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The cold bit into Crosshair’s fingers like a wild thing, savage and unrelenting. His hands throbbed. He tightened his grip around his Firepuncher with one hand, holding Mayday close with the other.
He took a step forward, then another, then another, boots dragging through shin-deep snow, Mayday staggering against him. He shifted, trying to prop Mayday up with a jut of his shoulder, and the other clone grunted in pain.
Crosshair swore under his breath. “Sorry,” he muttered, the word catching between chattering teeth. Had Mayday heard him through the wind? He couldn’t tell.
If only he was stronger, he could support Mayday with ease or carry him out, even through the snow. He hunched over, exhausted, with the effort of trying to keep Mayday going. Why couldn’t he be as strong as Wrecker —
He shook his head, grimacing. He wasn’t Wrecker, and he knew it.
He cast an anxious glance at Mayday, but saw only the other clone’s ice-limned helmet, inscrutable as ever. Mayday hadn’t truly spoken for hours; he’d only been able to utter the occasional groan of discomfort. He was still on his feet somehow, but all he could manage was to put one limping foot in front of the other, holding on weakly with his arm around Crosshair.
You can do this, Crosshair thought, though he wasn’t sure if he meant it for Mayday or himself.
The blue dark was oppressive, an endless vista broken up only by the pale snowy ground and the jagged hills, dark silhouettes looming above them. He should have been able to see where they were going, his night vision was exceptional, but the blast earlier had seared his eyes. Crosshair knew he wasn’t at his best now, between the blast and the cold and the blinding snow.
It was a truth that enraged him. Mayday deserved better. His loyalty had earned better.
Crosshair squinted until his head pounded, searching for any faint reflection that could indicate the direction of the base. He had coordinates and a rough idea of where they were, but in the howling blizzard those things meant little. If only the cave they’d traveled through was still accessible, but he knew they’d passed its narrow opening hours ago, likely blocked by the avalanche.
Tech could have found another way. Scanned the mountains and the snow, found a different path. But Crosshair didn’t know how to do that, and he could only keep going forward over the snow, dragging himself and Mayday through the vicious wind.
He let out a huff of breath, teeth clattering together with a violent shiver. There was a faint sense of pain, then the taste of blood. He’d accidentally bitten his tongue, and and it had been so numb he’d barely felt it. He spat bloody saliva into the wind.
He shook his head, pulling them forward, his Firepuncher disappearing into the snow with every step. Once he would have been horrified at the idea of using his weapon this way, without respect or care. But now that it was life or death, Mayday relying on him, he couldn’t care less.
He didn’t know how much longer he kept them both going. Time was immaterial; it no longer existed. There was only the keening wind, the breath ragged in his lungs, Mayday’s weight on his shoulder, the crushing cold, the ceaseless dark —
The dark —
He blinked. Narrowed his eyes. Focused. Hope rose within him, faint but real.
There it was, in the valley far below, a soft glow scarcely brighter than the surrounding blackness. He’d found the base.
The triumph that had flickered inside of him for a moment quickly faded. It was so far away. There was no way they could keep going on like this in the dark without rest. But if he stopped to rest, could Mayday start again?
Could Crosshair?
He shuddered with the agony of exhaustion. He’d have to chance it.
They’d reached an outcropping, a narrow spit of rock that provided a slight degree of shelter from the wind and snow. Crosshair sank against it, and Mayday followed, crashing hard to the ground. Crosshair braced himself to catch the other clone, softening the blow.
He pulled Mayday closer, wrapping his arm around him. He rested the Firepuncher across them both, as if its narrow frame could provide a hint of shelter, and Mayday leaned in against him.
Crosshair curled against him, shivering so violently it was hard to breathe. He winced painfully. He’d never felt cold like this before, cold so deep it hurt, cold that sank into every part of his body.
Maybe if he just tried to get some sleep —
But he could hear Hunter in the back of his mind. You can’t fall asleep. You’ll never wake up. That’s survival 101 for hostile environments.
Crosshair shook his head, pressing his face against the frozen cloth and duraplast of Mayday’s helmet. “We’re not far now,” he gasped through his shivering. “We’re gonna make it.”
”Crosshair,” Mayday breathed, barely audible through the wind and Crosshair’s shivering. “You don’t have to —“
”Yes, I do,” he snarled defiantly. “You’d do it for me.”
A pause. Had Mayday fallen asleep? Worse, had he —? Crosshair nudged him, then shook him, until he heard a noise he wasn’t expecting: a dry, sarcastic chuckle. For a moment, he sounded like Echo.
”You’re stubborn,” Mayday wheezed. “I’ll grant you that.”
”You have no idea,” Crosshair bit out. He screwed his eyes shut against the snow and the wind, the flicker of hope still lashing fitfully within his chest. If Mayday could laugh at a time like this, maybe he’d make it after all.
The night kept on, endless, eternal. Ice formed on his eyelashes, his brows, the short stubble of his head and chin. He hadn’t felt his ears or nose for hours. His hands were nearly frozen into blocky hooks. But he forced his eyes open, blinking away the snow on his face. The dark was drifting into the rich blues and violets of the deepest night, the snow shifting from massive flakes to fine powder, the wind slowly dying.
Crosshair gazed into the waning night and saw it clearly now, a light in the darkness. He coughed, shaking Mayday awake. He clambered achingly to his feet, then used the Firepuncher to brace himself and get Mayday up and standing. Crosshair pressed the rifle into Mayday’s hand to use as a crutch, closing Mayday’s fingers around it.
“Come on,” Crosshair rasped. “We can make it.” You have to make it.
“If you say so,” Mayday mumbled. He sank into Crosshair’s shoulder, and the brothers staggered forward into the snow.