A New Mission: Ash to Fire

Skill

Cooling down from his meeting with Dr. Park, Miles headed back to his quarters, curious what Zu and his Marines were up to. When he got there, as expected, music was playing, "Out of Touch," Hall & Oates, 1984, and he noticed that some supply piles had been started. The three were seated around a crate again but were not engaged in competitive card games, rather Mansk was shirtless for some reason and explaining something in detail to Zu. Miles could tell by the focus in his eyes and his fairly animated hand movements, for Mansk that is.

Miles approached. "What are you three talking about?"

Lyle amusingly answered, "He was explaining to Zu what his Angels of Death tattoo was and somehow it turned into a complex discussion on human religion."

Zu looked up at Miles warmly. "Your people have fascinating beliefs, My-ulls. What great stories."

Miles, like 75% of humanity in the 22nd century was non-religious. He was a lifelong skeptic, but not even an active one. He simply didn't even think about that stuff in his life. He figured if there was any supernatural deity out there, he sure as hell saw no sign of it in his life on Earth and it sure as hell didn't have any jurisdiction over Pandora. Not to mention his brief connection with Ziye provided more legitimacy to the Na'vi's deities, Eywa included—which he used to mock while at Hell's Gate—than anything he'd ever seen in his past human life.

Miles just smiled at Zu. "Darlin', wanna go train with the scope now?"

Zu sprang up, excited.

"Alright let's go. You too, Marines."

The recoms put on their tactical vests and grabbed their rifles Miles handing a weapon to his mate.

"For you, Marine," he said, alluringly.

Zu just beamed, a huge ear-to-ear smile on her face.

Miles then remarked, "Ah, we gotta get you a vest... we'll stop on the way."

Lyle spoke up. "Oh Colonel, that band is playing in the bar tonight. Think we should take Zu later? You know for our last night in Bridgehead... for a little while."

Miles pursed his lips and tilted his head. "Not a bad idea, son."

As they started to leave, Zu did something peculiar. She slung her rifle and then grabbed her spear and arm shield. Miles didn't question it though, he was never going to question Zu when she had her spear in her hand. He did note how fucking badass she looked in her recom clothing with her rifle behind her back while holding her spear and shield.

The four navigated to the East Hangar, made sure their Ikrans were still resting lazily, which they were, and Miles nabbed one of Lopez's spare vests for Zu. It was more minimalist than theirs, something light to start her with. Miles helped her put it on and she looked even more badass.

Before exiting the hangar, one of the aircraft maintenance workers mentioned to them, "You know, we don't really have a way to get up there and clean banshee... guano..." insinuating that they should clean up after their mounts at some point.

Miles just looked at the man and snarkily responded, "Well that's unfortunate."

Lyle and Mansk just snickered and the four went outside to the drill area of the airfield which had a shooting range with the marina in the background. They looked up to see that eclipse was approaching. It wouldn't affect shooting, but they made note of it all the same. Around them were SecOps personnel doing drills and patrolling AMP and Skel Suits. They paid the human stares no mind and went to the shooting range which was a long, wide rectangular area that extended to the edge of the airfield's concrete margins at the water, protective walls at the sides.