Kella’s Rescue

On the third afternoon of the Team’s “extended stay” on Kegena-Prime, deep into a massive, howling blizzard, they picked up a distress call on the Proud Mary’s radio: a woman was caught in an avalanche somewhere on the SE range. Haank recognized the area from colony maps from his work with the security team; it was around 10 miles out. There was some discussion about how to get to her, and it was decided that anything “flying” was doomed to fail in this weather, so ground transport would be needed.

The Team forced its way through the wind and snow, from the ship to the Colony Director’s building. Ella informed him of the distress call and the Team’s intention to answer it; the Director responded with a “you’re crazy” and offered the use of a colony roller, admonishing them to maintain radio contact. Sam and Abe remained behind at the ship, while Ella, Haank and Buck piled up some survival gear into the roller and headed out to the SE range.

Buck used the woman’s radio signal to guide them in, keeping her providing as much information as she could about her location; her name was Kella, an independent archaeologist studying the various old-world ruins on the planet, who fell afoul of the sudden storm while surveying the mountain area. They arrived without incident at the foot of the mountains, taking the vehicle as far up as they dared, and then set out on foot. The Team secured a lifeline to each other for safety, which turned out to be quite necessary, as the climb proved to be rather difficult for all but Ella, who was the most experienced in such matters; they arrived at the avalanche site mostly-exhausted. Buck used his biosniffer, and Haank, his handheld sensor pack, to attempt to narrow down the woman’s position, with little success through the interference of wind and snow, so Buck resorted to “yelling,” which, miraculously, yielded better results. With some improvisation, they dug out the snow and uncovered the crevasse where the woman had fallen. She was effectively uninjured, though she had lost her backpack in the fall. Ella climbed down into the crevasse with the aid of Haank’s autograpnel (from one of the Titanic VII’s lifeboat survival kits), which he used to winch them both back out, individually. (The backpack was not found.) After a few moments of rest, they began to descend back to the roller—which proved an equal challenge to their ascent, and might have ended in disaster if not for Ella as the group’s anchor. Further down, Buck, in the lead just ahead of Kella, slipped and broke through into another crevasse that opened up into a larger cavern, taking Kella with him. The two dangled at the lip of the crevasse while Haank secured the autograpnel and winched them back up; during that time, the two could make out what would later be identified as an oddly-recent Aslan colony ruin dug into an old cliff-face. After being pulled up, Kella begged to be allowed a closer look, but the Team convinced her to return later, Buck having marked the location on his inertial compass.

They all arrived at the roller thoroughly exhausted and freezing, but otherwise unharmed, and after a few moments of rest, returned to the Proud Mary, now late-evening. In the crew’s lounge, they discussed the day’s activities, and promised Kella to take her out to the Aslan site at her convenience, once the storm let up.

Notes

• Rigil Kent was on vacation, and unavailable; Winston failed to report in for reasons unknown (presumably related to the Memorial Day holiday)
• The colony rollers were tracked vehicles; nobody had the skill, but Haank had the best Driving to default from; combined with the Routine Usage, it went without incident—unlike the climb 😛
• There were a lot of Critical Failures rolled during the climb and descent, on top of Ella being the only character with points spent in Climbing, resulting in a “Comedy of Errors”
• There was some mild argument about the capabilities of radar, imaging radar, and terahertz radar, and their listed game effects, and whether or not it can “see” through snow, that was tabled for later; after much research and discussion after-the-fact, the answer is: sometimes