The Fan(Girl)

Posted on 09 Apr 2016 @ 6:03pm by Ensign Kelly Khan & Ensign Elisha Cherno

1,603 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: Outbreak
Location: New Risa
Timeline: MD 5

Kelly had just finished changing her clothes in the little tent she had brought with her and applied the dermal regenerator over the few scratches which she had gotten while camping and kayaking with Quinn. She sighed in satisfaction before she dug into her backpack for an energy bar or an MRE, wishing that she could have brought a portable replicator with her.

Suddenly, her combadge beeped and Elisha's voice came through, =/\=Cherno to Khan.=/\=

Saved by the combadge, she thought before she tapped the combadge at her hip. =^=Khan here. What's up, Cherno?=^= She really hoped it wasn't a recall to the ship, but if it was, they would have contacted her.

=/\=Kelly! You have to meet me ASAP!=/\= said Elisha excitedly. =/\=It's incredibly important!=/\=

=^=I'm sort of in the middle of nowhere=^= Kelly said as she grabbed a PADD from her pack. =^=Where are you?=^=

=/\=I'm at a hotel,=/\= came the reply. =/\=I've got a surprise for you. It's totally worth it, trust me! Can you get to the city? Or, I can come to you if you sent me your coordinates. That might be easier.=/\=

=^=What city, Elisha?=^= Kelly asked as she closed her backpack and exited the tent to prep her vectorboard while she typed a note to Quinn on the PADD that she had to go into the city to get something and put it in his tent where he'd see it.

=/\=Oh, goodness, um... it's the Capital,=/\= said Elisha. =/\=Hm? Oh! Paleza.=/\=

=^=Paleza?=^= Kelly asked to confirm before she grabbed the PADD she had set in Quinn's tent and checked the coordinates on it and direction from their campsite. =^=Got it. I'll be there in fifteen minutes.=^=

She replaced the PADD in his tent and jumped on the vectorboard after setting the combadge to monitor local aircraft frequencies as well as Blackhawk frequencies. She powered it up and brought it to a hover above the treetops before she aimed it towards the Capital and kicked it in. The wind began to whip through her hair as she increased the speed and brought it higher off the ground as she rocketed towards the Capital of New Risa.

Soon she was there and brought the vectorboard into normal air traffic lanes and tapped the combadge again =^=I'm at Thorgard and Delta. Where are you?=^=

=/\=Follow Thorgard South until you see a hotel with a great green awning out front,=/\= said Elisha. =/\=It's called The Paleza Grand. I'm in the bar.=/\=

=^=Gotcha=^= Kelly replied before she slowly made her way south down the street and obeyed the local traffic patterns until she arrived there. She settled the vectorboard down and keyed her biolock on it, then headed into the hotel with it under her arm to look for Elisha.

Luckily, Elisha was watching for her and waved at her from the bar. "Kelly!" she called, motioning her over. "Over here!"

"What's up?" Kelly called as she met her at the bar, still carrying her vectorboard and getting some strange looks from people.

"Well I have someone for you to meet," said Elisha, turning and pulling her brother out of the small crowd that had gathered around him. "Kelly, meet my brother, Joel Cherno."

"Hey," said Joel, giving Kelly a cock-eyed grin.

Kelly looked over and her eyes went wide and her jaw dropped open when she realized who it was. "Oh. My. Gawd!!" she gasped as she felt her knees go weak. She latched onto the bar with one hand and nearly dropped the vectorboard. "The legendary Joel Cherno," she whispered as she fought to get ahold of herself. "Here...on New Risa...oh wow...I have to be dreaming!"

"I can assure you, you are not," said Joel with a laugh. "I am really here."

"Oh wow!" Kelly said again, not knowing what to said now that she got to finally meet an idol of the vectorboarding world. "You are so amazing!" she said at last, her words starting to merge as they tumbled from her mouth. "Your triple three sixty dive is so insane that I haven't even dared to try it, but the Tornado! Oh my gawd!"

"You know, they key is to be aggressive," said Joel, as if he were talking to a student. "And don't be afraid of completely screwing it up. And work up from the bottom. Like you know, instead of a triple three sixty, start off with a single. I mean, you know, I'm assuming you've been trying the easier tricks, right?"

"Yah," Kelly said as she absorbed his words. "I don't get much time when I'm on the ship, but whenever I make planetfall on shoreleave, I do it every chance I get." She held up her vectorboard which was red and black with a neon green digital spider in the middle of it. "I even own my own board and custom tweaked it to be more aerodynamic and it can go faster and carry more."

"Hey, nice," said Joel, admiring the board. "The Cloudskimmer 8.0. And you've added the dorsal fin. That's gotta fly, man!"

Meanwhile, Elisha sat on her stool, sipping at a fruity drink with very little actual alcohol in it and grinning at Kelly and Joel. Her brother was great with fans. He never lost patience with them, even if they were completely bonkers.

"Can you please sign it for me?" Kelly asked as she gave him huge puppy dog eyes. "It would mean so much and you're so awesome! Everything I know about hoverboarding started with watching holovids of you. You are so incredibly talented!"

"Sure," he said. "Hey, Lish, you got a pen?"

Elisha picked up the felt-tipped pen she'd asked the bar tender for and slapped it into her brother's hand.

"Thanks, you're a doll," he said, just like always. "Anywhere in particular you'd like it signed?" he asked Kelly.

Kelly turned it for him "Right by the spider," she said. "Oh, I forgot. My name's Kelly. Kelly Khan." She blushes and holds the board steady for him. "No one back home is going to believe this!"

"Course they will!" said Joel as he signed his name to the board. "Lish, snap a pic, hey?"

Elisha was ready again. "Say cheese," she said with a grin as she held up the camera.

Joel posed with one arm around the board and the other around Kelly's shoulders and waited for his sister to snap the picture.

Kelly turned on a terawatt smile and beamed like she was having her picture taken with the President of the United Federation of Planets. "This is so awesome!"

Elisha snapped the picture quickly and grinned at her friend. "Here is where I would normally take down your information and send the picture to you," she said. "But I don't think I'll have a problem finding you."

Kelly laughed. "Thank you so much, Elisha. You rock!" She looked at Joel. "Do you think you'd have time for a little run?"

"For my number one fan? Absolutely," said Joel. "Got my board right here," he said, turning and picking up the board from where he'd leaned it against the bar.

"Oh wow. Is that a Vectorsport nine thousand ES?" Kelly asked as she ogled the board. "That's your own design, isn't it? I would love to get my hands on one of those. I heard the black market was offering a ten thousand gold pressed latinum bar reward for any information on them."

Joel chuckled. "That sounds about right," he said. "Yeah, they're hard to come by as each one is completely hand made. And they're not only bio locked, but voice locked, too. We thought about adding in a retina scan, but it seemed like overkill."

"Really? I added a bio lock to my board, too!" she exclaimed. "But yeah, that would go a bit too far. I didn't think about adding a voice lock, though. Does yours interface with PADDs for air traffic and such?"

"Of course!" said Joel with a grin. "What sort of Vectorboard champion would I be if it didn't?"

"Good point," Kelly said. "I shouldn't have asked that question." She looked down and shuffled her feet uncomfortably.

"No, that's all right," said Joel, clapping her shoulder gently. "After all, if I never rode my board in traffic, I wouldn't have to, would I? And a lot of boarders don't, you know."

"I know and I want to smack them with a neutron star fragment," she said. "I have another day here if you want to set a time up to show a fan what you can do. I wouldn't want to monopolize all your time with Elisha being here."

"Absolutely," said Joel. "I'm here for a week. I'm doing a demonstration in a few days, but I'm free until then."

"Just have Elisha get in touch with me and I'll be there," Kelly said. "I'm looking forward to it."

"I sure will," he answered. "It was nice meeting you."

"It was nice meeting you, too," Kelly said before she gathered her board up again and went to Elisha "Thank you so much, Elisha! I owe you one!"

"Don't worry about it," said Elisha. "What are friends for?"

"If you need anything, let me know," Kelly said with a smile. "I'll find a way to get it."

"Careful, I might take you up on that," said Elisha with a grin.

Kelly laughed, kissed her cheek and headed out with her vectorboard.

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