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“It seems we have awful luck, Sir Gilbert,” Zalkas says as he looks around. When they ran through the portal out of the Order Realm, something went wrong, and it spit them out in a random forest, too far away for Glib to hear S.G. For the last hour, they’ve been walking forward, blindly hoping to find someone who can tell them where they are.
“You have no idea, Scales,” Glib grumbles. The air is bitingly cold and Glib, being a poison dart frog, is having trouble staying awake.
“Well, it could certainly be worse!” the acid dragon says. His tail is wagging back and forth behind him as he looks around at the forest. He told Glib that he had never seen anything like it, all the trees and plants in the Order Realm look identical and have no imperfections. He’s certainly not bothered by the cold which might be because of his thick scales and heavy armor while Glib is left shivering in a cloak.
“Yeah, I guess it could be worse. It could be snowing,” Glib replies, not looking at Zalkas.
As if cued in by his words, a light snow begins to come down.
“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me!” Glib groans as Zalkas’ eyes light up.
“They are so unique and beautiful!” Zalkas says with a wide smile. He holds out his hand and looks in amazement at the frozen water. “When it snowed back home, it was never like this!”
“Let me guess, everything looked the exact same?” Glib asks as he watches the dragon.
“Precisely!”
“Okay,” Glib sighs. “So, listen. I’m a little frog, man, we aren’t exactly built for the cold,” Glib explains. “We need to find shelter until this storm passes.” Glib pulls his cloak tighter around himself, as the temperature begins to drop even faster, and snow begins to come down even heavier.
Zalkas studies him for a moment before walking over to him and picking him up.
“Hey!” Glib squawks.
“You’re right, Gloria-” Glib glares at him, “-we must find somewhere warm for you!” Before Glib can articulate a response, Zalkas is running through the woods towards the mountains he can see. Glib wraps himself tightly around Zalkas, firstly so he won’t get dropped, and secondly because he is very warm. And does he really need to keep his eyes open? It’s not like he’s in control of where they’re going. Besides, Zalkas is so warm. It’s just for a moment.
When he opens his eyes again, they are in a cave. “Glib, wake up,” Zalkas says and it sounds like its not the first time he’s said it. He’s shaking Glib’s shoulders and Glib blinks slowly at him.
“I’m up,” he says, his speech slurred with drowsiness. Zalkas nods and turns back to where it looks like he is trying to build a fire. Glib watches him and tries to stay awake, he really does. But everything feels so heavy and he’s just so cold. Surely a little bit of sleep couldn’t hurt, right?
Faintly, he can hear Zalkas trying to wake him up, but he’s too cold to do anything.
**
“Come on, Gilbert, if you die, I’m not sure if the mustached man will be able to save me from the lying one,” Zalkas says as Glib slowly wakes up.
“I’m not dead yet, bitch,” Glib groans, and God, how is it possible to be this cold?! He snuggles closer to his heat source.
Wait, heat source?
He blinks open his eyes and sees a worried Zalkas blinking down at him. He’s on Zalkas’ chest, wrapped in his own cloak like a baby, and they are both sat as close as is physically safe to the fire.
Glib stares at him, waiting on an explanation. Normally he would be raging mad, but he is far too cold and tired to feel anything but misery.
“You were cold,” Zalkas starts.
“Uh huh.”
“And I didn’t want to leave you on the cold cave floor.”
Glib looks at him for a long moment before just sighing.
“Wake me up when the storm ends,” Glib says as he buries his head back into Zalkas’ chest.
Zalkas nods and wraps his arms around Glib in an attempt to keep him warm. He watches the snow fall outside as he listens to Glib’s breathing even back out. He considers whether or not he would actually want to go back to the Order Realm. Everything there seems boring and repetitive compared to life outside with the others. And it's not like he has a wife or kids to go back to, if S.G. is to be believed, and if they are real, they aren’t awake like he is.
No, he probably won’t go back. He might as well see where this thing goes.