Rena | Alex, Luka, Max, Sofia

She matched his smile with a smaller, sadder one. She listened to the way he struggled to breathe, struggled to live, and her heart broke into a million more pieces than it was already in. Still, she was honest with him, she knew him, and she was almost disappointed in him for following his typical patterns even in his last moments. “It wasn’t nothing, and you and I both know that. You didn’t show up at my engagement party after two years for the free drinks.” Max chuckled from the corner of his cell. He was still trying to bust them out of the cube.

She listened to him speak, offering him the most melancholic expression as he strained to speak. What came out of his mouth next was something she had expected he would say, but the sincerity in his gaze both rendered her unable to speak and unable to comprehend anything except for the absolute desperation, grief, and unfiltered emotion of the moment. Slowly, she began crying harder and harder until she was just a mess of tears and mourning. His gentle touch only created more emotion in her, adding to a tsunami of feelings she’d been bottling up and avoiding for two years. She understood now why the greatest loves chose to die together. One could not go on with their life after experiencing a love like theirs, there would be no return. There would be nothing. No hope for the future, no reason to experience life after seeing it through the lens of something so remarkable. “I would rather die a thousand times with you,” she choked from between desperate sobs, “than live a thousand lives without you. There is no life without you in it, you’re the only person I physically cannot stop loving no matter how hard I try.”

“Tell me something,” he was begging for a distraction, and as much as Rena tried, she failed to block out of her mind that this was always the part in the movie where the dying person closed their eyes and surrendered their life. She shook her head in denial, her throat constricted by a weak attempt at controlling her sobs.

“No,” she whispered, “I can’t make it easy on you, if I do, you’ll…” She couldn’t bring herself to say it. She looked to Max out of desperation, pleading with him. “There has to be something we can do.”

The speakers in the cube echoed a blaring screech that continued ringing in their ears for moments afterward. Then, the expected noise of audio transmitting from an unknown location followed. Surprisingly, though it was the same voice modulator, the tone was different, more sarcastic. “Yeah, no shit,” the voice echoed, “what do you think I’m trying to do out here?” Rena looked to Max, who looked back at her in a strange mix of hope and confusion. Was he correct in assuming the fourth member of the cube was their savior? And, if so, how did they break out? “You’re welcome for the first aid help, by the way. I heard through the grapevine that you’re quite the bleeder.”

Unsure of who to trust, Rena just focused her efforts on Alex, who was barely clinging to life. “We did not get you this far to lose you now, okay? Stay with me. Tell me what you wrote in that letter. What did you need me to know?” She gently caressed the side of his face that she’d been holding, doing something--anything--to keep him conscious and present with her. “What did you want to tell me? What have you been holding in for two years? Whatever it is, just tell me. We’re gonna get you out of here and then we can figure out the rest, okay? You can’t give up on me now. I cannot lose you, I just got you back. I will not lose you. You have to fight.”

A hiss erupted from the cube and a cloud of something colorless and odorless began to fill it. A series of swears erupted from the speakers as Max started coughing, followed by Rena and Alex. “My bad,” the voice apologized, “I’m flying blind here.” Almost immediately after the gas filled the cube, the walls lifted, revealing the scene before them. Oxygen began to fill their burning lungs as they glanced around: quite literally nothing surrounded them except for wilderness. Max picked up a gun off the concrete floor after hearing sounds coming from the distance. After a few moments, he was able to locate the sound.

“Sofia?”

“He...he sent me,” she gestured down to her hands, “with this,” her hands were shaking, but she was able to inject Alex with something before either Rena or Max could refuse. “It’s an antidote, he knew what they were going to do and he wanted to stop it.”

“Sofi,” Rena had taken her attention off of Alex for just a moment, her gaze serious. How had the youngest, most innocent Petrova gotten involved in these shady dealings? “Who?”

The sound of rustling in the woods answered her question for her. A familiar frame on a familiar face caused her to stop dead in her tracks. “Viktor?”

“Not quite,” the man shot back. He resembled the other Petrovas perfectly, but his accent was different. It was perfectly American, completely different from all the rest. As he got closer, she saw the slightest differences in him, but he was still just as similar to Max as Viktor had been. “Though now seems like a good time to say I’m sorry for your loss. And, well, not to be too cocky, but a premature ‘you’re welcome’ for your lack of loss as well.”

“Who the hell are you?” Max asked in a threatening tone. Only Rena and Sofi could detect the fear he was disguising.

“Long story, but I think you know the cliff notes. We should worry about getting out of here first, wherever the hell ‘here’ is.” He tossed a GPS tracker to Rena’s right side to avoid hitting the lifeless form in her arms. “I haven’t figured out exactly how to get these things on yet, but keep it on your person. We’re going to find a way out of this hell hole before we can’t. You stay here with him, and we’ll find out way back to you, okay? The effects of whatever they gave him should start to reverse in the next few hours. If all goes well we’ll be back by then.” He threw Rena a few blankets and jackets and other miscellaneous items he’d picked up from wherever he’d come from. “Just stay alive, will you?”

“We’ll be back,” Max promised, most obviously distrusting the stranger and feeling the need to offer his own word to the pair. “I promise.” Rena tried not to think about all of the other promises that had been broken and instead focused on the pressing issues at hand. She hadn’t stopped shaking, neither had he, and now that they weren’t in the security of the cube, they were completely vulnerable to the elements. The wind was gusting and frigid and burned Rena’s face. As the trio left the pair alone for the first time in literal years, Rena got to work trying to bundle Alex in jackets and blankets and so on to keep him warm, only keeping the bare minimum for herself. She’d handle her own death when it was staring her in the face like his was.

“Stay with me, okay? Fight for just a little longer. Whatever Sofi gave you will start to kick in soon, you won’t have to fight so hard. We’re gonna get through this. They’re going to find us a way out of here and we’re going to get you the help you need, and it’ll all be over. We’re going to get the happy ending we deserve, okay?”

Tryst || Any <3

A campfire social, it had seemed sweet enough but a deep tugging feeling in her chest kept her from going. There was an ache deep in her stomach that spread like a virus up her body and to her raw throat and bleary eyes. She had long discarded her phone on the floor of her dorm, the screen cracked from the impact it had made on the carpeted floor. The sheets she had put on mere hours before were now ripped from the edges of her mattress and curling limply in a ball on the floor not far from her phone. Everything was tinted in a shade of gray it seemed, the sweatshirt she wore, the dim light from her reading lamp, the guarded hues of her eyes that stared blankly back at her from the mirror above her headboard.

Such a horrible attempt at making up for lost time, such a pitiful way to tell her he didn't really want to see her or stay long enough to see the progress she had made with Krigare. Maybe her father did not want to admit that he truly had forgotten that her birthday was last week (a date he promised not to miss) or maybe he just thought she didn't care.

Bubbling anger ripped its way out of her chest but left her mouth in a pitiful sob that racked her bones and shook her small form violently. Every fiber of her body was pained and her nerves felt as though they were numbed by a million little needles.

She had to get out, to move in some way away from her empty dorm and away for a little while. She was so incredibly sick of this place right now. The walls of her room were caving in on her and if she stayed for any longer she knew they would collapse and crush her. In a flurry of lavender-scented wind, she had grabbed her keys and a pair of sneakers before practically racing out of her room.

The trip to her car was quick enough and as she flung open the door to the black Mercedes (another forgotten birthday 'im sorry') she truly contemplated the pros and cons of leaving Virginia forever. A whiny from a nearby paddock dweller was enough to reduce that thought to ash and she slammed her door shut behind her.

In twenty minutes she would be in town, she'd take the long route so she could avoid any sight of the campfire and her friends that attended. Tryst flicked the radio on, not caring what the station was. The volume dial cranked to full blast and some cheesy pop song she had never heard filled the tanned interior surrounding her, swallowing her whole.

In an hour she would forget her father, forget how much she wished she didn't care, forget who she was as she became entangled in some foolish town boy who cared as little for her as she did him. Nothing would matter in an hour.

So she hit the gas pedal a little harder and turned the music up even more (if at all possible) and ignored the small amber glow coming from somewhere on the rapidly disappearing estate.

In her dorm the floor vibrated and groaned as her phone received text after text from her father.

With a heart like his Tryst knew that one day he would make a girl a very happy, blushing bride. A string in her heart snapped as she imagined a wedding she could never attend and a family he would have that she was unsure she could ever understand. Many nights she prayed that she would stop mourning what she never knew and finally get over herself. She also spent nights praying to whoever would listen that her father would show up at Whiteoaks one day and scoop her in his arms as he had when she was a child and the past would be forgotten, swept away like dirt.

The town approached distantly and Tryst shook her head clear of the fantasies and pipe dreams.

The cheesy pop song ended just as the streetlamps began to light.

(AN: Such a crap restart post but I needed to get angsty Tryst up.)

Heather Proudstorm | 22 | Eventing | Titanium "Storm" and Queen Of Spain "Armonía" | School Horse: WO Descendants Of Khan "Khan" | M: Blair, Open

Rena | Alex, Luka, Max, Sofia

As Alex began crying once more, Rena cried harder, wiping his tears away with still-shaking hands. Every time she thought she was done feeling these pangs of brokenness, desperation, guilt, grief, and every other emotion she forced herself to shut down in his absence, he said something or did something to increase the intensity by a thousand percent. They cried together until his tears weren’t distinguishable from hers and they were just two hearts bleeding out in front of the other. She held him tighter than she ever had, straining to breath from the suffocating emotions that were overwhelming her. She caressed his cheek, every gentle touch filled with love and the fear that it would be the last thing he would ever feel.

“That’s what I don’t understand,” she choked out, followed by more gasping deep breaths. Everything she spoke fell into a cycle of a jumbled strand of words, gasping deep breaths, an attempt at composure, and losing that composure as soon as the next words reached her lips. “You made me happier than any other person in this world.” She drew in a deep, gasping breath once more, then another, then another. Tears still spilled down her cheeks, making her face even colder. She was clinging to the figure in her arms out of both desperation and warmth, though her limbs were already beginning to go numb. “I would have gone to the ends of the earth with you, I would have gone anywhere if it meant I was with you. Nothing you could have done would have taken me away from you except what you did.” She was crying so much harder now, she couldn’t even breathe. “I looked for you for two years. I found you. I saw your face in a crowd and you looked the other way. It wasn’t until I convinced myself that it was all a lie that you decided to come back.” She struggled to regain her composure yet again, but resumed speaking when she finally had. “And I still can’t forgive you for that. I can’t forgive you for knowing that everyone I’ve loved has abandoned me and still doing the same. I can’t forgive you for leaving behind thousands of words and believing that they would fill the hole you left when you went. You know why I can’t forgive you? I still love you.” Her breathing got shallow and gaspy for a few moment, silence surrounding them other than the occasional sniffle. “God, I still love you. More than anyone or anything else in this world. And I can’t lose you. Not now, not ever. Please don’t die, I can’t lose you. Anything but you.”

…

Rena had been panicking for as long as Alex had gone unconscious, so the weakest fluttering of his eyes gave her the greatest sense of relief, even if it was barely anything. His blue eyes were struggling to focus on her, and she imagined his vision was blurry despite his repeated attempts to study her face. “I’m here,” she was crying once more, but silently this time, and out of joy and relief. The desperate prayers she had been praying since he’d gone unconscious were working. “I’m here, I haven’t left you.”

He tried to lift his hand to her face, but lacked the strength. Rena picked up his hand in her own and gently guided it to its intended position on her cheek, trying to ignore the guilt that pulsed through her. Desperate times called for desperate measures was what she had told herself, but she still wasn’t sure she believed it. She wasn’t fully Michael’s and she wasn’t fully Alex’s. She wasn’t even fully hers. She knew that if they survived this, there would be much more pain on the road ahead, but still, she clung to life.

Her hand had been stuck to his pulse like a magnet for what felt like hours, but it felt so much more at home intertwined in his. Because the expression on his face was that of confusion, she also guided it to her heart to prove they were alive. She held his hand to her chest for a matter of moments before letting it fall back into the mountain of assorted blankets and jackets they’d obtained, not letting go. Because of this movement, he seemed to register the new items, which immediately spread into concern for his companion. She smiled at him knowingly, squeezing his hand. “You’re keeping me as warm as I need to be,” she replied, “my life’s not the one in danger.”

Still, her upper half was bare to the elements, which seemed to be growing harsher. The sky was a cruel blue winter sky that taunted of warmth that seemed just out of reach. The wind blew in harsher gusts, each one going right through her small frame. Another flash of pain struck his face, causing more concern. She panicked once more, feeling helpless and unable to do anything to comfort him in his suffering, but remembered his request from earlier. “You wanted me to tell you something? When I was little, I thought that having cats was the sign of a happy marriage because we were never allowed to have cats no matter how much I asked and at that age I thought having a pet would solve all of our family’s problems. I’m a grown adult and I still measure a man’s worth by whether or not I could raise cats with him. I can’t paint because I have these visions in my mind that I can’t put perfectly onto paper, but I like to study those landscape puzzles and create stories about the worlds they picture. I don’t have a favorite color because I think that telling someone what your favorite color is gives them too much insight into who you are. I have had the same quote as my email signature since I was ten. Most of the reason I converted to Catholicism was to spite my parents. Intimacy scares me and I’ve pushed everyone away who has shown me healthy love. My mother abused me for my entire life and I’ve never seen a therapist about it because I’m terrified that they’re going to validate that it happened. I think my middle name is stupid and I take nyquil before I watch movies with people because movies bore me and sleeping through them is my only out. And, most of all,” her voice cracked under the weight of all the emotion, “I will never recover from losing you, so if you could please hold it together for a few more hours, it would be greatly appreciated.”

Not long after that, Rena heard what seemed to be the return of the three that had saved them. Alex had regained some of his strength, though he was still in tremendous pain, so she felt secure in leaving him for a few minutes to investigate her suspicions. He wasn’t strong enough for her to feel okay about dragging him along if it was nothing--he needed to save his strength for whatever journey would lie ahead of them. Squeezing his hand softly, she promised to return soon, then began a short walk deeper into the forest. “Max? Sofi? Are you there?” Before she knew what was happening, before she heard the sound of the gun or the feeling of a bullet ripping through the flesh just below her collarbone, she had the eerie feeling that it was too silent, that something was wrong. And before she’d fallen to the ground, before her cries could be silenced by the sound of the gunshot ringing through the air, she’d screamed out in terror of the evil that was lurking, hidden in plain sight. All she’d screamed was his name, the tone of her voice told him everything else he needed to know.

Katarena Suta | Alex

“It’s- okay-” she choked out, gasping for air and struggling to find it. “Looks- worse… than it- is.” Truly, this was the truth, or at least the present truth. The bullet had hit her in a place that avoided major arteries and areas with excessive amounts of blood. She’d broken at least one rib, but that was nothing compared to what she could have suffered. The countless hours in freezing temps seemed to help minimize the bleeding by some small fraction as well, so while she was still bleeding enough to create a gruesome scene around her, she wasn’t bleeding out in the way she was known to. Further, the shock and the adrenaline of everything that had happened were still pulsing through her, so she barely felt the pain at first over the burning of her frozen limbs. The fear on Alex’s face only heightened the sensation of fear and anxiety she felt, prolonging the numbing sensation.

“Didn’t- spend- hours… telling you- to- fight… to give up- myself.” She smiled softly at him, studying his expression with her intelligent brown gaze. Was she winning dying yet? Had she successfully put him at ease in the way he’d failed to put her at ease for hours and hours? Though she was quieter now because of the wind that had been knocked out of her on impact, she was largely cooperative and using the stillness as an excuse to study his expression, to study the ghost of the man she’d last loved two years prior. She couldn’t exactly tell what had changed, other than the fact that he looked tired. Tired of fighting, tired of living, tired of dying, tired of everything. Yet, it was his choice to leave, he could have stayed and he didn’t. Whatever he had done in those years was on him.

Could she stand? No. Was the idea of him carrying her more futile than the idea of her trying to get back on her own two feet? Absolutely. She could have laughed, yet, laughing would bring the shooting pain in her chest to a higher intensity than it already was. And, before she knew it, she was being picked up as if she were nothing at all. She clung to him with her remaining strength, burying her head in his chest. Because he’d been under the blankets for a few hours, he was warm. Warm enough, compared to her, to be extremely pleasant in that moment. She was almost disappointed to be put down, other than her pressing guilt about getting blood all over his shirt.

Processing the uncomfortable emotions she was feeling about everything that was happening was what got her through the remaining hour or so of Alex attempting first aid measures. Because she wasn’t strong enough to study whatever it was he was doing, and she was, in fact, feeling quite dizzy and lightheaded by this point, she had to trust him. She didn’t fully enjoy it, but she did it. She tried not to think about the way he cared for his own body and how eligible he was to care for hers. Instead, she focused on his scars, the ones she’d seen and many new ones she hadn’t. She wondered where he’d been that he’d done so much damage to his own body in two years. Was it that she was too healthy for him? She’d push him to grow, and he wasn’t willing to try for her? Wasn’t she worth the effort?

“Alex,” she said softly, after a long period of silence while he watched her work. She reached for his hand, burning herself on the cold snow. “I’m tired.” Of fighting. Of being the strong one. Of struggling for each breath. Of pretending I have it all together, when I’m just as much of a mess inside as everyone else, if not more of one. “Just sit with me.”

After a moment of fearful surrender, he took her hand and began to speak. He said everything he’d been concealing from her for two years, and suddenly a terrible feeling surfaced in her soul. Guilt. For resenting him, for being angry, for every negative emotion she had placed on him in his absence. He’d done it to protect her. He cared more than anyone else, and she’d mistaken it for the opposite. By the end of his rambling, nothing else mattered other than the two of them. She was holding onto his hand with both of hers, supporting him in his vulnerability while trying to convince him he was the one supporting her through her pain.

She moved one of her hands off of his to tip his chin down towards hers. Look at me, her movements begged, really see me. She smiled weakly up at him. She looked into his eyes for the first time without fear of what would happen if they lingered in that state for too long. “Try now,” she said in a tone that lacked strength. Though she wasn’t dying anytime soon, the blood loss was starting to really affect her. “Kiss me. If I bleed to death, I do.”

Alexander Littlewood | Rena, Max, Sofia. Lukas??

"You're not going to die. I won't let that happen."

His pulse quickened. This was wrong, this was all wrong - she was engaged, for fuck’s sake, and he would only hurt her more this way. No, this wasn’t right. He couldn’t do this; he wouldn’t let himself do this. He didn’t deserve any of this; he didn’t deserve the happiness she was offering. Surely there was a way to escape this without hurting her, even though he knew it was too late for that? He couldn’t hurt her; he wouldn’t be able to live with himself. Hell, he already couldn’t, but furthering that wouldn’t help anyone. She had Michael, and he had no one, and he would have it no other way. Wouldn’t he? It had to be like that. There were too many things already said, and too many that stretched between them, for it to be possible. This was irrational. He was acting on the emotions he sought to destroy. This is wrong.

Still, none of these thoughts did anything to stop him from leaning in closer. His hand had somehow found its way to her cheek, shaking though it was, and the touch was just as tentative as the one of earlier, although this time he couldn’t use the excuse that he didn’t have the strength. It was a question. Is this okay? Are you still alright with this? If this was going to happen, and he didn't dare hope so much as to believe that, he had to give her every room to pull away. To tell him that she’d meant it as a joke, nothing more, and that she was almost offended that he’d taken it seriously. To pretend that nothing had ever happened. To reassure him that although he wasn’t a terrible person - liar - she was done with him and his wasted broken heart. His pale blue gaze was frozen on hers, and no matter how hard he could have tried - had he tried - they wouldn’t be torn away.

Only once his hand had lingered for a few long seconds without her withdrawing, did Alex draw even closer. Another lasting moment, not from indecision but from the sudden fear that he would mess this up, that he'd misread the signs, that regardless of what he did he would fail in whatever this was about to be. He knew what he wanted, even if he wasn't sure how to admit it to himself or anyone, and it wasn't a case of uncertainty in his own mind; that had been made up long before this moment, from when he'd first met her even if it was subconsciously.

He wasn’t sure who, exactly, started it. But then they were kissing, they were kissing, and all he could think about was this is Rena, this is Rena, this is Rena. In that moment, he’d forgotten or chosen to ignore the wrongness of it all; that she was engaged, that he’d never deserved this happiness, that this could never last. Instead, even though they were both on the ground, he could almost feel his body floating. There was nothing else to think about, nothing else at all, other than the emotion he couldn’t describe in any other way than as catching a smile, breathing in the very colours he’d never told her she was, lost. He was drifting of his own free will, but this didn’t feel like drifting. Nothing could feel like drifting, not with Rena. This is Rena. This is Rena. This is-

He broke away gently, as gently as he could when everything in him wanted to never let go of her again. “Is that alright?” His expression was solemn, searching - she’d mentioned that, years ago, about how he looked at her for reassurance when he wasn’t certain of something. This was less of that and more of a shared secret, a question as to whether that mattered as much to her as it did to him.

After that, it was almost as if he wasn’t terrified anymore. If they died, so be it. If the trio never returned, so be it. If all they ever had together was that kiss, so be it. At some point, he pulled himself closer to the tree as a back rest, his fingers still intertwined with hers. It had begun in case of the pain he was sure she was feeling, but now he couldn’t imagine letting go.

It must have been over an hour later that he first heard a sound. The birds had been chirping occasionally, but that was nothing out of the ordinary. This was a dull, metallic sound that would have reminded him of a car’s engine, if he wasn’t so sure that a car could never make it into this wilderness. It was only when he heard footsteps that he let himself believe it.

“Max!” Never had he thought he would be calling Max’s name with such urgency. “We’re over here.” Alex didn’t want to think about what would happen if it wasn’t Max, if it was the person who had shot Rena. if it was the person that kidnapped them. He had to focus on the moment. And so he started calling out Max’s name at regular intervals, his grip unconsciously tightening on Rena’s at the prospect of rescue. There was a chance that Rena would be fine. Rena. As soon as they came into view, he started talking at such a speed it was a wonder they understood any of it. “Rena’s been shot-I don’t know how much blood she’s lost-she can’t walk-we need to get her out of here and-”

He didn’t let himself relax, even once Max and Sofia and the unnamed stranger that he almost mistook as Viktor returned; even once he’d confirmed that Rena wouldn’t die in the next few minutes; even once they were all loaded into the vehicle he didn’t want to ask how they’d found; even once Rena was in the emergency room and the paramedics were properly tending to her, more than anyone else could have done. They’d mistaken him as her partner - he tried not to think of that kiss, not when he knew that he could never act on those feelings again - but still, he hadn’t denied it. Maybe it was his anxious, pacing composure that made them think that; either way, he was going to work with it for as long as it could give him better access to Rena’s room. As far as he could tell, her visitors were restricted to family only, which immediately excluded him. Was it so wrong to want to say goodbye properly? This time, he wouldn’t disappear without a trace. He had to tell her that he couldn’t stay and watch her, not when her life was so perfect without him in it, and that however much he had wanted to be a part of it in any way, it wasn’t fair on any of them for him to stick around. He’d wait until she was stable, he decided. Michael would have arrived by then, surely, and then his deceit would be finished. Even though he didn’t believe in anything not part of the material world, he couldn’t help but murmur a thank you beneath his breath to whatever higher power had given them that goodbye. He’d keep those memories in his mind forever.

Only after he was sure she would be fine, after she’d been taken for stitches, blood transfusions, and a hoard of other things he didn’t catch, after the immediate risk was gone, he settled on one of the chairs in the waiting room, as far away from everyone else as he could get. Then, and only then, did he loosen up. His body had been screaming at him for hours, and he somehow doubted it would stop until he actually listened. (As close to listening as he would get, at least. It wanted medical attention, and consistent rest, and a respect it hadn't been given in years.) In some semblance of compliance, he drifted into a restless doze. He was still just aware of the noise around him, although not in any conscious fashion. It would have been funny, had he not been too exhausted to think about it, that he struggled to fall asleep in the middle of a silent night, and yet here, in what he could only guess was mid morning and with too much stimulation from every sense, he dropped off effortlessly. The small fact that he'd been poisoned in the last twenty-four hours seemed to have helped on that count, at least.

Alex was jolted awake when he felt a tap on his shoulder. He was still too groggy to pull away from the touch, instead settling for a confused stare at the nurse in question. “You can come through and see her.”

"Tha..." He forced a tight smile as he tried again. "Thank you." It wouldn't do for any of the staff here to notice something distinctly off about him. He was fine. It was none of their business if he found walking a struggle, or if he could sense that his body was still fighting off the after-effects. No, it was none of their business. Besides, Rena was the one who was shot, not him. He'd just been dosed with some mild so-called 'poison' and given the antidote just as quickly. He was fine. He had never been better, in fact. (The painful part about that was that it resonated, and that stung. Maybe this was the best he'd ever been. Maybe this was the best he would ever be.)

It shouldn't have taken long to follow the nurse's instructions, but courtesy of his lungs, it did. Apparently, one of the side effects appeared to be breathing difficulties. It was tempting to ignore it, to power ahead until he was able to rest in solitude, but the risk of losing control in front of people who were forced by law to help him was too great. Better to listen to it this time and win the long-term game of self-sabotage. In the end, this was a better decision.

Rena was sleeping peacefully by the time he walked in. Even in a hospital gown and looking the part of someone who had been through hell for the last two days, she still managed to look like the angel he'd thought she was when he woke up in the snow. He couldn’t tell how long he watched her for - he couldn’t tear his eyes away from her. He had to watch her breathing, just to remind himself that she was okay, this was okay, everything would be okay. The room was dimly lit, even though the curtains were open. The familiarity of English weather was grounding, if he could go so far as to call it that; something steady against the constant change he was growing accustomed to.

Almost subconsciously, Alex found himself holding his breath for a few seconds to sync with hers. It was an old habit from childhood; it gave him something to focus on other than his thoughts, and stopped the sense of clashing whenever he was studying someone else’s breathing. The room was still, other than the steady sound of both of their breathing and the occasional noise from outside. A rattle of a hospital cart, distant voices from down the passage. He barely noticed any of it. Rena’s fine. It’s okay. It’ll be alright. He had to focus on that for the moment - as if it was a choice. Rena was in the room, and it was almost impossible to think of anything else. Rena.