AIRBORNE Variant - Thunderbuck Armor

The second of the three Thunderbuck variants commissioned during the retaking of Canterlot was designated "AIRBORNE", and was intended to provide short-range vertical mobility and rapid insertion/excursion capability. Airborne armor variants were usually grouped into their own squads and used as secondary assets on the battlefield, providing offensive and defensive capability from attack angles that would have otherwise been out of reach. Ponies wearing Airborne armor would often be deployed directly into hot zones within Canterlot proper, to assist teammates and civilians under fire.

The Airborne variant is specifically designed to be lighter and more mobile than any of the other Thunderbuck variations. As such, it sports a modified helmet, chest and shoulder package designated "PARALIGHT", which has primary and secondary armor plates that are slightly smaller and thinner, and which are forged from a lighter alloy than standard Thunderbuck armor. The Paralight helmet has a larger plas-glass faceplate for additional range of vision, as well as a forehead-mounted medium-range tactical vision package that is integrated into the armor enchantment interface. Airborne armor is also equipped with HI-LANDING boots designed for hard-impact. These modified boots are about a foot taller than the standard-issue Thunderbuck boot armor, and feature secondary dispersal hulls and reinforced tensile actuators in the legs, allowing for sustainable impact speeds well over fifty miles per hour.

All this, however, pales in comparison to the Airborne variant's main innovation: the RE/JUMPJET package, designed specifically to give short-range flight capability to earth pony soldiers who would otherwise be land-locked. The Jumpjet is mounted to the armor's shoulderpiece, and replaces the standard reactor ring with a slightly modified version that makes room for its twin magically-augmented ducted fans, which power its main-axis full-weight ascent thrusters. The Jumpjet is capable of lifting the full weight of an Airborne-armored pony, with an average output of nine hundred Newtons per second of burn. Coupled to the main thrusters are auxiliary shoulder and flank mounted maneuvering thrusters which convert waste heat from the armor's reactor ring into usable force, providing a possible two hundred additional Newtons per second of vertical thrust, allowing Airborne troopers to lift weights up to 250 kilograms without assistance.

Fighting among the skyscrapers and spires of Canterlot would have been impossible without Airborne troops supplementing the main body of soldiers, and it was their timely arrival during several key battles that led to the eventual recovery of the Elements of Harmony, and the final expulsion of the Tyranid threat from Equestria.