Scene #4073: Flight Training I

Owner	Pose
Morrigan	The Solaris flight deck isn't as busy as usual but there's always something happening - fighters being refuelled, recharged, rearmed. Noemi Laporte, her uncle Brie and a gaggle of rookies can be found near a set of UEF Uhlans. If Alexis is looking to fly, she'd have already been outfitted with anything she couldn't bring herself - a flightsuit and a craft, a standard-fare UEF Uhlan space supremacy fighter. "Is everyone here?" Brie asks, looking short and stocky and old. "Then let's begin."
Alexis Maaka	Maaka's here, donning a new flight suit as she's standing with her issued fighter. At parade rest, she nods and gives a crisp salute to the instructor. As far as she's concerned, until her training is done she's one of the UEF. She might be a bit tall for the job, but it doesn't really worry Alexis as she climbs aboard her vessel, getting settled into the pilot's seat after donning her flight helmet. No need for pleasantries, she's here for training among these fresh faced recruits.
Morrigan	As the various recruits settle into their birds, Brie settles into his. He speaks over a communications link to every rook, "Don't touch anything until I tell you. What you're sitting in is the Uhlan, most commonly used fightercraft in all three of our fleets. Cost-efficient, maneuverable, solid firepower for its size with both guns and missiles, and damn hard to hit. What's more, it's easy to pilot." There's a dizzying array of buttons and switches before Alexis, in the cockpit, most labelled but some aren't. After a few minutes, Brie is done guiding everyone through the right steps to bring their fighters online. One by one, they slip out into the waiting black. "Take it slow, get a feel for the Uhlan," Brie says. Behind them, the Solaris looms, like a four-kilometer long sword.
Alexis Maaka	Maaka's flown before. Usually it was civilian aircraft or a gunship intended for atmo-flight, but she's not entirely blown away by the cockpit as she watches the interface come alive. She follows each instruction as Brie goes over the steps one by one. Gripping the flight stick, she gets used to the feeling of the controls. This would be a lot easier if she could synch into the ship's systems, but that can wait until she has the chance and the permission to modify UEF property for her specs.
Morrigan	"Right," Brie says, "Now, most of you have had sim time, you know what you're doing. We don't need to go through the basics of what to do in a dogfight - you know the theory, we'll go straight to the prac. Laporte, I'll take care of these rooks - but I want you to teach Maaka." "Understood, Alpha 1. I'll show her a thing or two." Morrigan's Uhlan breaks away from the pack, settling on Maaka's six, nice and high. "Simple sim fight, three seconds of target lock and you're dead. Think you're up for that, rook?" There's a teasing tone in her voice.
Alexis Maaka	"Let's find out." Maaka grins behind her flight mask, breaking from the others as she follows Morrigan tightly. She still has a lot to get used to with the controls, but this can't be too hard for a trial run right? "I gotta say, the sticks are smoother than I suspected. Feels good." She muses over comms, then begins to go for a bank, settling her fingers on the triggers.
Morrigan	"Uhlan's a good class. Good at everything, no real weaknesses. There's a reason it's our mainstay," Morrigan comments, watching Maaka bank away. "Simple rules: stick clear of the Solaris and any of the frigate groups. Your computer will tell you when it's been three seconds. Switching my IFF to hostile... now." And, just like that, Morrigan's fighter turns red on Maaka's HUD - and she dives in to attack!
Alexis Maaka	"Rog'." Maaka does the same thing, before she begins evasive maneuvers. She's very very excited to be able to fly one of these things, and so she gets into combat mode. The ship tries to go low, flying below Morrigan's own fighter while the trainee gets ready for a 180.
Morrigan	Morrigan kicks her Uhlan into gear, swinging around her centrepoint to try and keep Maaka in her sights. Zero-gee allows for a completely different idea of combat. "Don't try large sweeping maneuvers like you would in an atmosphere," Morrigan's voice crackles over the comms as she sets her target reticle over Maaka's fighter - a warning chime would sound in her ear. "All UEF fighters can turn on a dime, particularly the Uhlan."
Alexis Maaka	"Right, right." Maaka takes that under advisement. She begins to do a swift turn, like Morrigan says, before she kicks the accelerator. Trying to remain steady, she attempts a pass on Morrigan, intending to shake that lock through a game of chicken as she narrowly zips by the more experienced fighter pilot.
Morrigan	Morrigan shoves her fighter to one side, rolling up so Maaka can slip past. It breaks the lock, but then Morrigan turns her fighter on the head of a pin and sets about pursuing Maaka. "Beep beep beep," Morrigan murmurs to Maaka, taunting. "One second..." Elsewhere, it's easy to catch a glimpse or two of Brie's own duels. It's not much of a surprise to see that he's winning.
Alexis Maaka	Maaka grins, instead of letting it get to her she takes Morrigan's taunt as a good warning. 'Thanks for the heads up, honey.' she thinks to herself, before she begins to pull up and guns the throttle. The skirmish nearby can wait, right now Maaka's focused entirely on the duel here as she zooms past once more. This time, she makes a hard left, trying to catch Morrigan in her sights.
Morrigan	Maaka goes up and Morrigan climbs up with her, keeping her movements slow and precise. "That's two seconds." Her opponent banks left, turns in hard, and simulated reports of weapons fire are read against her shields. "Son of a-!" Morrigan snaps, rolling into a bank and slewing around to the right to keep Maaka in her sights. A red light flashes onto Maaka's HUD - that's a simulated missile launch!
Alexis Maaka	Maaka remains calm, even as the flighting light gets her attention. Time to evade. She begins to search for countermeasures, normally she'd be popping flares to draw away the missile, but flares in space? Not likely. She's gonna have to improvise. She makes a rough spin, a rolling maneuver intended to screw with targeting while she grits her teeth. "Come on..."
Morrigan	There's a pulsing button that does read countermeasures - not quite flares, but something that emits heat, the sensor image of its craft, and a whole lot of sensor noise to try and foul up tracking sensors. Maaka rolls, and Morrigan rolls with her. That gun warning chime starts up again and, after a moment, Morrigan says, "And you're dead, Maaka. Nice roll, if you'd dropped a few countermeasures it'd likely have worked."
Alexis Maaka	Pop. Maaka sighs when she drops a heater too late, and then switches the comm back on. "Should've remembered that sooner." she says, before she begins to fly a bit more relaxed now that the duel's over. "I'm too used to flares, this is a whole other thing for me to be honest. Thanks for bearing with, M."
Morrigan	"It's all good. That experience will come in handy if the Tevs ever hit an atmosphere," Morrigan replies, falling into formation. Earth hangs, huge and blue, behind them. Stations and vessels hang around it, lit by running lights. "You lasted longer than any of the other rooks," she adds.
Alexis Maaka	Maaka glances to where Brie was training with the other rooks, smirking. "I'll bet I did." She then turns her head, spying the Earth in rear sensors with a wistful look in her eye. It's incredible, always is, seeing any World where mankind finally figured out space travel. Her own world's barely gotten that down, just a few stations orbiting the planet. "Tell me, when did your world first begin colonization off world?" She asks after a pregnant pause, trying not to let the stars so far off distract her.
Morrigan	"That's almost ancient history," Morrigan replies, letting her fighter drift on pure inertia. "Over a hundred years ago. There was the Jovian Rim Federation, the Martian Concordia... they were all swallowed into the Galactic Terran Alliance with the Titan Accords..."
Alexis Maaka	"Wow..." Maaka does the same, drifting slowly while she goes stargazing. "It's crazy to think my world still considers 'a hundred years ago' to mean some Yanks thought the world was gonna end at New Years '99."