Dylan is a heavily-customized HAL-4 "Human-Astronav Liaison" serving as the chief navigator for Platinum Lion Salvage & Discovery. By Android standards, Dylan is a bit of a bad boy, a slick rough-and-tumble loner who keeps a switchblade in his pocket and lives by his own rules. He has a deep fascination with Mercurian culture, seeing them from the outside as this curious, iconoclastic planet of rebels who helped thwart Terra and its expansion into controlling the inner worlds, and has largely modeled his own personality after what he perceives a Mercurian way of living to be. Dylan doesn't really "do" salutes, or uniforms or chain of command; he's a star quarterback on a team of quarterbacks, he'll excel his job and as long as everyone else excels at theirs then there's no need to get all stuffy about protocol, you know? Things work out when everyone's on their A-game. It goes without saying, but as the ship's navigator Dylan works directly with Skydog407 in charting an expedient and advantageous course through the ever-shifting dangers of space. The pilot does not appreciate the informality with which his navigator conducts himself, but the charts he produces have thus far exceeded expectations. He is a star quarterback for a reason.
The bread and butter of the Delta line of Androids is starship operational integration and astronavigational computer interpretation, often serving as an intermediary between the ship's overwhelmingly complicated astrocomputer and a pilot who benefits from clear and concise direction. Basically every Delta droid can serve in this capacity, but Captain Tybalt isn't looking to hire everydroids, so what makes Dylan so special? Well, that loops back around to his cultural fascination with Mercurians. Chief among their many weird qualities, Dylan found the idea of a Mercurian's Gifts of Sol fascinating, and so he wanted one for himself. He has extensively modified his chassis to take on a more Mercurian appearance, installing pointed ear antennae instead of the traditional rounded ones and buying a sunstreaked hair color mod. His killer feature, however, is his eyes: At great risk and personal expense, Dylan had a miniaturized piece of scientific equipment wired into his optic sensor module which allows him to "see" the ever-shifting and otherwise-invisible warp currents that all starship travel in the Sol system needs to navigate if they want to get anywhere sooner rather than later. Normally these kinds of warp current sensor arrays are only found in deep space weather satellites manned by scientists like Caleb, a large and bull-headed Terran who would himself prefer to have nothing to do with a man like Dylan, let alone willingly sell him such a valuable piece of scientific technology. Somehow, in spite of this opposition, Dylan managed to get ahold of the hardware he sought after, and while he still depends on a standard astronavigational computer to calculate large star models, he now boasts a rare and valuable lens of starfaring insight. Having survived his one-of-a-kind installation he can now switch his vision to read local warp current flow patterns as if they were drawn right before him. Those glowing orange eyes aren't just for show, you know.
The price of Dylan's pursuit of a Gift of his own is a heavy one. Even though he managed to fit a scaled-down piece of scientific weather equipment inside his own chassis, its active operation and the added power draw it requires means Dylan's computer systems run hotter than a normal Delta droid. In practical terms what this means is, in order to prevent himself from burning himself out while using his Giftvision, Dylan needs to make sure he has cool, dry air around him to syphon the excess heat out of his body. He wears a vest over a sleeveless top as part of his rogueish aesthetic, but his arms are important heat sinks in regulating his internal temperature when he's computationalizing visual warp current data so he needs to keep them exposed. This puts some limits on when and where he can use Giftvision- when he's in the confines of a space suit, or a Hardshell Loader or any other kind of contained environmental pocket, he runs the risk of overheating the air bubble around himself and losing his heatsink capabilities. You don't need to read warp currents to move salvage, though, so this isn't as much of a problem for Tybalt; Duo Jie does a pretty good job of making sure Dylan suits up and participates in the gruntwork of wealth extraction alongside the rest of the crew. Also, tragically, his heatsink limitation means he can't use Giftvision when he's in a hot or humid climate, which effectively means he can't actually use his unique ability whenever he's visiting his beloved planet Mercury. On the other hand, running hotter than normal is yet another Mercurian trait he now possesses, so it makes Dylan's chassis mod that little bit more authentic. That trade-off works just fine for him.
A man like Dylan came to Tybalt's attention after completing a little bit of a spectacle- keeping with his bad boy self-image, Dylan maintains a passion for motorcycles, and spacecycles in particular. Fuel-efficient small-scale thruster cycles designed for short-range transportation in zero gravity, a spacecycle is an itty bitty tiny little open-air starship meant to be saddled by starfarers in full environmental suits that allows them to zip about a larger volume of space than they could under their own power. Dylan has one of his own, custom-modified with big exhaust pipes and raised ape-hanger handlebars, because of course he does. Using his Delta computer brain and his aftermarket Giftvision, Dylan calculated the long orbits of the Inner Belt and completed a full spacecycle course traveling from Ceres to Mars to Terra to Venus and ultimately ending up on Mercury itself, to the interest of a gaggle of gawking Inner Belt newspapers. The long distance and relatively low speed of riding a spacecycle across that much space meant that Dylan needed to be very careful in charting his course and keeping track of exactly where he was in the middle of space to make sure when he approached the next planet in his big journey, he'd be arriving where he needed to be as their orbits caught up with him. Being an Android himself was a crucial component to completing this journey, since he didn't need to carry food or water on his little spacehog, he could keep himself wired up to a portable power generator and let the cold void of space serve as a vast heat sink for his warp-reading needs. It took a lot of work to prepare for such a run, and without the aide of an astronav computer on his spacecycle he really depended on his special optics to read the warp currents he needed to ride to allow him to complete his journey. His exploits made headlines, but headlines are fickle and ever-shifting. Just as the glow of celebrity surrounding his achievement began to fade from Dylan's life, a new admirer approached his home on Terra with a job offer in hand- a handsome salary for a handsome man.
Between Bryce and Alan's navigational wisdom and Mahnoor's surgical piloting skills, the course Timberwolf charted through treacherous space should have been impossible to follow. Without the benefit of their star charts a tail would have no way of knowing which way the Ermine weaved and which way it intended to go. Captain Tybalt had invested heavily in the best assembly of starfarers he could find, however, so for the crew of the Platinum Lion Salvage & Discovery Company, the impossible was just a day at the office. Skydog407 was at the control yoke of the Mammoth, matching Mahnoor's flight pattern turn for turn, roll for roll. The cat was out of the bag- with Red Raven out of the picture Platinum Lion had no need for subtlety, and so when the Mammoth was chasing the Ermine, this time it kept a close tail. Bryce knew they weren't just being followed, they were being hunted, and he began to sweat as his crew's weaving maneuvers weren't able to outrun the Mammoth. He and Alan gave Mahnoor the best navigational charting data they could, making adjustments on the fly to account for the big blue ship that was right behind them; they tried to shake them off their tail but they seemed to have their routing dead to rights. Bryce couldn't make sense of it.
Aboard the Mammoth, Skydog407 put his Job Cartridge collection to use in reading the intent and response to flight data that Timberwolf's own Mahnoor would be executing, interpreting them exactly as Mahnoor's own training would have taught her- in their decisionmaking patterns they were exactly the same. What Skydog407 had that Mahnoor did not was a metal Mercurian leaning over his flightspace, one arm slung around his shoulder, his other arm outstretched, waving an index finger in front of the cockpit and giving an almost rally race-style read of upcoming turns and rolls in the warp currents. Big wave here, bank to starboard. Dip low, dodge that turbulence. Straightaway after this swell. It was extremely invasive and completely unprofessional but the live streaming data was useful, Skydog407 could interpret it through his TEST_PILOT_#%407 cart to develop new maneuvering patterns as he went. As he was piloting, Dylan was running calculations through the Mammoth's astronav computer, attempting to pinpoint where in space the Ermine was attempting to go, and where the currents might have left a wrecked old starship adrift. As the chase through Caelian orbit dragged on, Dylan narrowed the possible destination points to fewer and fewer pockets of calm space, until he felt like he had a probable hit. Coming up just ahead there was a little eye of quiet space in the middle of a swirling warp tide, a gap in warpspace with no push or pull to it; if a starship were kicking around in the void then the currents would likely wash it up in a spot like that. Once again leaning into Skydog407's personal space, Dylan traced his finger in front of the pilot's field of vision: a big ripcurl of warptide was forming just to port, if Skydog407 floored it right now they could ride the curl, sail past the Ermine and stake their claim to whatever wreck was waiting for them before the Ermine could make its way out of the warptide. Skydog407 understood the intent, he found the moment and punched the engines, sending the giant starship over, up and around the Ermine. Bryce's cigarette fell out of his mouth as he watched that big blue behemoth blow past his ship's front windshield, landing right exactly in the extra-secret pocket of space he'd been keeping in his vault of salvage leads for an extra-secret occasion. The wreck of the Quokka, the 22nd-century Martian star galleon lost on its voyage home from one of the planet's earliest trade contacts with Neptune, belonged to the Platinum Lion Salvage and Discovery Company. Bryce said every Venusian cuss word he knew.
What a find! Tybalt was ecstatic, whipping the crew to get suited up and explore the belly of such an historic relic. His mind raced, imagining the vintaged treasures that awaited aboard the crew's second claim- as a 22nd-century wreck, even the mundane items would have tremendous value to collectors and auction houses. He praised Dylan for delivering them such a fortune, but the Android played it cool; ain't no big deal, he's just doing what he does best, you know?
Skydog407, quietly, made a note to register a formal complaint of conduct with the First Mate.