Log:First Order: Naboo Drills
First Order: Naboo Drills
OOC Date: June 7, 2018
Location: Naboo
Participants: First Order, Kylo Ren, Grayson Oakfell, Evie Leven, Aenaria, Lioria Thrace
VANGUARD troops have been reallocated to Naboo for drills. They are supposed to report to Captain Kjalla and assume command of the AT-AT units near Keren. Once there, they are to use the walker division to eliminate a staged munitions plant. It sounds like an absolutely WONDERFUL mission that doesn't involve going to some planet that has shouting primates that want to throw rotten fruit at people. Captain Kjalla is easily found near where the AT-AT units are being prepped. Awaiting the VANGUARD to arrive. He seems to be overly anxious for this. Checking his uniform every few seconds for specks of dirt and other things.
Evennia Leven has made the claim more than once in her life that 'if it has an engine, she can fly it'. Truth be told, that particular claim extends beyond just starfighters, as her days at Sienar -- and even before that -- were full of operating vehicles. It was her thing to do. So when she was assigned to /this/ particular mission, with the chance to get her hands on the controls of an AT-AT? ... she was ready and waiting to go for probably the past twenty-four hours... and spent the flight over reading technical manuals to brush up on things even further.
So it seems she's the first of the group to approach, and she falls into a solid posture and crisp salute. "Captain," she greets. "Flight Leader Leven of the Vanguard, reporting for duty." She's trying really hard not to seem too excited. She can't stop herself from smiling... but at least that's a /normal/ Evie thing.
Grayson Oakfell is here. For medical guidance and to push things along should they stall. She is cured! CURED! No longer sick as she had been last weeks missions with those delightful primates, though still looking somewhat pale, though that's likely due to a much needed doze under a sunlamp. Not too far behind Evie the doctor will stroll up, "I have never driven one of these things, nor ..been in one. So. This is to be a dreaded delighting." Said heavily, her medical kit slung over one shoulder, the woman quite certain someone, if not her, will catch their finger in something and require repairing. If she shoots any of you accidentally ..well. It's your own faults. She should never have been allowed to come on these things.
Landing apart from the rest of the Vanguard is a black shuttle, its long batlike wings folding up into the air, collapsing in on themselves as a long plate on each wing slides down to make the silhouette more manageable. The stabilizing landing gear descends, and with a puff of steam, the boarding ramp lowers, and a man in a black tunic over black pants wearing a black cape strides down it, black boots clanking until he reaches the ground. By sharp contrast, he is not smiling, and instead could be more accurately described as 'brooding'. "Captain Kjalla. I see you've prepared the walkers. Good. The Vanguard members will each be piloting their own. Each. No exceptions." His scarred face turns towards the others, almost expectantly. "Any objections?"
Captain Kjalla for his part gives a salute to Evie when she appears, "Welcome to Keren, Flight Leader Leven. I trust that everything will be in order for you." he tells her. Grayson's comment gets a smile from him, "I assure you, it's not that difficult, Commander Oakfell and you'll have a team behind you as well. It's a staged assault today." he tells them. But then there's a shuttle landing and Kylo Ren appears. Kjalla stands to attention and salutes, "Supreme Leader." he greets him, the smile and joy slipping from the mans body. "They may certainly have their own walkers, yes." he nods sternly.
Returning late from the field is Aenaria, forward operative and infiltration specialist extraordinaire - also hot on the heels of some Naboo resistance fighters since a couple days past. She trudges up, prepped for the mission and sort of mingles in with everyone else like she was supposed to be there from the start. The Supreme Leader's appearance on site, however, makes her stand up a little straighter. She was not exhausted, she had totally not just spent the last few days with minimal sleep, shadowing nefarious individuals and trying to gain their trust, only to turn on them later... Nope... perfectly ready for everything. Good 'ol fashion Mandalorian endurance training reinforced with that handy First Order training...
"I'm sure it will -- and no objections whatsoever!" Evie chimes in response. The Kuati native is more than ready for the task. AT-ATs are especially impressive when one sees them up close, to say the least... but it is definitely more exciting to her than it is intimidating. She probably should be a bit worried about the idea of Gray behind the controls of a walker... but she's confident her skills can handle any... incidents that come up.
Grayson Oakfell definitely has no skills when it comes to walkers. None. Starbucks is off on another mission elsewhere, therefore today she is her own co-pilot. And the goddess of whatever religion she is a part of is her co-pilot. But of course she believes in no God, or Goddess, so she's on her own.
She will bow deeply to Kylo, a hand crossing against her chest, "I will be endeavoring to the high to not do the crashing, nor the crushing, of our own people." Then she straightens up, turning to look to the Captain, "Let us go now, the more we are standing and talking the less time I am having to be familiar with buttons." And ..there she goes. Striding. To get in her own walker. And get this show on the road.
"Good. Everyone mount up," Kylo replies flatly, turning himself to head for the walkers, the cape trailing behind him in the calm air.
To actually get inside, there's a lift inside one of the feet, because, I don't know the real answer, maybe there's a ladder up into the belly, but Kylo's has a LIFT. In the foot, and he takes it up into the belly of the beast. Before long, he's seated in the cockpit at the control panel, pulling down the targeting computer in preparation while he checks to make sure the comm channels are open. "Do not crash," is his first command into the comm unit. No further commands are forthcoming from his direction, however.
Captain Kjalla gives a salute to all of the VANGUARD members that head off to the walkers. Each of them can go up like Kylo did. Since he's fancy! There's a team in each to help them just in case that things go sideways. But none of them really help Kylo. Because he's terrifying! There's a few moments taken for Grayson's team and Aenaria's team to help them get the walker going. Then they're off!
It turns out that Aenaria is not a particularly good driver. She wobbles the machine around a bit before actually figuring out what to do. Then... yup. She's off. Like a drunk driver. Might be the exhaustion.
Evie's demonstration is... as one might expect. She's able to start the walker going without much trouble, but there's no epic walker backflips -- just fairly standard operation so far, but at least she's doing it on her own so far! Still, she's buzzing as she operates it. The feeling of being behind the controls of something as massive as this? It's invigorating.
Grayson Oakfell has literally never driven for herself in any capacity, in any sort of vehicle. And so once she's up that fancy lift into the inner belly of the walker she briefly walks around, not quite sure ..where to sit. There are two seats, and another in the actual belly of the walker for additional shooting. She exhales out loudly, honey brown eyes searching around, "Eeny meeny tiny toe ..where in the hells do I go ..." Heavily accented voice rings out musically, lips pulled to the side as she pats the back of one chair, sliding in behind it to look over the top, "Okay, Corr ..what would you do ..which one looks ..appropriate." Hrm. She figures the chair at the front will do, moving to slide into the chair, buckling herself in and eyeballing the controls. Right hand lifts and she'll tug at her bottom lip, drawing out her datapad with her left, thumb doing a quick search 'HOW TO START A WALKER' is entered in, and she begins searching the holonet.
Bottom lip is loosed and she'll hum softly, reaching out with now free right hand to ..gently boop a button. The walker grumbles to life but she neglected to read a step ahead to see it needed to be pressed while also pushing this other button. Hum. The walker stutters, one leg half-lifting but then it groans to a halt, dropping down to the left but still hanging and not falling over. Grayson lets out a grunting yelp, "Oh, very good Grayson, the Supreme Leader is here and you only give him reason to be killing your skin, not promoting you high. Okay." The datapad is set on the console in a holder meant for a drink, and she'll swipe left, bringing the screen up into a small holo projection of the instructions on how to drive one of these things. Both hands now free means she touches a panel and boops that button, the walker stuttering again but then humming to life, a klaxon going off to announce it's online and moving. Oh. Aahaha. Grayson begins laughing nervously, "Oh, this is not good, you should have been staying down you stupiding machine. Oh .." And she begins moving forward, her console showing the dots of the others around her, Gray moving ahead, her walker picking up speed, looking like a goose-stepping machine, hop hop hop, SHE GO FAST, "AH. DATAPAD, SHOWING ME TO SLOW IT. AHH." Vroom.
Is anyone immune to the thrill of driving a piece of machinery as big as a building? Of course not. The Supreme Leader is left alone in his, which is fine by him, so he's cruising along there, pushing the thing ahead. There's not MUCH to it, once you have an idea what you're doing, the computer systems make sure the legs don't tangle. Will he ever need to operate one in a combat situation? Probably not, that's what you people are for. But still, it's kinda fun. His mouth twitches.
"They look like they are going to have fun, Captain Kjalla." a vocoded voice states to the Captain on the platform. Kjalla gives a look to the crimson armored person that is standing by him, "The munitions station is what they will have the most fun with, we've put a lot of high powered explosives in there to help with the training." he states. "Excellent. The Governor sends his regards on his absence, he is looking into the attack from last night." the armored figure states as they look off after the walkers who are getting closer and closer to the target!
"Really...?" Aenaria seems... reasonably upset at how poorly the thing is handling at the time being. "I'll get this down... eventually." She observes some of the others casually operating the machines, but seeing Grayson having done as poor as her in the past had been a morale boost. But now that SHE was succeeding... well... Aenaria is left to suck on her own.
With what seems to be improving skill -- whether it's coming from that unwavering confidence, experience, or preparation, Evie's able to guide the walker easily closer to the target. She can practically hear the voices of her squadron cheering her on as the giant machine stomps along. "I could get used to this," she admits with a grin. But she wouldn't give up her TIE for it. ... now, add a giant jetpack to the thing, and we might be talking.
The key difference between Grayson and Aenaria is Aenaria is a highly trained operative. Grayson is a doctor, who has been, up to being brought into the fold that is the Vanguard, solely in medical bays. And who, due to position, politial maneovering and sometimes luck, has never had to have skills that eked outside the medical realm. Chaperones, drivers, the whole shebang. In other words; Grayson has a reason to suck. And the fact she manages to keep this walker moving forwards towards the target is a near miracle, one she laughs at, still terrified, "OH. Okay you do not slow down, but you ...you just keeping that way you big stupid machine .." Grayson says somewhat shrilly, her brown eyes wide and lips parted as she fully acknowledges she barely has a hold on this beast, "AAHHH. HAA. HAA. OH. NO." Thank GOODNESS she doesn't have her comms operating right now. No. She suffers in silence. Well. Inside a box that keeps her secrets. The datapad projection says to hit a button, and Grayson will, short manicured finger booping daintily. FWOOSH. OH. SHE SHOT SOMETHING. WITH NO AIM. AH. "Oh. Oh." No longer shrill, but a quiet sort of doomed sort of sound. Oh she don't know what she shot at.
The Supreme Leader's walker moves like it's not even being piloted, and has instead come to life, a giant hulking thing that stomps across the landscape with effortless grace, a majestic mass of metal looming large on the horizon, a colossus of weapon-making ingenuity in its purest expression. The man at the controls peers dimly through the viewport out at the target area ahead as his vehicle approaches, glancing towards the targeting computer but not pulling it down into place.
While the Supreme Leader and others are having fun in the AT-AT units, Lioria looks on from the platform where Captain Kjalla is looking over things as well. "So far so good." the vocoded voice states. And she's not whipping out any Force Powers to help. She's still training. Which might be why she's on Naboo given her teacher is here. "Now comes the exciting part. The explosion." the hollow voice muses.
Grayson Oakfell is really just mashing buttons at this point, the woman completely and utterly bewildered by what she's doing. Next time ...NEXT TIME ..she will label everything on the console. And drag Starbucks along to teach her in the moment. But ..with a quick scan of her datapad she'll read what the tutorial says, glancing to the console to type in that, adjust this here, and focus her firing power on an actual target this time and SWOOOOOSH. FWOOOM. BOOOOOM. KABUSH. She explodes it! BARELY. But she does it, "Ha ha! If only I am able to be telling Corr of this ..he would be very proud." Mmnnoooomaybe? Gray flicks on the comms then and tries not sounding /too/ pleased, "I did not blow any of you up, this is very pleasing."
So, lesson learned today? Evie can drive an AT-AT. She's always said that she could! What she NEVER said was that she had any talent when it came to shooting its guns, which handle QUITE a bit different than the ones on a starfighter. Still, she's left practically bouncing in her seat when it's time to bring the walkers back. What. A. RUSH!
