Mar 28 01:44:20 108 PA - I can fly! Pretty much.
From Chronicles
Mar 28 01:44:20 108 PA.
LANDING STRIP
Early afternoon at Kingsdale's Landing Strip is rather busy, with aircraft of all kinds coming and going. Off to the south side, where all of the snow has melted away and the green grass has returned, is Gabriel. But he isn't just sitting around on his ass this time mucking with his jet pack, or hopping around like a retarded monkey. No, he's actually making some passes parallel to one of the smaller, secondary runways. Not so high, not so fast, but very well controlled - looks like the extended time between his last lesson has seen quite a bit of practice. He even seems to make some turns, though they're definitely a bit awkward, and definitely slow. As his concentration is on what he's doing, he probably won't notice anyone unless they deliberately grab his attention. He's come a long way.
Erica walks over the landing strip dressed up in her Triax armor. Her jet pack is attached to her back. Looking up she notices Gabriel flying around. She chuckles softly to herself as she makes her way over to one side of the runways. She sets down a bag on the ground while she waits for Gabriel to land and join her.
It takes a few minutes before Gabriel notes his instructor - and comes to a light landing about fifteen feet away, declaring over the radio, "Afternoon, Erica! I've *really* been practicing! Not taking it too fast yet, or too much with the turns, but I'm getting used to the implant, and shifting my weight right. Plus the control, obviously." He waves his palm that contains the small unit. Perhaps as a personal amusement, he jets about three feet into the air, then comes down unassisted with a light clunk. "So, you ready to get started, or do you want me to try to kill myself doing a vertical loop?" One might hear the excitement and humor in his voice, even over the broadband radio.
Erica nods her head as she listens to Gabriel talk over the radio. "Good. I can see you are doing pretty well. Just have a few little things to go over and then you should be ready to go." She says over the radio. "We will mostly be going over high speed moves today." She activates her own jet pack and starts to hover up in the air. "Come on lets go out over the wilderness and we can start with high speed turns."
Gabriel's helmet nods, and he's quickly in the air, moving into a good stationary hover - not perfect yet, but very good - near his instructor. "Okay, lead on Erica. You seem to have a spot in mind." His non-controller hand is waved out... well, not in any particular direction, but clearly a, "Go ahead."
OUT OVER THE WILDERNESS
Erica powers up her jet pack and starts traveling at about a hundred miles per hour out west. She goes for a few minutes to get away from any air traffic or any populated areas. After reaching a good spot she slows down to hover in mid air. "Well let's practice high speed turns. We will max out your speed and try turning to the left and then to the right. You shouldn't have too much problem with this. Just need to get a handle for your speed."
On the way to their practice location, Gabriel said rather absently, "Hey, I think I can see my house from here." It's possible. But he primarily does a dutiful job of following Erica, keeping up with her very well, and once or twice speeding past her for a brief second or two. Not going to try to get into a race with her pack or her experience, that's for sure. The forests are pretty. When they finally reach a hover, he maintains his position long enough to listen intently, then nods and moves off. First making figure eights at almost a walking pace, then gradually picking up speed. He's definitely still a bit wobbly and not perfectly in control, but really, not bad. Erica may have been right - he might be ready now. "Don't know how hard a turn I can make in this thing without losing control," he comments after one rather awkward curve.
"Alright push your speed until you reach maximum speed. You are doing well so far." Erica says while hovering high up in the air so she can watch Gabriel from high above. "Well try making tighter and tighter turns while keeping your maximum speed. Then you'll start to figure out the limitations. After this we'll do some moves up in a cloud or two that way you can try flying where you can't see as well. Have to listen to your gyro compass."
"Got it," comes Gabriel's voice over the radio. Never uses the airman's term 'roger' in life. Marines don't go for that. Just to be safe, he jets up a few hundred feet to give himself more room to fall without ending up in the trees. "Here we go. Pushing it up." At first, his turns are taking an absurdly useless one-hundred yard radius. Figure eights and more complex four-way clovers. After a few of those, the turns begin to tighten, and various grunts can be heard over the radio. Probably not from the flight itself. Maybe more from concentration. The radius is eventually narrowed down to about forty yards, possibly a little less. He ought to be able to do better than that. Neither is his pack's speed maxed out, either. "This okay? For now?"
"Yah that is pretty good. Just get used to the forces as you make high speed turns." Erica says over the radio while she watches Gabriel make high speed turns. "Very good. Ok let's do some turns and moves up in that cloud." She says while pointing to a large low hanging cloud. She powers up her jet pack and goes from her hovering position to fly over to the low flying cloud. "You have to be careful cause you can get easily turned about without visual info. So just trust your gyro compass."
Gabriel follows Erica up, hovering just on the thin edge of where the cloud begins, looking somewhat timidly into its opaqueness. Even fluffy clouds can be intimidating if you're in the right mood. A healthy sigh comes over the radio, the kind that you hear when someone is pressing up their guts to do something. "Alright. Here I go. If you see me come falling out, please catch me." Then he's off. After a few seconds, "Can't see very far." Probably fairly obvious. Also probably fairly tough to determine just how far, or how not-far you're actually seeing. But he begins to make turns. Slow, wide ones. "I'm trying to remember a common focus point. The implant helps. But... it's... ah, it's weird, Erica."
"Good yah it is a little weird. Do a couple of loops and flips. Try to keep an eye on your gyrocompass so that you know which way is up. I'll keep at the edge in case you get in trouble." Erica says over the radio while she moves to hover under the low hanging cloud. "Keep moving and you'll get used to moving at night or in clouds. You know whenever you can't see perfectly. Use your compass to keep your orientation."
There's a long time of silence over the radio, though it's possible that an armor unit with good hearing could still hear Gabriel's jet pack moving along a few hundred feet overhead. "Tightening my turn." He does. "Speeding up... feel like I'm sliding a little, though." Up in the cloud, Gabriel has in fact sped up to his pack's maximum speed, but cranking up his radius to a very tight - at least to his consideration - twenty-five yards or so. This time the radio *does* emit some grunting noises from the acceleration. After some further grunting, there's, "FUCK!!" and Gabriel comes zooming out of the cloud and at a good angle toward the ground. Fortunately, he manages to correct himself safely above the elevation of the canopy. "Got a bit loopy up there when I tried a vertical."
Erica powers up her jet pack as soon as she notices Gabriel coming out of the cloud at a good clip. She catches up to him just as he manages to correct his momentum. "Yes that will happen. You should try flying at night when you get a chance. If it is a cloudy night you won't get much in the way of light. Just have to rely on your gyro compass at night. Now you see why I insisted that you get one."
"Yeah, I see. Let me try... out here." Gabriel does a wide vertical loop, a slow one, but a fairly neat one. More of a tight oval. Too vertical to be a circle, but close enough. "Okay, back to the cloud, Erica." Then he's off at a good pace. If 'pace' is the right word when you're flying. Once in the cloud, though he obviously can't be seen, he announces every maneuver that he attempts, and judges each one according to whatever his own one-to-ten personal scale of quality may be. "Vertical loop... whoa.. blood in my head. Try this." The radio cuts out, and he then crackles over the comm, "Strange. Actually feels better when I take the vertical faster."
Erica flies back up to the bottom of the cloud so that she can help out if something goes wrong. "You are flying like a pro now. Good job. All the practice was worth it wasn't it?" She says over the radio while she keeps watch. "Soon you'll be ready for the frantic flying of combat. What questions do you have so far?"
Some more quiet for a while, then, "Well, thanks. I feel like I can get around, yeah. But what if someone comes to chase me down? You, some bastard animal with wings? A pissed-off parrot?" Gabriel allows himself a tiny chuckle at that. "Seriously, how do I try to get out of the way of things headed my direction in a very bad way?"
"If you are being followed loosing them can be difficult to do. If you are faster then just try to use your speed to get away, but usually they are faster. You have greater maneuverability so try getting behind them or flying down under cover of trees. Clouds are also a good way to loose someone." Erica says over the radio in response to Gabriel's questions. "Might want to also try some targeting exercises."
Gabriel comes out of the clouds to hover near Erica, who has turned out to be an excellent instructor over these past long weeks. He might have done a lot of practicing on his own, but her certainly owes most of his skill to her careful guidance. With a nod, he says, "Yeah, I know. The Falcon was cheap," he says, referring to his pack, "built well, but not the fastest piece of equipment. Cover's good though. Not sure how I'll fly through the trees yet. End up as a smear on a thick trunk somewhere." He sounds rather morbidly amused at the thought. But the mention of targeting certainly gets his attention. "I know my NTI bucks like a sonofabitch, by the L-20 has nothing, obviously. So... some problems there. Maybe a little time to reset in between shots." He bonks on his helmet with a fist. "That headset thing - it let you que your pack fast enough to cover the recoil? Keep you in place better?"
"Well keep in mind you can land in a forest pretty easily. You'll have the advantage in taking off and landing just about anywhere." Erica says as she hovers near Gabriel. "I don't fire weapons with much recoil. My particle beam rifle just has a little kick, not much. I would suggest using lasers to begin with and then as you get used to firing from hovering positions move to your kinetic weapons."
The older man looks at Erica and his radio crackles with grim laughter. "Yeah, I'd love to do that, but I can't use it against these bastards up north, or so we've been told." He then shrugs - still an odd motion for him hovering at about one-thousand feet. "Of course, this thing probably won't make the weight limit anyway." He then zooms off abruptly to make a slightly-wobbly barrel roll before returning. "Okay, well, I can keep practicing. I *will* keep practicing. You've been a great teacher, Erica. You have anything else to teach before I throw you at the Nightingale and buy you a beer? Special moves that I should be aware of?" Gabriel asks.
"Try firing a few clips to get used to the recoil." Erica says over the radio as she keeps hovering up in the air. "Do some target shooting from up this high. See how it works out." She turns her helmet to look at where Gabriel is doing his barrel roll. "I can't think of anything else to add. Looks like you are a pretty good student. Lets head back to town." She says before heading back to Kingsdale at a good hundred and twenty miles per hour.
"Great! Woo, I can fly!" Gabriel emits like a child. Of course, this causes him to make a slightly over-turn that ends up being an odd pirouette. "Okay, well... I can sort of fly. I'll hit home and catch you back at the club. Maybe I'll even wear something nice!" He jets ahead of Erica shortly, then looks around and says, "Um... okay, I can't find the trail... oh, no, wait. Got it. Don't recognize where my home is... but I can land and walk." He'll thump Erica's shoulder with an armored gauntlet. "See you on the surface." Then he's away.
