Opening shock?

Absence of the familiar.

Thirty-two feet per second per second.

How do you breath in freefall?

"Through genetically developed gills" goes the 'whuffo' joke.

I wasn't laughing.

Mother Earth came to greet me and I shook her.

"Leonardo also tried to fly, but he, too, failed."
"What?" I said startled from my daydream.
"Da Vinci! Leonardo Da Vinci! You were daydreaming again."

Even after all these years Durandal's perceptiveness still rankled me.
My dreams were becoming more vivid now.
They say time is a great healer of wounds.
But all it does for me is open them.

How many battles had I fought... and won?
The Jjaro have a saying: "Whatever you say, say nothing clearly."

Lies, damn lies, and the Jjaro.
But as Durandal constantly reminds me: "Truth is the first casualty of war"