Abrae could be a cold place, especially on exam days. Kathryn Kerdi had already had a bad morning and she was considering calling in sick for the first time in her academy career. She nearly fell out of her bunk and onto another recruit in her barracks, then she spilled her caf all over her clothes and was currently running late for class. This wasn't just any class either, it was the last day of her ground assault course and subsequently the final exam.

“Ryn, nice of you to join us.” The warrant officer who had been leading the course was playfully called 'Boom'. From what Ryn had heard he told ladies at the cantina that he was the 'boom-master', a fact that always made her eyes roll involuntarily.

“Sorry sir, ready to go now.” She quickly straightened her flight uniform and attempted to stand at attention even if her legs begged her to lay down and sleep a few more hours.

They had already been briefed on the mission. They were going to fly a TIE interceptor through a trench, hit some marked targets along the trench floor, and take out a priority target before returning to base. The class had been running scenarios through the simulators for the past three days so she knew what to expect but certain details would be unexpected to create a more realistic testing environment.

Ryn climbed into the cockpit of her interceptor and prepared for her run. There would be several pilots, including Boom himself in proximity of the trench to observe and be there in case a pilot slammed into the walls.

The targets were clearly defined with visible bright yellow markers and a identifier on the targeting point on her nav computer. As soon as she entered the trench she could feel the difference on the yoke. The optical illusion of the walls for a pilot that was used to the vastness of space made the world seem to suddenly be going much faster than her throttle indicated.

She made out the first target on the ground and remembered her training to lead the target and compensate for the time the shot would take to fall to the ground. Being in an interceptor only made the timing harder. If only bombers were available for the course she wouldn't have to work so hard. The fact was that when she finally was placed in a squadron they would probably have interceptors and she needed to learn the skill just in case. Or at least that's what Officer Boom consistently drilled into her head over the past several weeks.

With every passing target Ryn continued to think about how much she wanted to finish her low level skills and move on to her main certification. She let her impatience fuel her as she found one target after another. Some were flush to the ground, others had been mounted on broken towers. Her mind started to drift to wonder how they set up each run so quickly after each pilot finished, but she reigned those thoughts in and focused on the approaching primary target.

The sensors showed the structure as being five meters tall with a set of anti-aircraft turrets at each of the four corners. The bunker looked banged up as she approached but she had trouble making out any details at all as a volley of missiles fired in her direction. Ryn used the ground and walls to evade the projectiles. They blasted against the surfaces just as she yanked the controls to move out of their path. It was far more difficult given that she had to maintain her trajectory and keep her target zone if she wanted any hope of hitting the bunker. She was pulling wildly on the controls to keep from being hit by the missiles or slamming into the walls by overcalculating. She looked hard into the nav computer and realized that she was dangerously close to overshooting her target. Gritting her teeth Ryn pulling on the trigger and fired her proton torpedo and quickly pulled up and out of the trench.

The navcomputer showed clearly that she had grossly overshot the target but did a bit of damage to the farthest pair of anti-aircraft turrets. She punched the dash lightly with her fist in aggregation and turned back to return to the hanger and await the results of her exam.

OOC:

WC=795