Walk the walk...

New Avalon Aerospace VF-28 Hellion

Role: Naval-based Space Superiority Interceptor

Origin: Terran Federation

Manufacturer: New Avalon Aerospace

Origins: The YF-28 was conceived as a result of Terran Federation Fighter Corp's NextGen Heavy Fighter program to procure a ultra-performance alternative to the mainstay TVF-22 Warhawk that is less constricted by budget concerns. Centauri Shipyards submitted the YF-16, Federation Trinamics submitted the YF-39, and fighter production newcomers New Avalon Aerospace submitted the YF-28 in December, 3264AE.

After simulation evaluation by Fighter Corp Command and recommendation from Fleet Admiral Cindy Velaberg, the YF-28 was chosen as the winner of the competition. 95% of the competition budget was diverted to New Avalon Aerospace to allow them to build test models, while the remaining 5% was distributed between Centauri Shipwards and Federation Trinamics for follow ups.

Test models were constructed, and the fighter entered into limited production as the VF-28 Hellion at the beginning of 3267AE.

Variants:
YF-28X - Initial testing model with TVF-22 engine and gravity drive.
YF-28A - Advanced testing model incorporating New Avalon Institute of Science's experimental hyper fusion engine.
YF-28B - Final testing model.
VF-28 - Block 1 limited production model undergoing combat trials.

Design Features: First implementation of hyper fusion reactor in a fighter frame, reinforced shield generator with triple redundancies, first implementation of a capital-grade anti-fighter energy weapon in a fighter frame. High acceleration, high maneuverability, heavy weapon payload.

Power Plant: NAIS FC-301H fusion engine with classified power output. Two gravity drives with multiple vernier generators.

Accommodation: Pilot only in limited self-propulelling ejection seat. Completely sealed and self-pressurised cockpit with grade 2 inertial compensators.

Armaments: Four high-powered energy cannons arranged in forward-facing double gunbanks. A single capital grade anti-fighter beam cannon located below fuselage. Two internal ATAS  (Advanced Tactical Aspect Seeking) missile bays, carrying twenty missiles each. Two standard internal pallets for additional mission configurations capable of carrying ATAS missiles, CMs, and other armaments.

http://www.symmetrymagazine.org/breaking/2009/12/17/dark-matter-experiment-results-announced/

I guess I should bookmark this site for future readings. Interesting news there though.

So I watched a little more of it, and all I could think during the action sequences were...

Imagine Max in a VF-25... Damn.

I cooked bacon for the first time ever, and it was good.

I think what the team lack this season is.. focus? To be consistent over the entire 90 minutes.

Still, a win is a win.

Freespace 2. Oh how I love this game, and how it has inspired me so in my writings, and my current sci-fi setting.

Merry christmas to all!

Tousen, I think the following word describes what happened to you well.

PWNED.

Tousen, you just make yourself sound like a super hypocritical whiner.

'I love the internet.

Someone's worse than you? They're a baddie. Someone's better than you? They have no life.'

The Ventilation Safety Act was proposed and accepted by High Command during the infancy of the Terran Federation. The basic premise was that ventilation ducts and shafts employed in all military facilities must be impossible for a live human to fit into. It was a preemptive and compulsory measure put into place after suggestions by special op members who had successfully infiltrated enemy bases using this method. It also resulted in a major overhaul of multiple facilities throughout Federation space in order to comply with the new act.

Fortunately for Amanda Williams, Lieutenant Junior Grade, the Central Bank of New Hampshire was not a military facility. That also explained her choice of entry - crawling through a ventilation shaft after being inserted from the roof. The body suit she wore was comfortable enough, and together with her helmet served to keep her heat signature from showing up if her adversaries were using thermal scanners.

She shook her head as she paused to examine the schematics displayed on her visor. It was criminally stupid for the robbers to have no means of escape. InOp's briefing indicated that they had not expected the quick response from local law enforcement, and had likely panicked, taking everyone in the building hostage. Strike one. Strike two was that they had brought along military-grade weapons, which meant that the military would be called in. And to complete the three strikes, they actually shot a hostage, and thus High Command had called her in.

Amanda confirmed her location as her preplanned entry point, hooked her fingers into the maintenance hatch's handle, and waited patiently. The superimposed thermal view on her visor showed a warm body moving towards her section of the ventilation shaft, and she smiled. She was one of the more unique operatives, not just in her batch, but the entire unit. Her marksmanship was distinctively bad among her peers, even if it would still be considered excellent compared to the rest of the Defense Force. She shone, however, in athleticism and close quarter combat so much that she was considered a specialist within a specialist unit.

The figure passed directly below her, and she murmured a quiet "Mark" to start a sixty-seconds timer display at the side of her visor.

The hatch was pulled open as she dropped down on the unsuspecting man, her hands reaching out and twisting his head with such speed that the robber's neck broke before her feet landed on the ground. There were only six of them in total, and thus they had probably decided to have patrols close to the main hall where the hostages were kept. It was sound logic, but it also gave her a larger window of opportunity to work with.

She took three powerful strides, accelerating to her maximum speed. Having being picked out by military scouts when she was young, her education was supplemented by intense physical training, and the extend therapy all citizens of major star nations got meant that she had even more time to hone her muscles. The nanofibres of her body suit further enhanced her muscle output, causing one Amanda Williams to move at a speed of approximately twenty-five meters per second. She reached the hall in barely a second, and drew both hypertitanium swords out from the sheathes on her back, zeroing on the nearest man highlighted on her visor display. Even without the aid of the advanced software electronic suite, the energy rifle in his hands was a clear indication that he was one of her targets.

The average human reaction time was two hundred milliseconds. The man was talking to a fellow accomplice, and it took him an extra half a second to notice the black figure charging at him. In that half a second, she had travelled nearly three-fifth of the distance between him and the corridor she entered from. By the time he had recognised her as a threat, she was almost onto him. His arms were just about to lift his weapon up when a blade severed his head from his shoulders, as his body began to collapse.

His companion fared no better, as the other sword cut across his upper torso within the same swing, the flechette launcher sliced into two as well. Three more. Amanda utilised the momentum of her weapon swing to turn towards the next target, a pair of them standing guard across the main hall at the other corridor entrance.

She accelerated to full speed once more before the first corpse had even hit the ground, and the screaming of the hostages alerted the other two men to her presence. They brought their weapons to bear, but she was just too fast. In that hundreds of milliseconds for them to pull their triggers, she had already moved a little over four meters from the position they had aimed at. They noticed their mistake too late, and by the time they adjusted their aim, she had cut them both down.

Not stopping, she turned into the corridor, and flung a sword at the last man. High Command wanted at least one survivor for questioning, so she had to adjust her aim. The blade bisected the man's right forearm at a speed just above one-fifth that of sound, and the stunned gunman dropped to the ground, clutching his arm in pain.

"Hostiles neutralised, medical attention required for injured prisoner," she spoke into her comm, nodding with satisfaction as she eyed the timer. It still had forty-nine seconds to go.

"The forts are in position, ma'am."

Admiral Angelina MacKenzie acknowledged the report with a nod, her eyes still fixed onto the main plot. It was set to show a scaled down version of the Sol system, with a sea of green icons, especially within the inner system. The Conclave had decided that holding Terra and the inner assets were more important than spreading out what ships the Terran Federation Navy could put out to cover the entire system.

Not that was much comfort, she thought harshly. The Republic of Luminaire's Navy had brought in almost five entire battle fleets above McKenna Station's orbital plane instead of through a jump point, catching the TFN by complete surprise. Latest reports indicated First Fleet running for the McKenna-Sol jump point after a brief but brutal exchange, and she read the print outs at the sidebar of the display with a frown.

That First Fleet could get away at all due to its ships having better acceleration was scant comfort that even if, which was a big if, it arrived in Sol with the rest of its ships intact, the total combat strength of the TFN here would be barely three battle fleets' worth - Home Guard, Fourth Fleet and First Fleet.

She could not help but think of how badly the Luminairieans had outwitted them. Taking into account the distance between McKenna Station and the nearest Republic major naval base, this attack must have been planned well before their fleets attacked the Terran Federation's outlying systems. Travelling via hyperspace tunnels was nearly instantaneous, though limited by the finite number of jump points each system had. Sol had three confirmed jump points, while McKenna Station had a staggering seven. Most interstellar traffic used those, as they were much faster, even if a ship had to make several transits. A modern starship's hyperspace drive also allowed it to transit into hyperspace, though it would require the ship to be a certain distance away from the system's star, and its speed would be at most a thousand or so times that of the speed of light.

Which meant that the RLN ships hitting McKenna Station must had been sent nearly a month ago, despite the fact that Federation's border systems were only attacked two weeks ago. For all she knew, there might be another Republican fleet ready to transit out of hyperspace.

Angelina shuddered inwardly. Her flagship, the TFNS Spiral of Winter, might be the largest vessel in either navy, but it was cold comfort against the juggernaut bearing straight for her. She was not going to roll over though, and at that, she smiled grimly.

"Even more curious than that, and maybe more brave, we are proven something about Wally West here that has been starting to become distinctly clear since the second half of the Cadmus arc. The Flash is a superhero. He does good. Why, you might ask? "Because it needs to be done" is about the most reasoning you’d get from this Flash. That’s very square-jawed a concept, isn’t it? Well, couple that with his good-natured hedonism, or at the least, fun-loving. One might be tempted to get cynical when these personality elements join, but save his few youthful overindulgences or poorly-worded/timed comments, there is nothing contradictory about this union of characteristics. The real trick, it seems, is that it’s hard to look past his goofiness and see the hero within. That’s the problem that the other core Leaguers suffered under earlier in the show’s history, as the Flash’s complaints in The Ties That Bind attest to. But if the goofiness has no contradiction, why should it be so hard to bypass? Ah, the fault then lies with the beholder (that is, us), and not Wally. This is modern fatigue with idealism at its finest, ladies and gents. The idea that it is easier to accept an anti-hero with a scarred past and a difficulty telling right from wrong than it is to accept a happy-go-lucky guy who does the right thing because people would get hurt otherwise and then goes home to his modest apartment in satisfaction. Wally West, as Flash and Substance shows, has devoted his life to the people. It’s in his day job. It’s in his superheroics. It’s in his community service. Why? Because he can, and because it needs doing. “Because I can” has been a sad excuse of those who do bad things for years. Shouldn’t the do-gooders get to say it once in a while? Flash and Substance, in its own gentle and amusing way, reminds us that the only reason we would question a man like Wally West is that we are trying to justify our own inability to do the right thing when we know we both can and should. Wally seems to fit in a fence-painting into his busy schedule. When’s the last time you helped your neighbor when you saw him needing some assistance?"

This is taken from a forum poster who reviewed the Justice League Unlimited episode "Flash and substance", and it is... strangely thought provoking. We do get a lot of anti-heroes nowadays, but seldom do we get someone like Flash, yes?

Dragon Age: Origins is epic.

That is all.

A forum poster on 'What exactly IS Hand of Reckoning?' (A spell in World of Warcraft)

"Blizzard wanted to name the spell Hand of Reckoning, The Grip that Strangles all Evil with the Power of the Light.

But that wouldn't fit so they had to shorten it. "

I find cats generally adorable. Not sure what else to say on that topic, but I will link this instead.

I love Rath. His tendency to go '...' makes him such a cool stoic. He is even cooler than a wall 8D

That is all.