Zero G Springwine

Posted on Thu Apr 25th, 2024 @ 7:15pm by Chief Armoury Rormu Yazlin & Elara ‘Kara’ Vance (*)

Mission: Fractures
Timeline: Jan 2398
1248 words - 2.5 OF Standard Post Measure

Elara had gotten quite a few stares since she had come onboard but day by day it was becoming less as people got used to her appearance. It was not every day that her species was found out on random cargo vessels in the middle of nowhere so she could give them all a little slack while they adjusted to a woman with bright pink hair and purple skin among them. Being Quartermaster on the ship was certainly very different than other ships but now that she had a better understanding of the who and what where she felt she could afford a night off. It was why she was sat in the middle of what everyone referred to as the bar waiting for the game to start on the screen. She had been told that a live watch of zero-g football would not be at all possible once they left port as the communication array was a little sluggish so she was taking advantage while she could.

"Don't bother, the Valks are horrible this year." Yazlin landed on the stool with a bit of a sigh, drink in hand. The screen displaying the stadium seemed to struggle somewhat with packet drops and lag. It was a lower priority signal, so it usually took a bit of doing to keep a steady stream of data. "Who are they playing?" Zero-G had held her interest after she first came into contact with it, it had been a novel thing when she was in the Militia and it was during a time where the other things to do were cleaning her rifle and looking out over the vast countryside. It had drawn her in and never really let go.

The people skinned woman had not expected anyone to join her so took a moment to reflect on what she had said. The Valkyries were playing awful this season for sure as they were struggling to regroup after losing so many players to injury or retirement. “Stormriders.” Elara said.

"Oh really?" Yaz shook her head a bit at that, the Valkyries had their work cut out facing off against what many considered championship contenders, "You have any credits riding on this one?" She knew the sport was well liked among gamblers, and for some it wasn't much fun if they didn't have a little bit of action riding on it. She never really got into all of that, especially on the edge of Federation space gambling wasn't really a savoury business. Besides most of the uppity humans were all 'we've got evolved sensibilities' about it.

"Nah. I never gamble with my credits. Never know when they are going to come and go." She commented thinking about the gamblers she used to know. A lot of them became more and more desperate until they were nothing but a shadow of their former selves. "It should be a good match but my team are just not playing well at all this season."

"Fair enough." Yazlin looked up at the screen as the first quarter of play started and the ball was put into play. "The signal-caller has his best years behind him. Shouldn't have fleeced the franchise when they extended his contract." The Bajoran had gotten into the sport a bit more deeply during her boring 'guard this turnip field' days on Bajor than she cared to admit to most people.

Ha! She thought as she realised someone else was seeing exactly what she had about the signal caller. "Certainly fleeced something." She said with a lot more resentment for someone who did not have any credits on it. She had a lot of feelings for them as she watched the screen eagerly.

"Oh, come on! Hand the ball off!" Yazlin suddenly burst out at the screen. An errant pass was intercepted by the Stormriders' defense. "By the Prophets, you might as well walk into your own endzone if you're going to be throwing passes like that."

“He won’t. Never has before.” Elara chucked. “This is way they have lost 9 out of 10 of the last matches.” She added knowing her stats. She might not be as involved in the sport anymore but she kept up enough and had spoken to her former teammates 2 days before.

"Hasn't the new coach helped the play-calling?" Yazlin knew enough to be annoyed at the signal caller, but that was the extent of her knowledge of the Valkyries. She was more of Rovers girl herself. "It's almost as if they don't want to win." she looked over at the woman 'enjoying' the match with her, "Anyone ever told you that you're a dead ringer for that Volis girl that got absolutely blasted by the Rovers last year?" She realised she might just sound a bit xeno-phobic, "You know who I mean? Sarah? Yara?"

“I was called Kara after an actual Earth Valkyrie.” The woman revealed after she let the silence settle for a moment to just add to the tension of the conservation. She shifted in her seat and held out her hand to the other woman. “I go by Elara now.” She admitted.

"Rormu." The security chief narrowed her eyes a bit at Elara. It would explain why she seemed so familiar, "I'm sorry that happened to you." She felt a bad about how she had described the injury that had happened due to getting tackled by two people at the same time. It was one of those things that with the current level of medicine you thought very little about, but some injuries were so severe that people couldn't comfortably return to their role in the sport. The same must've happened to her.

Elara let her hand drop to her lap and shrugged. It happened to lots of athletics it was just sad that it was just before the Olympics which meant that she had missed her chance at a medal. “Could have been worse.” Elara commented. She was lucky to have escaped with her life.

"Lots of things that could've been worse, doesn't change the fact that it's a pretty terrible thing to happen to a professional athlete." Yazlin was all for lifting oneself up by the bootstraps but there should always be room to wallow a bit before doing that. It served a purpose in her mind. "So you're trying your luck on the frontier now."

“Been out here a while. Quartermaster seems to suit me.” She said with a shrug. It was not a big step to her as she easily made it work for her but she could see it was very different to other people. “I am still as healthy as I was as a professional athlete I just hurt in a couple of places if I move wrong.”

Yazlin knew from experience that it wasn't just ex-professional athletes that hurt when moving wrong. The job on a ship like the Mary Rose was ideal for people like them. A slightly slower pace. A bit more control over the day to day. "That's why they invented springwine." She motioned to non-verbally check if Kara wanted a drink as well before ordering two spring wines from the bartender.

“That they did. Extra cold please.” Elara caught the non verbal and smiled as the woman went off and returned not long after with both drinks. “Here’s to not hurting tomorrow hmm?” She said chinking her glass against the other woman’s as the football adverts faded away back to the match.