Meeting the Blink pilot

Posted on Mon Apr 9th, 2018 @ 4:16pm by Warrant Officer Koh Otassu

Mission: https://wellington.pegasusfleet.site/index.php/sim/missions/id/4
Location: Fighter bay

All immediate business out of the way, crew signed in, quarters assigned, fighters and support equipment inventoried and settled in their designated locations, Jack Carver found himself with some free time. What better way to spend said free time than by investigating the strange, sleek, alien fighter in the fighter bay.

And that's where you'd find him, quietly and calmly, slowly circling the ship, investigating it from every angle.

Sleek in ways that only a fighter pilot could find pleasing, built from an alien mind to counter an alien threat. From the other side of the Blink Fighter's hull, one could hear a voice with a building volume, a building fervor. It spoke in a language unheard by many of the Federation, the tongue of the Ts'usugi. It built into a grand proclamation, that ended with the phrase "Shori wa matatakumani kuru!" and then silence, as Koh made his way to Jack's view, and then further to Jack's side.

"When the first Blink Fighters were produced, the Emperor at the time was very pleased with them. He called us his Starfighters, or something close to it in translation." Koh said with a smirk. "I've watched the archive a hundred times, I've obviously memorized the Emperor's entire speech... and that last part always gets me excited. Shori wa matatakumani kuru." he cleared his throat, "Victory shall come in a blink."

Jack smiled as he listened, pausing his walkaround to let Koh catch up. "Very fascinating." he offered in complete honesty. "And it's a remarkable ship. Very different design doctrine from ours." he mused, resuming his slow walkaround.

"Larger than ours. Heavier, too, I think. Let's see ... Very aerodynamic shape. Large control surfaces. Are these RCS thrusters? Probably very fast and maneuverable in atmo." Carver mused, inspecting every inch of the sleek, black ship. "Beautiful lines. Energy weapon emitters, I count five of them. Bit on the small side. Pulse or beam, can't tell without popping the hood. One projectile emitter, reminds me of our micro torpedo launchers. Very directional weapons, narrow firing arc."

The human male continued his slow walkaround. "Beefy engines. These look like sub-light engines to me. Ah, those most be the atmospheric support engines. No super-luminal? Hidden above?" he jumped, pulling himself up on a trailing edge. "Nope. Hm. Elongated shape, beefy engines, aerodynamic, but lacking super-luminal. Narrow arc weapons, focused firepower, if a bit light. This is a close range space superiority fighter, am I right?" he asked Koh, finally stopping and turning to face the other.

"Right on every count. You know your design theory." Koh nodded. Now it was his turn to be impressed. "Blink Fighters are too small to support a Dark Drive, so they're limited to subluminal." he then motioned to the middle of the craft, where all the drive works and power generation was hidden, "When the Blink Drive kicks in, though, it propels the craft to eighty seven percent of luminal for just a fraction of a second." he met Carver's gaze, and then very purposefully blinked.

"Straight line distance, about two hundred and fifty thousand klicks." he remarked, "the system has a few pre-programmed maneuvers it can perform while in blink, since no living pilot can react that fast." he stated, as a matter of fact. "Weapons are pulse. Continuous beam weapons had a tendency to heat up the emitters if used constantly. Since heat is hard to get rid of in space, we went with a pulse weapon to cut down on buildup."

"And one projectile feeder. Energy weapons are nice but sometimes, you have to actually knock on someone's door." Koh said with a smirk.

Jack chuckled. "True enough." he smiled, looking over the blink fighter again. "Impressive. Very impressive. Does momentum carry over post blink? Or can you go in facing X way and come out facing Y way?" he mimicked the motions of a fighter flying with his hand, three fingers together, thumb and pinky extended outwards. "I'd love to see her in action some time. Maybe even get some stick time, if permitted."

"Here, let me show you something." Koh said, and then crept under the fighter's frame. On the bottom of the craft, Koh opened up an maintenance hatch about the size of his hand if the fingers were all spread, then moved so Jack could get a look. Inside the hatch was a cylindrical object, with a series of wires and tubes about it. "That in the back is half the key. The Inertial Dampening system. During standard operations it compensated for inertia, allowing for some pretty spectacular mobility. Those larger tubes there are the power feed from the Blink Drive itself." and at that, he patted the underbelly affectionate, though the drive was actually a little higher.

"When the drive engages, it floods the system with power. That inertial compensator... becomes an inertial nullifier." he paused, "Negates momentum, negates inertial. During that singular moment, I can tell the craft to bank and turn, to pull an Immelmann turn. Then I return to the real world, and wait a few seconds for the charge to build up again."

"I'm working on getting an accurate re-creation of her in the hollow room.. wait, that was wrong. Holoroom. There we go. Holoroom. Accurate recreation, in the holoroom. Though, the only way to know what it really feels like to fly one, like you say, is to actually fly one. Right now, though, she's the only one here. I have some seventy eight in storage as exchange for parts and maintenance, but Renee keeps saying you guys don't need that as long as I'm crew. If you want some more wings, you'll have to requisition them from Fleetmaster Tukal." a pause, "Who I hear is on very good terms with the ... admiral? Supercaptain? Trying to figure out your ranks. Myers. Him."

"Not familiar with the rest of the crew yet. Term is Admiral, if he is what I'm thinking you mean. Supercaptain works too." Jack shrugged. He gave a low whistle at the explanation of the inertial compensator. "That is a remarkable piece of tech. I don't think we have anything similar. We probably have the technology, just nobody thought of building one. I'm very impressed." he smiled, crawling out from underneath the fighter again and standing back up.

"Now. Your turn. Analysis of my ship." He thumbed to Black Sheep 1, the Gryphon named Bad News. "Curious to see if you can figure her out from doing a walkaround and giving her a once-over. Also gives me a moment to think about how to integrate your blink fighter into my squadron."

"That's what it's all about. Exchange." Koh smirked, "Though, I know traditionally the Ts'usugi are very close-to-the-vest when it comes to their tech. Doubly so when we found out that no one else out there in the black is going about superluminal the same way we are." he chuckled, and started to walk towards the Bad News. "Initial lookover, very sleek. Looks more designed for transition into atmosphere than the last batch of Starfleet fighters I saw. I'm sure they could manage just fine, but they'd generate a ton of drag."

He started to circle the craft, ducking under and gently touching. "First assessment, lack of headroom." he smirked, pointing up. "Hmmm.." and he looked a little closer at something. "Are those... Modular points?"

"Yup." was Jack's only reply, even as he followed Koh underneath the Bad News

"I haven't seen those in use. We phased them out on our support craft because there's always a carrier or support ship nearby when we deploy so, if we need heavy firepower or something to that effect we can call down an orbit support." Koh mentioned as he continued his walking tour. "Ahhh, there's those blue parts. Humans must find the color blue pleasing." he chuckled. "Well defended, I'm seeing some good offensives here but, with the modular points you could add more."

Then he chuckled, "With the mod points, you could probably rebuild this thing into anything you need, without a support craft beca... because Federation fighters don't *need* a support ship." he gave a good belly laugh at that. Odd to see a Ts'usugi actually display like this. "Oh that's clever."

Jack chuckled, then laughed as well. "Well, you're not wrong. We do build our fighters for prolonged independent operation, basically miniature star ships. In fact, she has a life boat, so you could actually call her a ship." He rested a hand on a leading edge, giving his fighter a bit of a pat pat. "Bare as she is, she's a heavy fighter, built more for firepower and survivability than speed or agility. The hard points and optional packages allow her to function as light bomber, tactical recon craft, light cargo craft, emergency medevac, you name it - she can even fill a SAR role."

"Tint me impressed." Koh nodded, "See, if we need something discreet without a support craft, we ask the Dalacari nicely for one of their shuttles. We promise to be careful with it, and bring it back, but those things are comfy." he chuckled, "Damn comfy."

"See, *their* shuttles and fighter craft are superluminal, so we borrow their equipment if we need to go far. Though for the most part we operate with a support ship nearby. Pretty much like you said, close range space superiority fighter."

"Different doctrine, not necessarily better or worse." Jack rubbed his chin stubble. "Breaking my head over figuring how to include you into my fighter wing, into Starfleet doctrine. Problem is that there's only one of you, and our ships are too different really to work as wing men. Lack of superluminal also limits how I can use you." A pause. "How did you get to be stationed onboard a Starfleet ship? And, think we might be able to get another blink fighter with pilot so there's two of you? At least that way you have a wing man and I can use you as short range defense flight."

"There was a huge cross fleet effort to repel hostile Klingons from a Dalacari station. My wing took heavy loses, heavy enough to temporarily disband. So, I was given the option of either shuffling into another lesser-damaged wing or take the first step toward something better... as the Fleetmaster put it." Koh smirked, "So, I requested the transfer over to the Wellington."

"As for superluminal, I remember Renee saying she was working on something, but until then we're two ideals from two worlds. I can cross-train on your fighter types in the meanwhile until a second requisitioned Blink fighter comes over." a pause, "Or, just stick to short range support and harassment."

Jack shook his head a bit. "I don't mind giving you some stick time on a Gryphon, but I have my crew. As for you serving as lone support and harassment fighter, I'm not entirely happy with a single fighter without wing man going in to any combat situation. Always good to have someone on your wing that can help scrape bogeys off your tail." Beat. "No offense."

"So I'm gonna see about figuring out who I have to talk to to get another blink fighter assigned to the Wellington." Jack offered. "Until then, I can use you for probing, recon, things like that, but I'd like to keep you out of combat much as I can." he folded his arms over eachother. "That work for you?"

"None taken. We have a similar phrase so, no worried." he stated as he shook his head, "But yeah that all sounds good. Point and click, coasting recon, no issue here." he then gave a nod, "I understand where you're drawing your decisions from. Just gonna miss the acoustics until we get a wingman."

"As for who to talk to, someone with a lot more steel on their neck then either of us."

"Ain't that the truth." Jack chuckled. He liked this Ts'usugi pilot. He was smart, down to the proverbial earth and knew his stuff. "I'll see if I can get some face time with supercaptain Myers, see what he can arrange. Meanwhile I'll see if I can fit you in the training roster, see if I can get you some stick time on a Gryphon. See about you showing me what a blink fighter can do, and, if you agree, I'd like to try her out myself some time."

Koh gave a nod, "Sounds like a solid plan, chief."