VR Training

"Cadet, I am going to assume that it is safe to say that you at least have some knowledge about patrol cycles or hover cycles in general at least enough to turn one on so we can skip that part and the section about how you have to have the linked helmet." 

"History, all you need to know is four wheels is okay, two wheels is even better, and no wheels is king."

"Am going to tell the simulator to use the one you got to take a joy ride on as the base model for your training today. The LDPD ones are the same as ours except for the paint job and a few tiny differences thanks to who holds the manufacturing contract. Unless you were on one every day for a year you could probably not tell the difference in their performance."

Zeph jumped back a bit when the holographic virtual LDPD patrol cycle 003 materialized right before his eyes as three dimensional pixels came together. Biggs almost died of laughter due to how dramatically Zeph reached. He truly could not wait to totally blow the mind of what he perceived as an extremely overprotected young naive sheltered newly mented adult.

Biggs spent the next half hour going over things that you really wanted to check out before riding a hover cycle of any kind especially if it was not one you were familiar with. What he pointed out in what he called the pre-flight or ride checklist was way beyond what was in the operators manual. 

Checking things like the charge level of the batteries and if it had plenty of hydrogen was a given, but looking closely at the bottom of the hover plates and even the stitching of the seat to give you an idea of how well it was maintained showed that Biggs had earned the position of the primary driver of the MCU for his ability to make sure that it was it perfect condition for when it had to be put into action.

Zeph made sure to ask plenty of questions about tolerance levels and what could be expected out of the maintenance drones and technicians in realistic terms, but he tried to ask a few questions about how the VR simulator room functioned and how the projections could be touched and even support the weight of a person. 

"How should I know kid? I am an old grease monkey with a badge, not some techno wizard. This thing operates on stuff that is about as understandable to me as what a FA can do with what remains of their former divinely given powers. There are reasons why we normal NEO's ain't sent out to deal with them kid. Enjoy the privileges of that fancy badge of your while you can. Odds are it is going to get you killed eventually."

"Hop on and let's see if you can at least make it go in a straight line and excite a stop without flying off the front, before we ever think about how to make it go in the direction you want."

What happened next was the first time that Biggs was disappointed in how Zeph's training was going. He was disappointed because he did not go flying off face first towards the virtual asphalt when the surprise obstacle popped up to test reaction time and how Zeph handled performing an emergency breaking situation. 

Behind his helmet Zeph was grinning ear to ear. It might have been his second time to have a hover cycle between his legs, but he grew up in a part of LA where you were either a skater or bmxer, and with a bmx course in park next to Ocean View Apts the choice was obvious. 

Wheels or not, hand brakes were hand brakes, and you definitely want to use both the front and back ones at the same time, unless you wanted to show off to a hot girl with a stopie AKA front wheely stop.

First time he tried it he got a bloody nose and a broken arm. But the cute neighbor girl did write her phone number on his cast so he felt like it was worth it. And when his sister landed her rich boyfriend, he got to experience the thrill of high octane powered dirt bikes out in the dunes.

"Beginners luck. Let us see how you handle something more complicated than a straight line rookie. You want to be able to handle traffic during the 12:30 to 1300 rush right. Autopilot sure won't impress a girl."

Biggs being punching in various simulated turns for Zeph to attempt to navigate through into the control panel of the virtual simulator room, because his VGPIINN access was restricted by the same jammers installed to prevent cheating by the recruits thanks to him not being listed as an actual instructor. 

"Not bad. You know what moving the controls does at least." 

That might have been what Biggs said but he was somewhere between half impressed and half disappointed. He really wanted to see Zeph eat virtual asphalt at least once. 

*Boop, boop, boop*

""Let's see you handle a double hairpin followed by a reverse spiral.""

*Tumble, tumble*

Zeph was not expecting a hard left handed spital immediately after two very sharp hairpin turns to the right, and flug himself off the virtual patrol cycle thanks to the amount of speed and opposing g-forces he experienced, during what would have been a successful execution if he was going a little slower or realized he needed to lean in the opposite direction as soon as he came of one wicked curve and into one in the opposite direction. 

"Happy now Officer Biggs?"

"Depends on if the AI lets me have a copy of you rolling like a kicked stone or not."

"Ask it nicely later, and it probably will send it to you and all of the patrol cycle units in the division."

"Get up, get back on and I will punch in something more realistic."

One more rather entertaining reunion with the virtual asphalt later, Zeph was able to handle pretty much anything that Biggs threw at him.  Simulated traffic on an exact replica of the route between HQ and Tom's held no challenges whatsoever. 

"Rookie you have just enough time left to move on to a real patrol cycle. HQ can issue you a temporary permit to make it all legal, so you want to play in traffic or earn me a promotion before buying me a steak at Tom's."

"I will give you one guess Officer Biggs."

"Alright let me go clear it with the Sr. Instructor and XO first.  If they give the green light on it you got the cred and guts to make a wager with them?"

"I have a few spare credits, and my bounty earnings should be finished being processed by tomorrow."

"Earn a few thousand extra crds already rookie?"

"Closer to a million. Til it hits I got 5k give it take a few hundred. I give my drone and pets a 300 a day spending allowance and I haven't checked my balance recently."