The showoff crystals you see, mate, are what scientists call hard light. Pretty much, it means they're holograms that have dimension. All I know is that we didn't want to snag them at first.

Right. Who in their bloody right mind would want to slam into something that was just floating in the air, and looked cunningly like shiny painted steel.

Well.... besides Zoe.

Hiro took off, and zoomed down the course. He was damn fast, of course. He made it to the first jump and did a flying squirrel. Maximum air trick. He let go of it and swung away from the yellow crystal, which we were quite sure would smush him as we watched on the monitors.

I'll let it be said here and now, there were plenty of disappointed sounds when he did dodge it. He scored 360. That was out of a thousand. Hiro didn't even place. He still managed to score well, and pull off every trick he could with his amount of adrenaline. He scored an overall 5th. Out of eight.

Kaori went next. Speaking of a nice ars... Oh. right. Sorry. She placed third. I didn't watch her, as I was busy getting for my own run.

My own run... I took off the first ramp, and did a Spaghetti 360. They don't allow Spaghettis on the Tricky circuit, because it was deemed 'to dangerous' Tell this to Pysmon, who tries to decapitate himself for his ubertrick. What can I say. its management.

The board was doing nicely. They had patched the wax space with a solid tube, and than just shaved off the entire thing but for the base layer with a superheated cutter. Fused it all nice and neatly. Did they circular grind, and even added some speed grooves for me. I love those bloody things.

I landed and tried to edge my way around the corner, and barely managed to. Would have destroyed my balance if I hadn't scrapped the snow with my hand. That was a negative 10 points. hmph. I made it up with a back flip and than a switch rotation, but it still hurt my pride that I hadn't just taken the fall and recovered than palpably taking off of my score. Made it to the big jump grounds, through, and pulled off every single grab I could think of. Got my score near the mark for bronze, but didn't. I, Moby 'stupid git' Jones, therefore received the fourth placing.

Mac went next. He pulled off everything I did, and than some. did a ducking double back flip to flying squirrel to avoid the red, and an inverted mute to avoid the orange. But he didn't avoid barely snagging the yellow, which multiplied his points. I don't think anyone noticed. I sure as hell didn't. Bloody hell, through, when he was told he had the highest score, that boy was happy. Till, um. We patted him on the back. oops. Stupid Hiro. Stupid me. Stupid bloody fence. Oh well. Mac was sure as hell happy with the gold medal around his back.

Through I'll be damned if it didn't make the bloke bend a little bit from its weight.

Zoe went next. I guess she had seen him snag the yellow, cause she did a combo and snagged the red. Did less tricks than me, but got the silver.

Eh. Live, learn, and get them stinking drunk so they'll tell you their secrets.

That's right. That night, we established a new tradition as well.

Drinking dry several bottles of the local liquor. Damn, sake is spicy. You wouldn't think so, but... no. Spicy. Sweet. Like the orange stuff in Joe's Crab Shack. (Merqury City, if your wondering) only highly alcoholic.

The legal drinking age in Japan is 18. We lied about Mac and Hiro claimed guardianship of Kaori. The bouncer couldn't tell about Mac, what with the fact that nobody and nobody could tell how old an American was that wasn't of our party.

We actually learned a lot of things that night. Like never chase Sake with Soy sauce. Like Elise hates clothing when she's drunk. Mac will get a nosebleed if he sees a supermodel topless. and, JP can break dance better than a black guy.

Well... I was drunk. Not to mention, I divided my time between the west Indies and Bristol. and the hills of BMX and Snowboarding. So why would I care, right ?

Besides the bloody fact I'm a buffoon who was righteously drunk and there is an ingrained rivalry between the French and British. The fact that Jurgen called us both Pussies did NOT help.