Faction Force Land From Falling At Terminal Velocity (Jedi)

[Shira Varanin]

CLOUD CITY SENTINELS TRAINING COURSE
BESPIN

A handful of Sentinels and other Jedi stood at the edge of Cloud City. A repulsor platform was barely visible, far below.

"Recapping the briefing. The goal of this exercise is to enter free fall, reach terminal velocity, and then use the Force to land safely. You will land very hard. There's no avoiding that. Whether you land without dying or shattering your spine is between you, the Force, and the emergency fields that'll catch you if you fail to slow down or just miss the platform. If you do fail, just like I did my first couple of times, a cloud car will bring you back up here and you can try again.

"Final warning. In one standard gravity, in a type one atmosphere, at the altitude we're working with, terminal velocity will be about two hundred kilometers an hour, if you're belly down, arms and legs out to control your fall. If you tuck and go head down for more speed, you will not be able to slow down enough to make the landing, and you could get seriously injured even with the emergency tensor fields trying to slow and catch you.

"Soon as you feel ready, make the jump one at a time when the green light flashes."

Shira tossed them a two-finger salute and stepped off the edge of Cloud City.

 

[Shira Varanin]

The pastel orange clouds of Bespin whipped by. Up close they were vapor that slicked Shira's hair, dampened her clothes, and made her grateful for waterproof implants. Wind shoved against her outstretched arms and legs, putting an interesting strain on the upper-back intersections between flesh, bone, and metal. Her cybernetically protected spine flexed with and against the pressure. It wasn't wholly unpleasant - uncomfortable, sure, but empowering too.

"Terminal velocity," said a tiny electronic voice in her ear. Time to slow down from two hundred kilometer per hour.

An endeavor like this wasn't easy and would never be. Shira called on the Force as deeply as she could and grabbed hold of her own body as if she was a rock in a more normal training exercise. The pressure of the wind eased considerably, but not enough. In theory if she hit the platform at this speed, she'd still shatter her legs and get comparable damage up her spine. That wouldn't happen, not with the emergency catch fields in place - this exercise had minimal real risk - but she needed to slow down further if she wanted to stick the landing. She closed her eyes and dug deep. Reduce speed far enough and the landing could feel like the end of an especially high Force jump. Jedi could survive big falls with ease. This was just a notch or two beyond the normal.

The catch fields didn't trigger. She hit the platform painfully hard. Her boots made a thud they could probably hear in Tibannopolis.