Voodoo, Revisited

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

A little over a week ago- if one goes strictly and solely by the calendar- Ellen went through the basics of an assessment test with a certain ex-Navy specialist. (She's still not entirely clear on what a SEAL is. Or a plain old ordinary seal, as in the animal. But she figures that if it were relevant, he'd have said something.) Since then, she's been practicing all the required events and practicing hard, and abusing the living daylights out of the Milliways time phenomenon to do it. A day of practice and training at the Bar followed by a full night's sleep is followed by a day and night of the same at the Citadel, as much to avoid being questioned about why she's improving so quickly as to double up on her practice time. It's been effective, she thinks.

She hopes, anyway.

Well, only way to find out is to get up good and early and head out to where she's agreed to meet Voodoo for another assessment run-through...

Comments

[boston_bruiser]

And here comes Voodoo in - three guesses, and the first two don't count - a polo shirt and blue jeans.

He really needs to talk to Bar about that. He's got very little in the way of fashion sense, but he's sick of looking at his closet now.

He's carrying a stopwatch and a spotting scope. It'll take a while to go through it all - the PFT alone takes about 20 minutes, nevermind the long-distance shooting event, the CQB event, and the hand-to-hand event - but it'll be worth it in the end.

"Hey. Got everything you need?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

He should have a look at Ellen's closet sometime, then. Other than the combat armor she has on now and the power armor she keeps stacked to one side, it contains a Vault 101 jumpsuit, a Vault 101 jumpsuit with some armored bits, and that dark green set of fatigues she had on when they first met. That's it. It's all what you're used to, one supposes.

"I think so," she says in answer, and indicates the firearms to one side. "I've been putting a lot into this."

[boston_bruiser]

"Alright, let's do this," Voodoo says, setting down the spotting scope and checking the stopwatch to make sure it works. It does.

"First event is the pushup. You have two minutes to do as many as you can with good form. Get set."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Ellen nods once, gestures to Dogmeat to settle down to one side, and drops to the ground. She's had enough time to get back into the swing of things with this, she's been pushing herself, she can do this- right?

Right. She's sweating despite the Scottish winter temperature out here (seriously, she's never going to get used to the seasons around this place) by the time she's done, but that's because she's just managed to pull off a good forty-three pushups in two minutes.

[boston_bruiser]

Voodoo counts off the pushups, making sure her form's good and watching the stopwatch out of the corner of his eye. He stops it once it gets to two minutes.

"Time. Next event is the situp. You know the drill. Get set."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Ugh. Definitely not one she likes, but- well, you don't get to complain, not about this. She settles herself down, feet flat on the floor, hands interlaced behind her head, and reminds herself firmly that she is not allowed to tuck her chin in.

This would be so much easier in recon armor, she thinks. It bends in the middle more.

Then she stops thinking about it altogether, because the only way to get through this part is to concentrate on the numbers.

[boston_bruiser]

Voodoo's holding her ankles and counting her off, glancing at the stopwatch every so often. She's taking this a lot better than last time. No grunting, no sweating - she'll pass, so long as she don't flop on the two-miler.

The stopwatch eventually comes to two minutes, and Voodoo stops it.

"Time. 78 situps. The two-mile run is next. Get set."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Two weeks of convincing yourself that your previous performance was shamefully poor will do that to you, yeah. At the sound of the number Ellen props herself up and comes to her feet. "Dogmeat," she calls, "let's go."

The heeler hops up and trots over to her side. He knows this part. He's been doing it with her a while now.

"Ready."

[boston_bruiser]

Voodoo starts the stopwatch.

"Go!"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Two miles, Ellen realized at some point in the past week, is about as far as the trip from Underworld, on the Mall, to Rivet City. Only this run is on the surface, not through the Metro tunnels to Anacostia. Once she was able to properly fix what the distance meant in her mind, it got easier to stick at the right pace for the run; she could picture where in the tunnels she'd be by now, which turns she'd have to make to get there ahead of whatever danger might be on her tail. Yeah, she still had to sweat through it all and it still wasn't easy, but at least it didn't feel abstract any more.

For Dogmeat it's more a case of just keeping up without breaking off to run after squirrels or rabbits. Ellen's insisted on him coming with her each and every time.

[boston_bruiser]

Voodoo watches the duo as the circumnavigate the lake twice. She's got a nice easy pace down, that's for sure - and if she's flagging, he can't see it. She comes to a stop beside him, and he stops the stopwatch. 15:45. He does some quick math in his head, based on what little he knows about the APFT.

"298 out of 300," he says, showing her the stopwatch. "Fifteen seconds away from a perfect score, but two points doesn't make much of a difference."

"Let's move on to distance shooting. Grab whatever gear you want to use, then meet me at the range," he says, slinging the spotting scope over his shoulder. "200 yard target'll be first, then 300, then 500."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

This part's been relatively easy to practice, by comparison. Most of the Initiates aren't planning on doing much with sniper rifles, so Ellen's had plenty of time to practice distance precision by herself. Not to mention that after their talk the other day, Knight-Captain Colvin came out with her to where she was practicing and started giving her advice on her form. It's helped, at least as far as she can see. Now she just has to prove it, first here and then at home.

Dogmeat hangs back for this one. Ellen doesn't want him too close when she heads up to the firing line with the sniper rifle in hand. "Ready," she says.

[boston_bruiser]

Voodoo sets up his spotting scope next to Ellen and sights in on the target at the 200 yard line. "Give me five rounds, wherever you want. We're not doing rapid-fire just yet. Take your time."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

She doesn't aim for the head in all-out combat situations or speed drills because it's just not practical. It's too small a target when time is of the essence. If you need your target to die, you don't want to miss because you leaned to the left a bit or breathed at the wrong moment. And frankly, back home, it really isn't uncommon at all for supermutants to simply shrug off the first bullet or two to the skull. Horrifying, but not uncommon.

It's different when you're specifically not being timed, though. Then you can pick and choose your targets as you please, and this time what Ellen's choosing is the head portion of the outline- the eye region, specifically. Very carefully, very steadily.

[boston_bruiser]

Voodoo nods in approval as he looks through the spotting scope. It's a dime group, for sure, but then again, he'd be disappointed if it wasn't - 200 yards is point blank for a sniper rifle, easy stuff.

"Okay, let's switch it up. Reload and give me five rounds rapid, wherever you want."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

That's another story. Ellen doesn't even comment; she just reloads and takes aim again. Lower this time, though. When speed is of the essence you go for the center of mass.

(She wonders, sometimes, why raiders don't wear more protective body armor than they usually do. She'd have a much harder time with them if they at least had the sense to sling a metal plate around their necks. But no, they're all about straps across the chest, pointy bits on the shoulders and thighs, and enough visible skin to let a surgeon plot out a whole operation at fifty yards. Must be all the chems they're on.)

(She's not wondering right now, though. She's concentrating on placing her bullets properly, as quickly as she can. Wondering comes later.)

[boston_bruiser]

The distance shooting event is over fairly quickly - he can tell by dime group after dime group that she knows what she's doing, and unless this Gunny guy has vastly stricter standards (which Voodoo seriously doubts) she should be able to pass this portion of the assessment.

As she puts hole number ten in the 500-yard target, Voodoo stands up, compacts his spotting scope, and slings it over his shoulder.

"Good job. CQB's up next. You bring the Norinco?"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Sure did," Ellen says as she checks over the sniper rifle one last time to make sure it's safe to put away. "Extra ammo, too, just in case."

She did, after all, have assistance last time. Better safe than sorry.

[boston_bruiser]

Voodoo nods. "Okay, so here's the deal. You'll clear the rooms one after another. I've switched up the layouts and cutout locations from when you were last in there, so it's going to be a whole 'nother ballgame. Other than that, everything's the same. The cahds, the cutouts, the electronics - it's all the same. I'll be monitoring your progress on the camera feeds. Once you're inside, stack up on the first door to your right. Enter and clear on my mark, then move on to the next room."

He looks over his shoulder at the kill house, then back at Ellen.

"Fuck 'em up, kiddo. Go!"

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Ellen flashes a brief smile and darts forward, the Chinese assault rifle in hand and ready to go.

She's only been through here once before, so she hasn't had the opportunity to practice quite the same way- but when she went up to her room after the last time, she found the flashlight Mr. Mills had given her ages ago. A short while (and a quick trip to the Bar for a hand mirror, some small slates, and some chalk) later, she had practice gear for rounding corners and pegging targets in near-darkness without putting a mark on something she's not supposed to hit. That helps as she slips into the first room, and the next, and the one after that.

The ghoul-filled ruins of the Giddyup Buttercup factory were a little like this, she thinks as she ducks behind a simulated couch to get a safer crack at a silhouette of a hostile just behind and to the left of a security officer. Although there was more noise, and it smelled much, much worse.

[boston_bruiser]

Voodoo watches her on the camera feeds, nodding as she enters and clears each room. She's prioritizing her targets much better, going after the ones with clear shots first, dispatching them each with a three-round burst to the chest. He checks the cameras. She's a third of the way through the first floor. Time to switch it up.

Voodoo flicks a switch, and the kill house goes dark. The cameras have a nightvision function - it's grainy, but he can still see her.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Ellen freezes for just a moment as the lights go out. Then she flattens herself back against the nearest wall immediately. Not for long. Just enough to let her eyes start adapting to the dark- she doesn't have time for more than that.

(She wouldn't at home, either. If all the lights go out at home it means something intelligent is about to try to kill you.)

Then it's out of the shadows again, as quickly and as warily as she can. Where one trick's been pulled another one's likely to be on tap and she does not want to inadvertently hit a friendly target because the lights came back up and confused her. Not when there's so many other targets so much more infinitely worthy.

[boston_bruiser]

The sudden darkness doesn't rattle her. Not that he can see, anyway. Good. He watches her as she clears more rooms, then checks the camera feeds. She's about three-quarters of the way through the first floor. Maybe a little less.

Voodoo flicks a switch, and on come the fog generators, filling the kill house with an near-opaque mist in moments.

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Oh, that's just prime.

Well, not like she hasn't dealt with it before. It'll slow her down some (and maybe make her wish for her Shishkebab- that blade is wonderful in limited visibility conditions), but that's it. Keep sweeping, avoid the figure holding a radio instead of a gun, don't automatically assume that anything in cover is an enemy because the one she's just caught sight of through the fog is a cowering hostage- there, now, that cutout there, that one's a hostile and it's going down.

There's another room or two to go on this floor and then it's time to navigate upstairs. She half expects to hear footfalls coming down the stairs after her; it's got her on edge, extra careful.

[boston_bruiser]

She just came up the stairs to the second floor - the fog doesn't seem to affect her much, besides making her a little slower. Voodoo watches her, then checks the number on the camera feeds. She's about...a third of the way through the second floor, maybe less.

He flicks on the strobe lights.

She is going to hate this.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Yes. Yes she is. So much.

But hating or not isn't going to change things, and at least she's not getting shot at, so... forward, again, and with as much care as she can manage without ruining her time. It helps to think of it as the flickering of the Vault's lighting system turned up to twelve.

Okay, no, that doesn't help at all but it at least lets her dismiss the urge to scream. The faster she finds every last hostile in here the sooner she can put the whole mess behind her and breathe easy again.

[boston_bruiser]

The strobe lights are psyching her out. At least, from what he can tell by looking at the camera feeds. It'll all be over soon, though - from what he can tell she's two thirds of the way through the second floor.

Coming up on The Monster.

He flicks a switch, and slightly less annoying, but no less distracting song starts blaring over the stereo system.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

The new song at least has this going for it: after the first few syllables, Ellen's brain stops trying to understand it. Whatever language that is, it isn't anything that she's ever heard before. She can't be expected to know it. So it's just background noise, like ventilation system fans or gunfire, and it can be ignored.

Which is good, because on her own the Monster is almost enough to make her wish she'd brought Dogmeat. She might as well be running blind into a warehouse full of raiders...

... but at least no one is shooting at her, not just at the moment, and that's enough of a consolation to keep her going at top speed from cover to cover and wall to wall, putting three rounds swiftly into the center of the chest of every enemy target she can manage, and two more carefully into the heads of the ones that're holding hostages as shields. She can do this. She's done it before.

[boston_bruiser]

She just cleared The Monster.

Pretty quickly, too, considering she went in there alone.

With some switch-flicking, Voodoo turns off the strobes, the fog generators, and the music, then turns on the lights. He turns on the PA system.

"Standby for cahd check."

He ambles over to the kill house and checks every room for the gunmen's chest cards. At the beginning they've all got three neat holes in them, but they gradually deteriorate to the point where about one in four is untouched at the end. He finishes checking The Monster and turns to Ellen.

"Good job. You got rattled toward the end, but that's to be expected. You eventually want to get to the point where all of this doesn't even faze you."

"You were pretty good with your entries - you came in quickly, dominated the room, and didn't give the enemy any room to breathe. That's what's important. You were a little slow in checking a corner once or twice, but you'll have plenty of time to iron that out. Other than that, I'd say you're good to go for this part." He pauses and puts the index cards in his pocket.

"Alright, last event's hand-to-hand combat. I'll meet you by the lake."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Ellen gulps, looking back over her shoulder at the room, and nods. "I'll get there," she promises. "One way or another."

Just one more thing to practice.

She nods, and goes to return her rifle to its accustomed place. Hand to hand fighting back home usually means that someone or something's deprived you of any other option. No sense bringing the gun- or her knife- into a situation where she might be tempted to use what won't be there.

"Dogmeat, stay here," she says. "Watch the guns. Do you understand me? Stay with the guns."

The dog whines, but obeys, and Ellen trots off to where Voodoo is waiting.

[boston_bruiser]

Voodoo waits for Ellen with his hands by his side. Soon enough, Ellen jogs over.

"Okay, same deal as last time. Remember, all eye gouges, groin strikes, and heel stomps will be simulated. No bone-breakers."

He squares himself into a fighting position, fists in front of his face and left foot forward.

"Hit me."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

It's not going to be a repeat of last time. Ellen knows a little better now. Enough to know that he's bigger, stronger, and more experienced, and that her only chance at making an honorable showing here is good technique combined with high speed. A strike to the throat's out of the question; at her size and his reach it'd only be leaving her open to attack. But if she fakes that shot and uses the opening of his high block to step in and go for the solar plexus- and make a grab for his other hand, she's all too aware that if she doesn't immobilize his hands fast she's going to wind up in an armlock or worse- yeah. Okay, she can go for that.

(The question, of course, is whether or not it works.)

[boston_bruiser]

Voodoo's thrown enough fakes to see one coming a mile away. Ellen's is no different. As she fakes, he watches her other hand - sure enough, it's going for his solar plexus.

He blocks the blow, gets a hold of her forearm, shifts his weight, and throws her over his shoulder. All he has to do is pull off a simulated heel stomp - if that stunned her enough. He raises his right leg above his waist, preparing to bring it down about a foot from her head.

If this works, it'll be game over.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Well, that would be a big if. Especially since the first thing, and the second, thing, and the third through fifteenth things John-117 taught her about barehanded combat was falling, and recovery from same. When you're used to being subjected to throws by a seven-foot-tall augmented human from the Future!, you get back on your feet fast. And you lash out as fast and as hard as you can at the one leg the person who threw you still has on the ground, because if that isn't a vulnerability, nothing is.

[boston_bruiser]

Voodoo really wasn't expecting her to recover so fast, and it shows. At the blow to his left leg, he crumples to the ground, then rolls away and springs to his feet again.

Ellen lasts a long time - a lot longer than last time - but at the end of the day, he's the one who's been stress-tested with this kind of thing almost every day of the week for the past five years. And there's just no arguing reach.

It's a kick that finally does her in - one of her own. He blocks a kick to his diaphragm, wraps his arm around the leg, sweeps her other leg, flips her over on her stomach, and applies pressure to the femur. She taps out soon enough.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

How she managed to last that long she really doesn't know, but at least she managed. There's an obscure sense of pride in that as the pressure is released and she gets her arms under her, propping herself up.

She's gonna need a few moments to get her breath back, but that's okay. There's enough air coming in to manage a brief, "How'd I do?"

[boston_bruiser]

"Pretty goddamn good," Voodoo replies. "I can tell you right now that if I was some four-year jahhead, you could've beaten the shit outta me. Your fakes and kicks need some work, mainly so they're not so easy to detect, but other than that, you're good to go. I dunno who you'll be sparring, but they're in for one hell of a fight."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

Ellen has no idea what a jarhead is, but she's assuming it's some kind of helmet reference; she's heard the mutants call Star Paladin Cross a buckethead before when she's in her power armor and helmet. Regardless, she nods. "Thank you," she says, and starts to get up. "I think it's probably going to be one of the Knights. Not sure which. I'll make sure to tell you how it goes... I owe you for this."

[boston_bruiser]

Voodoo grins. "No problem, kiddo. It keeps me sharp, anyway."

With the kind of job he's got, he's got to get in practice anywhere he can.