| Girl Talk |
| Summary: | They aren't grease-monkies damnit! They're refined ladies! |
| Date: | 26 Aug 2041 AE |
| Related Logs: | None |
| Players: |
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| The Farmstead - Sagittaron |
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| This is a sad and squalid patch of loamy earth, the blackness of which is broken up every few meters by rotting bits of green. Located on some of the highest ground near the Jharkand Delta, the farm went to seed a while before Warday — making it good only for growing weeds. An old farmhouse is the plot's most notable feature, perched as it is at the very summit of the hill — beside the charred walls of a barn quite recently set aflame. Those rickety structures aside, only two other hints of civilization remain. A poor excuse for a road winds its way down the slopes, its grey-white gravel partially obscured by encroaching dirt, while a small broken-down water pump creaks idly in the breeze, its handle worn by decades of use. The fields themselves have the undisturbed look of once-flooded ground — before the intrusion of men. The remains of broken tractors, plows, and various other farm implements have been carried by rising waters to their final resting place by the base of the farmhouse. Just enough barbed wire fences have survived to mark the edges of the twenty-acre property. |
| Post-Holocaust Day: #181 |
After Coll's involvement in the barn burning she's still trying to recover from the minor burns across her body and the deeper damage to her knees. But? It hasn't seemed to slow her down much. Her skin still being sensitive, she's still eschewing the tanktops and opting just for undergarments and a blouse above the waist. Most of the people down here have started to sunburn in some way but Coll just seems to be tanning. Somehow. She's currently parked her butt on the ground next to the winglet of a Raptor, leaning her head close to the minigun as she looks it over and makes notes on a small pad.
The whole barn attack is as good a time as any to justify giving the aircraft down here on the ground a full once-over. There's a good number of deckies down here to do the job, of course. Along with Coll, mucking around under the wings, is Cilusia, who stomps around on top of the winglet. She's checking the seal of the door to make sure that none of the heat from the blaze damaged it in the tiny bit that would space flight…well, not impossible, but downright hairy in the lack of full suits. The heat and sun don't seem to bother her - quite the contrary, she's just down to a single tanktop and her black pants, hair going all over.
Coll ticks off a few more notes about the gun before reaching up under the wing to its mount. She flicks a switch, disengaging the barrel lock and spins the six twenty millimeter barrels. "How's that door look? I'd rather not have nitrogen try and exit my face and eyes at unnatural pressures. It'd seriously fuck up my tan." She spins it back the other way and reaches back up to re-engage the lock before standing up and dusting off her rear.
"Don't look any worse than it should after coming in through atmo. It'll have to be replaced after one or two more re-entries, I'd wager. I'd put my stamp of approval on it," Cilusia replies, working the hatch open from its halfway position, then shutting it all back, latching it. "Pressure test'll confirm though. Just gotta ramp this baby up over standard atmo and test for leaks." The seal has a little bit of gooey wet stuff on it, which will bubble up if there are in fact leaks once the cabin's pressurized from inside.
"Good deal." Coll steps up past Cilusia and towards the rear missile racks. She lifts her hands to the mounting bar and uses them to heft herself up on top of the bird. "When I flew the other one out of the barn I thought I was going to do a lot more than prang the rear stab. Figured I would probably rip a wing. I haven't actually flown a Raptor in about two years. Maybe more." The Crewman opens up the access panel on the side of the port missile rack, pushing a few buttons.
"Better than I can do. Cars…and loading tank canons…that's about as far as I go. I'm no damn good when it comes to anything more complex. Once you get over about a half-dozen gauges, my mind gets all mushy." Good thing though? No more barns to fly in and out of, at the very least! "Ok, ducking inside for a pressure test, back in a jiff. Gonna set it to auto-cycle, 1.5 atmo, hold for 5 minutes, then depressurize back." Hatch open, Cilusia ducks in, and starts to poke on the keys and stuff to access those functions.
"Then you're just a little less qualified than I am. I can push a Raptor with about as much skill as a first-timer. I never had the feel for flight. I always got hung up in the cockpit with technical stuff. That's why they lateralled me out to ECO." Lauren continues pressing buttons on the pad, taking a few notes on the read-out. When Cilusia returns from inside, Coll is staring down the missiles tubes of the rack, wiping off the nosecones of the rockets.
Clunking back out onto the winglet, Cilusia shuts and seals the hatch from the outside, with that sort of whine that indicates there's pressure building inside. By eye she goes around the seams of the hatch to check for leaks, using the aptly-named Snoop compound. To look at the top of the hatch, she's got to get up on her very tippy toes. "Yeah, I'm just a grunt from some backwater. Never had the brains for any sort of academy, but between when my dad did in the service and what my mom did to pass as a job, I fit in pretty good."
Lauren continues cleaning off the missiles gingerly, scraping bits of mud off from the prior night's storm. "Bah. Backwater's not an excuse. I had one hundred people in my high school and it was the only one in the county." She grins at the memories that have been hitting her more and more in the past few days. "Some people just look for it. Seek it out. Other people don't nothing better or worse about it. Its just who we are." Crewman Coll actually seems to be in better spirits than she has been in quite a few weeks. But she looks far more tired. Not physically exhausted but more strained on a different level. "So what'd your parents do, anyway? Said your dad was prior service?"
"Yup. Scorpian shipyards. Died up there somewhere putting one of those big mother frakkers together. Welder, got blown to frakkin' bits with 13 other guys just doing their jobs when a tank blew. So, you can understand why I'm a little godsdamned paranoid when it comes to seals and safety equipment and shit." While Cilusia chats, she keeps checking out the hatch seals, across the top, down the far side, along the wing seam, checking for even the littlest bubble or leak that might be in lieu of a full bubble. "Mom owned a tacky-ass little gift shop there. Of course, I can only see how tacky it was in retrospect. Damn, when I was a kid, I thought that jewelry and little knick-knacks she sold was the coolest stuff."
"Yeah, don't suppose I can blame you for being so careful. I know the aircrews appreciate it. Sure as hell beats someone bein cocky, cavalier, or just plain lazy about that job." Coll runs the yellow rag over the nosecones one more time, this round being much faster. "Sounds like your mom had a cool little shop, though. Virgon is full of that stuff. All the tourists with money to dump? Your mom sounds like she would have done really well there. There's nothing wrong with that stuff either. Tacky can be made to work."
"True, true. But I don't recall a huge tourist business in the little corner of Scorpia that I called home. Don't get me wrong, there's some fabulous frakkin' beaches, some gorgeous jungle falls, and tons of sights to be had. Just…yeah, not many people want to vacation in hot and steamy when they can have all the sights in a locale that's just…warm." One or two more times Cilusia runs her fingers around the seal, then finally pops the lock on the hatch again. The cabin depressurizes a bit earlier than it should but it's no biggy, no explosive decompression or anything.
Coll stuffs the rag into her pants pocket and unbuttons the rest of her blouse, reaching into her pocket for something. When it comes back out, she's holding a plastic bottle of something..looks like Aloe. "Always wanted to get to Scorpia. I had a few layovers there or milk runs when I was flying. Never for more than a few hours. I mainly remember the heat, but yeah I'd heard about all that. My last CAG was from there. He used to tell stories about running around the jungle with his buddies when he was younger. They used to shoot each other with BB guns or some suicidal nonsense that would blind mere mortals. He had some great pictures of him and his wife from all over the place. Placid, light blue lagoons. Contrasting waterfalls from the rocks with lush jungles? I grew up in the forest. Its my home away from home. I'd have loved to have gotten there."
"It's really nice when you don't have to spend every minute there. Signing up for the fleet was sort of a vacation for me and shit. Course it figures, it's all a big shithole until it's nuked to hell and back. Then you start to get homesick. Luckily, I managed to get all this done…a little piece of home that goes with me wherever." With just a single tanktop on, Cilusia is able to show off the tattoo that runs the length of her right arm, from shoulder down to wrist. It's a single piece of art with a variety of lillies in reds and pinks with black shading. It's a bit shiny with the sweat from just…being here.
"Heh." Coll smiles, shrugging off the green duty shirt onto the wing. The green gel is squirt into her hand and she offers it to Cilusia. "Here. Put some on. Feels great, too." Her free hand slaps the gel to her midsection and starts redistributing it over her lightly burned skin. "That's a damned pretty tatt, though. I love it. We didn't have any kinds of flowers like that on Virgon. Not except in the rich towns all the tourists flocked to." More of the leftover gel gets rubbed to her arms. "I've always missed home but I used to resent it just a little. Right after I left, I didn't like to tell people where I was from. Didn't want people thinking I was a hick." She rolls her eyes. "After awhile I realized that as much as I didn't want to tell people, its who I was. And I was nineteen. I was full of fire and arrogance. Just a little in love with myself." Lauren cracks a smile at Cilusia.
"Man, that sounds damned familiar. I've been up and down the ranks more than once. Spent the first two months or so once that behemoth left drydock sitting in the brig. If that tells you anything. I had more than one encounter with the law back home…and that was rare for as backwater as we were." Were…heh. Past tense. With a nod, Cilusia thanks Coll, and takes some of that aloe. "Been a long frakkin' time since I've gotten this much sun and heat…well, since that Leonis clusterfrak. Thinkin' I should've enlisted in the godsdamned marines. My aim with a rifle isn't so bad now."
"Same." Lauren is rubbing the gel all over her face and neck now. "I was a Lieutenant. My CAG was going to fast-track me to a Captain slot and squad leadership. I got drunk and decided it would be a good idea to assault an MP." She snorts, shaking her head. "I used to hate myself for falling so far. Frakking up that bad? Now I couldn't be happier unless I was actually flying again. Pretty fortuitous. I guess you gotta zen out to wait and see how events play out in the long run to judge their value." Lauren evens our the gel around her stomach and sides before stooping for her green duty shirt once more. A gentle breeze finds them, Coll turning her face into it. "Bah. Still get plenty of opportunities on Deck. Like you said, Leonis." Lauren looks back to her. "Simultaneously the scariest, stupidist thing I've ever done and also one of the proudest moments of my life. I'd do it all again. Even die if I had to."
"Damn…I got pissed off and popped a PO One on Delphus. They said I was too frakkin' volatile to be on thet crew. Figured that shipping me out to a whole new crew, bunch of people that was the best and brighest sort of deal from around the fleet or whatever would be best. Shape me up and all that shit. I guess it's working good so far. Haven't been busted back down a rank yet." Cilusia mostly puts that lotion on the back of her neck and arms, across the bridge of her nose and forehead, where she's getting a little pink. "Yeah, Leonis was frakkin'…just, I don't even know if crazy is the best word. I'm pretty sure I could've gone my entire life and happily not seen half the shit I saw down there."
"Nice. Always wanted to pop a few different people. Though more and more lately I'm getting the urge to beat the shit out of more than a few of the officers. Use my fist as a facial battering ram to remove the smugness or hypocrisy." Lauren shakes her head, adjusting the blouse in the breeze. She opts to just leave it open for now, cooling off. "Yeah, after Raptor three oh five? No way I'm ever getting promoted again. Even if I did? So what. You take a nosedive and fall hard enough, eventually I stopped caring. If you notice? I don't tend to throw around a lot of 'sir' and related stuff anymore." Coll chuckles, leaning against the skin of the Raptor. "Can't imagien what you all went through being down there so long. I was there forty-eight hours and that was already bad enough."
"Yeah, well, you get real good at doing shit you thought you'd never have to do. In my case? Playing Marine. Too many Cylons and not enough actual soldiers, so…took my ass back to basic and figured out how to shoot a gun allll over. Among other things." Like survival training. Recon. Guard duty. Tank operations. You know, the basic shit.
Coll nods a few times, sticking her hands into her pockets as she watches Cilusia. "I never thought I'd have to build a bomb like I did. I never thought I'd voluntarily jump out of a Raptor twenty miles above the ground." She takes a long breath and looks across the field. "I had Sergeant Constin take me to basic. Teach me how to soldier. Sweat the officer out of me. I wish the training the Navy gave in basic wasn't so concerned with stupid technicalities and more on actual fighting."
"That's the sort of shit that would've come in handy on Leonis, for sure. Though, I can tell you now, being an officer ain't for me. Too much…like you said, too much about the technicalities. I like doing shit with my hands too much. Leave the thinking to the thinkers, and I'll offer my professional opinion as needed. But damn…jumping out of a Raptor twenty miles up? That's pretty frakkin' nuts." As Cilusia chats, she plunks her ass down on the winglet of the Raptor…no chance in breaking that thing, even if it weren't built to support miniguns and shit: she's a lightweight.
Coll offers a shrug. Its a gentle motion up and down while the sun wanes in the sky. "I miss it sometimes. But not on this boat. I got to play with my hands a lot when I was an ECO. I had a blast. I just believe I'm better-off without a commission on the Cerberus." The Crewman watches a pair of Marines patrol around the perimeter. "Heh, that was pretty nuts. You're right. I led the jump portion of the advance team insertion at Anadyomene. We didn't even have a plan for getting off Leonis. Constin told me it was a suicide mission but he was going. I volunteered to follow him. We just figured we would either be killed during an attack or left behind due to the intensity of Cylon operations in the area." The way she explains it sounds like she might be discussion the weather.
"So are you and Constin…well, you know?" Cilusia says with a head jerk in the direction of the passing patrol. Uh-oh, girly talk! On the edge of the wing, Cilusia pulls up one leg toward her chest and lets the other dangle over the side.
Lauren chuckles, still watching the Marines. "We're close." Its a tough read. She's either telling the truth or just being vague on purpose. A leg bends at the knee and she rests the toe of her boot agaisnt the winglet's top plates. Her gaze drifts to Cilusia. "What about you? Seein' anyone? Chief? Maybe someone from Engineering?"
"Hell no. Nobody's even on the radar, in all honesty. Just been keepin' my frakkin' nose down and doing my job. That's not to say there aren't a few on ship I'd like to have a tussle with, for sure." Cilusia gives Coll a little smirk there, a little knowing look that says maybe there is in fact someone on the radar. She's playing her cards close, though.
Lauren watches Cilusia, lifting a hand to run through her hair in the breeze. At the end she laughs, nodding. "Aye. There's quite a few I'd like to pin to my bunk and ravage silly. Pillage, plunder, and run amok." Coll just grins like an idiot. "But eh. Its all good. Maybe you find someone to have jollies with. Maybe not. These days, I don't think its terribly hard. I'd have a hard time believing you're holding a cold bunk, regardless."
Cilusia just gives a little wink, while hopping down off the wing. "Yeah, well, it's nothing serious….yet. Not with anyone in particular. I don't want to say that I'm easy or anything. I just…don't see any point in commitment as this point, ya know?" Once off the wing, she stretches side-to-side a little, arms up over her head, and twisting her body one way then the other. "So I hear they got steaks burning over this way…" she says, fading off a bit as she starts to drift towards the farmhouse…
Lauren shakes her head, snickering. "You don't have to be a slut to enjoy sex, hon." She shoves off the Raptor and across teh winglet. "All that taboo nonsense is a big pile of horseshit. We got just as much an entitlement to havin a good toss as any guy." She hops down off the end. "Can't argue about commitment, either. Do whatcha please. Way I see it, Fasi? If it makes you happy? Why not. Get married or shun the idea. As long as you can wake up in the morning with a smile on your face, its hard to see the crime in it anymore."