traits from character creation. He quickly looked at the menu to track them. They were Booting and Synchronization. Booting allowed a Bottom to turn on the MTM 10% faster than the normal activation time. Synchronization allowed a pilot 10% higher Synchronization Rate with another pilot. The Synchronization Rate was really important. The Top was operating the mech. If they had a low rate, there would be too much interference and lag for the MTM to fight effectively. Infact, it was coded so that it would not even allow the Bottom's MTM controls to engage for the Top at less than 49% synchronization.
With Terry's specialty, he could synchronize with more people. The way Synchronization Rates were explained, they worked based on complementary personalities and personal bonds that might have formed between the pilots beforehand. So, Terry could still pilot with people that he did not totally get along with. And those that he did get along with would make the MTM run extremely smoothly. Terry had a Bottom skill and a General skill. Normally, he would just go with the flow and just choose to be a good Bottom pilot. However, he really did not trust any of the guys here not to be total creeps. They were NPCs. Who knew what was running through their coding? He was still in the mood to be treated well. Being ogled and belittled by someone that was not even real was not part of the plan. Especially in a fucked up world like this one right now. For the time being, Terry decided to try to be a Top. If it was not working, he could always fall back on his special skills. The basic clothes aside, the room was neither too hot nor cold. That meant the facility was under extremely controlled conditions.
