Bernoulli's Principle

"Get away from her!" an angry voice called out, startling me more than I had been in a long time. "Don't you lay a finger on my plane!" Ah. That was why it had looked familiar. I pulled my hand away from the aircraft and turned to face a fuming Mirage as she stalked towards me, her light blue eyes smoldering with anger. It seemed I couldn't do right by this woman, not that I had been trying or anything, but still…

"Commander Arad," Mirage began as she continued to make her way towards me. I stood my ground as she swiftly closed in on me, not wanting to show any weakness to anyone present. "Are you seriously trying to recruit this walking disaster?" It took a lot of self control for my only reaction to that remark to be a slight twitch, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw the brown haired commander continue to sport his playful smirk and give a shoulder shrug to Mirage's question. "I recall telling you not to take the battlefield lightly," Mirage continued, not paying attention to what her commander thought of our small confrontation.

"I don't care much for swinging big guns around," I told the pilot in front of me. "I'm here to fly."

"Oh?" Mirage asked, a dangerously fake expression of understanding coming across her face. "You want to fly? Well, then…" her eyes narrowed as if she had finally caught an annoying mosquito after hours of careful planing.

"Commander, do we have a spare flight suit?" Mirage suddenly asked, her blue eyes not leaving my own.

"Heh," commander Arad lightly chuckled before answering. "Yes. Yes we do." The man finally uncrossed his arms and waved over to me. "Hayate, come with me." I was tempted to continue my staring contest with Mirage until we collapsed from hunger or dehydration, but…

"This isn't over," I murmured just loud enough for Mirage to hear as I began to walk away with the commander. Before she disappeared from sight, I could see her dangerous expression only grow, an almost feral grin following me as I left the flight deck.

Commander Arad quickly lead me through a couple of doors to a ready room with some spare flight suits hanging and ready.

"I hope you had a light breakfast," the commander laughed as I began changing. I was slightly worried at this point, I hadn't ever really been on anything more rough than some amusement park rides when I was a child, and even those I was sure were nothing compared to a military variable fighter. I zipped up the last part of my suit and grabbed the helmet that went with my suit, heading back outside with the commander. We waited outside for a couple of moments while Mirage got changed and some personnel who had been outside finishing their maintenance did some last minute checks on Mirage's plane. When the female pilot came out, I had to remind myself that the woman before me was an enemy, or at the very least a rival, and not something to be… admired. It wasn't the first time I had seen the woman in her flight suit, but it was the first time I had seen her in the day and with a somewhat clearer mind.

After some quick words with the mechanics tending her plane, Mirage shot me a look and simply pointed at the rear seat of the cockpit. I put on my best face of defiance and put my helmet on with as much confidence as I could, not hesitating while I walked towards the ladder that had been extended for me.

Once we were both in the plane, it was a quick couple of checks before we were beginning to hurdle down the runway at crazy speeds. But the craziness didn't stop there. The woman was handling the plane as if she was trying to shake off a persistent enemy, with sharp turns, accelerations and rolls every couple of moments. I grunted and gritted my teeth just to maintain conciseness and the minimal amount of concentration required to still be able to understand what was going on.

"Are you enjoying the skies yet?" the woman asked, her voice completely at ease in every way, laced with just the right amount of teasing coyness to bolster my efforts to maintain my rebellious nature even now.

"I'M LOVING IT!" I shouted back in response, grunting through the whole statement. I knew I wasn't fooling anyone with how much of an issue I was having at trying to maintain conciseness, but that wasn't my goal right now. My goal was to defy Mirage's pitiful expectations of me. And I felt like I was succeeding if her annoyed 'tisk' of displeasure was anything to go by. So of course she only tried harder. And in turn, my efforts only increased. After what seemed an eternity, a voice came over the radio.

"Mirage, come on in, Theodore's saying you're straining the frame too much." Mirage gave another grunt of displeasure before responding.

"Roger." She still whipped the plane around to get us back to the platform, but it was otherwise a comparatively pleasant flight back. If Mirage's normal piloting was usually this graceful, it probably would've put me to sleep. I was beginning to think that everything would be alright as soon as we got out, but my stomach disagreed. Apparently it didn't like going from stationary to flips and turns to stationary again in rapid succession. As soon as I was out of the craft, I was hunched over and spewing, hardly removing the helmet fast enough.

"Do you get it now?" Mirage asked, a smirk in her voice that irked me more than… more than it irked me that I couldn't find something that I could compare my level of irked-ness to.

"Mirage, that's exactly why I'm assigning you to be Cadet Hayate's training officer," I heard commander Arad say.

"What?!" Mirage quickly asked for the both of us as I tried to recover.

"I want him up to speed in a month," the commander replied, his foot steps starting to travel away from Mirage and myself.

"W-wait! Commander Arad!" Mirage called after the man, clearly in distress.

I thought I had finally recovered enough to trade some verbal spares with Mirage after her sound defeat at the hands of her own commander.

"The skies…" My stomach was severely disagreeing with my minds assessment of my state of readiness, but I tried pushing on. I stood up straight, much to the protest of my body, and tried speaking to a startled looking Mirage. "… are waiting…" The queasiness I was feeling was beginning to peak again, but I had to deliver my line. "… for-" I couldn't do it. I heaved as I was facing the woman and received an appropriate disgusted reaction from her as the remainder of my breakfast came up. Once she had regained enough of her facilities to leave, she did at a rapid pace that would've made me laugh if I was feeling any better.

"That's one way to make an impression," a familiar aged voice said as I finally started to feel a little better and was able to stand up fully without any heaving. "Though I don't think it was necessarily the best one to make," Theodore finished, a slight chuckle in his voice as he approached with a towel, Perry bringing up the rear with a bucket and mop.

"Almost any impression would have been an improvement over what she had of me before," I replied as I caught the towel Theodore had tossed at me.

"Oh?" Theodore laughed as I walked over to Perry and took the mop to begin cleaning up my mess. The man looked a little surprised at me, clearly have been expecting to do the job himself, but didn't try to take the task once I had begun. "I can't imagine she thought that badly of you," the older mechanic said as I began to try and get the small piles of half digested food off the black surface of the flight deck.

"Well, when we first met, it might have been seen as me… um… doing things with a minor," I slowly admitted as I focused intently on my job.

"Oh." Theodore said simply.

"I wasn't of course!" I quickly clarified, hoping I wasn't alienating my self further form the people I would probably be around for the foreseeable future.

"Of course, of course," Theodore responded, only half convincing me he meant it.

"And then I had… um… I guess borrowed? a military variable fighter during a battle with Zentradi who were under var influence."

"Borrowed?" Perry asked from his place he had been watching me from.

"Well, I wasn't planing on keeping it, that's for sure," I replied defensively.

"Sure, sure," the man quickly said, waving his hands in a placating motion. I sighed heavily as I temporarily paused my cleaning efforts.

"Heh," Theodore lightly laughed seeing my exhausted reaction. "Well, if you're hoping to improve any kind of view Miss Jenius has of you, I'm going to suggest you don't make light of what the commander just said."

"Huh?" I asked, not quite remembering what the man had said in the first place. Theodore just gave an even more hearty laugh at that.

"I guess you were a little… in disposed at the moment." the man lightly teased before relaying what the commander had said while I had been recovering from Mirage's flying. "You're basically going to be studying under Mirage's wing. She's an excellent pilot, from a technical standpoint at least. Everything you'll need to know, she'll be able to teach you. As for the instinctual part of piloting…" the man squinted over me as I continued to prop myself up using the handle of the mop I had been using. "I think you might be able to handle that part on you own," he finished with an aged smile. "After that stunt you pulled with the commander and Lieutenant Ihlefeld, I think you'll be able to read the skies pretty easily."

The rest of the day was largely relaxed comparatively. I did have to sign some documents with the secretary who had lost me earlier. She seemed to be very upset with me that I hadn't been following her closer, but was quick to drop it as soon as I apologized. I may not be a law man, but the contract seemed to be a pretty lenient document. I wondered if the commander had drafted it specifically for me after my requests or if it was like that for the other pilots as well. Deciding not to look the gift horse in the mouth, I signed the documents and was told I had the rest of the day to indulge myself after I was handed a flight jacket I had seen the other members of Delta Platoon wearing.I asked around a bit about the auditions, but quickly found out that no new members had been added to Walkure. My mood was dampened after that bit of news, and I began to shift my efforts at trying to find Freyja again.

The girl had seemed so dead set on joining the Walkure that for her not to be able to join after she had shared her passion with me seemed to feel like a personal loss. I spent a fair amount of time trying to back track to the secretary I had signed my papers with to see if I could get any clues on the young Windermeran I had been traveling with.

"Oh. Well, she got a, um… special audition," the woman replied, not fully meeting my eyes for whatever reason.

"A special audition?" I asked, unsure of what that even would begin to mean. Walkure was already a pretty special group of singers, how someone could have more special on top of that seemed to be some kind of challenge.

"Well, maybe more… non-traditional would be a better term… ?" the woman seemed to ask herself, still not giving me a more direct answer.

"Well, can you just tell me where she is?" I asked, getting slightly annoyed at the obtuse answers. "She's probably pretty distraught right now and I'm not sure what kind of… damage… someone with her energy reserves can do when they're not in a stable emotional sta-"

"Why would she be distraught?" the woman quickly interrupted, her eyes showing some genuine concern that made me pause for a moment. I had thought it pretty clear that Freyja wanted to get on to Walkure with her rather embarrassing display earlier today, but perhaps this woman was just out of touch or something.

"Well, I think she just might be upset she didn't make it, is all," I explained to the woman who suddenly seemed to understand why I had been wanting to find the bright haired woman.

"Oh!" she replied, a happy smile coming over her face that didn't make sense until her next statement. "Freyja did make it on Walkure. She didn't make it through the normal auditions, but we had suspected something special about her and gave a rather… unusual second chance. She passed with flying colors. You can probably meet her back down in Barrette City. I think Chuck said something about a Kinoko Cafe. It's right where you got on the trains to get up here," the secretary finished helpfully.

"Thank you, uh…" I trailed off, not remembering having ever caught her name.

"Oh!" the woman said surprised again. "Yuri. Mizuki Yuri," she introduced.

"Thank you Miss Yuri," I told the woman as I headed for the door so I could go congratulate Freyja. It didn't take long to find the Cafe she had told me about, it was practically right there as soon as I walked of the tram I had ridden back down into the city. I looked around hoping to spot the bright haired young girl and wasn't disappointed when I found her sitting by herself and mumbling like a crazy person. I tossed my flight jacket at her to both surprise her and save herself from whatever kinds of things she may have been mumbling about. I was amused by her reaction as she flailed under the garment and eventually removed it, looking around for the owner of the clothing item. Upon spotting me, her eyes widened in shock.

"What?! Hayate!"

"Hi!" I replied, a small smile on my face as I moved to sit with the young girl.

"You're still on Ragna?" the girl asked, putting the jacket I had thrown on her down on the table in front of her. She suddenly seemed to realize that the jacket she had just put down belonged to me. "What's up with the uniform?"

"Oh," I replied as nonchalant as I could. "I joined the Delta platoon." Again, her surprised reaction was worth the effort I was putting in at staying casual about the whole thing.

"What? Really?" she quickly asked, again looking at me with shock in her eyes.

"I heard about the audition," I continued, my happiness for the girl coming through in a light smirk. She began to do a fairly creepy laugh that I at first thought was forced, but soon realized was, in fact, genuine. "Aren't you the lucky one?" I asked her, finding myself using the same line I had when she had been allowed to do the auditions without the preliminary audition.

"Sorry for the wait, Freyja," a voice I had remembered hearing earlier today called out, breaking Freyja from her laugh. I glanced to the source and saw the large man who had been with Mirage earlier and a woman that looked vaguely familiar walking towards us. Luckily, it seemed Mirage was absent for the time being.

"Shall we get going?" the woman asked, glancing at me and back at Freyja.

"Fo' sho!" Freyja replied happily, jumping up from her spot and pumping both her arms as if she needed to psych herself up for some kind of show. I reached over and grabbed my new flight jacket before standing up, the new uniform catching the large mans eye.

"So you must be Hayate Immelmann," he said while sticking out his hand as Freyja and the unknown woman continued ahead. "Chuck Mustang, number three of Delta flight." I reached out and shook the offered hand, glad that at least one member of the team I now found myself on was at least appearing to be friendly. Chuck and I joined the two woman and began to walk down the stone streets.

"Where we headed?" I asked Chuck as we continued down the nice sidewalks of the city, getting closer and closer to the water front.

"Well, we try and stay off Elysion as much as we can, it helps us from hating the place when we need to stay on it for longer periods of time. Because of that, we all live out in town. I'm guessing you don't have a place set up for yourself yet, right?" Chuck asked, giving me a questioning sidelong glance.

"No," I replied, shaking my head in tandem with my answer.

"Then you can lodge with us guys over at my place. I've got a spare bed and everything, so don't worry about it. Just… your room mate… Messer is just kind of… leave him his space and you'll be fine."

"Messer?" I asked, not sure if I liked the sound of this person. "Who's Messer?"

"A good man," the woman, who I still didn't know the name of, quickly replied. Chuck suddenly looked like he had been shot and quickly ran up beside the woman.

"Kaname, why don't I come over with a plate of delicious local jellyfish dumpling-" Chuck began quickly, speaking as if he was trying to repair whatever untold damage he had just caused.

"Sorry," the woman I now assumed to be Kaname replied unconvincingly. "Our dorms are female-only."

"Figures," Chuck replied with faux happiness.

"Wow," Freyja said as she fell back into step with me behind Chuck and Kaname. "I guess I'll be living in this city now," the bright haired girl said with a sense of wonder never leaving her voice.

"I didn't expect this either," I added in, speaking nothing but the truth. I had expected to wander around jobless for a month or so while I tired to pick up some seasonal work. To have picked up such a high profile job within hours of arriving on this planet… someone was looking out for me. My thoughts went to earlier today when I had heard the whispers in the wind and subconsciously, my hand went to rub the crystal that hung around my neck. While I lost myself in thinking, we finally came to where we had been headed, some kind of restaurant right on the waterfront that had a large sign that claimed the establishment to be named Ragnyannyan.

"Welcome to my humble abode and male quarters of the Delta Platoon: Ragnyannyan," Chuck said with a grandiose gesture to the building behind him. I smiled slightly at both the name and the good luck I believed I had once again come across. A place to live that also constantly had a large supply of good food? Never had I had so much luck in one day.

Well, it hadn't all been good. There was that whole loosing my lunch thing…

"Ragnyannyan?" Freyja asked, reflecting my curiosity behind the name. Before he could elaborate, Chuck was pulled from us by a cry coming from the front of the restaurant.

"Bro!" a young male voice called out.

"Welcome home!" a familiar group of kids chorused as they rushed out the doors of the establishment. I balked in recognition while Freyja decided to use her words to express her surprise.

"It's those kids!" she said, her eyes going wide with shock.

"The phone thief!" One of the children yelled while the other two looked just as surprised.

"Thief?" Kaname asked while turning to Freyja who looked like she had clammed up all the sudden.

"Thief!" the children yelled in confirmation as they began to hoot and holler like a pack of wild animals.

"Well, I just…" Freyja tried as she brought up her arm with the strange phone wrapped around it. With the constant yelling in the background however, Freyja was looking like she was fighting a losing battle.

"How's that right?" I yelled at the children in an effort to help out my traveling companion. "You guys put it on her-" I was suddenly interrupted by the sound of shattering glass coming from within the restaurant. All shouting stopped as everyone turned their attention to a quick brown creature that was jumping from table to table on the outside patio of the restaurant.

"A mercat?!" one of the patrons yelled in surprise as the animal landed on his plate of food with a large cooked fish in its mouth.

"What the hell?!" another customer exclaimed as they jumped away from the agile creature. I let out a small sigh as I realized my new accommodations wouldn't be mercat proof. So much for getting rid of this stuffiness…

"That's my dinner!" someone yelled from inside, a woman with pink hair and an… ample chest quickly coming outside followed by a tomboy-ish looking girl with a green pixy haircut.

"Cheeky kitty," the girl with green hair sighed, looking at the mercat with loathing.

"You again?!" a Ragnan female who was even more busty than the pink haired woman said in an exacerbated tone. She began to stomp towards the animal in anger, quickly provoking the creature to jump and take off again. "Hold it!" she yelled after the aquatic nuance as she chased it off the balcony of the patio. When she realized her yelling was going unhindered, she called down to Chuck who was still trying to figure out why Freyja had been called a theif.

"Chuck, it's yours!" Delta flights number three was quick to grasp the situation and stepped in front of the mercats rout to the water. The man's two younger brothers also came to his aide in their sudden showdown against the seemingly disadvantaged animal.

"Aloha," All three greeted menacingly, as if their words and intent behind them wouldn't be lost on the creature. Before any of the three Ragnans could move, the mercat had already sprung at all three of them, swiftly dispensing pain with it's flippered tail. I winced in sympathetic pain for them that quickly became all too real as the grizzled mercat jumped at me as well and gave me a solid slap across the face. The force of the blow was enough to throw my unreadied ass to the ground and I could hear Freyja and the woman who I had only known for a couple of minutes mutter sounds of sympathy.

"What the hell?" I asked aloud, quickly finding the creature looking conceitedly at all four of its victims. "I didn't do jack shit to you!" In response, the mercat simple ate its prize whole and swam beneath the water to go harass some other unfortunate people. "Freaking mercats…" I muttered as I began to get back up, my attempt interrupted by an involuntary sneeze.

"Are you okay?" Freyja asked, coming and bending over me to give my cheek an appraising look over.

"Are you allergic to cats by any chance?" Kaname asked, also looking at where the mercat had slapped me.

"I'm not letting it get away next time!" I promised myself as I rubbed my nose in vain to try and get the stuffiness to go away.

"You're in my way," an irritated voice cut in, the impatience of the tone grating on my nerves harder than the statement would usually cause. I looked to see who the impatient prick was only to find it was the same guy who had been with the commander earlier today when they had found me out on the flight deck. Now the tone made sense.

"Oh, you." I replied, not entirely too happy to see the man here.

"Messer!" the well endowed Ragnan called out, her tone letting me know that she most definitely didn't share my impression of the man. "Welcome home!" she finished happily, taking me back for a moment. Did that mean…?

"Oh," I said, giving my sudden insight a voice. "We're roommates."

"Great timing," Kaname said happily, her tone not making just as much sense to me as the Ragnans. Which was none. No sense what-so-ever. "Wanna have dinner with us?"

"I'll pass," the man said, bring a wave of relief over me. "I already ate."

"I see," the Kaname replied, her tone of hopefulness seemingly undimmed by the cold response. "Next time then." I silently hoped that a next time would never come. My lingering allergy induced sneeze, however, would wait for no man and promptly reminded both Freyja and Kaname of my presence.

We all ate big meals that night, each of us hungry for our own reasons, my chief one being the vacancy I had created in my stomach earlier that day and Freyja's even larger than normal appetite coming from her auditions earlier. I learned that Kaname was part of Walkure too, explaining why she had seemed familiar, and that the green and pinked haired woman, Reina and Makina,were also part of the singing group. It felt weird to be eating with a bunch of galactic Idols at first, but it's surprising how quickly your mind adjusts when you're hungry. The women left almost as soon as we had all finished eating, as it was already getting pretty late and Freyja and my own training would be starting tomorrow. After seeing the four off, Chuck lended me some sheets for my bed upstairs and I quietly made my way to the room, mindful of the dark haired man who I didn't want to wake for any reason. As soon as My head hit the pillow, I was out.

"Get up."

A cold hard voice broke through whatever dream I had been having and brought me back to the dimly lit room above Ragnyannyan.

"Get up," the impersonal voice repeated. I looked over towards the door of the room to see the tall and intimidating form of Messer half way through the frame. "You have thirty minutes to get to Elysion. Set an alarm next time, I'm not going to wake you again." With that, the man efficiently fished his transit through the door and closed it, not softly, but not hard enough to be considered a slam. I sat there for a minute until what the man had actually said to me registered.

"Thirty minutes!?" I cried out suddenly, shooting out of my bed and throwing on the clothes I had hastily thrown on the floor last night in an effort to get into bed as quickly as possible. In a blazing five minutes, I was practically tumbling down the stairs as a startled Chuck greeted me just as he was walking out the front doors.

"Morning… Hayate?" the dark skinned man asked, clearly wondering at my rushed entrance.

"Woke up late," I quickly explained out of breath as I joined him near the door.

"Oh," The man said, understanding coming upon him followed by some guilt. "Sorry about that, I guess it would've been nice to know when to get up, huh?"

"Oh, don't worry about it," I said, mildly joking. "Messer had your back today. I guess I'll need to grab an alarm clock or something after training today."

"Don't worry about that," Chuck said as we continued walking together. "I'm sure I've got an old one you can have."

"Thanks," I said, again glad that at least one person in my new work group was treating me well. We continued to make small talk the rest of the way to Elysion and I even arrived ten minutes before I had to. Commander Arad had raised a surprised eyebrow, clearly surprised that I had shown up on time, and even though it was grudgingly, I managed to say a thank you to Messer who simply 'humphed' at my effort.

Then there was Mirage.

"Good to see you didn't choke on your vomit in your sleep," the woman said in greeting, setting the tone for the day.

"Good to see the robot's recharged their batteries," I returned, getting a subdued chuckle from Chuck and a slight twitch in the commanders ever present smirk. Mirage's face quickly darkened with both anger and embarrassment.

"Mirage," the commander asked, jumping in before Mirage could say anything back. "What do you have planned for Mr. Immelmann today?"

"A couple of simple tests and concepts that anyone with half a brain could ace. As such, I have fears that it may be too much for our newest member," she haughtily answered.

"A test?" I asked. "What's that got to do with flying?"

"If I'm going to be teaching you how to fly, as ludicrous of an ideas it is, I need to be sure you'll understand the words and concepts I'll use to correct your many deficiencies," Mirage quickly answered.

"Ensuring he has a solid foundation," Messer said to himself, but at a volume that everyone could hear regardless. "A good call." The commander nodded in agreement.

"Seems like you're off to a good start then," Arad said as he stood up to leave the large briefing room. "Let me know what the results are and what you plan on doing after he's done."

"Yes sir," Mirage replied crisply with a salute that the commander lazily returned. He, Messer and Chuck left after that, with Chuck giving me a thumbs up and a quick 'good luck' before leaving. Once they were out the door, I turned my attention back to Mirage. We had a staring contest for a good twenty seconds until she huffed and grabbed a small stack of papers behind her.

"Paper, huh?" I said, noticing the antiquated medium. "Going the old school route."

"No talking during the test!" Mirage said sternly with a heavy scowl as she dropped the papers off in front of me and quickly retreated back to the podium where she had a chair and data pad waiting for her. "I didn't want to risk giving you the test on an electronic medium in case you met my expectations and tried to cheat," Mirage explained. I wasn't sure if she was just trying to get a rise out of me at this point, and if I had cared about what Mirage thought of me, that may have hurt. But as it was, I was finding myself more amused by her efforts than anything. "Why can't I talk?" I asked, deciding to ignore her depreciating remarks for now and causing the woman's brow to twitch slightly which I found oddly satisfying. "Who can I ask or talk to for help? You certainly don't seem like you want to give me any." Mirage put on a deep scowl which ruined her… somewhat… pretty face.

"Despite what you may think, Mr. Immelmann," she began with a low and somewhat threatening tone that I almost had to strain to hear. "I do not want you to fail. In fact, it's quite the opposite. You failing would look very bad on me after the commander left me with such an important task as training anew member. I will admit that I don't think you have what it takes to become an effective fighter pilot, but I will try my hardest to make you a competent pilot." The air between us was silent and still for a few moments as I sat there taking in her words. She then relaxed her face and took a deep calming breath before speaking again returning to her professional tone. "Now, no talking and take your test. You have an hour which is overkill if you ask me," she finished with a mumble. Mirage then sat in her chair and began reading off of her data-pad.

I continued to sit there for another moment, thinking about what she had just said to me. My performance was going to reflect Mirage's efforts in some way, and I could tell that despite her loathing of me, she was going to put in the genuine effort to make me a 'competent pilot.'

"Hayate!" the woman suddenly yelled out, startling me from my thinking. "Focus!You're down to fifty now." Shit! I spent ten minutes just sitting there?! I quickly opened up the paper booklet in front of me and began answering the questions. There were some pretty simple questions,like what certain movements of the plane were called, or what the three different modes of operation were for Variable Fighters. Some of the other stuff was admittedly outside my knowledge base. I had no idea how the concept of lift actually worked beyond, 'go fast with wings to fly.' And then there were even some physics problems that dealt with propellant management in zero atmosphere environments. Half a brain my ass! I gave Mirage my best stink eye when I came across these obviously difficult problems, but my efforts were in vain as she was clearly engrossed in whatever she was doing. I just sighed and gave the tougher questions my best go and hoped that I had enough points in the more simple sections to carry me through. Before I knew it, Mirage called time and pulled the sheets of paper from my grasp while I was still trying to fill in one last question.

"This is admittedly better than what I expected," Mirage said quietly under her breath once she had looked over the paper for a couple of minutes. "But much worse than I had hopped," she finished loudly, eyeing my raised brow. "We'll need to do some book work, but not much."

"Aw, come on!" I replied indignantly. "I bet even you wouldn't be able to answer some of those!"

"This test was for you and not me," Mirage quickly replied with slightly reddened cheeks, choosing to inspect her nails.

"Can't I just learn that stuff as we go?" I asked, hoping that she might take some mercy on me for once. "I learn better that way anyways," I tired. Mirage actually seemed to think this over as she brought her hand up to her chin to think. After a couple of seconds, she gave me a sidelong glance before heading over to the podium at the front of the room and putting on a headset. She then hit some keys that were out of my view and after a short pause, spoke into the headset.

"Theodore," she began, apparently speaking to the mechanic I had meet yesterday. "Are the simulators available today?" I perked up in my seat a little. Even simulated flying was better than bland book work. "I see. Can you be ready for Mr. Immelmann and I by twelve?" I looked over at a clock that was in the room and saw it was only eight. I began to slouch in my chair as I realized that it wouldn't be that easy to get out of the more boring parts of this. "Thank you very much. We'll see you then." Mirage put the headset down and grabbed her data pad, tapping away at the device until a projection came up at the front of the room.

"Quit sulking," Mirage demanded. "Or I'll tell him that he can save himself the effort of loading up the sims."

"Fine," I mumbled, straightening up and doing my best to pay attention as Mirage went over the principles of atmospheric flight, beginning with lift and Bernoulli's principle. When she saw I was having trouble staying awake after twenty minutes, she had me stand up. When she saw I was becoming adept at sleeping in that position, she decided to switch tactics yet again. She walked over to my test and grabbed the last page that I hadn't even been able to get to in the hour I had. She then ripped it from the booklet.

"Hey!" I shouted at her, the noise being enough to shake my doziness off.

"Quiet! I'm trying to help you!" She said pointing a finger at me angrily. "Besides, it was a blank page anyways," she mumbeled. I remained quiet as she came over and handed me the piece of paper.

"What am I supposed to do with this?" I asked her quizzically as I looked at the torn piece of paper.

"Show me that you understand Bernoulli's principle and we'll go to the simulators right now."

"Huh?" I asked, suddenly wishing I had been paying attention to Mr. Fancylastname's School boss.

"You learn better doing things, right?So, we're going to continue the lesson by doing things. Demonstrate Bernoulli's principle." I glanced over at the projection at the front of the room that had very generic diagrams that were not helping me at all. All the words were over six letters long and half of them didn't seem to make sense.

"Hold the paper by pinching two adjacent corners," Mirage began, clearly annoyed that I didn't know the first thing to do. I did as she told me and looked back at her once I was done.

"See how the paper is just hanging there?" I raised my eyebrow at her. No shit it was just hanging there. "Blow just above where you are holding the paper," Mirage told me, briefly waving her hand above the paper where I should blow.

"Above it?" I asked, her request not making any sense. "What's that going to do? Shouldn't I blow bel-"

"Just do it." Mirage snapped, clearly getting tired of me. I huffed, at her but did what she told me anyways. As I blew above the paper, it suddenly began to flutter and then after a few seconds, stayed parallel to the floor until I ran out of breath. Surprised and confused, I did it again. And again. And again. Each time, the paper rose up and stayed there until I ran out of air. I shot Mirage a questioning stare and saw her quickly hide an amused smile once she saw my face.

"The faster a fluid moves, the lower it's pressure will be. The higher air pressure under the paper causes it to rise. The way our aircraft do this is by having the air travel farther on the top side of the wing than on the bottom side, which is why our wings are shaped the way they are. The further the air has to travel in the same amount of time, the faster it moves. The faster it moves, the greater the pressure difference. The greater the pressure difference, the greater the lift. Do you understand now?"

"I think so," I replied after a moment. It was still hazy, but it was definitely better then the blindness I had before. "But why do I need to know this?" I asked, trying to bring it back full circle.

"So you know why your plane stalls when you try to turn to sharply. If you know why it happens, you'll be able to correct it faster and more efficiently than just trying to 'feel it out'." The room was quiet for a couple of minutes before Mirage glanced at a clock. She sighed heavily before saying, "Take a break. Get some water and come back ready to pay attention. We have a long ways to go before we get to reaction based maneuvers in micro-gravity."

Classes continued like that for a week. Each day I would wake up before the sun came up and get ready in complete silence with a roommate who I didn't feel one hundred percent comfortable turning my back to, come to work in what was pretty much a huge robot, and learn the theory behind flying an aircraft in impromptu labs Mirage seemed to think up on the spot. The best part of my days was the last hour when Mirage and I would get in the simulators and put to practice what we had learned that day. When Friday finally came around, I was more than ready for a break, but didn't expect the one that was offered.


AN: Bet you weren't expecting a little science lesson, huh? Thank you for all the awesome feedback and thoughts on last chapters question!

Sorry about the pause, but that unfortunately is bound to happen sometimes. There are periods of time where, due to my job, I'll be away from a stable internet connection for sometimes months at a time. Fortunately, I'm still able to type during those times so when I do get back, I should have plenty to post. Should.

Hope you guys are liking the tweaks I'm making to the story so far. Next chapter will help explain why Hayate is acting more like someone who's taking this stuff seriously.

Anyways, Hope you guys enjoyed and I look forward to giving you the next update when it's ready! See you when I see you!