Before Beasts, There Were Storms--6

The Long Nap

Morning came. Max ran out of steam and slowed to a paddle, which he occasionally broke out of to snack on the protein bars. Tyson fell asleep under a tarp with a sunburned and heat exhausted Ayah. Kai soaked in the sun long after his clothes had dried, though his feathers had a heavy, weighed down feeling he tried several times to shake off, and which didn't leave until the sun started to once more lower in the sky.

In the bloody haze of a day yet to be taken over by the dark navy of night, Kai saw Max slow, slow, and finally stop. For a moment, he thought Max was going to call it a night and pop up out of the water. But when a wave bobbed them up, his plated shoulders sunk down. With a curse, Kai shot out, catching Max by the ropes about his torso, and pulled him up against the raft.

The dark gold head flopped against the raft edge.

"Max. Max!" He gave it a light whap.

"Nnnngh."

Kai let out a puff of air and reached into the water to hook his arms under Max's. After nearly being yanked into the water himself (new Max weighed a ton and his pissed off ankle didn't help much), he managed to get Max into the raft with a minimal amount of sea water. He checked up on his breathing and pulse, then dug out one of the thin, metallic emergency blankets from the raft's storage pouch and wrapped it about him. He found himself smiling as he then turned to do the same with the dragon and girl beneath the tarp. Tyson snuffled something about hot dogs and snuggled closer to the feathery fluff of Ayah.

Team tucked in, he plopped down into the wider space in the middle of the raft and pulled over the cooler. After grabbing a survival protein bar (which, from what he read on the nutrition label, could probably kill someone if they ate too many through protein kidney blockage), he leaned back his head onto the rim of the raft and watched the stars come out as he munched. Rather than grabbing an emergency blanket, he wrapped his wings about him in a cocoon and breathed deep with his mouth open, which gusted hot steam across them.

Galaxies pressed up against the glass plain of the atmosphere. He tried to trace the edges of the Milky Way, but soon found himself caught in paths of brighter stars; a never ending connect-the-dots.

The ocean had fallen almost quiet, the hush down to a whisper behind the slap of waves against the raft's sides. He could even prop his swollen ankle on the other edge, exposing it to the cold, which he hoped would work like an ice pack. Ayah had long before taken off his shoe and sock to examine it, though she hadn't managed to do much other than make him feel sleepy.

And he was still sleepy, he realized, as he found the last few bites of the survival bar thick and hard to chew. The star strewn sky glowed bright as overcast daylight, though the contrast between it and his closed eyelids didn't have that great of a difference. He was even starting to...to wonder...if it was stars he saw or...

Siberian air flowed, sour and dry, against his face. He quickly covered his mouth with his arm, knowing his lips were cracking even as he did so. The snow rushing past wasn't white, but a light gray, which surrounded him in a blinding fog, and it creaked under his boots. Each step was a battle, as snow and exhaustion sucked down on his feet.

He had to get there, in time...he had to get there...he was already so late, so late, too late.

When he reached to his belt for Dranzer, his fingers had gone clumsy with cold. They wouldn't listen. It was almost as though they weren't his own.

I'm going to die, he thought, clear as day. Yet it didn't frighten him. If anything, it brought a rush of relief.

Finally. Finally he could be free. Nothing here could touch the dead, nor would he be able to hurt anyone else.