STF

0400 Exercise with the MACOs

Posted March 1, 2023, 9:48 a.m. by Mar. Captain Wulf Baumann (MACO CO) (James Sinclair)

Posted by Lieutenant Helena Laursen (Helm/Nagivation Officer) in 0400 Exercise with the MACOs

Posted by Mar. Captain Wulf Baumann (MACO CO) in 0400 Exercise with the MACOs

Posted by Lieutenant Helena Laursen (Helm/Nagivation Officer) in 0400 Exercise with the MACOs
Posted by… suppressed (15) by the Post Ghost! 👻
Helena arrived to the gym just a few minutes before 0400. Assessment and then MACO style training. After the last few days and her recurring fatigue and weakness, Helena thought she might have finally lost her mind. She would know for sure after today. She guzzler half a water bottle and stuck it in her bag as she walked through the gym door.

Laursen

Sergeant Kristensen was already there, but just barely. She was seated on a bench and was stretching her arms. She looked up and jerked her chin up once sharply in the universal greeting of ‘ ‘Sup?’ She stood up and said “Morrning, Lieutenant. Five minute warm up, then we will begin.” She pulled off the long sleeve sweatshirt she was wearing to reveal a sports tank. Her arms were massive, and her chest and shoulders appeared to be more at home on a professional athlete than a combat specialist.

MACO

Helena nodded back, “Good morning, Sargent.”
The woman was built Helena would admit. Exercise and training didn’t bother her, but sparing…she was goingbto have to work extra for that. Helena set her bag down and set on the floor and began stretching. When she was done she nodded to Kristen’s. “Whenever you are ready.”

Laursen

The Sergeant pointed to a treadmill and said “2 kilometers. Fast as you can. Go.” and she got the treadmill next to Laursen and began to run, slowly building up speed until she was at a three-quarters speed sprint.

MACO

Helena used for run that in 15 minutes. Now on a good day she still could, but she had to really push for it, and wasn’t good for much after. Today she made it in 20. That wasn’t pacing herself that was all out run. It wasn’t a lack of form, technique, or knowing how to breathe. Kristensen could see the muscles twitch and try to falter, but Helena kept going.

Laursen

When they were done running and had worked up a solid sweat, Kristensen pulled out a bunch of floor mats and laid them out. She looked at Laursen and said “Ok… come over here.” She waited till the pilot had stepped on the mat and then she said “Alright… knock me down.”

MACO

Helena stepped onto the mat and looked at Kristensen. Well that was goingbto be interesting. Helena doubted she could use out right strength. Helena rushed her and at the last second, dropped to the side and aimed to take out the back of her knee, and then the opposite thigh if the MACO actually went down.

Laursen

Hitting her legs was akin to slamming into giant Redwoods. They didn’t give, and they certainly didn’t buckle. What did happen was a giant hand shooting down and grabbing Laursen’s ankle and her being swung and unceremoniously tossed to the ground. Kristensen didn’t smirk or gloat or tease, however… she simply said “Get up. Try again. This time, think about gravity and where people are most unbalanced.”

MACO

Helena rolled back ro her feet. Their instructor at the Academy had talked a lot about how to unbalance people with grabs, holds, distraction, but Helena had never been required to take advanced classes. He had talked about how people were unbalanced when shifting their weight because they weren’t rooted in place. Most people carried their center near their stomach which was wrong. Center of gravity was naturally lower. A strike to the solar plexus was a delicate target. The other was the head. Or something like that. It had been a long time since Helena took thos classes. She seriously doubted Kristensen didn’t know where her actual center of gravity was, but alright. Helena went at her again, aiming to put momentum behind her and catch her in the upper abdomen. Helena thought it probably looked a lot like a rag doll trying to move a Redwood tree. At the last minute she realized there had to be a better way than trying to use speed and weight, but d@mn if she knew what it was.

Laursen

Kristensen didn’t move, not even when Helena’s shoulder hit her in the stomach. For Helena, it was like… ramming your shoulder into an exercise mat… wrapped around a large metal pole set in concrete. Hands once again grabbed her, this time about her waist, and she was lifted up and thrown, albeit somewhat gently, to the ground. “Again. And this time, get angry. Get out of your head. Get into the fight!” Kristensen said.

MACO

Helena tucked her chin and hwr arms slappes the mat as she landed. At least Kristensen wasn’t trying to hurt her…because that hurt enough. Helena blew out a breath, she despised that. First she’s told to think, then told how she should feel, and finally to ‘Get out of her head’. Every single hand to hand or weapons instructor/tutor she’d had told her that. Like she was supposed to understand what that meant and how to do that and it would miraculously make her better. Like that phrase was some universal maxim. She rolled to her feet and went at the combat specialist again.

Laursen

A large hand hit her square in the middle of her chest. “Stop. take a breath.” the large Norwegian woman said. “Listen. You are smaller than me. Weaker. That is not a criticism. It is simple fact. You cannot beat me by trying to come straight at me. You have be more instinctual. And never… absolutely never… fight fair.” She handed her a water bottle and said “Drink. And then get ready. I’m going to show you how to take down a larger opponent.”

MACO

Helena grinned around the mouth of the bottle. “Renault’s great at not fighting fair. Stabbed a Naussican in the femoral artery while it was tryin’ to eat my face off.” She took another drink and set the bottle down. She turned to face the other woman.

Helena

Kristensen scowled. “What is a Naussican? Never mind. You should never put yourself in a postion to have someone or something trying to eat your face. You are small. You are faster than someone bigger than you. Use that. Learn vital points. Pressure points. Dive it, strike, jump away. That should be your goal. You are not built to apply and receive large amounts of force. So apply small amounts in vital areas. Now… when you come at me again, I want you to aim to land a punch or kick not on the side of my knee, but behind and slightly above. Here.” and she pointed. “There is a nerve bundle there. If you hit it right, the pain is quite noticeable. Now try.” and she held still.

MACO

El quietly had been watching at the door to the gym. Even with her getting up early to do her stretches, meditations and exercises, they seemed to increasingly compete with the MACO’s whom, in her opinion, had co-opted the small gym as their own. She had increasingly taken to splitting her disciplines between her quarters and an area of her – yes, after a month and more of being isolated in her machine shop, El had started to see it as her own space – machine shop. It wasn’t ideal but competing for space and time simply wasn’t something that she was interested in. She ‘worked’ for a living with distinct shifts; the MACO’s had the day to do what they did, which included a capitalization of the gym.

For the short time she had been the ‘fly on the wall’, all El had seen was the big MACO lady embarrassing Helena. She liked Helena and didn’t much like seeing her being tossed around for the others seeming ego. That was not the way to train, at least by the way that she had been. Even at the military academy the hand-to-hand training consisted of more drilling than doing at first. With a start it reminded El that Helena had offered to instruct her in piloting small craft. Her instruction in the past were short range space to space shuttles or worker-bees. In her ‘detention’ per se she had read up on the shuttle pods that familiarized her with the engineering of them, what was ‘under the hood’ and the particulars of the consoles. That was all good in theory. She simply hadn’t done much specifically. She thought she should talk to Rick. Even as a Petty Officer he specialized in shuttles back on Earth. He’d be able to do the under the hood specifics.

Her mind was wandering, and it was time to go. El would work on her exercises elsewhere or find one of those elusive times when it would be empty. Slipping away she moved quietly down the corridor. It was only one deck up to both her quarters and engineering.

El, Eng
OOC: Carry on folks .. just adding in a little reflective moment here <G>

“It’s a story for later, but I will tell you sometime.” Helena whole heartedly agreed with not getting pinned by a Naussican again. Ah! That’s why her kick didn’t work earlier. She was aiming at the wrong spot. Oh, she was so bad at this. Helena wasn’t feeling humiliated though. She was enjoying it, even though she was ‘loosing’. Helena went at her again, moving past Kristensen instead of directly at her, and kicked at the back of her leg with the side of her foot.

Laursen

Kristensen didn’t move again, but she did say “Good! Yes! Better. Now try again, but this time I want you to do something different. Come at me as you did, but when you are about a meter-and-a-half or two meters away, drop and slide past me. When you do, punch that spot. Hard as you can. Whether or not it connects, roll to your feet facing my back. Go.”

MACO

Helena did as instructed and realized at the last minute mats were made for sliding but falling. She slid, but it burned. She punched the spot, but didn’t connect enough as she slid past, or at least Helena didn’t think she did. Then rolled back to her feet, facing Kristensen’s back.

Laursen

“GOOD!” Kristensen said. “Excellent! You did that really well. Now, focus on where you are striking, thats the priority. Start slow. Slow is smooth, smooth is fast as Captain Baumann always tells us.” Her wristband beeped and she looked down. “Time is up for today. We will pick up tomorrow.” She looked at Laursen and a small grin played across her lips.

“Interesting. You say that you are recovering from an injury. Odd that when you didn’t think about it, it didn’t limit you.” and she shrugged. “Just one if those things, I guess.” and she began to pack up.

MACO


Posts on SS Sojourner

In topic

Posted since


© 1991-2024 STF. Terms of Service

Version 1.15.9