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Caro,
just in case you are reading this:
no, Danyael will *not*
appear later in this arch!
Thanks
to Trivia for editing this on short notice when the person I
asked first was taken out of commission by the dreadful Triple-C,
also known as the Common Christmas Cold.
2088-12-26
Earth - NAC - High Sierras
The
snow crunched under the cybersteed's hooves. Here, high up in the
mountains way above the desert level, it had snowed and thawed
and frozen and snowed again in the last weeks, creating an
intricate pattern of ice and snow that caused dramatic light
effects in the winter sun.
At
least to his eyes. Snow crystals, glittering in rainbow colors,
were blown into his face by the wind and the horse's swift pace.
Pearls of ice hung like beads on a string on the thin twigs of
the trees lining the trail where the stands of firs gave some
path for them, each one of them glittering with a minuscule
mirror of the sun in his back.
He
was cantering through a land of ice and rainbows. For a moment,
he wished he could share the sensation of it, but he knew why he
was alone out here. She would have grown cold too swiftly, and
her eyes would only see white. White and black and blinding
glitter of sunlight on top of it. So he came out here alone,
urging Triton to a swift gait that covered the ground, for once
not worrying about imprints and tracks. Not today. And tomorrow
he'd be gone off-planet again anyway.
Having
reached the top he got out of the saddle, wandered the last
meters by foot. One of the few benefits of a service record kept
clean so far: he could move freely on base, something he'd come
to appreciate recently. The snow lay high here in the small
clearing of the firs, actually reaching up to his thighs. He felt
the first trickle of snow melt searching its way into his boots.
He didn't care, actually sat down in the deep snow and studied
the bluish green of the sun filtering through half a meter of
snow before reaching his eyes. For a moment, he wondered how ice
caves would look to his eyes.
A
single drop of ice was almost white. Almost. He raised a
half-frozen drop dangling from his fingertip and watched it
reflecting the sunlight above the snow. Glittering rainbows and
tiny suns. It was silent out here. The wind had ceased. Triton
knew better than to disturb him. The GPS was killed, and any
creature moving would cause significant creaking in the frosted
snow surrounding him. Still, he scanned the landscape with a
distrusting glance before he dropped back into the snow and felt
the cushioning mass envelope his figure. For a brief, silly
moment, he just...
...played.
With
the result that he was soaking wet when he returned to base four
hours later.
32,000
meters above, an infinitesimal boost of a thruster caused a tiny
satellite cube to spin about on its spacial axis. Fourteen
seconds later, another infinitesimal boost in the opposite
direction halted the movement. A system of semi-biological photo
receptors strangely resembling the eye of a fly vibrated as they
zoomed in on the snow covered surface below.
A
mountain peak came into view. Roughly pixilated at first, then,
with growing resolution, more and more details showed up. Black
firs lined a clearing. A single hoof trail ran across the snow,
stopped, continued as foot prints that ended on the very top of
the mountain...
With
a touch of disdain, Oberon
Michael
stared onto the screen at the other end of the TRC
on board of the HHS
Helven. His
second, Gabe,
looked over his shoulder and chuckled. "Two thousand and
some years since, and they still haven't forgotten that
outrageous outfit of yours."
Michael
sighed theatrically. "If only we'd gotten that crewman in
time back then. The mess he made of the planet is still sickening
me. And not because of the bedsheet I had to use to cover the
Roman uniform. Darn intelligence, they should have realized that
was the wrong people!"
Gabe
patted his shoulder sympathetically. "Intel,
recon, and
deserters are always a hassle." He studied the
no-longer-grainy image of a snow angel a bit longer. "From
the one we're watching? The one who faced the
Fenrij?"
"Yeah."
Michael nodded, laid his fingers together and applied enough
pressure to have the tips almost glowing white.
"Do
you think he's mocking you?"
"Don't
think so. He isn't that aware of us." He snorted. "Still...
call Intel and Covop,
it's about time *Lucy* gets his thing together!"
Gabe
laughed faintly. "Consider it done, Boss. Just don't call
'Cifer 'Lucy'
to his face. Rafe
would object to piecing you two together for a second time in two
hundred years and I don't have another chorus willing to give the
bridge a new paint job."
Michael
grunted. "And Gabe... Don't call me 'Boss'."
"Aye,
aye, *A-A.*"
Behind
him in the captain's seat, Oberon Archangel Michael buried his
face in his hand and groaned.
End...?
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Covop:
Covert Operations
Fenrij:
the species that built the scarecrows
Helven:
just mix Heaven, Hell, and Elven and see what you get.
HHS:
Heavenly Hosts Ship
Intel:
Intelligence
Recon:
Reconnaissance
TRC:
Trans Reality Connection
Names:
those followed by (!) are felt offensive
Gabriel
"Gabe" "Gaby"(!)
-- first officer
Lucifer
"'Cifer" "Lucy"(!)
-- covert operations
head officer
Metatron
"MT"
-- ship computer & communications system
Michael
"Mike" "Mikey"(!) "Mickey"(!!)
--
captain (oberon) of the Helven A
Raphael
"Rafe"
-- medical captain
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