All Down Hill [pt. 1]

Posted on Mon May 13th, 2019 @ 8:42am by Captain Luka Mahone & Lieutenant Commander Sofia Nikedoros & Lieutenant Gunnar Arnason
Edited on on Mon May 27th, 2019 @ 10:21am

1,917 words; about a 10 minute read

Mission: Snow Birds
Location: Haumea Colony, Mountain Side
Timeline: MD 04, 0900

"So we don't have a name for this mountain yet, but that's because I haven't asked the civilian science crew who surveyed this spot what they wanted to call it. We've had a few issues back and forth over who named the Daucin, so I'm making it clear who gets to name what."

Commander Luka Mahone had piled all the Vesta 'volunteers' into a small shuttle up a mountain range. In one hand, he had a bright red snowboard. In the other, he was recalibrating a tricorder. It was the excuse he had given himself to show the shore-leave bound crew the sights that were his colony. He was dressed appropriately, but not as heavily as normal, excited to test out his newfound skills on the powder.

"No one has to do anything scientific," he reassured, "I'm just going to take some basic readings on the way down. Our advance team didn't see anything harmful, so we shouldn't have anything unexpected pop up."

"Just be careful," Nikedoros cautioned, placing herself in position to ski down after him. "You're still new to surfing snow instead of waves."

Overhearing that, Martin moved off to the side, deciding it might be best to watch until he had a sense of who might or might not wind up needing a doctor. "I'll just hang back here for a bit. It's been awhile since I did anything but cross-country," he offered by way of excuse.

"Probably a good idea, just in case." Ildri looked down a the snow. "It's so beautiful though." She had some trepidation about strapping strips of wood to her feet and hurling herself down a mountain.

Nearby, Asahi had plucked a snowboard out for himself, but seemed much more cautious of the matter. Having more than one doctor in the same area he was in was enough to make him leery. But, the idea of Luka not-so-cautiously slipping down a slope was partially humorous and worrying. That did not stop him from cracking a joke. "Oh come on Doc," he said, eyeing Martin. "I bet it won't be that bad. It's just the same thing with more physics."

Martin shrugged. A bit behind him someone from the colony was putting up a tent, which he assumed was for warming up and maybe enjoying some mulled (or possibly spiked) cider after a few trips downslope, but once it was up he planned to talk to the guy in charge about having an area for treating injuries. "Eh, I will eventually." He looked over at Ildri with a smile. "For now, I'm also enjoying this lovely view."

"I agree." Ildri said, barely paying attention to their conversation. She gave no indication when eventually might be either.

"It's a nice view," Rufus said, hopping out of the transport and inhaling deeply. "But the SMELLS - those are amazing!" His tail wagged in anticipation and he hit the quick inflate on inner tube he pulled out. The others might ski or snowboard, and while he could go down upright like that, it just wouldn't be as much fun. He inhaled again, nostrils quivering with anticipation - Ah! so many scents here and sucking them in as he flew down slope would be a major rush. "It's an olfactory panorama. I can't wait to take them in at speed."

Martin chuckled, looking at the big Kainan whose nose was moving almost as much as his tail in response to all the new scents on this new world. Human vision was slightly better than Kainan, especially for close static detail, but from a Kainan perspective humans were practically 'nose blind'. "Enjoy, Ensign! I haven't tubed since I was a kid, but I remember it being a lot of fun." He tapped his nose. "Even with my limited sense of smell."

"I brought spare tubes, Doc. Help yourself," Rufus offered, flashing a big canid grin before pushing his tube to the edge of the slope and flopping belly down. "KOWABUNGA!" he howled, hurling over the edge, tongue hanging out and ears streaming behind as he sailed down the slope, wagging tail sending up big roiling plumes of snow in his wake.

"Well as long as he doesn't hit a tree he should be fine." Ewan laughed watching the chief conn officer barrel down the slope. Ewan glanced over at his wife and kids, all adjusting their own sets of skis, snowboard for Markus, as the larger chunk of the group started down the hill. Adjusting the straps of his poles to ensure they were tight, Ewan pushed off the edge following the Kainan down. Markus, helmet-free despite his mother's warnings followed suite quickly after.

"Martin if you wait to ski just because you think someone might break something you wont enjoy a single moment." Allison chided as she shuffled up to the Doctor peering over the edge, "You'll spend the entire time worrying. Besides the ship is just a tap away." She watched as Ainsley shuffled past over the edge following her brother and father.

"I don't know," Ildri finally replied. "I think it's a lot more fun to remain in one piece." She glanced at the doc to see what he was going to do. She sighed. "Ok, I'm going, if I die send a message to my brothers and lie about the circumstances of my death." Ildri said to Doctor Sorenson and then timidly pushed off.

Martin puffed a laugh as he watched her push off, then glanced up at Allison. "If she spills out, one of us should be close enough behind to get to her, eh? If you're going to wait here in case one of your kids breaks something," he added teasingly, pushing to the edge. "I guess I might as well go."

Allison laughed, "The kids know how the ski they've been doing it since they were young, I'm more concerned about you at this point." She replied as she glanced down to see that her family had already disappeared around the corner. With that, she pushed off and slowly began moving back and forth across the hill slow enough to keep an eye on all.

For a moment, Asahi thought his opportunity to continue teasing was lost. As another opened up, he took a step over to the doctor's side again, ready to poke at the doctor's hesitance to ski down the slope. But another distraction would cause the Intelligence Officer to look in the direction of Luka, who had, with a big shout, hurriedly followed the others down the slope with his snowboard.

"I think that solves that, Doc." He said, with a bit of hesitance in his voice as he clutched his own board. "... You first?"

Martin hesitated a moment, but a glance over his shoulder reassured him that at least one of the colonists near the tent had a red cross band on his arm. What's the worst that happen? It didn't look like all that challenging a slope. "Okay," he agreed with a smile and took off down the slope, gliding side to side as he got the feel of it again. It had been awhile, but it was just like riding a bike...

Ildri was surprised that she was still on her feet. But, all in all, this was rather pleasant. She wasn't going to fast and had studied how to slow herself down. Occasionally a small amount of snow brushed parts of her skin that weren't covered and she found it . . . wet. She really should have discovered snow before now, but somehow it hadn't come up.

A little behind her, Martin noted that she seemed to be doing quite well. But since she was (sensibly) going slower, he was rapidly overtaking her. So as not to throw her by zipping by too close, he swung wide to pass. WHUMP - his ski hit something beneath the snow and he felt himself pitch forward. He just barely reacted in time to make it a fall instead of a cartwheel...but still landed in a jumble.

Allison slid to a stop laughing as she watched the doctor struggle to stay up before taking the fall in horrible grace. "Are you alright there Martin?"

Oof. Martin rolled up, shaking off snow and then flexing the hand that had come down hard as he fell. "Yeah," he called back. "Nothing hurt but my pride."

Ildri stopped and went over to him, much more unsteady on the skis than when going down the hill. "I thought you had decided to stay up top?" She took off her skis and offered him her hand to help him back to this feet.

"Thanks." Swallowing his chagrin, Martin took the offered hand, but a herd of wild Yetis couldn't have dragged out him that he'd followed out of concern that she might spill out. "Looked like they had a medic up there in the tent, and Asahi wanted me to go down ahead of him," he explained, glancing around and then up the hill. "Though he seems to have changed his mind."

"Ah,"Ildri said. "Well, at least you're not hurt and practice does make perfect. Isn't that a Human saying? One of these days I should write a book with Kriosian sayings. You can lead a posat to carpet but you can't make them sploot." Of course there was no such saying, she was only trying to make Martin feel better about wiping out.

"Yes, it is," Martin agreed, getting his skis back under him. "...um, the thing about practice, not, uh,...splooting?"

Ildri grinned. "I would explain, but it's much more fun to make you wonder for awhile."

"Certainly more fun than wiping out," Martin laughed.

As he observed Martin completely wiping out and safely getting himself up again, Asahi clutched his board tighter. Martin actually knew how to ski, and the last thing Asahi wanted was to find himself in a medical bed because he had done something reckless.

Then again, there were those tubes. He saw Rufus run off in one, there had to be others. He caught sight of them in the corner of his eye, making quick to switch out the large board for one of the safer-looking tubes that he could sit in. It didn't take much longer to set himself up, mimicking the Kainan's actions by leaping onto the tube and pushing it down the slope, targeting himself to slide past the good doctor and counselor on the way down. He would have made for a good tease at them if the unexpected lurch of vertigo did not set in. Instead, he simply zipped past, clutching to the handles of the tube best he could.

Panic set in when he realized a fatal flaw in his plan; he didn't know how to steer. It may not have been that difficult, but for the moment, Asahi internally flailed as the form of one of the snowboarders swiftly approached his view, directly in his path.

His reflexes kicked in a moment too late, as he leaned a bit too far to the left, causing the tube to topple over and Asahi to tumble forward in the snow, and into the boarding victim.

Down at the bottom of the hill, Rufus climbed out of his tube in time to look up slope and see another tube coming down. The Kainan jumped up and howled a cheer for the tuber, who was really flying.

"Whooo! Arrooo-ROOO- " he cut off abruptly, tail tucking in a cringe, "..ow."

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