[oom] A visit to the Milliways Garage with Adrian Shephard

[dejah_thoris]

 She finishes her coffee and turns to Shephard.

"Would you mind if Woola joins us?  He enjoys exploring almost as much as I do."

Comments

[hecu_marine]

"'Fraid so, ma'am," Shephard says. "Things're unstable as fuck but they c'n take off'n land straight up and down, and they'll hover in place for a pilot who knows his shit. Our medics swear by 'em for rescues."

"Better not plan on emergency evac, though, the prop wash from the fuckin' rotor blades'll fuck the ever living shit out of your parachute if you try. Only way out of one of these in the air's into a convenient pile of somethin' soft, or a lake or some shit like that."

[dejah_thoris]

She chuckles and lets the skimmer drift in place for a moment. It bobs as gently as a cork in a bathtub.

"You sound like you speak from experience."

[hecu_marine]

"You only have to jump out once for it to stick in your memory, ma'am."

(All the other unplanned exits from flying machines involved crashes.)

[dejah_thoris]

She turns her head, just enough to speak to him.

"You're calling me ma'am again. If you insist on attaching an appellation to my person, I'd prefer -- professor. Or doctor, whichever you prefer."

[hecu_marine]

"Force of habit. Momma and my DI drummed it into me but good," Shephard says. "Sorry 'bout that."

[dejah_thoris]

"No need to apologize. It simply makes me feel like your mother, or your commanding officer. I'd prefer to be your friend, if that's all right with you?"

[hecu_marine]

"Fair 'nough," says Shephard. "Most folks who ain't from my part of the country back home ain't used to hearin' it used much either, so I'll do what I can to avoid it."

[dejah_thoris]

She grins, and nods. That's all she can ask, really.

She leans forward and grips the control bars again, banking them away from the rotor craft. The aisle stretches ahead of them as far as the eye can see.

"So how fast do your two-wheeled craft go, anyway?"

She shifts her weight, and the craft begins to pick up speed. Nothing faster than the golf cart so far.

[hecu_marine]

"Up to a hunnert-twenty miles an hour," says Shephard. "I don't reckon I ever did much more'n about eighty or ninety on-"

He stops; a thought occurred to him.

"Y'all use miles or metric on Barsoom? Or somethin' else entirely?"

[dejah_thoris]

"I'm familiar with Earth's Imperial measurements in distance."

She can do the conversions in her head adequately enough.

[hecu_marine]

"Mmkay. Most I've done on my old Buell's about eighty-five miles an hour, then," says Shephard. "Legally I was only supposed to be doin' sixty at the time."

Ride a few hundred miles without seeing a cop, and you get all experimental.

[dejah_thoris]

"There are legal limits on the speeds your vehicles can travel at?"

She puts on a bit more speed, her hair beginning to flutter around her shoulders.

[hecu_marine]

"Used to be," Shephard says. "Ain't no rules about that kind of thing no more. Ms. Vance'n my momma've got a shitload of better things to do than make stupid-ass rules."

[dejah_thoris]

"I suppose in more populated areas, it might make sense. I think the people of Helium would laugh if I attempted to decree something so ludicrous."

A little more speed, probably twenty-five miles an hour now. The pin feathers of each wing adjust constantly as their weights shift.

"I see what you mean when you say this place goes on forever."

[hecu_marine]

"Some of it's safety," Shephard concedes. "Last thing you want's some culero who don't know the local roads proper takin' a hairpin curve at forty when twenty-five's the fastest you c'n make the turn and not go flyin'. Straightaways, though, most of the time it's pretty much dumb as shit."

"Aw, you ain't seen the half of it yet. Keep on goin' 'til you git to a big blue chopper with a little grey'n black one next to it, then hang right. You got to see the Jaeger."

[dejah_thoris]

"Jaeger? Those are the massive armored suits that Mister Pentecost was talking about?"

She assumes by chopper he's referring to the rotor wing craft. She pans her gaze over the line of strange panoply vehicles they're passing. A little less than a minute passes and she sees the ones he'd described. She banks the skimmer and immediately cuts back her speed.

"Holy Mother Issus..."

[hecu_marine]

"That's them," says Shephard. "I know a fella here who used to pilot one."

He smiles a little at the response. "Hansen says this one's called Tacit Ronin," he says. "It was the first in the field, from what I hear. Somethin' like that, anyways."

[dejah_thoris]

"I knew they were--big. I mean, he told me the dimensions of the things." Her voice is tinged with awe, and the skimmer drifts as she lets her gaze travel up and up and up.

"But knowing and seeing are two entirely different things."

[hecu_marine]

"No kiddin'," Shephard agrees. "There ain't but one flyin' machine I ever had to pilot that I liked flyin' in, and I thought it was pretty fuckin' big- until I saw it up against this."

[dejah_thoris]

She turns in her seat, and gives him an incredulous look.

"These machines... fly?"

[hecu_marine]

"Naw, naw, Jaegers don't," Shephard says. "But the lion I flew's the only thing I seen that's near as big and still moves."

[dejah_thoris]

She nods, and turns back to contemplate the monstrosity she sees before her. "The resources alone needed to build such a machine, much less pilot it... It must take a small city to keep it maintained. Do you mind if we get a better look?"

[hecu_marine]

"Go right ahead," Shephard says. "Only seen it up close once myself. Things're supposed to be as expensive as aircraft carriers, and those were small cities themselves."

[dejah_thoris]

She nods, and leans forward, bringing the skimmer back on course. Woola had just returned to their location from wherever he'd been exploring, and was glad to get moving again.

"Aircraft carriers, those are the waterborne ships, yes?"

She waited until they were within yards of the Jaeger before she began increasing the altitude. It gave the impression of being on a lift. The engine hum was almost silent, even against the hard surfaces of the garage.

[hecu_marine]

"Yep," says Shephard. "I dunno how you arrange things on Barsoom, but in my day there weren't no other kind. Think we used to have some lighter-than-air ships you could land real small planes on once, but we ain't had those in ages."