This is a short story on how Zephyr, my anthro Zeraora, came to be a salvager and engineer aboard the independent vessel Indigo. As for the space suit, think Dead Space, heavily inspired by it, just need to finally design the infernal thing.
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The feline creature never quite fit into this world, an alien among a species that, while welcoming and friendly, never quite let you feel like you're completely part of the population. Zephyr had immigrated to Gezeran VI as a child with his mother and father, but his father passed away relatively early on after an accident at his workplace left him poisoned and burned, unable to recover. Zeph and his mother managed to carry on until he moved out and she was taken by an explosion at a power facility near her home.
Now in his early 20's, the Zeraora had bounced around the planet here and there, taking on whatever jobs he could, this time as a mechanic for small space craft and shuttles, earning him a decent living and some skills he'd put to use in the future. As this job wasn't particularly hazardous, with everything tightly controlled and quadruple checked for safety, he needed nothing but some basic clothes to keep grease and whatever other filth these vessels accumulated in space off his fur.
Things went well for months, almost a full year, and Zephyr was rapidly approaching his 23rd birthday. He felt as though he could finally maybe settle down, the urge to leave the planet and return to his native world gradually disappearing, things finally slow and peaceful enough to lay down a foundation and finally live out his life how he wanted. He never got that chance though, as fate has a strange way of forcing one's hand towards their destiny.
For months the news broadcasts droned on about politics with this coalition's neighbors, a lot of posturing and bickering, but Zephyr never paid any attention to it. He can't make a living watching that stuff after all. After the first violent quake ripped through the ground and building though he was quickly able to piece together what was happening: the neighboring systems had enough of their crap. Barely able to stay on his feet, alarms and sirens blaring, Zeph manager to scramble out of the building just in time to hear the evacuation annoucement: get the hell to the evac shuttles now.
All around him, and assumedly the rest of the planet, the Zeraora could hear and FEEL the missiles, laser cannons, mass drivers tearing into the ground and shaking the earth beneath him, targeting vital military infrastructure, power facilities, anything that could offer resistance to occupation, not seeming to target civilian evac points though. The slender, dirty feline is able to reach his shuttle as a result, boarding it and starting to strap into his seat.
But things can never be easy. Nothing is ever free. Just before he can buckle in, an explosion tears through the shuttle, incinerating half of the vessel and the occupants unlucky enough to be caught anywhere near the cockpit. Zephyr is thrown against the back wall of the main passenger compartment by the explosion, with plasma conduits spewing fire and toxic gasses through the front half of the shuttle, his lungs burning with the heated gasses filling them with every breath. Hacking and coughing, almost choking on the fumes, Zephyr scrambles onto his feet and notices one of the military personel beside him.
The soldier had been struck all over their body by shrapnel, likely killed before they could hit the ground, and next to them was the suit they were likely trying to squeeze into. It had a tough, woven exterior that covered its airtight, temperature-controlled lining, with plates of plasteel covering any and all soft points and joints, built to withstand combat in or out of atmosphere, and colored white and red just like the planet's flag. The helmet was deployed but not on the suit, attached to the waist. Shaking the fog out of his head, Zephyr knew exactly what he needed to do.
The feline shoved the dead soldier's hand away from the suit to claim it for himself, sliding himself into the leggings before tugging the torso up and over himself, the front and arms opening up to make way before they closed around his body, likely held closed by powerful electromagnetic force or god know what they use for these things. Finally he unclips the helmet from the belt, bright metalic silver with red glowing from the front through several horizontal panels, and places it over his head to seal the suit and activate its internal oxygen supply.
Thankful this species had a similar build to himself, Zephyr finally lifts his head to look around the room, ready to call out for other survivors and guide them to one of the few remaining escape pods, only to be met with silence and flame. He was the only survivor, everyone else had sat too close to the front and were bucked in, unable to esape or even react quickly enough. He didn't have time to think about it though, this thing could blow at any minute or they could be struck by another projectile, so he blocked it out of his mind the best he can and rushed through the burning husk of a shuttle to an escape pod.
He threw himself inside, smashing against the backwall before hammering the eject button, the door slamming down and sealing itself before violent ejecting itself from the shuttle up and into the atmosphere, rocketing out towards space. Zephyr finally sat back in the seat proper, not bothering to buckle himself in, sweating and panting and wishing the suit would stop making his belt dig into his waist, and he looked out the front window in the door. He was finally high enough to see the small fleet in space flinging hell down onto the world, but that wasn't what filled the Zeraora with dread. It was the single gigantic vessel, a goliath of a ship even among titans, built only for one purpose.
Zeph could see the front of the vessel opening, like a budding flower spreading its pedals, with a massive red core exposing itself to the world beneath it. It grew brighter and brighter, more intense, almost too bright to view even through the helmet, until an incredible beam fired from that core and straight into the planted towards its molten core. At that instant, Zephyr understood what was happening. He, like many others, had heard rumors of these kinds of colossal vessels, these armageddon machines capable of all sorts of terrible things that could destroy or alter entire worlds in just a few days. Or in this case, minutes.
And this one was minutes, the massive energy beam piercing through the crust, mantle, straight into the core while Zephyr watched, the surface elsewhere fracturing and seeping magma, ripping itself apart as the colossus tore at the very forces keeping the planet together. And finally, in a blinding explosion, the world was torn asunder and turned into mere pieces, the force of the explosion rocking the escape pod and violently throwing Zeph to the floor, knocking him out cold even inside his suit as rocks and debris pelted the hull.
When the feline came too, the pod door was opened and another creature looked down opon him, his helmet opened now that he was in atmosphere. It was definitely friendly, he immediately recognized it as another member of their alliance, and Zephyr knew he would be safe. But now he didn't have a home, nothing was left of the planet he grew up on and had lived on for so many years. He was taken to medbay, he was treated for all the fumes he had inhaled and any other injuries, and they let him keep the suit and helmet as long as he removed the insiginia since nobody was left to protest him keeping it.
He remained on the vessel until they docked, abandoning it the instant he could and boarding a trade ship to go wherever the stars would take him. The military suit would be an invaluable tool, and over time he customized it to better fit his duel role as security and engineer, drifting between the two jobs until eventually ending up on the Indigo in his current lead role. Without a home, and no assurance his next one would be safe, Zephyr decided his home was the frontiers itself. No politics, no sovereignties, no allegences. Just him, the crew, and anything they could get their hands on.
As for the star empire that had forced Zephyr into exile, they didn't get any further. The rest of the alliance were swift and merciless, as those kinds of weapons and vessels had been banned, and genocide would never be taken lightly. They had been crushed in a week by fleets many times their own size.