16 April 1916
Sgt. Bud "Bert" Bogart
18th Sqd. RFC
Bruay aerodrome

Hello again; I introduced myself about a month or so ago and then proceeded into obscurity. The thing is, my Wing Commander says I'm not allowed to fly when it's regular or clear sunshine out, as that interferes with something called the TrackIR system. He wasn't able to tell me more about it; classified, I guess. Anyway, bottom line is I'm not getting much time in the air. However, ...

the squad started out on DH-2s, which I had a tough time taming. And then, I I finally got the hang of the ride, and the lay of the land, someone decided to change our mounts (to FE-2s) and our 'drome. Offhand, that smacks of German infiltration and espionage to me. So here we are at Bruay, which for navigation purposes may as well be in the middle of Kansas, for all I can tell. I'm gonna have a heck of a time finding my way back to here, I'll wager. But my biggest beef right now is the plane. Slower and less maneuverable than the DH-2. And then there's the gunner. Twice now, I've gotten dead behind a Hun, and my boy up front, a Capt. Bennet, just sits there! What's up with that?? I'm screaming for him to shoot, and he's just sitting there!! The first time, the Hun got behind us, and Bennet wouldn't use that special backwards gun, and so we got shot up pretty bad. Then, to boot, I managed to get down low over one of our balloons, figuring that they at least would scare him off, but they wouldn't shoot either!

After a few days in the hospital, we found one of those new Rolands the Germans got, and Capt. Bennet just sat there again. Cripes, I dang near rammed the Hun this time, and Bennet didn't even flinch. This time, I did manage to scare the Hun down low, only to get shot at by his infantry. Not much control left in the bus, so figured to put down in a field. And don't you know, right when I'm 50 or so feet above the ground, the real-life sun poked out of the clouds, flooded the room and the Trackir, I completely lost vision, and crashed (amazingly unharmed) .So, My gunner won't shoot, my infantry won't support me, the Sun is against me. Something's not right....

Is there something I need to do to get an AI gunner to shoot?