Credit to my friends for editing, proofreading and helping in general, they're not on so i can't actually credit them properly though. (I'll hug them later)
She always hated being in the air, it went against all her instincts as a survivor. She had destroyed enough vertibirds to know that being in one was the same as being a tesla cannon shot away from a fiery death and amazing as she was, even she couldn't survive a vertibird crash. The fact that the prydwen was basically just a really big vertibird, well, blimp actually, which actually made it even more dangerous than a vertibird, considering the whole ballooney bit, didn't serve to ease her worries at all considering she was on it. It wasn't just her either, the soldiers, the children, the scribes, the engineers, almost everyone in the brotherhood was on this flying deathtrap!
She hadn't tried going down to the engineering deck, not just because she lacked clearance, but also because she didn't think it would ease her worries to see how many catastrophic failures the ship risked everyday. She'd honestly rather take the nightmares of rogue vertibirds ripping through the blast resistant fabrics and burning civilians and combatants alike in a blaze of helium, it was better than solid proof that they could all go down in seconds, she'd just have to hope that there wasn't anyone out there with a really big tesla cannon.
It honestly wouldn't be so bad if Maxson, sorry, Elder Maxson, wouldn't make a point to piss off everyone they made contact with. Like when they'd taken the core for the Prydwen from rivet city, the locals certainly hadn't taken kindly to that, nor had the outcasts who had been using the reactor to power their armour. The following battle had proven that Maxson had to stop making enemies or, sooner or later, they'd all pay for it.
She wasn't stupid though, she knew that nothing was going to change if someone didn't step up to Maxson, but no one was brave enough to try, especially not her. No, the faint hope that there were enough people in the brotherhood who still shared her values wasn't worth the bloodshed if she was wrong. It wasn't that she doubted that she would have backup, she knew of at least two others who were on her side and she figured that would be enough. But if it was too early then they'd have to fight Maxsons loyalists, and she wouldn't stand for that because, well..they were brothers too, asshole brothers, but brothers nonetheless. Even so, she was getting tired of waiting. That's all her life was nowadays, waiting, for herself- for others- for the end of those stupid medical check ups that were fooling absolutely no one as to their true purpose- when was it all going to end!
Realizing that that train of thought went nowhere, she decided to think on their current predicament instead. Namely, the fact that everyone in the Brotherhood was sitting a thousand feet in the air and at risk of a fatal fall should anything dangerous make it past their defenses. In the worst case scenario they should have a fallback, something to keep them safe, it'd have to be easy to use, portable, and cost efficient, but was there anything that could fit that description?
They could try jetpacks but those required power armour meaning the kids would be out, and they didn't have enough vertibirds to get the entirety of the brotherhood on the ground without at least a week's notice. Though honestly, they should have done that rule of strategy, don't concentrate your forces. What were the footsoldiers doing up here that the turrets couldn't achieve anyway?! She admitted that the Prydwen did work as an effective supply depot but that didn't explain why they weren't sending their loose soldiers to establish a larger controlled area in the wasteland. Not too large, of course she'd seen the effect of trying to hold a border while overextended, they all had, but with their numbers and supplies they could easily take another two or three outposts near the airport, maybe send a few teams around on goodwill missions, lord knows the commonwealth could use it.
This wasn't the time to agonize over the brotherhood's suicidal protocol though, she'd be ranting to herself all day if she continued to quietly disparage all of Maxson's strategic failures. By then the brotherhood would in all likelihood be dead and in the water and differences aside, she wasn't about to let that happen. Thinking back on her time in the D.C. wasteland on the eastern coast in the hope that it will reveal a solution to the brotherhood's sky high dilemma, she recalled the military posters she'd seen plastered around the wasteland and zeroed in on one particular detail.
Grinning, she went over the details in her head, strings, linen, a bag, a belt, yes, something like that would work. She'd need to find a weaver in the wastes- and someone that could supply her with the necessary materials, but if she was successful, then no one would need to worry about falling from the sky anymore. She'd be able to sleep properly at night again. With that in mind, the former knight captain put on her mask, stuck her head down and walked out to meet the day.