"I need to check the manifest," she argues, panting heavily. "I need to know exactly what we have in the bag before it gets dark."
"Sit the fuck down, Reese." The command rips out of me, sharp and low.
She blinks. Her spine stiffens against the bark. She opens her mouth to argue, her sharp wit preparing a comeback, but she reads the absolute finality burning in my gaze. She slowly slides down the trunk until she is sitting on the dry needles.
I crouch in front of her. I pull the medical kit from the top pocket of the survival bag. I rip open a sterile gauze pad. I reach forward.
She flinches as my gloved hand approaches her face.
"I will not hurt you," I say quietly. The words carry a blood oath.
She stops moving. She tilts her chin up, exposing the long, pale line of her neck. She gives me access. The trust costs her something. I can see the fierce independence warring with the logical need for assistance in her eyes. I press the gauze firmly against the laceration on her temple.
She hisses through her teeth.
"The cut is shallow," I report, keeping the pressure steady. "The bleeding will stop soon."
"Good," she whispers. Her breath ghosts over my knuckles. The heat of it is a stark reminder of how fragile human biology is against this terrain.
A deafening groan echoes through the valley.
We both snap our heads toward the sound.
Down in the ravine, the broken fuselage of the helicopter shifts. The boulder that arrested our momentum slowly gives way under the sheer weight of the twisted metal. The ice beneath it cracks with a sound like a rifle shot.
We watch in absolute silence as the helicopter slides backward. Slowly at first. Then rapidly.
The metal screeches against the rock. The damaged tail boom snaps against a tree trunk. The entire machine tips backward over the sheer edge of the granite drop-off. It plummets into the abyss, disappearing into the whiteout conditions below. Tenseconds later, a muffled, distant crash echoes up the canyon walls.
The helicopter is gone.
The emergency radio bolted to the dashboard. The extra blankets stored in the cargo hold. The remaining emergency rations tucked under the passenger seats. All gone.
We’re left with the clothes on our backs, the single survival bag at my feet, and the rapidly descending night. The temperature drops another ten degrees in the span of a single minute. The wind howls, a terrifying, mocking sound that promises a slow, freezing death.
Reese stares at the empty space where her helicopter used to be. Her expression hardens. She remains eerily composed. She slowly turns her head back to me.
"Well," she says, her voice stripped of all its previous bite, replaced by a hard pragmatism. "That complicates things."
I stare down at her. The wilderness surrounds us. A frozen hell designed to kill everything it touches. The blood in my ears finds a new rhythm. I have never been more focused.
I will dismantle this forest branch by branch before I let her die out here.
"We survive," I say, my voice an absolute promise in the swirling snow. "Nothing else matters."
3
Reese
My helicopter is gone.The crumpled airframe just slid off a sheer drop, taking the emergency radio, the rations, and the winter sleeping bags down into the ravine. Snow falls in silent flakes.
A large, incredibly warm hand remains pressed firmly against the side of my head.
Santi Costa stands over me. He applies steady, deliberate pressure to the bleeding gash near my temple. He ignores the sound of the helicopter vanishing into the ravine. His focus stays on my injury.
The man is an imposing figure in a ruined charcoal suit.
His gold watch catches the weak afternoon light. His sheer physical proximity is an anchor when the throbbing in my skull threatens to spin the forest into a blur.
