Rene grabbed Rosaria’s pistol barrel the skin of his palm obstructing the receiver from moving back and forward.

“What..” the girl started, instinctively trying to pull the weapon away. Rene kept his grip without difficulty.

“Control the barrel,” he repeated, “If you wave it around like that you are likely to shoot someone, probably yourself but more problematically me.” Teaching civilians to use firearms and particularly pistols was a nerve wracking business, more so because Rene was trying to be polite about it. If he had waved a loaded gun around like Rosaria had just done the best he could have expected was a dressing down and more likely a blow to emphasize the point. It didn’t help that most people had seen enough holo-dramas to assume they had some idea what they were doing. Yarue took the opposite attitude to Rosaria. Probably owing to having seen weapons used first hand he was almost fearful of the small pistol that Rene had issued him. That caused its own problems though they weren’t as immediately life threatening as Rosaria accidentally shooting someone would be.

The main hold of the Bonaventure was about fifty feet on a diagonal and thus the only area on the ship long enough to provide a practical range. A tarp had been hung from the opposite corner with four targets painted on them. The targets were more or less human shaped. Less really given Rene’s limited artistic abillity, but psycologist had long known that, despite a species wide penchant for violence and war, individual humans did not like to harm each other. Without proper training a combatant was likely to jerk the barrel to the side at the last minute, or to slash with the edge of a blade rather than thrusting home. Overcoming that instinct meant training people with targets that looked human. Rene found the notion of training people out of an impulse to spare each others lives to be vaguely depressing.

“Alright, take aim like I showed you,” Rene told the pair, demonstrating a proper shooters stance, legs spread and weight shifted forward. Rosaria and Yarue aped the stance, peering over the sights of their weapons.

“Fire when you are ready,” Rene began to say. Predictabley Rosaria fired before he had finished speaking. Plasma snapped across the room, burning a fist sized black mark. They were using plasma pistols, civilian variants of the marine issued side arm that Rene was used to. The power level had been dialed back to a minimum, theoretically ‘less lethal’ setting that allowed them to practice without shooting hole in the freighters hull. Rosaria’s shot was well wide of her mark and she cursed in frustration, Yarue did better winging his target with a black burn. 

“You need to squeeze the trigger gently, jerking it like that makes the barrel waver,” Rene told the girl.

“How many times are you going to tell me that!” she snapped in frustration.

“Until you start doing it,” Rene replied simply.

“Dinner is ready Colonel,” Mia purred lustily, evidently having awaited a pause in the conversation. Rene nodded his head.

“Ok, safe your weapons,” he instructed, demonstrating by clicking the saftey on and siding the powercell from his own weapon. Rosaria and Yarue did the same, although in Rosaria’s case with a mixture of reluctance and frustration. Rene smiled inwardly. Did the girl expect to be a sharpshooter on her first day? Evidently she did, but if that was the case she was going to be learning some hard lessons about a great many subjects in the near future. The thought occurred to Rene that perhaps Thorne had punished her if she hadn't learned quickly enough. He felt a good deal more sympathy than he had a moment ago.

“You are doing well, trust me, it takes some time,” he said to his two students as they all headed for the improvised table where Solae and Dasin would bring the food. Rene and Solae had agreed that the meal would also serve as a chance to discuss what to expect when they were contacted by the Kalodrei. In addition to being well born enough to work in an important diplomatic post Solae had a passion for the work that was obvious to any one who knew her. Rene was proud of Solae and pleased that she had found work that bought her such joy. The Kalodori were there best chance of survival and Rene was pleased that the woman he loved was an expert.