John Ringo - Emerald Sea

“Well, that was pretty awful,” she growled.

Jerry had reached the station by then and touched Vickie on the arm.

“Vick, let Herzer do landing control,” Jerry said. “We all need to learn, but I don’t think right now is the best time.”

“Agreed,” Vickie replied, massaging her shoulder. “Those flags really get to you after a while. How do you do it, Herzer?”

Herzer frowned at her, puzzled for a moment, then laughed.

“Vickie, once you’ve trained to hold a shield and sword up for four hours, straight, this is nothing,” he said, flexing his shoulders slightly. It was apparent that they were corded with muscle.

“Time to start working out.” Jerry chuckled. “Okay, I’m going to take Shep up. You stay here and watch the landing. When Koo takes off, go get Yazov and you follow Koo. As each of us lands we watch the next person’s landing.”

By evening the riders were covered in sweat and the dragons had started to lose their interest in the game. When Koo had to be waved off twice and Nebka nearly dumped on the second wave off Jerry called the training.

“Skipper,” Jerry said climbing the ladder down to the quarterdeck, “we’re going to pack it in for the day. I think we’ve gotten all the training the dragons are up for today.”

“Agreed Warrant,” Colonel Chang said. “Good job.”

“Thank you, sir,” Jerry replied with a tired grin. He had stripped off his helmet and his hair was dripping with sweat despite the cool wind from the north. “With your permission we’ll launch a dragon for top cover tomorrow around dawn and start working out scouting mission methods. We also need to start working out a signaling system.”

“There are various things to figure out,” the skipper replied with a thoughtful frown. “I’d like to come up with a way to recover them at night, and we still need to work out a way for them to effectively attack ships, that sort of thing. I think we’ll have a dinner meeting this evening. Before then, get yourself cleaned up and get some rest.”

“Yes, sir,” the warrant officer said, saluting. “Permission to leave the bridge?”

“Granted,” the skipper replied.

“Dragon returning off the port beam,” the lookout called.

“He’s signaling,” the communications midshipman added, looking through his binoculars. “Two figure eights on the dip.” He consulted a table and nodded to himself. “That’s ‘group of delphinos.’ ”

“Bearing looks to be about one-seven-zero,” Commander Mbeki amplified as the dragon flapped nearer. “Eight of them.”

“Probably just dolphins,” the skipper said. “But at least the signaling system works.”

“Herzer’s preparing to launch with Warrant Officer Riadou,” Mbeki said. “I’m heading up to pri-fly.”

“This should be interesting,” the skipper said and smiled at the chuckles it elicited.

Herzer hadn’t been on a dragon since the first flight but he found his position on Shep easily enough. The extended rein system was confusing at first but he soon found his holds. The reins had been extended so that Jerry had his own set behind Herzer and could take over if needed.

“Just let me handle the takeoff,” Riadou said. “I tested this out with Vickie and we shouldn’t have trouble. But stay away from motions until we’re airborne and I tell you you can take over.”

“Okay,” Herzer said.

The wyvern hopped to the launch platform and grabbed the launching baulk automatically. The wyverns had come to enjoy the takeoffs, at least the first few of the day. It was a good game until it became tiring.

Herzer gripped the straps and looked at the launching officer. The position had been taken over by one of the ship’s petty officers since there were insufficient riders to man it. The PO caught both their eyes and their thumbs up, then hit the release.

Herzer had pointed his face forward and gasped as the wyvern was hurtled forward and suddenly they were in the air.

“What a rush!” he yelled with a laugh.

“That it is,” Jerry said. “Almost makes up for the landings.”

Jerry got the wyvern up to about seven hundred meters and then turned the controls over to Herzer.

“Now just follow my commands,” Jerry said. “I know you can sort of control the dragon, but the next time you’re up by yourself you’ve got to get it back on the ship. And that takes a bit more control than your first time.”

“Will do.”

They worked through various flight contours. Level flight, slow spirals up, slow spirals down. Finally Jerry signaled for landing and waited until the ship turned into the wind.

“Try to line it up on the ship,” Jerry said, signaling to the LSO and getting a wave in return.

“Got it,” Herzer said, signaling in turn. He watched the motions of the LSO and grimaced. “I feel like I’m going to overshoot.”

“Watch the LSO,” Jerry said. “Don’t think. Let the LSO do the thinking for you.”

Herzer tried to control the dragon but he realized he was all over the sky. “I’m not up to this. Yet.”

“True,” Jerry replied. “My dragon.”

Herzer let go of the reins and watched the landing. Jerry’s handling of Shep was much smoother and in no time they thumped to the deck.

“I’m going to need a lot more time in the air,” Herzer said as they dismounted and the grooms took Shep below. He realized he was sweating even though he had done practically nothing. The landing had been physically debilitating.

“Yep, you are,” Jerry said. “And that’s going to be hard to arrange what with everything going on. I hope by the time we get to the Isles you’ll be qualified.”

As they sailed south it had become warmer and today it was, arguably, hot. Herzer thought about that as he mounted Chauncey and looked over the side. The water was a deep, cerulean blue, like liquid oxygen. The good news was that if he had to dump, the water was at least going to be warm.

But he put that out of his mind as he gave a thumbs up to the launching officer and looked forward.

He had gotten used to launchings at this point and paid much more attention to the dragon than the launching. Chauncey took the air easily, though, and he directed him into a spiral up and to the right.

“Just get up and into landing position,” Jerry had told him, so he spiraled the dragon upward until he had good altitude and directed it to the pattern.

Vickie was being recovered from a recon mission so he waited for her to land, Chauncey gliding at near stall speed on the light winds. He realized that the dragons were becoming more trained to the landings and was considering that aspect when he realized it was his turn to land. He turned on final and waved to the LSO, getting a wave in return. He checked the telltale on the masthead and prepared to correct for the wind being slightly off the starboard side. Joanna had gone for a swim and she was sculling along on her back, watching his approach. On the other hand, it looked like everyone in the ship had fallen out to watch the landing. The crew had gotten used to dragon-flights, but Herzer figured that the first time for a newbie was an event.

He put that out of his mind, too, and watched the directions from the LSO. Again, Chauncey seemed to anticipate some of his commands, as if he had gotten used to the orders as well. But, while this helped, it was still a bastard to make the landing.

He saw that cargo nets had been rigged to the rear and sides of the platform and that the recovery team was standing by. Although that was standard procedure as well, it made him chuckle faintly. If he overshot or dumped it, it was going to be heartily embarrassing.