Violette is finally back to her old self. All green and brown on top and all purple below. All pig of a plane. The brass decided to let the ‘B’ flight do some balloon hunting. There was one in particular, east of Albert that needed to be swatted. Gaston hit the balloon first but in the end he needed some extra help. Caporal Tsu claimed the gasbag.
In the afternoon the ‘B’ flight was lucky enough to be selected for escort duty of a British B.E.2c from RFC-15 who was tasked with dropping his bombs on enemy troop camp positions near Champien. More clouds rolled in and this time with ground fog developing for good measure. Following landmarks would be near impossible. Luckily for the ‘B’ flight all that they needed to do was to find their two-seater and follow him along. Easier said than done. Finding part was easy. It’s the following bit that proved to be tricky. The British machine was so slow that the Nieuports were constantly dropping out of formation just to stay afloat. During one of those maneuvers de Geuser and Tsu touched wings and had to return back to base with damage. This made Voscadeaux nervous every time he had to swing to port where his remaining wingman, Garrigou was flying. They both had to be careful to stay with the Quirk and not collide. On top of that they had to keep an eye for the Fokkers, which could jump out of any of the clouds at any given moment. Finally, the B.E.2 reached the target area, dropped his load and quickly turned back, but something was wrong. They were not following their preplanned route. The Quirk had to land at La Cesne, an aerodrome way out of the way. Gaston was furious for this detour, but what could he do? He was ordered to escort and escort he shall. But now they were released and could finally head for home. Gaston will need an additional dose of le pinard to calm his nerves.
"Take the cylinder out of my kidneys, The connecting rod out of my brain, my brain, From out of my arse take the camshaft, And assemble the engine again."