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Episode 02: Cosmic Imperative / Re: CH2: S [Day1|1900hrs] Show us what you got!
Last post by Dumedion -[Show/Hide]
The curl of a half-smile stayed in place as Talia listened and watched Atlas’ weigh in on the mission; confidence and amusement apparent in her posture and body language. While ignorant of the Kzin’s idiosyncrasies and physical tells, she knew pilots well enough and the egos that came with them – no one liked to look like a fool right out the gate, but to Talia's mind, they died in training to prevent it in reality – so her head dipped in acknowledgment and left it at that. Her attention shifted to Tessa as the blonde chimed in, offering her thoughts on the matter. Talia shrugged and nodded again when her wing-mate spoke up about hazing, though. It was true enough, the Wolves liked to fuck around with each other, but there was a time and place for it.
Training was neither.
Still, Atlas' reaction was amusing. Like I don't have better things to do with my time, Talia rolled her eyes. 'Airtight' was designed to test and push everyone's limits, working as a team. It didn't matter who flew with who - if they'd had a fourth driver, they'd all probably die anyway.
“Just to clarify,” Shadow held a hand up before they went any further, dark eyes turned back to Atlas. Her voice and tone were level, all business, yet spoken through a lingering smirk. “This isn’t about you or your ego, and certainly isn’t about fucking with the new guy. I trained on and flew 307s for two years before qualifying for the 409 program,” Talia tilted her head to the row of Valkyrie’s across the simulation. “So I know exactly what you're facing here. There really isn’t time for bullshit. By the book, we’re talking months of classroom theory and practical exams before quals – I had three weeks to get it done. You have eight hours, maybe less; so why don’t we stop wasting time.”
At least he figured out how to suit up, Talia’s eyes flicked over his armored exosuit quickly as she cradled her helm under one arm, chin jutted to him. “It takes almost that long just to sync these suits to your bird alone, by the way, so regardless how good you are, your reaction time and operating capacity will still be off,” she shrugged, then nodded to Tessa’s recommendation. “Training wheels it is. A few laps to start, at least,” Shadow agreed, then led the way to the waiting fighters without waiting for them to follow. The clock was running.
Talia continued as she walked. “Do yourself a favor and forget trying to compare the 307s to the 409s; the Valkyrie is a completely different animal, designed from the frame out to be superior in every way possible. Beyond the hard point options Goldie mentioned – which you’ll need to qual for individually, of course – it’s a whole new ship. Nothing handles the same. The exosuit and ship are attuned to every driver, offering unparalleled reactionary capability. Your RIO is gone, replaced with one of the most advanced C&C platforms ever designed; HUD function and data integration is faster, crisper, than anything you’ve ever seen – throw in the TVD and you can see through the damned hull,” Talia paused to glance over her shoulder at Atlas. “Hope you handle it better than I did. The sensory load alone made me nauseous.”
She stopped at the nose of Atlas’ bird, head cocked at the obvious modifications to the cockpit; it looked almost the same, at least from the outside. “This is you then,” she nodded to it, then arched a brow at Goldie. “I’ll run him through pre-flight if you want to work us up a route,” she asked with a shrug, “standard CAP, I suppose? Keep it simple?”
Talia consulted her wrist PADD then glanced up at the cat-man. “Pre-flight SOP is in Appendix D, section 3 of the manual if you want to follow along,” she told him with a tight smile. “Or if your the hands on type, be my guest,” she jerked a thumb up into the box of his ship. “Sooner we get going, the sooner we get gone.”