First off, I apologize for the delay, I was distracted by outside factors. I'm still wanting for name suggestions guys. Come on, give me something! Read and enjoy!
The Rookies, Happiness, Peak One.
Griff was pacing impatiently on the Osprey, Allegra was more jittery than usual, both her knees bouncing. Nate was impassive, staring out of the window, Viggo, on the other hand, kept a rushed conversation with Allegra. He was shaking as much as she was.
"Get ready, drop zone is coming up in 30 seconds!" The copilot shouted over the sound of the rotors.
Allegra slid her other boot into the bindings of her new board, courtesy of her latest sponsorship deal with DC. Viggo slid his feet onto the board that had been custom made for him in Sweden, Nate had cinched a generous deal with some big western company by the name of Tomp. Griff had made a good deal with GNU, getting him a new board and bindings.
They felt the bird do an abrupt turnaround, and then the ramp at the rear end of the Osprey lowered, letting in the cold. Griff shuffled forwards, shaking with excitement. Beyond him, Allegra could see the fluffy whiteness of the slopes.
The jump light went green, and Griff howled as he leapt onto BIG Mountain. Nate was right behind him, silently landing on the slope. Viggo was next, his trembling abated, his nervousness was gone.
There was a small poomf as her board hit the snow, the rotorwash beat against her back as the Osprey pealed away. The wind blew her single braid back, and then it settled gently. The slope stretched out like a curving cloud, glittering invitingly. Here and there, there were stabs of rock that seemed to erupt from the snow, the trees were slightly bent, and frosted over with ice, so that they too, shimmered beautifully.
"Allegra!" Viggo shouted, throwing a snowball at her to grab her attention. "Are you gonna ride it or stare all day?"
Nate and Griff had already disappeared. She could see their tracks in the snow.
"Isn't that your boyfriend's favorite line?" Allegra replied, grinning. She got another big snowball thrown at her.
"Shut up." Viggo said, scowling.
Her smile faded. "Vig, I didn't mean-"
"Forget about it." He said, brushing her off, "Let's just start boarding."
They both relaxed as they settled into the familiar boarding styles they had possessed for years. Soon, Allegra got restless, and started pulling tricks and grinding on the trees. Not about to be left out, Viggo pulled off a few himself. It heated up, both of them taking their feet off their boards.
Then Viggo pulled off a wicked trick that Allegra knew she couldn't match, and she gave him applause as he landed. He gave her a smile that looked more like a scowl.
Allegra felt another stab of guilt for the gay reference. She knew he wasn't, he definitely knew he wasn't, but the jokes and the backtalk still stung him bad. Viggo had tried to hide it when they first met, using his self-deprecating humor and confidence to project a hologram of sorts, hiding his bitterness. Allegra saw through it though. It reminded her of herself when she was younger, when insecurities haunted her steps.
But now, she was skilled, hot, and kicking ass.
The same could not be said for Viggo. He was still slightly built, and his style didn't help him either. She knew that one easy way to attack a man was insult his masculinity, and calling him gay was one easy way to do that. More than that, it was his own voices that crippled him, his nagging doubts that shackled his stride.
Allegra felt for him, but the only one that could drag himself out of his funk was him.
Ormstead, The Court.
His head was pounding, both with irritation and pain.
The murmuring of the crowd behind him buzzed around his ears like so many mosquitoes. Nearly the entire mountain had turned out to watch the proceedings.
The SSX circuit was at stake.
"Gregory Ormstead, you are being held in a lawsuit by the ASA, by violating the agreement you signed with them on December 17th, 2007." The judge sounded tired.
He leaned forward, resting his arms on the rich wood of the small table. "Do you mean the agreement I terminated half a year later?"
The Judge frowned, and stared daggers at the reps from ASA sitting across the room from Ormstead. "Is this true, Mr. Mulhaven?"
The ASA men remained silent. Their lawyer spoke for them. "This claim is false, Mr. Ormstead tried to terminate the agreement by shouting obscenities at my clients over the phone, but it was never terminated on paper."
"It was, I sent the termination papers to you. They've probably already been run through a paper shredder and dumped into a trashcan. Thankfully-" His hand closed on a sheaf of papers. "- I made a copy."
Across the small courtroom, the ASA boys looked like they had all swallowed largemouth bass.
The sheaf of papers was given to the judge, and he studied them with a sharp eye. When he finished reading, he glowered at the men who had gone after Ormstead with a lawsuit. "Mr. Mulhaven, do you have any explanation for this excellent document?"
The shark stood, his shock of grey hair poorly smoothed back. "This document was never seen by me, nor by any of my employees. Mr. Ormstead is a thief-"
The buzzing of the crowd turned into a slow roar. The judge banged his gavel until it cracked. The quiet returned.
"I will not have low-born insults in my court. You present your evidence, Mr. Mulhaven, or you keep your mouth shut."
Mulhaven went red with either embarrassment or rage. Ormstead could not tell. His lawyer passed another set of papers up to the judge.
"The hell is this?" The judge growled.
"Those are our financial reports of our payments to the dependencies we loan money to. As you can see, our monthly loans to Mr. Ormstead never stopped taking money from our hands."
Parker looked hard at the papers, then looked at Ormstead, then looked at Mulhaven. "So you sent him money, that proves nothing."
The other man looked distraught. "Good judge, we only give money to men still in line with our agreement."
"Where is the proof that Mr. Ormstead broke with this agreement? You still have yet to disprove his claim. According to Mr. Ormstead, he was well within his bounds, according to the agreement, to break off to form SSX."
Mulhaven hissed like a scolded cat. "Using our money, using our ideas."
"I paid you back, every cent you gave me I gave back. You just want a cut of something that you think should've been yours." Ormstead shot back. He looked back up at Judge Parker. "Sir, I used ASA's money to give SSX a kickstart, once I gained enough money, I paid off every loan, and broke the agreement, as I was able to. ASA's sharecropping agreement-"
"Objection!" Mulhaven boomed.
The judge ignored him.
"-only enabled them to get a major cut of the profits from my merchandising and small supply business. Both of which I closed down legally. The agreement said nothing on sporting associations."
"We revised our agreement."
"Also prohibited by the legal document, besides, I terminated it before you could change it anyways."
Parker glared at the ASA table. "Any further statements from the plaintiff?"
They said nothing.
"Gentlemen, I don't even know why I let you into this courtroom. You have provided almost no evidence, and have done nothing but accuse Mr. Ormstead of both violating your agreement, and stealing your ideas for a "Snowboarding Superpark". The agreement, as I have seen, was ended over two years ago. As for your superpark. I do not recall you coming to this mountain to hash out the hard details of the SSX agreement in my court. I do not recall you laying down the money to build the tracks that now snake across my mountain. And I sure as hell don't recall you bringing in so much wealth and commerce into my town." The judge stood shakily. "This court is adjourned, Mr. Mulhaven, you lost, get off my mountain."
The crowd clapped and roared, this time, Judge Parker did not bother to settle them. The accusers slumped down the aisle and threw the doors open violently, retreating to their black sedans.
Ormstead rose heavily, wondering how he didn't just collapse at this rate. He approached the judge's stand a bit unsteadily.
Parker was sitting down again in his chair. "They're not going to leave you alone Greg."
Orms sighed. "I know, they didn't care much in the first two years, when I was taking my circuit all over the world. They didn't care when the Tricky craze was sweeping people off their feet. They only care when I settle down, when I finally make this thing big."
Parker laughed dryly. "You just said it, when you were traveling, they were just hoping you would get lost in a snowstorm and never emerge. But now, you've put down roots. You're dangerous Greg. You'll be changing the world now."
