AWD #012: Practice and Plans
Practice and Plans
Summary: Several pilots and a Marine sergeant congregate in the fitness center, the conversation turning to an upcoming training exercise.
Date: 18/01/2013
Related Logs: Takes place immediately after Punch, Counterpunch
Holtz Ygraine Tiptoft Stone 
Fitness Center
Smelling of sweat and grease, the Fitness Center is a place where individuals can come to work out or just work off stress. The area closest to the entrance is taken up by two very large sparring pads with a pathway down the center, each pad removable to reveal a Pyramid court beneath. The walls beside the pads hold lockers for everything from pugilist sticks to boxing gloves to rubber guns, though deadly weapons are strictly prohibited in here except by authorized personnel such as on-duty Military Police. Standing goalposts for Pyramid are also kept against the wall. Past the pads are a vast number of nautilus machines as well as free weights to lift. At the back of the room are workout bikes, rowing machines, treadmills, and stairclimbers. There is an entrance to the pool at the rear as well as a locker room to the side.
January 18, 2005

The crowd in the fitness center is starting to thin out. Holtz is here, bearing the signs of a recent sparring match: tousled hair, a sweat-stained shirt, and even a couple cuts and bruises here and there. He's standing not far from the mats, smoking a cigarette with his gym bag slung over one shoulder as he pointedly ignores the occasional dirty looks he gets from passersby.

And in walks Ygraine. She's got her gym bag of course, opting for the sweatpants and a tank top instead of the fugly sweatshirt. Also, it keeps her cool. Her hair is bunned up so all of her freckles stand out even more against her skin. "Hey, Holtzy." she greets with a smile. "So you basically work out to stay in shape, and then you suck down a cancer stick. How does that work, exactly?" She seems amused rather than chiding.

Holtz' face lights up as he sees Ygraine, and he drops his bag to the floor with a grin as she approaches. "Hey, Shakes," he greets her in return, taking a long pull off of said cancer stick. A little not-quite-cough escapes his lips as he exhales, the side effect of trying to smoke with tired, overworked lungs. "Old habits die hard, I guess," he replies dryly. "But hey, it's your pilot's fault I fell off the wagon." Yes, Bennett was the first to give him a smoke after almost a decade on the wagon — not that he declined the offer.

"Oh, don't you blame Butch for your lack of ability to say no." She's still teasing about it, and she makes the term 'saying no' sound like she means something else. "You on your way out? I was going to punch and kick the bag a bit and get out a little aggression." She has aggression? She isn't shiny happy people like, all the time?

Holtz grins, catching the double entendre in her words. "Yeah, I was, actually." His head jerks down in the direction of his bag, loaded up with dirty clothes, sweaty towels, and an empty water bottle. "I can stick around though, if you're wantin' the company." A brow raises at the mention of aggression, but if anyone can understand her desire to hit something, it's Holtz.

"You wanna hold the bag for me? You can tremble at the awesome might of my punches and kicks." She snickers, moving to the side to drop her bag, then bending over to collect her tape so she can wrap her hands.

"I'm quivering already. Be still, my heart." It's Holtz' turn for a bit of teasing as he takes one last pull off his cigarette before putting it out. His steps are still a little stiff from his earlier sparring as he walks back onto the mat, but he's moving easily enough as he takes a position behind the punching bag and braces his body against it.

Ygraine sticks her tongue out at Holtz as she wraps her hands, taking a few minutes to listen up by rolling her neck and shoulders and flexing her feet. When she's ready, she heads for the bag, and starts punching and kicking. The opening salvos are weak and loose and clearly meant to be warm ups.

Nobody's seen much of Tiptoft since the news from Virgon came back. The normally gregarious lad has kept to himself, mostly, emerging from his bunk only to eat, fly, sim, lift, and shit. Today's venture into the fitness center presumably would fall into the 'lift' exception to the recent 'Thumper keeps to himself' behavioral rule. (Let's hope for everybody's sake that it doesn't fall into that last one.) Dressed in standard-issue undershirts and a pair of faded blue sweatpants with the number 17 emblazoned on its left cheek, the stocky man jogs over to the gym's free weights, located for narrative convenience near the punching bags.

"Come on, Shakes, I know you've got more punch in you than that," Holtz says with a waggle of his brows as Ygraine peppers the bag with her opening salvo. And then he notices Tiptoft making his way towards the nearby weights, taking a hand off the bag long enough to offer a wave to the other pilot. "Hey, Leo, how's tricks?"

"Hey, Tippy!" Ygraine beams at Tiptoft. It's not oblivious to what he's dealing with; rather it's an invitation to smile back. She continues to kick and punch - perhaps unsurprisingly, her kicks have some serious slam to them, moreso than her punches.

"Yo. Surviving, yeh?" The big man's already warmed up, judging from his sweat-matted clothing. Bending forward, he snatches a pair of heavy weights in his left hand and chucks one to his right. It's caught with an oomph — that causes his face to break into something like a smile, albeit with more teeth. "Gotta keep up the routine. Game stays the game. Just quarter 1."

Holtz looks over at Tiptoft, taking a measure of the other man's disposition. He likely knows the other pilot well enough by now to mark the man's change in mood recently, and he nods. "Best thing for it," he agrees with a nod. Not too hard to figure out the cause, especially remembering his own reaction to the news of Tauron. Ygraine's pummeling of the bag pushes it back into Holtz' body, and he spreads his feet a bit to steady himself. "There it is," Storm says to her with a wry smile.

Ygraine grins. "What, you didn't think I had any oomph?" she teases Holtz, though she does look over at Tiptoft in concern. For a moment, her gaze goes between the two men, and she grins a little in a way that might seem a bit suspiscious. There's a quick kick-kick-punch combo that rattles the bag.

Relax, y'all. Tiptoft's not about to punch a wall. Or burst into tears. Or demand a sympathy roll in the proverbial hay, Storm. He's too busy admiring his muscles, which ripple so beautifully as his right arm begins forty reps. "Oh baby," he mutters to himself, rather audibly. "SHIT, you still GOT THIS." Vanity of vanities; thy name is Leo. Ygraine's amused gaze is met with a knowing shrug.

Holtz snorts at Ygraine. "Far from it," he deadpans. "I know better." He rolls his eyes in Tiptoft's direction, but he's a little relieved to see the other man's usual vanity assert itself. At least he's not out throwing furniture around. Or breaking faces.

Well. If Tippy's gonna admire the muscles, Ygraine will turn her attention to the man opting to brace her bag. She casts an impish look in Holtz's direction, murmuring, "He'll be just fine." Her punches are textbook as far as how to throw, but her power's on the weaksauce side.

Tiptoft is not actually a fighter — which might be why he hasn't elected to join the pair at the bags. But judging from the fact that these free weights look like toothpicks when compared to his biceps, he could likely do quite a bit of damage were he inclined to bust someone's face in. Only when he's finished his reps does he return his attention to the others, ambling over — still carrying those weights — to display his body to these two conveniently located admirers (slash commisserate about loss slash shoot the shit). And then, to Ygraine, jerking a playful thumb in Holtz's direction: "How was he?"

'Admirer' might be too strong of a word to describe Holtz, who only gives another snort of mock derision at Tiptoft's flexing. "Pull your feet in a bit. You're letting the power bleed off," he says to Ygraine a moment later, his head nodding downwards. He might not fight like a trained boxer, but he at least seems to have a grasp on the technique. Then another look goes to Tiptoft, a questioning brow raised.

There's an answer for that. "What kind of lady kisses and tells?" she asks rhetorically with a grin, keeping her focus on the bag. Punches and kicks. The latter are way, way better than the former. Also, now is not the time to infer she's not a lady. While she sweats and punches and kicks a bag, spreading her feet as instructed.

"Mmmph." Tiptoft tilts his head to one side, thick brows furrowed. Then, with a chuckle: "Fair enough, yeh?" And whatever follow-up question he might have had promptly dies on his lips. Instead, after a moment, he turns to Holtz. "When's the next Pyramid game gonna be?"

Holtz' flinty eyes flick back and forth between the two of them, but he holds his tongue, with only a throaty chuckle escaping his lips at the interplay. "Don' tell me — no, no, I don't want to know," he murmurs half to himself. He grunts as the movement of the bag under Yggy's assault rocks him back on his heels. "There ya go, that's better," he notes to her before looking over to Tiptoft with a shrug of the shoulders. "Depends on you, man. Though preferably not the same night I go ten rounds with a frakking battleaxe of a corpsman." As he apparently did tonight. It's actually meant as a complement to Andromeda, of sorts. "But yeah, give me a yell when you're down."

"Oh yeah? Who was it?" asks Ygraine curiously. "You know we're going into paintball against the marines. You think we even have a chance?"

"I'm good when you're good, Storms. And shit, against Marines? Only way we win is if they let me throw Pyramid balls at them." Thumper has apparently thought seriously about this prospect. "Like, chuck some paint in a ball, which would frak with the weight all well and good, but damn, then I'd just go into this windup and — " With surpassing speed, the big man whirls into a throwing motion, and for a moment it seems as if he might fire the weight in his left hand into the deck. But at the last minute he pulls up with a taut little grin. "Nah, we'll get our asses kicked. And they'll never let us forget it until they call for CAS. Circle of life, baby."

"Jones. You know the kinda butch-looking one, the one I keep hearin' took a Raider round down at Avery Hall? Her," Holtz explains. "Not sure what got into her, but she fights like a godsdamn psychopath." He looks at Ygraine. "There's always a chance, Shakes." A chuckle goes Tiptoft's way. "Paint grenades? Lemme know how that works out." His tone is sarcastic, but there's also a hint of enthusiasm for anything that could be a potential weapon, no matter how crazy an idea. "Ya know, it said on the brief that to win a total victory, they had to take us — all of us — out or force a surrender. I say we oughta find some dumbfrak who can't shoot and have 'em run for the hills while we give our lives for the cause." He snorts. "If we can't win, then at least they won't either. Not completely, anyway." How nihilistic of him. "Let that stick in their craws a bit, yeah?"

"I don't know, maybe if we got a few of the better shooters up in the trees, we could thin them out a good bit?" Ygraine suggests. She's kicking and punching one of the body bags, with Holtz bracing it, and Tiptoft nearby with freeweights.

"They'd be just like paint grenades. Laugh now, bro, but when I start wrecking shop on those frakkers, you'll know I bring the pain." As for tactics? "Shit, I like the running away thing. Even like the climbing trees thing. Guess that's why they pay you to do the thinking." With that, Thumper starts another set of forty, this time with his left hand.

"Yeah, that too." Holtz nods at Ygraine, then snorts at Tiptoft a moment later. "Just hope they don't expect me to do all the thinking. Otherwise we're in trouble." He keeps his body braced against the bag as Yggy's strikes, more powerful now than before, continue to pummel the thing.

Catching the end of what is being said by Tiptoft makes the newest arrival raise a brow. "Why would we all be climbing into trees?" Comes the question from Stone. Glancing to the others as well. "I am sure there are others around to do the thinking for you, if you are running out of steam." A bit of a tease at that.

"Don't you worry your pretty little heads." Ygraine tells her fellow airmen. "I'm sure we'll all come up with a plan." Half turning, she oh's at the new arrival. "Hey, Gunny. Stone, right?" She doesn't clarify on the whole tree thing.

"Hey, man, better anybody else do the thinking than me, yeh?" Tiptoft grunts. Halfway through his routine and all's well. "My thought is, like. Big brass points, I fly in a straight line and lay some HURT on. Maybe sometimes I don't even do it in a straight line. Got that zig-zag and shit." He does a sinuous little shimmy of his body to demonstrate this point. Thumper's got moves.

"You're about as subtle as a sledge, Thump," Holtz says with a snicker. It's not said in an uncomplimentary fashion, though. Sometimes a blunt instrument is the best tool for the job, after all. "Gunny," he says to Stone with a nod. "Just a little bit of brainstormin'," he says, trying to sound as innocuous as possible, despite the sly glint in his eye. "You playin' in the exercise, Gunny?"

Stone nods, "Correct." He offers to Ygraine while he is moving to try and find something to occupy his own time with. "Just keep your eyes on the prize." He tells Tiptoft as he goes on about the zig-zag and so on. Grinning a bit still. Nodding at Holtz greeting though at the following question he looks over and studies the man, "Hmm? Which one?" He asks while moving to join at the free weights.

"The paintball exercises in about a week." Ygraine says. Her punch and kick combos resume after a momentary pause, and every now and then her gaze darts over to the free weights.

"Hey man, I'm good with these if you want them." Thumper offers his very heavy free weights to Stone, holding them out with just the slightest challenging smirk on his face. You gonna let a pilot show you up? But whether or not he's taken up on his offer, the big man seems to be done with this set for now. "Anyway, good seeing you. Got some time booked in the sims in fifteen and I should finish my run. Not that the sim-Cylons got smarter, and, like, it's PRACTICE. Not the game. But shit. Orders, yeh?" With a shrug, he moves off, muttering "practice" under his breath.

"Trainin' op down on the planet," Holtz clarifies with a slight smile, the punching bag bouncing against his chest. "Haven't heard? Shit, I hear Pie and your XO are already making bets on it. Should be fun." He smirks at Tiptoft's comment about the simulator Cylons. "Yeah, yeah, Leo, we're workin' on it," comes the reply. "Take it easy." A jerky nod is offered in the other pilot's direction.

"Practice," Thumper calls back with a grunt, before he hits the hatch and scrams.

Stone nods and takes the offer from Thumper with a small smirk on his face. Taking them and only going ahead to start using them. "Ah, perhaps I will be at that." He says after Ygraine explains it, eyes going over towards Tiptoft as he is about to move off. "It's better than nothing at least. I am sure you'll enjoy it." There is a bit of a grin at it all. Shifting his studying gaze he does notice the looks from Ygraine towards himself and Tiptoft as the other man is moving away. Though Holtz words has his attention as he chuckles, "Have they now? It does sound quite interesting then." As for the simulator Cylons, he has to say something. It takes a moment but soon enough he does say, "If they get too good you all won't get to show off." Winking at that. Clearly just a playful tease.

"If they get too good, we have to get better." Ygraine remarks matter-of-factly. "Are you saying you won't enjoy it? Since you know perfectly well that the marines will be expected to mop up on any ground maneuvers." She kicks the bag, using the same leg, three times, low-middle-high before grinning up at Holtz. Showing off, but only a little.

Stone might be teasing, but Holtz is serious when he looks over at the Marine sergeant. "Hey, the better they are, the better we're prepared. Besides, all the frakkin' sim models are First War relics anyway." Ygraine gets a smile in return as her trio of kicks buffet the bag, but once her leg goes back down, he releases the punching bag and saunters back towards the edge of the mat, picking up his gym bag once again. "All right… I've been in here gods know how long and I need a frakkin' shower. I'm out." He nods to Stone and tosses a little wave at Ygraine as he starts walking towards the hatch.

"I probably will enjoy it." Stone replies to Ygraine before nodding to Holtz. "That is indeed true. I do trust you all to be the best pilots we have and need." He says in a more serious tone before nodding again. "Take that shower and we'll meet later. IF nothing else, then on that paintball practice." He tells him and sets down the weights after a set.

Ygraine grins over at Holtz on his way out, giving him a waggle of her fingers. Looking back at Stone, she pauses in her combo efforts. "How's your sparring, Gunny?"

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