Taking a Turn
Summary: The good old "Trapped on a planet" scenario. Archer and T'Pol find themselves caught up in something of a temperamental storm whilst on an away mission. Response to a challenge.
Disclaimers: No, I don't own anything that already does to Paramount, Archer, T'Pol, C Deck etc. I do own the snowstorm however.
A.N: Okay, this piece is in response to a challenge set on The Logical Choice forum board by a one Tami. For that reason, seeing as it's due to be finished for the 4th, it wont be too long, two or three chapters. It will be fun though (to write at least –smiles–)."Think Antarctica."
………………………
Suddenly he sneezed.
They stood close together, the tips of their toes curled upon the crystal edges of a most magnificent and terrifying sight. Before them lay a sea of shimmering silver, of uncontaminated white with a splash of enigmatic purple, headed by the most spectacular of piercing jades in an indigo sky: A snow desert with otherworldly Northern lights.
"Well ah'll be damned…" And then he sneezed again.
"Commander, are you alright?"
The Vulcan had seen humans sneeze before, but often when she did, the act, if continued, eventually led to a trip into sickbay.
"Ah'm a Southern boy T'Pol, Florida born and raised. Ah'm just not used t' the cold, that's all. Ah'll be fine."
Standing just inches before them, fighting off a hybrid of anxiety and anticipation which churned and battered away at his ever-racing, ever-proud heart, Archer smiled, although it was something barely visible under the thick faux fur lining of his draping hood.
"You know I only needed T'Pol for this one Trip, so if you infect half my crew with the cold when we come back… well the brig has been empty for a while, and it is looking for a little company."
T'Pol felt it safe to assume he was applying humour to the Engineer. So ignoring the banter she raised a scanner that was littered on its LCD screen now with tiny particles of beautiful ivory ice. Not appreciating the sight of them on her equipment however, she quickly brushed them away with a thick murky brown cotton glove.
"The Eisilium minerals are located two and a half kilometres due North of this landing sight, buried in a cluster of boulders."
The two men looked at her expectantly. She pointed slightly to her right.
"That way."
Together they nodded.
Then, with a quiet grunt Trip heaved a rucksack full of drilling equipment that sat quietly at his feet onto his back. Wobbling for a second on his knees he fought to keep his balance, then tenderly stood up straight ready to go.
Taking one of two other sacks left at the Commander's feet, Archer too struggled and wavered for a moment as he hoisted the chunky bag of equipment onto his shoulders.
In one rather graceful swoop T'Pol shouldered her own load and began walking through the due North course she had literally pointed out and set for them.
Their mission was relatively simple, in comparison to others they had executed before. Through luck alone, by putting a hand into the Vulcan database and quite randomly picking out a destination (a tact much objected by T'Pol) Archer had chosen their next planet to seek out and extend a handshake to. Their next planet, on discovery through the Science Officer's more regulated scans, turned out to be a place laden with a rich source of the rare Eisilium minerals, as discovered on a comet back in the youth of their mission. And this source of Eisilium was astonishingly close to the surface, buried in rock faces and boulders not centimetres from their surfaces. And the people who owned this planet (but for an unknown 'good reason' did not live on it) had utterly no objections to them coming down with their handshake-manner to obtain a sample… or five.
Of course though, all seemingly perfect proposals had their drawbacks.
"Think Antarctica," Archer had said as way of example when briefing his two accompanying crewmembers on the planet's brutal weather conditions. Trip had let an involuntary shiver run through the cracks of his spine. T'Pol had looked on with a cocked head.
"It'll be cold Sub Commander, very cold. Probably like… 'the anti-Vulcan' planet."
Her head had remained tilted and on that the briefing had closed.
"So where's all these blizzards and snowstorms y' promised us Cap'in?"
Archer looked back on the audacious Southerner with a tilted smile.
"It's the middle of summer here right now actually, no storms due for another month I'm afraid. Ambassador Kraeke assured me the weather would stay relatively mild for us, if we stayed relatively quiet. It's just going to be very cold."
Looking far from disappointed Trip threw his nose into a brief, biting wind and looked on at the two and a half kilometres they were destined to tread through.
"'Cold' would be an understatement, ah think."
His skin was on fire with a prickling chill, to be mildly descriptive about it.
"The walking and the rucksack should heat you up."
Engaged in her scanner T'Pol had been her naturally quiet self when half-listening to one of the Captain and Commander Tucker's conversations. Unknown to either however she felt her system take a hostile welcome to the sub-zero temperatures around them. Hardy though she was her people were an extremely warm-blooded race, as any one visit to Vulcan would capably show you. Humans had managed to adapt to life in the colds of such places as Canada and Scotland; such places on Vulcan did not exist. However though, and unsurprisingly, she continued without mentioning this.
Another brief and vicious arctic wind swept across the small parts of their faces which were bitterly exposed as they carried on steadily. Archer gritted his teeth and thought long and hard about the significant importance of collecting this elusive Eisilium. As ever he was able to will himself on with his bold and stalwart nature. Behind him his accompanying crewmembers carried on without complaint, only a few half-jokes, as ever uttered on Trip's behalf.
Archer had walked many times the length of two and a half kilometres before. He had run marathons, climbed mountains, desert trekked, completed triathlons, swam the English Channel even. Needless to say he passed his physical at Starfleet, quite literally at a sprint. The cold however had always been something of a weakness and downfall for him, and these two and a half kilometres would not be taken at any record-breaking speed by the fit Captain, or at any easy pace at all.
Before them the path was clear however. The snow was immaculate, if not at least half a foot deep, and the air crystal. The skies were harmonic, not a cloud touched upon the swirling mass of jade and indigo above. The winds were sharp and vicious, but short-lived and generously infrequent. Only the cold and the depth of frost they had to tread through caused the slow pace. The weather itself was at a tranquil lull, and the three were ever grateful for it.
Keeping a steady pace they made better time than they knew, trudging through their path at a fair speed for the conditions they were enduring. Twenty minutes in Trip decided to pipe up again.
"How much d' y' reckon we'll be able t' dig up?"
Archer turned to T'Pol who just as quick went back to consulting her scanner.
"From what I can detect, at least six grams of pure, uncontaminated Eisilium, for each drill, perhaps more if we go closer to the core of the boulders than was first intended. I cannot be certain however until we are at the actual sight."
Instinctively the two men looked on, hoping to catch a glimpse of some archaic rock buried into the never-ending stretch of snow. They saw nothing of the kind. Before them though was a rising gradient that composed a rather steep hill. Archer squinted to make it out, finding the depth difficult to judge in a canvas so toneless. It was steep though, of that he could see, and it stretched far.
He shifted the weight of his rucksack as a thick billow of frosty breath escaped his red tipped nose. Quietly he grunted then bared a smile.
"Not far then?"
T'Pol shook her head. "No, another kilometre before we are there I believe."
He raised a brow, impressed by having travelled much further than he thought in just that time.
Moving on a few more steps they then hit the hill together, and the two men felt the flaming protests from their backs almost instantly. T'Pol, remaining in steady, flawless stride carried on ahead, unaware of how taxing the hill proved to be for her human companions.
"I believe once we are over this hill we will come across another flat and the boulders should be in that area within the co-ordinate radius the scans have set us."
Archer felt himself falling forward on every step, reaching to claw his way up the snow bank, of which with every powerful step the Vulcan took above him a drift of snow would dislodge under her rising heel and come down on him. As comical as the sight must have been, he imagined, he was not wholly appreciative of the accidental act.
Trip took liberty to stop for a moment, craning his neck up at the eerie, still sky as he scanned the remainder of the hill.
"Did it look as steep as this to you when we were down there?"
Archer threw him a grin from the corner of his lips.
T'Pol, it could go without saying, reached the top before them. Archer watched her as she came to a stop, then seemed to stand in puzzlement at what she saw before her.
"Problem Sub commander?"
She turned slowly, as if finding it difficult to tear her perplexed gaze from what she had discovered.
"I would advise that you do not rush to the top of this bank."
Archer's half smile slid from his face and Trip dipped a brow.
"Like I asked Sub Commander, is there a problem?"
Slowly, turning back to what she had discovered, she nodded. She did not indulge him with a vocal response however.
With a sigh and a grunt he heaved himself forward, pulling away from Trip's side and reaching the Vulcan at as much a run as he could manage, declining to obey her suggestion that he approach slowly. He found out in a moment why she had warned him to go slow. Sinking his feet into the snow he threw on the breaks as T'Pol extended an arm as a barrier and stopped his torso toppling forward as his heart leapt into his gaping mouth.
She threw him a side-glance. "I warned you."
Trip came up cautiously at their side. His brow shot up as his eyes widened briefly.
"Wow…"
Before them, not one hundred yards away past another slightly downward sloping hill, lay a gaping abyss in what had before appeared to be a flawless white desert. The crevice stretched on as far as the eye's vision could reach, curving with the wide arc of the hill, which went as far beyond the horizon as the black tear did. Beyond that was the flat T'Pol had promised them. Somewhere a kilometre or so off, Archer barely managed to sight a cluster of lone boulders with a slight blue shimmer to their dull grey exteriors.
"There's our Eisilium."
She gave Archer another blank side-glance.
"So who's gonna sprout the wings an' fly across then?"
There was no question to whom Trip's elbow was pointing blame at as the three gazed on almost stupefied by the revelation.
"These co-ordinates are correct, Commander. We have only walked one and a half kilometres, the boulders from here are still a kilometre off, and within the radius the scanner calculated."
"That don't mean to say there aint still a big helluva hole in the ground we're gonna have to leap over first t' get to them!"
Trip's blunt exclamation bounced down the little hill before the crevice and into the gaping blackness with an eerie, endless echo. They felt a slight tremor underfoot. Archer threw him a biting frown.
"I told you Trip, the Ambassador had one rule; keep it quite."
Slowly the vibrations caused by the shouting wavered away into the background. Trip looked both huffy and apologetic. He never did take kindly to being scolded, especially over breaking such trivial and seemingly pointless rules as 'keep relatively quiet on an utterly deserted planet'.
"T'Pol, is there anywhere else around here, on this side of the crevice, which might have a source of Eisilium we can extract?"
Again she found herself buried in her scanner through the Captain's indirect order. Below she could feel the nerves of her toes freezing over, until she was all but standing on numb feet.
"There is an abundant source of the mineral fifteen kilometres due South West of here."
"Well I aint walking fifteen K in this!"
Again the ground below their feet shivered restlessly, this time though not settling into nothingness, but carrying on a low, mundane drum.
"Trip, one more yelp out of you…"
Mid-sentence he trailed off.
Instinctively the three turned slowly together and faced out over the void again as the vibrations underfoot began to pick up volume, just as a rather merciless wind began to kick up at their ankles in conjunction. Around them the temperature seemed to plummet drastically.
"What the—"
Trip's horror stricken eyes were forced up as a heavy shadow fell upon their three small shivering bodies. Overhead a menacing canopy of ebony clouds was gathering, quite literally it seemed from nowhere. Seconds later in the distance it began raining glossy black lightning.
"What happened t' summer?"
Trip's nervous quip was barely heard over the enraged thunder, which followed relentlessly after each brief, black strike. Archer took a hold of his coat's protective hood as the growing winds tried to prise it away from him.
"Either we brought it on somehow, or Kraeke made a miscalculation in his forecast that he's going to hear about when we get back to Enterprise."
T'Pol looked around at the horizon that lay far beyond, and suddenly felt even her nerves flinching. Although the lightning was at a distance, and seemed to be keeping that way, something else was coming…
"Sir."
Archer did not hear her as he protected his ears from the devastating sounds of above. The men threw their backs to the wind, which was coming from the horizon she was watching warily. She took a deep breath.
"Sir! I believe there is a front approaching from the North!"
Finally, as he continued to show his back to her, racing to make up his mind on how safest to abort back to the landing sight where their shuttlepod waited, she raised one shivering arm and spun him round as she latched a forceful grip onto his shoulder. From there as she snatched up his attention she pointed yonder North. Terror ran amok along his expression as he followed her gloved point.
"Drop the rucksacks! Back to the pod now!"
Together the heavy burdens were abandoned, leaving them to sink into the depth of shivering snow below, where they slowly began to slide down the hill towards the abyss.
The commanding officers didn't know it, but they were being given a most explicit first hand account of how very delicate this planet's eco-system was, and why it was uninhabited. That delicate balance was charging towards them right now in the full-blown form of an all out, enraged and highly temperamental snowstorm.
Behind, as they began to run forward, the tempest raced towards them like a creeping tilde wave of snow and ice and lightening. It moved in one slow, steady sweep, almost like an avalanche but airborne and growing in fury and strength as it traipsed on through the vast desert of snow.
They managed to break out into a flat sprint together, moving faster than they would ever have believed capable by their frozen legs before. Trip almost immediately took an unlikely slight lead, and could very easily have taken them over by one hundred meters or so by now, if not for he refused go on without his Captain. Archer could not help but notice this.
"Move Trip!
"No way Sir, ah aint—"
"Move as damn fast as you can Commander, that is a direct order! And you will be seeing the brig if you disobey it!"
Trip's legs were fighting with his conscience now. They begged to take on the full speed he was capable of. He begged that his Captain might let him be foolishly loyal, just this one time.
The unruly wind was creeping up on them now, taking lead over the blizzard and the lightning, biting down on their noses and ankles as the men duelled in a battle of will through their stern gazes. Finally though Archer won, and Trip's legs got the better of him as he sped off at quite an impressive pace, deciding he would use the lead as advantage to get the shuttlepod prepared for them all to leave as fast as it took to flicker on the engines.
Archer slowed himself enough that he could look behind him at the approaching front, and to see if he could not hoist his Sub Commander to his side, who, as unlikely as it seemed, appeared to have fallen behind.
As he found out however, stumbling on with his neck twisted back to see, she had not fallen behind, but simply vanished all together.
Amidst the tornados of loose snow and white winds visibility had plummeted with the temperature, and he felt he was staring on through a strange, artificial fog that threw the lands blind. Turning forward again he discovered he had lost sight of his Commander as well.
For a moment he was only aware that he was still running, and seemed to have no control over that. Then as fast as he scowled himself for being stunned by confusion, he pulled out his communicator.
"T'Pol?"
He received no response. A minute of hailing pulled up the same result every time he called her name. So quickly he tried another tact.
"Trip?"
The Commander struggled with his device as it sprung to life, trying to fish it out from under all manner of layers and pockets with woollen-laden fingers, of which he almost dropped the contraption twice as Archer continued to hail furiously on him.
"Yeah?"
"Is T'Pol with you, or ahead of you?"
In all honesty Archer would not have been surprised if she had bolted ahead amidst the terror and confusion, either dropping or ignoring her comm. in the process. He didn't know a member of his crew yet who could outrun her, Trip very much included. Even if he had taken an early lead she could still have stretched ahead of him easily. The Engineer's response though put the final hole in his hopes.
"No… Why?"
Trip knew 'why'. He had decided to ask anyway.
"Keep going until you get to the pod. Take off before the storm can fully hit you. There's too much of a risk the pod will be destroyed if it's left grounded."
"No way! I aint leavin' you both here!"
Archer had already slowed down to a casual jog. His mind was most defiantly made up.
"If I have to warn you one more time Commander about questioning my orders…"
In the background of the conversation the crunching of snow under running feet had stopped. Trip was at the shuttle. In the distance, over the expanding winds and flying loose snow, Archer thought he could just make out the two.
"Get in and take off now."
The very tips of the approaching front were nipping away at him now. The full brunt of the flying snowstorm was no more than a couple of hundred meters from him, coming like a tsunami on ice. He watched it without a flinch in his stance as he finally came to a complete stop, closing over the lid of his communicator.
Straining to hear, he could just barely detect the sound of a whining engine over the howling winds as Trip put into practise everything Travis had shown him from their first ever mission with Enterprise not more than seven and a half months ago.
Then with an abrupt blast from the twin ducts and a prompt from the thrusters he was reluctantly gone from the surface on his Captain's very insistent orders, and tearing out of the suddenly hellish atmosphere.
Archer turned to fully face the menace before him now. Staring into it with stern eyes and dry, twisted lips he moved his reluctant legs on the other way from where he had just been running to, preparing to throw himself into the gist of what he believed had just swallowed his Sub Commander. His last words came with a wiry smile, before he allowed himself to be thrown into the snowy eye of the storm.
"Alright, you son of a bitch; what did you do with my Sub Commander?"