Mal-Lilly-Wash, flying lessons.

[badinlatin]

The door from Milliways opens, and the first thing that greets Mal is the smell of Inara's incense.

He'd forgotten about the door leading into Inara's hatch, and holds out a hand for Lilly so she doesn't trip over the awkward lip of the entranceway.

"Wish like hell the door'd stop movin' around on me like that - I went into the bar through the door to the bridge."

Comments

[badinlatin]

"Constellations. Et cetera."

Mal can take off and land again without getting his crew dead in the middle.

He leaves fancy to Other People, and looks up to Wash for further explanation.

[flybywash]

Wash looks back, and heaves an overdramatic, long-suffering sigh.

"Okay. A clause about me being the only person who gets to give flying lessons on this bridge needs to happen. 'Scuse me for just ooonne sec...."

He leans over to turn a group of switches all the way to the left of the console, then types in a quick command on the primary keyboard. It beeps in reply; satisfied, he crosses to the co-pilot's chair and finishes shunting over a little bit of the control to that station.

"Constellations, radar, pitch/yaw/roll readings -- that's the tiny one in the middle right -- we're in Norton Quadrant right now, so besides that big arc, your primary guidepoint's the star cluster in the bottom center right there."

[awesome_lilly]

...yeah. Lilly peers down at a small screen. There are numbers. There are Chinese characters. They are equally incomprehensible.

She peers out the window, spots the star cluster, and brightens.

"Oh, okay. I just want to keep those stars in the bottom middle? Shiny, I can do that."

It's not too hard for a girl who played a few videogames in her day. But there is one thing missing...

"How do I make it go faster?"

[badinlatin]

"Guuuuhyoudon't," Mal blurts out in a rush, moving a bit closer to Lilly's controls.

"Speed is...not a good plan. Heh. At the moment. Right, Wash?"

[flybywash]

Without missing a beat, "Speed is a very very bad plan that ends in death and destruction and running out of fuel before we hit the next point so no no speed. No. Speed can happen later, after the turning and the refueling."

[awesome_lilly]

Lilly sighs.

"You guys are no fun. Fine. No speeding yet."

Something occurs to her, and she turns to smile hopefully at them.

"Mal said there's anti-grav... does that mean barrel rolls are okay? I've done them before!"

When she was a raven. Shhhh.

[flybywash]

Wash considers Lilly for a long moment.

To Mal, "Naomi gets my dinosaurs, you get my shirts, and Zoe gets everything else."

And back to Lilly: "Okay. One barrel roll. But carefully, he adds, pointedly. "First, look up and to the right, and hit those three yellow buttons right in a row there."

[badinlatin]

"Yes. Yellow buttons are good."

Mal grips the back of the copilot's chair, and waits. Not that he doesn't have faith in Lilly or anything.

But.

[awesome_lilly]

Lilly dutifully looks up and to the right, grinning madly, and hits the three yellow buttons.

"Here we go!"

She twists the wheelyoke sideways, carefully keeping it as level as she can as the stars in the bottom middle of her screen start rotating around and up.

It's probably not the smoothest barrel roll Serenity's ever performed, but it is almost certainly the one accompanied by the most gleeful giggling.

[flybywash]

Wash is doing his best to stop hanging onto the other yoke for dear life. It's mostly working.

Sort of.

As Lilly goes, Wash subtly sneaks in a few adjustments to slow the roll and keep them on course. And...okay, it's kind of hard not to grin at the way she's laughing.

It's not smooth, sure, but it's exactly how flying's supposed to be.

[badinlatin]

And Lilly's laughing.

This is enough for Mal.

As the ship levels out again, Mal beams at the girl with a quip, "Suppose you'll make a captain yet."

[awesome_lilly]

"Hell yeah."

Lilly is practically glowing as the stars end up in the bottom center of her screen again.

"Maybe the next time you take a vacation I could even fill in for you!"

She's probably kidding. Probably.

[flybywash]

"If you do, can I get a raise?"

Ridiculously hopeful.

[badinlatin]

"No raises for pilots who steal the captain's wine," Mal retorts with a grin.

[flybywash]

"I gave it back!" he protests. "And I didn't steal that much."

Beat.

"Did I?"

[awesome_lilly]

"I'm going to have to go with the 'stealing Captain's wine is wrong' precedent here," Lilly announces.

"I want it to carry over for when I'm captain too."