Kip and Flash.
Sep. 22nd, 2008 11:25 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
Kip Lowry and his chronoplane Flash are often in the public eye, and not always on purpose. Kip (short for Christopher, but the only time he's ever been called that in his life was when his parents were mad at him) is (and has been for quite some time) in the first half of his 20s, hot-headed, impetuous, adventurous and cocky.
He is one of the few who can "see time," with a natural ability to timeslip; not all Chronopilots have this ability (and - unfortunately and despite the Corps' best efforts - not all who have this ability are Chronopilots, which is the cause of more than a few of their emergency missions). Most of the pilots are simply good with time, a certain amount of natural ability - similar to some people's ability to always know what time it is without looking at the clock - and augment this with special goggles and the instruments in their planes; Kip doesn't need to, and is constantly being scolded to use them anyway to double-check himself.
When he was little, he accidentally timeslipped forward and saw himself as a Chronopilot performing at an airshow. This incident immediately precipitated his induction into the Corps' special early training, and didn't help his cockiness at all.
Kip generally dresses the part of a World War One flying ace, with leather jacket, white silk scarf, and leather flying cap (unbuckled) and red-lensed goggles (pushed up to forehead) which he almost never takes off. He carries a Webley revolver in a shoulder holster, because his style (and hence the missions he is chosen to complete) tends to require it.
His plane, Flash, rather resembles a Sopwith Camel, with alterations which include making him a two-seater. He is finished in a warm cherry-wood veneer, highly varnished and with a large red lightning bolt running from the cowling down each side; his propeller is also painted red, as are his wings. He has removable windscreens in front of each of the two cockpits, and heavy dark-brown canvas tarpaulins that can be stretched over the rear cockpit when it hasn't got a person in it, or up over both cockpits and latched onto the windscreen in front to use as a roof when the weather is particularly terrible and the top wing doesn't provide enough shelter. His cowling and fittings are variously aluminum or brass. He is outfitted with a single machine gun on an interrupter gear to keep his pilot from shredding his propeller.
Kip's "handler" and main mechanic is named Alex. Kip fussed and kicked at the traces for a bit over having to have a handler in the first place, but when Alex turned out to be an extremely good-looking young woman, he settled down quite a bit, just as the Corps had anticipated. She spends the greater part of her time rolling her eyes at him.
He is one of the few who can "see time," with a natural ability to timeslip; not all Chronopilots have this ability (and - unfortunately and despite the Corps' best efforts - not all who have this ability are Chronopilots, which is the cause of more than a few of their emergency missions). Most of the pilots are simply good with time, a certain amount of natural ability - similar to some people's ability to always know what time it is without looking at the clock - and augment this with special goggles and the instruments in their planes; Kip doesn't need to, and is constantly being scolded to use them anyway to double-check himself.
When he was little, he accidentally timeslipped forward and saw himself as a Chronopilot performing at an airshow. This incident immediately precipitated his induction into the Corps' special early training, and didn't help his cockiness at all.
Kip generally dresses the part of a World War One flying ace, with leather jacket, white silk scarf, and leather flying cap (unbuckled) and red-lensed goggles (pushed up to forehead) which he almost never takes off. He carries a Webley revolver in a shoulder holster, because his style (and hence the missions he is chosen to complete) tends to require it.
His plane, Flash, rather resembles a Sopwith Camel, with alterations which include making him a two-seater. He is finished in a warm cherry-wood veneer, highly varnished and with a large red lightning bolt running from the cowling down each side; his propeller is also painted red, as are his wings. He has removable windscreens in front of each of the two cockpits, and heavy dark-brown canvas tarpaulins that can be stretched over the rear cockpit when it hasn't got a person in it, or up over both cockpits and latched onto the windscreen in front to use as a roof when the weather is particularly terrible and the top wing doesn't provide enough shelter. His cowling and fittings are variously aluminum or brass. He is outfitted with a single machine gun on an interrupter gear to keep his pilot from shredding his propeller.
Kip's "handler" and main mechanic is named Alex. Kip fussed and kicked at the traces for a bit over having to have a handler in the first place, but when Alex turned out to be an extremely good-looking young woman, he settled down quite a bit, just as the Corps had anticipated. She spends the greater part of her time rolling her eyes at him.