Wordcount: 292 words
Rating/Warnings: PG-13
Summary: The trainees learn flying is not quite as easy as it looks.
NOTE: This is the first draft of a story, so it will most likely contain plot holes, retcons, and other inconsistencies. I’ll come back and fix things once the story (or arc) is complete!
~*~*~*~*~
And Now We Fly
The part of training that she had been looking forward to least was the flight training. The fledglings were already adept at flying themselves, but flying with a rider was a much different action. May was worried, since she was larger than most riders and Baron was smaller than most foxhawks that things would be overly complicated.
But it turned out that the complications came less from weight and strength than in the ability to anticipate each other’s movements. True, Baron had to work harder to get them in the air, but once they were up the difference in weight and strength was negligible.
She turned out to be about average in terms of aptitude for flying. She never got over the lurch in her stomach when they took off, the leap into the air and the frantic wing beats always made her feel more like she was falling than flying.
But once up she got the hang of meshing minds, just enough telepathic communication to get to the level of instinctual leans and turns. They did okay, although nowhere as well as Softpaw who excelled at flying. Swift was fast, but Softpaw was nimble and when they played tag she frustrated him more often than not.
Dog and Winter were less adapt, though Dog put more focus into improvement and Winter simply enjoyed trying. It was hard to stay frustrated with Winter’s perpetually pleasant and joyful personality, even in the fact of sometimes abject failure.
Then ended up with the expected number of bruises and scrapes, but they a managed to get through without anyone breaking anything, which was a positive mark. The medics were used to the steady stream of riders and foxhawks as they battled through the learning curve.
~*~*~*~*~