(A/N - Shout out to the Star Trek: SCE series with Corsi, Stevens, and Gomez!)
Mariner scanned the mission parameters and pulled her snow gear out of the back of her storage closet. "You guys didn't tell me that this planet is in solar winter!" she growled at Rutherford, who was pulling on his snow boots.
"Their sun has lost over 50% of its luminance in the past year. The Daystrom Institute has scientists studying the cause and a solution, but in the meantime, we have to help them with alternative power sources," Boimler explained, already dressed in his silver and red snow gear, ready to go.
Mariner yawned for the hundredth time, hoping Tendi wouldn't notice that she and Boimler were dragging ass due to an extremely late night on the holodeck. Not missing a beat, Boimler swiftly handed her the mug of raktijino that he'd been holding.
"Thoughtful jerk," Mariner whispered, giving him a sly smile which he returned. She took a sip and noticed that he'd made it exactly the way she liked it.
She continued sipping from the mug as they walked down the corridors to transporter room 2. "Where did you get that? I want one," Tendi whispered to her.
"Boims," she replied as if it was the most normal thing in the world for Boimler to bring her a special cup of coffee.
Tendi looked over at Rutherford, who hadn't spoken more than a few words to any of them since they had eaten breakfast. Tendi noticed that Rutherford was carrying both Boimler and Mariner's gear bags along with his own.
"What's the deal?" she whispered to him.
"They caught us," he whispered back as they turned the corner into the transporter room.
There wasn't any time for her to react to that news because they immediately stepped on the transporter pad and began the transporter sequence. "Mariner is going to kill me," Tendi thought with certainty while the transporter cycle completed and placed them on the wintry planet.
"Boimler, Mariner, you're with the geothermal team. Tendi, Rutherford, you're with the dilithium team. Stay warm, stay hydrated. Report back hourly," Ransom instructed, reading from his PADD in his right hand while doing bicep curls with his left.
"First mission as boyfriend and girlfriend. New milestone," Boimler nudged her as they struggled through the frigid wind and deep snow.
"You know, we need a cute couples name," Mariner mused.
"Beckward. Mariboims." Boimler replied with a laugh through his scarf.
"Marinler," she chimed in.
They ducked inside a cave and joined one of teams of Corps of Engineers officers that had coordinated the worldwide power plant mission. Captain Sonya Gomez greeted them and motioned to another officer to bring them up to speed.
"Hi, I'm Chief Fabian Stevens," he said, handing them each a smaller PADD with detailed instructions, "you're going to be helping us run the geothermal lines down through the rock and into the core of the planet. Boimler, you have section 12, Mariner, you have section 13. A lot of this job requires waiting, so I'm sorry to say that you're going to be a bit bored. Try doing jumping jacks to stay warm."
They all laughed together until another officer walked up to their group. "Fabe, let them get to work," she said, her icy blue eyes regarding all of them in turn.
"This is Commander Dominica Corsi-Stevens," he introduced her, "she likes to spoil our fun and she is not interested in pranks at all." Dominica rolled her eyes, but Mariner could tell that she was smiling behind her scarf.
"Do you think that's his wife?" Mariner whispered as she and Boimler made their way deeper into the cave to reach sections 12 and 13.
"Corsi-Stevens… probably," Boimler reasoned.
"Okay, what's their couples name?" she asked, deciding that this would be a fun way to entertain herself through the mission.
"Corvens," he answered immediately.
"Yes, I like it," she agreed.
They settled into their positions and waited for further instructions, texting each other with as many funny couples names as they could think of, eventually turning it into a guessing game.
"Samvana," she sent to him.
"Tendi and Rutherford!" he replied.
"Sections 10 through 15, prepare for drilling," they heard Chief Stevens call out over their comm badges.
"Finally," Mariner mumbled.
The process began smoothly. A laser drill hovering above the cave drilled through the rock ceiling and down into the base rock. They monitored the temperature of the drill and the depth of the hole, making micro adjustments as the process continued.
Just as the final depth was reached, Mariner's tricorder picked up a pressure increase coming from the core of the planet, which didn't make any sense.
"Mariner to Stevens, the core pressure is rapidly rising. Suggest emergency shut down procedure," she called out through her comm badge. She received a garbled and staticky reply that she couldn't make out, so she attempted an emergency shut down from her tricorder.
"Boimler, do you read?" she attempted her comm badge again. More static.
A deep rumbling began under the surface and Mariner's feet picked up the vibration just as the tricorder did. A high-pitched trill from the tricorder alerted her to the flare up that was about to regurgitate its way up through the freshly drilled hole.
"Here goes nothing," she said calmly, aiming her phaser at the ceiling to create a minor collapse, hoping it would be big enough to seal the hole and block the flow of material coming from the core of the planet.
She was successful in landing a large rock over the narrow hole and she was sure that it would work again in the other sections. She hurried back up toward the entrance to the cave to find Boimler, hoping he'd come to the same conclusion she had.
"Boimler!" she yelled since the comm badges didn't appear to be working.
"Mariner, up here!" she heard his reply, glancing up to see him on a ledge, "I'm about to create a collapse to block the magma!"
Several teasing remarks came to the surface of her brain, but she was too busy climbing up to the ledge to blurt them out. They aimed their phasers together to create the small collapse, effective in plugging another hole.
"What the hell happened?" she asked him as they stared at the pile of rocks.
"I don't know, comms are down," he replied, gesturing for her to climb down from the ledge so that they could work their way back up to the cave opening.
"Let's get out of here," she agreed.
They fought their way through several other minor collapses in sections 11 and 10, pausing in a clearing to test their comm badges again.
"Boimler to Chief Stevens—"
A huge explosion in the distance rocked the cave, knocking them to the ground as sections of the cave ceiling fell all around them.
"Boimler!" Mariner yelled, trying to stand back up. As soon as she got her footing, everything went black.