The plan, the secrets and the empty graves

[Aurora Nightshade]

Aurora gripped Terrence's hand though by then hers were rather numb. She shivered again and peered ahead of them. It was nearly dark and the snow flying around them was obscuring any sign of the caves.

"We can make it," she said over the wind, partly to reassure Terrence and partly to reassure herself. She felt weak, the numbness of her body making her limps stiff and heavy, her body shiver uncontrollably.

She checked her compass again. They were still heading east, the caves should be close now. She peered into the swirling snow as they walked, pressing her strength and endurance to it's limits.

Aurora stumbled, letting go of Terrence's hand as she tried to regain her balance against the winds and the cold, only succeeding in landed face first in the snow. She didn't even have the energy to curse herself for it; she was too tired, too weak from fighting her way through snow and wind.

She pushed herself to her knees and looked on ahead, she could see the shadow of rocks and trees not far from where they were. The darker shadow that would be the mouth of the cave, and opening to the system that had formed in the hard rocks.
A glimmer of hope entered her rapidly fading spirits; she couldn't force herself to her feet. Her strength vanishing as she reached towards the cave. Her vision graying, as the last bit her energy fled her body and the world went black.

[Mr. T]

The mantle of darkness fell over them. Terrence knew that the situation was dire. Night would drag the temperature down and with it their last breath. But Terrence wouldn’t let her. He would push through and find shelter.

His heart sank, when his hand suddenly felt empty. He spun violently, kicking up as he did snow. Aurora had collapsed over the snow. Immediately he picked her up and cradled her against his body. She felt cold, too cold. He had to hurry. “Not again… I won’t live through this fucking thing again!” he cursed as the image of Aurora was overlapped by a woman lying dead on a hospital bed.

With every step, he was sure he would collapse. Somehow, he never did. Somehow he always had enough strength for another footstep and another, until he found the mouth of the cave. He rushed inside, away from the cold and placed Aurora’s body on the floor. He gathered what was needed to start a fire and managed a weak flame that lit and warmed the dark hole with its flickering dance.

He stripped off his jacket and shirt, both drenched by the cold and kneeled besides Aurora. His hands cupped her face. “Wake up…” he whispered as he found her pulse. She wasn’t responding. So instead he left her side and dug into her backpack. A set of dry clothes would help bring back the heat to her body and get her blood flowing once more.

[Aurora Nightshade]

Aurora shivered in her sleep, her clothes had been dampened by the snow, her body weak and numbed by the cold. She lay still, not moving for a long time. She could hardly feel movement around her, forcing her mind to the surface. She tried to force her eyes open but couldn't, her body desperate to slide back to the depths of sleep, where not even dreams could go.
Aurora moaned softly, her mind registering sensations one-by-one. Cold, a bone-deep chill that made her shiver. Warmth, distant and faint but it made her long for the heat to be nearer. Darkness than flickering light.

She slowly opened her eyes, light danced around her, revealing dark stones, gray and brown in color. She focused on that for a moment, trying to remember what had happened. How had she gotten here? Where was she? She looked around her, her body felt heavy, weighted down, but she struggled and managed to sit up.

There was a low fire nearby. Clothes that she recognized as her own and Terrence's lay on rocks near the fire, drying. She chanced a look at herself, noticing that she was dressed in a dry sweater and pants but not the ones she remembered changing into. Her second belt, that normally held weapons when she had them was also missing. She looked around the cave, relief that they'd made it washed through her, battling with confusion, fatigue and mild embarrassment.

"Terrence?" her voice was weak, barely a whisper. She felt frail and still chilled but at least she was dry, and out of the cold, white hell outside the cave.

[Mr. T]

Terrence waited somberly. His mind had long abandoned the cold realm and was digging into his past. Memories better left undisturbed resurfaced. At first he felt confused, but slowly something was starting to make sense. It was then he understood that he wasn’t challenging Beams for something as noble as revenge.

Deep down, in his dark heart, Terrence knew that this was not about his wife and daughter. It was about pride. Terrence was a great soldier. He was loyal, strong, responsible and efficient. Yet they held no respect or value towards him. In the end, Beams had showed him how dispensable he truly was.

“Terrence,” Aurora called. He had dressed her in dry clothes and left her resting by the flames. But when she called out to him, he stood and went to her side. His face was hard, unreadable. She was his opposite, he pondered as he scanned her face. Surely she fought on thinking of her lost companions and with the mission that she was making a better world. Terrence could care less about the world. He just wanted prestige and honor. He wanted to live and be treated with the command and respect he once did. But even at that time, he was betrayed. Forever disposable, forever betrayed. Those thoughts would be the beginning of something new, he knew it well. But at the time he set them aside, for her.

“How are you?” he asked sitting beside her. He pressed his hand against her forehead, and then he cupped her face for an instant, before returning it to his side.

[Aurora Nightshade]

Aurora looked at him instantly feeling like she was looking at a stranger. Terrence was looking at her as if she were a patient in a hospital bed being viewed by a doctor who didn't really care. She shifted and looked away, she couldn't understand what was wrong with him.

"I'm sorry. I guess I'm not as strong as I thought," she gazed at the crackling fire and shivered but it had nothing to do with the cold.
"Once it gets light we can continue. If memory serves the pass isn't that far away. We can fallow this mountain range south. After we go through the pass we can head strait to Anya's get the stuff and get to the device," she spoke in a flat tone without any real enthusiasm. She knew she sounded much like a disinterested student who was smarter than the instructor and knew it.

She resisted the urge to hug herself and will away the feeling of weakness, or uselessness. She scooted closer to the fire though it did little for the ball of ice that had gathered in her gut.

"I..." she swallowed and tried again. "I suppose you're fairly upset with me for not making it. I apologize, my body just gave out on me. I know how weak that sounds. It won't happen again," she clenched her hands into fists watching the flames dance across the small logs, licking traces of cold away with a burning tongues of orange and yellow heat. She stared at it not really seeing it, not really caring about it.

How could I have done something so wrong? Why does this always happen to me? She thought of something she read once, a quote that she committed to her memory because it was what her father had done and she'd been young and capable of hating him for it. Of hating her parents and her aunt for dying on her.
"She's so afraid to fall in love, so scared to get close to anyone, because everyone who said that they'd be there, left," she whispered, unaware that she'd even spoken the words out loud.

[Mr. T]

While Aurora spoke, Terrence focused on his gun. He had four rounds left, he cursed for wasting his shots. They would need more weapons, a lot more, if they planned to take down Roger Beams. Hopefully there would be a merchant in the town where that Anya lived. But when he heard Aurora comment on her weakness he had to look up. She was gazing at the dancing flames, as if mesmerized by their intriguing movements. There was an undertone of pain and sadness under her icy pitch.

Terrence pressed a strong hand against her shoulder and forced her gaze towards him. “Don’t be stupid. I barely made it as well. You did well. You held on for as long as you could. Just concentrate on resting. Tomorrow me move, we’ll be out of the cold soon,” he cracked weak smile for her, like her it too had an undertone of sadness. He had seen many trained soldiers, give out against the harsh cold. It wasn’t an easy feat, especially when unprepared.

Her last statement did not go unheard. Terrence however chose not to comment on it. He too would leave her one day. He never stayed anywhere too long. He was always fighting, always rushing to participate in the most dangerous missions. Family commute simply wasn’t in his blood. He was made for the battlefield and without it he had nothing.

“Get some rest…” he whispered as he settled himself opposite to her and lay down on the cold stony floor. Sleep came quick and easily, dragging him further into the depths of his self. Lately old wounds and scars were flaring up. Perhaps it was a reaction to the fact that every second he was closer to his goal.

[Aurora Nightshade]

Aurora took the time to watch him sleep. She didn't feel strong at all. She felt tired and weak and saddened. After they got back to the wastelands she would confront him on this drastic change in mood. He was a soldier, something she'd never been, something her father had died trying to be. She hated it.

She shifted herself so that she was propped up against the cold rocks, facing the fire, silently contemplated the scars that laced her body. If Terrence had changed her into dry clothes, than he'd seen them. She had so many; criss-cross patterns down her arms, across her back, several wounds along her sides, her belly. She traced one of the jagged scars along her side, lightly with her cool finger. She remembered how she'd gotten it, how it had burned and bled while she fought and won.

"I wish I knew what I was fighting for. I'm not my mother, or my aunt or my father. I wish I knew how to heal him. Why have I survived all of these years with no purpose in my life?" she spread a hand over her belly recalling the feeling of that tiny flutter of new life that had shivered inside of her once. And how quickly it had been erased as if it never was. "I lost my chance. And it will never come again," she shifted again and using the rocks as a brace, struggled to her feet.

Aurora made her way to the dry clothes and began to fold them, taking her empty weapons belt and fixing it into place. She slid into her trench coat and stuffed the dry clothes into her backpack. They could eat some of her food rations in the morning, get a little strength back for the journey ahead. She looked at Terrence and grabbed his coat, laying it over him as he slept before she returned to the opposite side of the fire and laying down. It wasn't comfortable but the ground rarely was. Aurora closed her eyes and slipped into her usual state of half-sleep. Too wakeful to miss sounds, too asleep to dream, too tired to care either way.

Anya would make them stay the night, she always did, it was hard to resist a bed and strength restoring meals when you lived with makeshift one-night shelters and rationed meals most of the time. An Anya was very persuasive and persistent. She would pry information out of her and Terrence before their stay was over.

[Mr. T]

Lately whenever Terrence slept strange details and memories engulfed him. It was a strange feeling. It reminded him of a type of hallucinogen were one would get the sensation of being burned. Such was the feeling eating him away. Illusionary flames, painful memories tearing at his being, but were they too an illusion? A painful recreation meant for him to cope with another deep and more sinister fact? Whatever the case, when he woke up, he had little or no recollection of it.

As Terrence stood, his eyes followed the movement of the coat as it fell from his body. His lips curved into a smile when he picked it up and folded it over his arm. His dry shirt was neatly folded near Aurora’s belongings. He picked it up as well and slid it down, over his chest. And then he wrapped his coat around his arms and stepped out into the snowy cold.

Outside the harsh winds had loosened their hateful lashing. The weather would no longer hinder them as before. Still it was best to leave soon, less it reared its ugly and hateful nature once more. Inside he kneeled besides Aurora and stirred her awake.

“Are you strong enough to continue?”

OOC: Hey sorry for taking so long, I was running on empty and had to refuel my creative spark. BTW I think that one or two more post should suffice and then we should start a new topic in Anya's house, less you have another event planned for the way. Either way, I’ll follow your lead!! ^.^

[Aurora Nightshade]

Aurora had been in her usual state of half sleep, though she'd not heard Terrence stir, the man moved so silently it went unheard. Her senses went on high alert when he woke her and she jolted sitting strait up, her eyes wide, confused. Her body had tensed and she told herself to relax.
She pressed a hand to her racing heart and concentrated on breathing evenly. There was no battle here to be fought. She looked at Terrence and blinked once as if she didn't recognize him.

"I think that I can make it. I've got enough food with me if we want to eat something before we head out. It'll stretch a few days at least," she told him as she got to her feet. Her muscles were stiff from the cold, hard ground but she was stronger today. A little shaky but strong enough to complete the journey.

Her eyes unfocused for a moment as she looked towards the mouth of the cave. She could see the cold snow outside, she could smell the small fire that had gone cold during the night, and she felt the cold. They had daylight on their side. They had all day to get out of Canada and back to the wastelands. Once they were out of the mountains, the snow would be gone. She looked at Terrence and than walked out into the snow. Food could wait for a little while anyways.

The map wasn't needed. She took her compass out and looked around. They were near the cave system. The small section, where they were, was still far enough out of the mountains for easy travel. She checked the direction and started out into the snow. No evidence of where she'd fallen, of where Terrence had carried her was left. The snow and wind had blown it away.

[Mr. T]

Terrence observed Aurora as she stood in the mouth of the cave. The light penetrated the darkness and shimmered off her body. Her eyes caught the light and for an instant they were the most precious he’d seen. But all those thoughts and emotions were filed away and pushed far from his mind. Instead he gathered his thoughts on conserving his strength for troubles to come. He was fighting himself. He denied a part of him that was capable of overwhelming his senses and flooding his brain with images and emotions that were better left undisturbed. Back there safely in his home or in the boat, he allowed himself such weakness. But he was in the field now and he needed to remain sharp and focused. There was no space for distraction when the enemy could be right around the corner.

“What’s my heading he said,” staring out into the snowy horizon and wishing they were somewhere else.

[Aurora Nightshade]

Aurora checked the compass than pointed south, already walking slowly in that direction. She didn't speak, she wasn't sure she could keep her voice from shaking yet.
She put the compass back in her pocket and shifted her backpack on her shoulders. She was still feeling weak but once they got back to the wastelands, they could rest for a little while.

She had to focus on that alone. Everything else would have to be background static until she had the time to sort it out. But for the time being, she needed to concentrate on the mission, on the destination and where they were heading. She'd become very skilled at pushing her emotions to the back-burner. She did so now with a vicious will.

"If we head strait, we'll reach the pass by nightfall, maybe sooner if we rush it. By the time we get there, it'll be warmer. The snow is already melting." She looked towards a patch of brown grass where the sun had already melted the snow away.

It wasn't going to be long before the cold was gone. the coast was the worst for freak snowstorms and rough weather. But near the mountains, the snow came and went overnight. Sometimes only a few hours of snow and than warm temperatures melted it away. Made travel hard, the jet stream had never fully recovered from the Purging. The ocean currents had returned to a semi-normal state but still had sudden shifts now and again.

She had observed and listened to talk and conversations her entire life, gathering information without anyone knowing that she was listening. It was a skill her aunt had prized in her. A skill that she'd developed carefully along with others that she used when she took on jobs. She was a mercenary, and with such a title came a set of skills that no other title required.

((OOC: I'll be moving the story to "Other Lands" forum after you post here))