Chapter 1
This was the culmination of all those months of planning. Everything he had worked for. He had learned a new written alphabet for the sole purpose of researching Equestrian geography and weather. All of the late hours in Twilight's library researching, learning, and waiting. He had put up with many things. He had put up with the fire breathing lizard, the equine occupant of the library, and all the shenanigans of the Ponyville residents. He had put up with Princess Luna, and her “hairless abomination” insults. He had put up with Trollestia. He had been patient and waited for what felt like an eternity. Winter had finally come and to him that meant one thing, and one thing only. Snow, glorious life-enriching snow.
He could put up with that.
The weather was perfect, with beautiful sunny skies and the wind light after the past week’s mammoth winter storm. The snow was absolutely phenomenal and it had fallen in record-setting levels. It had never been about the quantity, but quantity is nice when the quality is extraordinary. The weather team had really done an excellent job with getting the humidity and temperature correct to create the perfect fluff. Creating perfect snow was more of an art than a science, but he had thoroughly explained the science, and weather was pegasi art. Thankfully they had followed his snowmaking instructions to the letter, yielding perfect powdery precipitation. Some of the members of the weather team objected to his request, but had finally given in. For him, the worst part was when he had to practically tell off Cloud Kicker.
She was the weather team’s expert in snow temperature and moisture content, so she had thought very highly of her recipe for frozen precipitation. To him, the only thing high about her snow was the extremely high water content, which meant a higher density and “wetter” snow. Her snow wasn’t terrible to ride on the day after it fell, but a week later it would become a sheet of solid ice, regardless of the ambient temperature. There was a reason she was livid for a whole day after he told her that the snow he needed had low moisture content. She was only doing what her job demanded. The weather team was tasked with storing as much water as possible for the coming summer months in the snow-pack, so high moisture content snow was critical. His proposed snow was light and fluffy like the powder of the Rockies in Colorado and Utah, while Cloud Kicker’s snow was akin to the crud of the Sierras in California. She hadn’t calmed down until he told her of its intended use, which ended up confusing her further. She had muttered something along the lines of “bucking insane human, riding on snow.”
The storm hit the Mane Range perfectly, coming in from the West after picking up moisture from Saltlick Lake (I hate ponifying things so much). This had a profound effect on the storm, because it had been depleted of most of its water content during the long and dry trip over the Equestrian continent. The weather team didn’t normally allow winter storms to deplete in moisture, but his idea was to match the Utah lake effect as closely as possible. He had done so much research and testing, but finally he could see all that hard work had paid off (You could say it was the perfect storm).
It was going to be an amazing day. He placed his board on the snow, remembering how the hike up the slope had sucked, but then about how the payoff was going to be way beyond worth it. After removing his large backcountry backpack, he took out his collapsible snow shovel and stowed his snowshoes. He happened to glance at the now worthless avalanche beacon, which made him laugh. It would be utterly useless here in a land of minimal need for av. beacons. After referencing his slope meter, he started digging a pit in the snow.
Mountaineering was never his strong suit, and all his training was done hands on without any kind of instruction, meaning he had winged it. Ha, winged it, RD would get a kick out of that one. The pit was to visually inspect the layers of snow and see if a layer was unstable and could potentially cause an avalanche. He wasn’t going to chance it after such a big deposition of low-density snow onto layers of high-density snow. Satisfied by the inspection, he started preparing for the drop.
His 164cm snowboard was waxed and ready, both bindings symmetrically set 15° toe out, bolts tight. Edges nice and sharp, although today it wouldn’t be as necessary. Size 12 boots laced up tight, none of that boa binding hype. Pants sagged to minimal and acceptable levels, jacket perfectly baggy. Helmet and goggles fitted, gloves donned, mp3 player on playlist mode. Twilight had yet to fully explain the whole ‘magic-can-charge-your-weird-technology-stuff’ but had said it was quite simple in theory. After double-checking his ratchet straps and tightening his backpack, he was ready.
He had already chosen his basic line before dropping. No large cliffs or anything insane. It was his first run of the season, so he wasn’t going to go all “Art Of Flight” on the run. Minimal pillows, not too steep, it would be a fairly basic descent. His first turns were a little rough; he was edging too hard for powder and dipping his nose a little. After adjusting his weight, his turns became fluid and he slowly started to increase his speed. He was about halfway down when he came upon his first real obstacle. It wasn’t a cliff, but it was a sizeable drop-off with some exposed rock and he needed to jump to clear it. He busted a fat triple cork ten… not really. He wasn’t a pro, but he had style. A nice poked out melon grab with a late backside 180 was good enough for him. His landing was a little heel-heavy and sub-par, but it was nothing he couldn’t fix later with a bit of practice.
He followed a small ridge down the rest of his line to the base of the slope. It was over fast, his legs hadn’t even started to really burn. It seemed to go by too quickly for 2000 vertical feet. It was fun, but he wished it could last forever. Looking back on his run, he was content, but the thought of work the next day was utterly devastating to his positive outlook. It wasn’t so much work as it was being a lab rat for Twilight. So many tests and such little time…for snowboarding. Winter only lasts so long.