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Fara i Viking - Chapter 7

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Chapter VII – Onward and Upward

The maintenance that Berwald had to do on the ship was taking longer than anticipated. At least, it was taking longer than Mathias, Aleksander and Eiríkur had anticipated. It might have had something to do with how Tino kept disappearing down into the engine room for hours at a time to distract the engineer from his work with idle conversation.

Tino realized this after a few days and so made a conscious effort not to distract the engineer any more. Because while he was rather happy with the planet they had decided to set down on, the others did not quite share his love of the cold weather. On the fifth day of their stay, instead of heading down to spend a few hours with Berwald when he became bored, Tino took up his rifle and some empty bottles and cans from their garbage and set up a make shift shooting range for himself. Two crates from the cargo hold were dragged out into the snow and set up a fair distance from the ship, and atop them Tino lined up the empty bottles and cans in as straight a line as he could. Then he walked away, counting his paces as he went. Twenty, fifty, one hundred steps; that was far enough for a warm up and if it proved too easy he would go back another hundred.

The small-statured sniper set down his rifle and box of ammunition and began digging out a comfortable place to lie down. A small trench fit his body, and a little ledge of snow propped up his rifle. Tino stretched out along the ground and pressed the butt of the rifle up against his shoulder, resting his cheek against the side as he lined up his sights with the first empty bottle.

His actions were performed with a bare minimum of movement. Ammunition into the barrel of the gun, the chamber snapped closed, safety off, cocked, primed and ready for firing. Tino took a deep breath, relaxing into his little trench as he stared down the length of the gun, sighting his target without the use of anything more high tech than a small piece of iron. And then finally he pulled the trigger. The recoil from the rifle pushed back against his shoulder, rocking him backward slightly, but Tino barely noticed it. He was focused on the items at the other end of his make-shift shooting range and listening for the sign that he had hit his target. It came after the crack of the rifle, a ping of the bullet hitting the empty tin can and he saw it fly off the crate.

Then the sniper discharged the spent bullet casing, cocked the gun and fired again. Beside the empty spot where the can had stood moments before, an empty beer bottle shattered into a hundred pieces as it was pierced. Casing discharged, gun reloaded, aim, breath, fire. All the actions happened in rapid succession with very little movement from the part of the gunman, and in only a few moments the line of bottles and cans on the upturned crates had completely disappeared. Around those crates the previously flawless snow was now scattered with dented tin cans and shards of glass from shattered glass bottles.

When the targets had all disappeared Tino picked up his gun and tucked the empty casings into his pocket. He was pleased with this little practice. It assured him that he was not out of shape, that his eyes and his trigger finger were still as steady as they had always been. And while he would have liked to practice for a while longer, his ammunition and the items he could use for targets were limited, so he would have to let that be it for now. Slinging the rifle back over his shoulder, Tino traced his footprints back through the snow. He would have to bring the crates back into the cargo hold so they could be reused, but the cans and glass shards he left where they were to be buried in the next snowstorm.

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Tino was dragging the first of the two crates back up the ramp that had been formed by the door to the cargo bay opening and settling into the snow that surrounded them when Berwald spotted him from within the engine room and he stepped out to help him. Tino heard the man's footsteps approaching and looked up.

"D' you want help?" Berwald asked when their eyes met.

"No, I can do it," Tino assured him with a quick nod. "I've done enough distracting you from your work already."

"I don' mind," Berwald assured him and stepped forward to take the crate anyway.

Tino hesitated a little nervously, "No, really. The others are getting kind of impatient, and I feel bad because I know it's my fault. I'm keeping you from working every time I come down, so I'm not going to distract you any more while we're here."

"Oh," was all that Berwald could say. He had not been aware that it was causing trouble, though he knew it was taking him longer than usual to perform the routine maintenance that the engine required after all that the ship had been put through in the last few weeks. But he had gotten used to Tino's presence and the smaller man's cheerful voice. He would be lonely again if Tino stopped coming down to see him.

Tino nodded and then offered the man a smile. "So you get back to work, I can do this myself. Don't worry."

"Alright," Berwald eventually agreed. He wanted to help Tino with the heavy crates that he was obviously struggling with, but if Tino insisted that he did not want help, then Berwald would leave it be. He turned around and headed back into the engine room to get back to work.

After all, he had already wasted enough time watching Tino shoot cans off the top of those crates from the small window in the cargo bay.

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Berwald finished the repairs to the engine on the seventh day since their landing on this planet. When he climbed out of the bowels of the ship to announce that they could be on their way again, Mathias whooped with joy, unable to contain his happiness. They had all become rather bored and complacent over the course of the stay. Shore leave was only fun when it was not freezing outside, although Tino had greatly enjoyed the snow and the fresh air. Mathias had complained about it and Aleksander and Eiríkur spend most of their time inside the ship rather than venturing out into the cold white outside. It was probably because none of them had proper winter clothing, otherwise venturing out into the snow and the below freezing temperatures would not have been so bad.

"Alright, let's get going then!" Mathias said when Berwald announced that his repairs were done. "I'm ready to get off this rock."

But Aleksander looked out the window thoughtfully and then shook his head. "It's almost nightfall, we might as well stay down here for one more night and leave in the morning."

"What?" Mathias whined. "But we've been here a whole week already. I want to go."

"You've been here a week. I think you can wait a few more hours," Aleksander replied. "Besides, while we've all been sitting around doing nothing, Berwald's been working. Don't you think he deserves a break, too?"

"What?" Mathias rolled his eyes and scoffed at the idea. "He hasn't been working the whole time; he's been doing whatever down there with Tino half the time. That's enough of a break, I think."

"We were just talking," Tino argued, feeling embarrassed for reasons he could not understand. "While he was working. It wasn't a break at all. Why can't he have one night off? It won't hurt anyone to stay here one more night."

"It hurts me," Mathias replied. "It's boring here. It's too cold to go outside and there's nothing to do on here, as usual. I want to get somewhere it's exciting. The Swede doesn't need a break; he's like a robot anyway."

"You're such an ass sometimes, Mathias," Tino frowned and glowered at the man. Their captain, though he rarely acted like it. "Stop being so selfish. Berwald deserves time off just like the rest of us. You can't just constantly have him working, how would you like it if someone treated you like that?"

"Why would anyone treat me like that?" Mathias asked, as dense as ever.

Aleksander slapped him on the back of the head. "Tino's right. You're a selfish idiot."

"Ow!" Mathias complained and rubbed at the back of his head. "What was that for?"

"For being a selfish idiot," Aleksander repeated. "Say whatever you want, but I won't be flying this ship until tomorrow morning because I want to spend one more night sleeping on solid ground. So unless you feel like flying this thing yourself, which you know you can't and I will kill you if you do, we won't be leaving until morning."

Mathias had lost another argument to Aleksander. This was not surprising, it happened all the time. But it surprised Berwald that Aleksander had argued in his favor. Even Tino had stuck up for him against Mathias. Berwald was not used to that. He was used to being largely forgotten and overlooked by his crew mates. This was a pleasant change.

But while Mathias grumbled and slumped down in his chair unhappily, Berwald was not actually sure what to do with his evening of freedom. He remained where he had been, standing by the door to the galley, at a loss for what to do. Tino saw this, saw him standing there befuddled, and hopped out of his seat. "You haven't been outside yet, have you, Berwald?" the small man asked as he walked over to him. "It's really pretty, come on," he grabbed the larger man's arm and began pulling him toward the hatch. And Berwald followed him silently.

After all those hours sitting in the engine room talking about everything and nothing, Tino was no longer intimidated by the tall man and his intense gaze. Berwald was not mean, nor was he someone to be frightened of unless you made him angry. Tino was still convinced that he could do some serious damage if he actually got into a fight, but he realized that he had never actually seen the engineer get angry. Berwald was kind and gentle, and actually rather shy, which Tino found extremely endearing.

Tino dragged Berwald out into the snowy landscape beyond the confines of their ship. Once they were outside he released the taller man's arm and happily trotted a few steps away, enjoying how his boots crunched in the powdery snow. They were lucky enough not to have been caught in any storms while landed, but a few gentle snowfalls had dusted the top of the ship with snow and made sure that there was always fresh powder for Tino to play in. And play he did. He found the cold refreshing, invigorating, and he loved to tromp about in the fluffy powder right after a snowfall.

This time while Tino entertained himself, Berwald just stood by the ship and watched. It was not the first time he had watched Tino playing in the snow on this planet, though it was the first time he had done so openly. He thought it was adorable, the cutest thing he had ever seen, to see Tino so easily reduced to a playful child each time he stepped out into the powder. And he was happy just to watch, though happier the few times Tino had pulled him into his games briefly, until the sun began to sink below the horizon, then he motioned for the small man to come back and together they went back inside to warm up with a pot of coffee and some reheated cans of soup before heading back to their respective quarters to sleep. And all the time they were oblivious of the curious stares they received from their crew mates.

In the morning, as planned, the ship was locked up airtight and they set off on their journey again. They left behind them only some litter and a patch of flattened snow that would be gone as soon as the next major snowfall came to the planet.

The small reprieve had been nice, but the five men easily fell back to their usual routine. Aleksander sat on the bridge plotting, planning and tracking their course, often with Eiríkur at his side. Mathias migrated between the galley and the bridge, where he was generally in the way until thrown out. Tino hung around the galley, where he used the large table to lay out all the tiny pieces of his weapons as he took them apart and then put them back together all while nursing a cup of weak coffee. And Berwald was out of sight and usually out of mind down in the engine room, keeping an eye on various gauges and readouts while performing maintenance as needed.

And everything was fairly normal, as far as these men were concerned, as their ship floated leisurely through the vastness of space toward their next destination, and closer to their destiny.
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byQuillandClaw's avatar
Tino and Berwald are so cute together.