The Aftermath

[Painless]

"A river?" The soft ground was much more inviting to him than the hard stone of the cell or the dried out dirt in the compound. The moisture in the soil instantly froze under his feet, and he drew up as much of it as he could gather, forming thick boots that nonetheless made his feet feel even lighter.

"I can't go anywhere near large bodies of water. Too much radiation locked up in there, it's dangerous. You have to remember here, I might have these powers, but I'm still human." He wondered if the same was true for Lina. Obviously she was as immune to heat as he was to cold. Does that mean she's cold all the time?

Even so, something had to change. They had to get as far away from whatever was in the well as possible, and that meant either crossing the river or following it. And they had to decide now. Making an ice bridge over the river would have been possible if he was alone, but not with a fire mage slowing him down.

So, along the river it was. He took off sideways, running away from the compound but not getting any closer to the water.

"Come on. We'll have to find a bridge!"

[Olivia Cycien]

There was a loud cracking crash as the outer wall of the compound was smashed into oblivion followed by another terrible roar. What ever was chasing them sounded seriously pissed. They were running out of time. They certainly didn't have time to run downstream looking for a bridge. Her mind was racing as she tried to think of a way out of their predicament. It was hard to think when the thing chasing them roared again making her heart pound with fear.

She might be able to hurl a fireball at the river causing enough disturbance that Nolan could make a frozen bridge. If she crossed the bridge after Nolan she might be able to make it. Then she had a flash of inspiration. She had seen him making ice boots for himself. Perhaps he could do it to her feet? It was true that it wouldn't feel good, but her body temperature would go down far enough that she wouldn't melt the ice bridge. If they did it quick enough, then it just might be possible.

The radiation was something they'd both have to take a chance with. It was better than confronting the source of that hideous roar. Trying to ignore the thought that the thing chasing them was getting closer with every step, she called out to Nolan. "Wait! Stop!" She would just have to hope he would listen. If he did listen to her idea, would it work?

[Painless]

Nolan, not being a mind reader, had no idea what Lina was thinking, so when she told him to stop, he looked back only long enough to see that she was still running, and kept up the same pace. If she had something to say to him, she'd have to say it on the move. He kept following the river, hoping she wouldn't fall behind.

The run was starting to take it out of him. Rather than run under his own power, he'd been manipulating his ice boots. It allowed him to run much faster than his legs would carry him, but it was very tiring. Still, a little extra exertion had to be worth it if it let him escape their pursuer.

When she kept calling after him, he forced himself to slow slightly, so she could catch up, and he turned to her. "I'm not going to stop running from that thing. If you want to, go ahead. But if you've got anything else to say, you'll have to say it while we're still moving."

[Olivia Cycien]

She doubled her running speed and caught up to him. Her red hair was falling in a disarray around her face and neck and her cheeks were flushed with high color. She was terrified of the thing chasing them. She was angry that she had to work together with this rude man. Was it possible she was also having fun? She thought maybe she was. She felt more alive than she had in months.

She moved closer to Nolan, so that she could tell him her idea. The longer they ran in this direction the closer that thing could get. Hell, it was all flat land back there, the beast could simply angle toward them if they kept following the river. They had to get across.

"Nolan! Can we make an ice bridge across the river? We have to chance the radiation or we'll be killed...or worse!" She gestured behind her though she didn't look back. "Maybe if you froze my feet the bridge wouldn't melt and we can get away from that thing!"

[Painless]

"Okay, I think I can do that, but it's going to be complicated."

It's not fair. If I so much as touched her, I'd probably die, and she can have her feet frozen and come out of it just fine? But that was how it was. Fire and ice powers worked differently. She was more of a mage, manipulating fire to her advantage, while he was more of an elemental; on some level, he was ice.

Still, that meant he had a much higher degree of control over his powers, from what he'd seen so far. It would be tricky, and they'd have to be close to the river. He cut across diagonally, heading toward it. "I'm going to start making the bridge when we get close. Don't slow down, just keep running. I'll make the boots for you as you go." He'd have to keep reforming them, as her body would no doubt do its best to melt them away.

The river was looming close now, it was the moment of truth. Nolan summoned up his energy and made a wide, flat ice bridge. For once, he let himself slide, thankful for the extra speed it gave him. More importantly, it let him face back so he could keep an eye on Lina. "Hurry, I can't do this if you get too far away."

[Olivia Cycien]

The pain in her feet was intense and immediate. It felt as if razor blades were scoring her skin and digging deep into her flesh. She screamed and almost stumbled. She held her arms out to the sides for balance and ran as fast as she could. Every move only increased the exquisite pain, but it was working, she felt her body temperature beginning to drop rapidly.

As soon as she hit the ice bridge she copied Nolan and slid. She had a brief image of herself as a girl learning to roller-skate. She called upon the memory of how she had moved in the skates --slipping and sliding everywhere-- and used it to move herself faster across the ice bridge and toward Nolan.

She could feel the cold seeping into her, taking away her strength and her will. There was another furious roar behind them. It sounded almost on top of them now and she felt her heart race faster. She struggled to get to the other end of the bridge. Her legs felt as if they were encased shards of glass and the shooting pains were starting to move up the trunk of her body. If she didn't get over there soon she would die!

She made a final desperate lunge and fell onto the ground just past the bridge. She was gasping and shivering. She could barely raise her head and had no idea if she was going to make it. Was the creature coming? Where was Nolan? She couldn't see anything. She struggled against the darkness.

[Painless]

He heard Lina scream in agony, but he couldn't stop to help her. All he could do was keep sliding along, reshaping the bridge with a stray thought and a wave of his hand each time she came too close to the edge. The whole thing was steaming wherever Lina was, but the thin layer of water let her slide that much easier. That, combined with Nolan's guidance, got her to the other side of the bridge.

Even then, he kept his eyes locked on her. If he looked away even for a second, he'd have to look towards... that thing. Whatever it was. It had probably been human once, he'd figured that much. Like them. But instead of taking on properties of fire or ice, it had become some sort of cloud. Cloud of what, though? Smoke? Water? Radiation.

It came from the well. No doubt, someone had fallen in there, or even jumped in to escape the bombs. And it had worked, in a sense. But he'd been changed, as the water boiled away and the radiation washed over him, mixing with him. Nolan had never understood the science behind these transformations, if there was any. All he knew was, if he was right, and he desperately hoped he wasn't, coming toward the river had been a very bad idea.

He dispelled Lina's ice boots. She was still there, fallen. Too weak to even stand, from the looks of it. Nolan cursed. He couldn't leave her behind, and he couldn't shield himself without hurting her.

Taking hold of her hand, he dragged her to her feet. "Run, dammit."

The pain was agonizing, and he could feel his skin blistering just from the slightest touch. But he dragged her along for as long as he could, before he had to let her go and hope she could still keep up.

[Olivia Cycien]

Her hand felt as if it had been encased in a glove of ice. She was too weak to scream. How she managed to get to her feet even with Nolan's help was beyond her. She stumbled forward, trying to make her legs go, but there was no way she was going farther.

Nolan's hand was relentless however and she was dragged along. The pain was starting to travel up from her hand and she felt relief when Nolan released her. She kept trying to run. Her legs were clumsy at first, they felt like rubber and didn't seem to want to listen to the commands of her brain. She felt colder than she had ever felt.

Her head throbbed and ached where she had been hit and her heart was racing with terror. How were they going to get away? They were going nowhere with her in this condition. Nolan would have a better chance to get away with out her. He deserved to live, after all he had helped her, whether she liked him or not.

"Go on Nolan!" She called to him. "Run, don't wait for me, just go!" She flapped her arm weakly at him.

[Painless]

"No. I wouldn't have gotten out if not for you. I'm not leaving you behind, and whatever that thing is, I'm not letting it get you." He still wasn't that big of a fan of Lina, either, but he owed her too much. They never should have tried to cross the river. Now that thing was going to get them.

More importantly, his hand felt like it had been burned down right to the bone. He was not going to let her go down, not after he'd suffered that much trying to save her. It wouldn't be easy, but there had to be some way out of this. Think, Nolan. That thing is water vapor and radiation. You can use that...

Of course. Water. It was made of water. It was huge, angry, and far more radiation than water. And that was assuming he was even right in the first place. But he had to give it a shot. Had to breath deep, try to feel the water in it, to freeze it, to...

"AAarrgh..." The scream he let out matched the one he heard from it, but while his was quiet and died off quickly, the thing's cry seemed to split the very air in two. It was unbearably loud, unbearably painful. He fell to the ground, unsure if it had even worked. His hand was aching, his head was aching, everything hurt. Except the ground. The ground was soft and cool...

All I have to do is lie here, and it will all be over, right? Either it ran away and we're safe, or it didn't and we're dead.

Too much running. Time to just lie down and let someone else sort it out.

[Olivia Cycien]

Lina heard the beast cry out and saw Nolan fall to the ground. She was shaking with cold as she stumbled toward him. She didn't bother to look back. If the thing was going to take them, there was nothing she could do about it, she was too weak to attack it. She fell to her knees and for a moment she thought she would pass out.

When the dizziness passed, she crawled over to where Nolan lay. She knew touching him would be a bad idea. Instead she grabbed the shoulder of his shirt and pulled. She crawled and dragged him at the same time. She had no idea where to go, but it seemed that staying here would be a bad idea.

She heard a strange clumping dragging sound behind her and looked over her shoulder. The cloud creature was partially frozen. Some parts were misty looking but there were jagged chunks of ice bristling randomly from it's body. The ice had caused the creature to fall to the ground where it was less mobile, but it was still attempting to drag itself after them.

She turned away from the sight of the creature and continued to drag Nolan, trying to be careful not to touch any part of him except for the shoulder of his shirt. As she crawled, she began to notice there were small twigs and leaves on the ground. She picked these up randomly and began to eat them, still moving them forward at a distressingly slow snail's pace.

Gradually her strength returned and her body began to warm up as she ingested more of the leaves and twigs. When she felt strong enough, she turned so that she was facing backwards, her hands gripped both of the shoulders of his shirt tightly as she pulled and tugged, dragging him with her.

She saw that the creature had stopped moving. She had left it farther behind as she crawled and ate and now it lay still.  Was it dead? She didn't know. She only knew that she wanted to get help for Nolan, but where? She had no idea.

[Painless]

The motion shook Nolan from his stupor. He hadn't been unconscious, not really, but he also hadn't been moving or processing anything, so it hardly mattered in the long run. There was an uncomfortable tension in his neck. He reached up, trying to find the source of it, only to realize that someone was pulling his shirt. Someone uncomfortably warm.

"I'm up," he said weakly, pulling himself away from her. He could barely crawl. The ground was dry here once again, with no water to nourish him. He was feeling weak. The ice he'd used to protect himself had long since melted, and his skin was starting to redden just from being around Lina for too long.

"Water. I need water. Just a little bit of water and I'll be okay. I can put some ice on this burn and I can get up and I can drag myself somewhere cold and I'll be fine." He groaned, but forced himself to stand. Only to fall down again. There was nothing to support himself with, so he could only sit on the ground and try to recover some strength.

At least the thing wasn't chasing them anymore. Apparently he'd been right about what it was made of, or close enough. Freezing it had been a good move, and they were safe for the moment. At least he'd die in a normal way, overheated and dehydrated, rather than consumed alive by some monstrous radiation cloud.

He looked around, and saw one gnarled tree, black wood with a few leaves. Leaves? They'd have water in them, not much, but something.

"Lina, we need to get to that tree." He crawled towards it, finding it easier to move with a goal in mind.

[Olivia Cycien]

"Alright. Are you sure you will be better then? Is there anything I can do to help?" Lina looked anxiously at Nolan's burnt hand. He had done that trying to help her. She had to find a way to help him out.

The short distance from where they were to the tree sapped some of her strength, apparently she still wasn't up to speed. It would probably take her a couple days at least to recover. Her feet and hand still hurt like a bitch but it was a small price to pay for being alive!

She saw a second tree nearby and sat down next to it. It was far enough away to assure that Nolan wouldn't be damaged further by her and still close enough that they could talk without having to shout. She also wanted to be close enough to help if he needed it.

[Painless]

The tree was sturdy enough for him to support himself on, and he grabbed a leaf off a low hanging branch. There wasn't much moisture in it, but there was a little, and he felt better almost instantly. Going for another one, he chewed it before spitting out the resulting pulp. That was the best way to get the water out of it, he'd found. Just chew the leaves, absorb it all, then spit out the dry chunk of plant matter. Once he'd cleared off an entire branch, he actually felt strong enough to stand without resting along the tree.

Unfortunately, it wouldn't do anything whatsoever for his burnt hand. He could usually ease the pain of injuries, and even heal it fully if it was just a light scratch, but any injury caused by heat or fire was there to stay until it healed naturally. And that was an extra slow, extra painful process. At least he could ice it to keep infection away.

"Are you okay, Lina? I think we should try to find some shelter for now. I feel a little better, but I need some rest before I'll be at 100%"

[Olivia Cycien]

She frowned and stood. Shelter was all well and good but there were other things they needed. Like food. His burnt hand and how tired he looked only made her feel more agitated though she wasn't sure why that was. She put one hand on her hip and gestured to the wasteland around them.

"Where do you think we're going to find shelter? Do you think something is going to magically crop up? There isn't even anything to eat nearby."

She ran a hand through her hair in frustration and let out a sigh. She turned her back to him and crossed her arms over her chest in an unconscious gesture of self comfort. She gazed out over the barren land hoping to spot a light or some smoke. Anything that would indicate a sign of life.

[Painless]

"If I had some water, I could make an ice shelter for me, but right now there's barely enough in these leaves to keep me standing." He joined her in looking around, wondering what there could possibly be. He didn't see much of anything, and the ground was pretty flat. Though, there was what looked like some rocks over in the distance.

He pointed them out to Lina. "They might not be much, but they'll at least keep the wind off. And they'll make us a little harder to spot." Right now, they were the tallest things around, aside from the trees, Lying down by the rocks would make things a little safer, or at least that was how Nolan felt.

Pausing only to strip off as many leaves as he could carry, he struggled off toward the rocks.

[Olivia Cycien]

Muttering under her breath, Lina broke off a couple of small branches and followed Nolan. She chewed on them as she walked. She hated to admit that Nolan was probably right. That still didn't solve the food problem. Maybe after she'd had a bit of rest, she'd see what she could do about hunting up some food. She was fairly decent at foraging.

As they drew closer to the boulders, she noticed that they seemed to be sparkly. Maybe they were some sort of quartz? When they were almost to the boulders she sniffed the air and smelled ... water!! Probably the only kind of water she could be near. The quartz boulders indicated that there was a hot spring somewhere nearby.

If she could find something to scoop the water out with, it could be set aside until it cooled enough for Nolan to use. Or perhaps he could freeze it!

"Nolan! There is a hot spring here. I can smell it and the boulders have quartz in them I think." She began looking around near the boulders, hoping to find something she could use as a makeshift bowl. "I know you can't be near hot things, but its the only kind of water I can touch. If I can find something to scoop it up and a container to put it in, maybe you could freeze it and use it?"

[Painless]

"Hot spring?" Of course. a spring would have water that constantly bubbled up from below the ground. So, it wouldn't be irradiated, or at least not as much. Rivers stayed irradiated because they drew from mountain lakes and glaciers that had been hit at the time of the bombs, but maybe a hot spring wouldn't have the same problem. And then they could actually drink it. That would be great.

"Right. Yeah, I can do that. Here, let me try..." He focused, trying to draw up some ice, to cool the water, but it wasn't working. Clearly it was too hot. He was sweating just from being this close, and he couldn't afford to be losing so much water. He crawled around to the other side of the rocks and leaned against them.

"If you can get a little bit of it separate, then I can freeze it no problem. But when it's all together like that, it's too hard. I can't manage it."

He looked out onto the plains, hoping to see something they could eat. But there was nothing. No animals, at least. Maybe some of the plant were edible. People had a tendency to eat berries the second they spotted them, but there were roots and that sort of thing, that might go unnoticed. He said as much to Lina. Roots wouldn't be much of a meal, but it was better than nothing.

[Olivia Cycien]

Lina looked around the immediate area and spotted what looked like a stone that had been scooped out in the center. It made a perfect bowl! Pleased, she moved over to the boiling water and dipped the stone bowl into it. When it was full she lifted it to her mouth and took a long refreshing drink. The boiling water slipped down her throat and into her belly where it sat like a hot coal.

Feeling much better, she filled the bowl again and walked over to where Nolan was sheltering on the other side of the rocks. She placed the bowl a little bit away from him so that the heat wouldn't get to him. Then went back to the springs to look for some food.

She found some nice fat looking roots growing close to the water and began plucking them. After collecting several of them she washed the dirt off of them in the hot spring and then returned to where Nolan was. She sat down and laid some of the roots next to the stone bowl.

"This will have to do for now. I'll try to scare up something better tomorrow."

[Painless]

It took a while for the water to cool, but once it was separated from the source, it wasn't hard for Nolan to speed up the process considerably. The water still felt lukewarm when he drank it, despite being just above freezing. But it was enough, and the second it touched his lips he could feel his strength returning. "More," he said. He'd get it himself, except he couldn't go anywhere near those hot springs.

"Thank you," he said when she laid the roots down next to him. They were bitter and not very filling, but that didn't really matter. It was nice of her to share them in the first place; he wasn't used to that. Out here it was every man for himself, and while he'd troubled to help her when he could, he wasn't really expecting her to do the same.

There was a small space between two rocks, just big enough for one person to lie down comfortably. One rock was sort of overlapping the other, leaving a very sheltered space. It was still uncomfortably warm this close to the hot springs, but the humid air felt good on his skin. He did his best to cool it off, concentrating the resulting frost in his burnt hand.

He wasn't really in any condition to sleep, but it was nice just to lay there, and when Lina returned with more water, he decided to talk a little.

"So what's your story?" He asked. "What do you do when you're not being locked in a cell or chased by monsters?"

[Olivia Cycien]

Lina shrugged and chewed at a root. "Not much to tell really. My parents are both dead. My father died last spring." She looked away and stared out into the desert as she spoke this last bit. She swallowed hard trying not to think too much about what had happened. When she had regained  control again, she looked back over at Nolan.

"He taught me a lot of things. He was pretty smart. I've been on my own since then. You know, the usual survivor stories. Everyone seems to have one. One lesson dad didn't teach me was not to trust people. I guess I learned that one the hard way." She popped another root into her mouth and chewed it slowly before continuing.

"So anyway, I guess I'm what you'd call a forager. I like to look around in old wrecked buildings and stuff, to find things I can use. I can hunt pretty well too. For a little while, I lived in a small shelter that I'd built myself. But its not a good idea to stay in one place for too long.  I made my own coat from a deerskin. It was pretty cool. I could carry all my tools in it."

She frowned remembering that she no longer had a coat. "Those people who conked me on the head, they took all my stuff. Now I'll have to go foraging again. I can't always go around depending on my fire abilities. Dad always said it was best to do things the hard way and not to use my abilities unless I absolutely had to." She looked curiously at Nolan. "What about you? What did you do before all that fun back there?" She gestured in the direction they'd come from.

[Painless]

"I guess I was a forager, like you. I tried to stay north, but there's just nothing up there, so I had to come down here. I mean, obviously, I like to be where it's cold, but I can only eat plants and stuff. Nothing you have to cook. I can't be around a fire long enough to even get one going, much less cook something." He stared at his burnt hand. It was starting to become a habit.

"I don't really remember my parents. I think they died when I was little. But I was okay for a while. I learned to control my powers on my own, and now no one can mess with me. I learned a lot of stuff from books. I found an old library once, and I just stayed there for months. There was a well, but... not like the one here. It was safe, and I stayed there until it ran dry, learning from all the books that hadn't burned up." He'd survived on edible moss and mushrooms that seemed to thrive on moldy books.

"Anyway, when they got me, I was trying to hunt. I don't know what I would have done with it once I caught it, but I thought I could figure something out. It was a deer, and I was just about to kill it when they got me. I guess they probably killed the deer too. Maybe it was back there. Then again, the thing in the well probably got all those guys, so we probably wouldn't want it now anyway."

Sharing their stories hadn't really provided the comfort he'd been looking for. He chewed on another root, thinking. There were more questions to answer. Despite their incompatibility, he liked Lina well enough, and thought that so long as they kept their distance, they might be able to help each other.

"So, what do we do now?"

[Olivia Cycien]

She shook her head and stared at her last root. "I don't know. We can't stay here. The sun will be up in a few hours and you'll get cooked." She set the last root down near him and picked up the stone bowl. It was still cold from the last time he froze it but not enough to cause severe pain. She moved to the hot spring and refilled the bowl, letting the hot water rush over her hands.

She returned and set the bowl down near him again before resuming her spot on the hard ground. She looked over toward the river. There were several trees in the area. Not all of them were black and dead. Some of them looked younger, as if they were newly grown. She had read somewhere that radioactive soil was pretty fertile.

She looked back over at Nolan. "Can you make an ice weapon that you can throw?" She pointed to the trees that were closest to where they were. "There may be a few deer in the area. If you can kill one I can cook it for you and all you'd have to do was cool it down enough to eat. I know how to cure meat and we can use the skin. I can also make a water bag for you if you want?"

[Painless]

If it wouldn't have killed them both he might have kissed her right then. As it was, he contented himself with a smile and a "Yes please." The idea of being able to store water was the best news he'd heard all day. It would mean that he wouldn't have to travel so close to rivers and lakes and risk radiation poisoning. And meat, that would be good too.

"I'll need to work up some water first. Maybe if I dig a ditch from the hot spring, I can run off enough to gather it up to be used. Once I've had a little more water, I can make just about anything. You saw what I did in the cell, right? But that was porous stone, soaked with water, and in an enclosed space. Still, if we see a deer, I can catch it, no problem."

He pick a tree at random and got a good look at it. Sure enough, they were young and fairly green. He'd be able to get a lot of water out of the leaves. Clearly they drew off the hot spring for water. Radiation wasn't exactly good for plants, but the ash from a nuclear exchange, that could be an excellent fertilizer.

[Olivia Cycien]

She smiled back. It was the first real smile she'd given anyone in a long time and it made her look younger and kinder, despite her red hair and flashing green eyes. "I think I can find something to use as a temporary shovel. I can dig the ditch, probably that would be safer for you anyway." She got up and searched around until she found a nice rock with a spatula-type edge.

She began digging near the hot spring and while Nolan was examining a nearby tree. As she dug she made a mental list of what she would need to make a few simple tools. The bones of the deer would be helpful, and she could make a very serviceable water bag from the bladder. She worked backwards, creating a small channel and finishing with a pit in the ground near the tree he'd been looking at.

The water flowed smoothly from the hot spring and filled up the little pit quite nicely. She figured it would be just small enough for Nolan to work with. She stood up and stretched her back as she examined the horizon for light. No sign of the sunrise yet so things would be ok for a while. She nodded with satisfaction and looked over at Nolan. "Ok, done. What's next?"

[Painless]

He liked her smile. Seemed that it didn't come as easy to her as his did to him, though. Well, it didn't really matter. For the moment, she was helping him, if she smiled, that was just a nice little bonus. He watched her dig the trench and let it fill before going to work. The water cooled down a little, but it made a big difference.

He drew it off a little bit at a time, slowly gathering more and more, until he had a big ball of ice floating in the air in front of him. Enough to fill most of that space between the rocks. "I'll need to take some of this for me. So long as I have a little extra, I can survive in the daytime. Though, it takes a lot of energy to keep this up. I really hope we get a deer."

He brought the ice sphere to his chest, where it broke as though it were water again, shimmering into the form of a thick icy layer. Something to keep him cool even near the hot springs. "Do you want to try hunting now, in the dark? Or should we wait til morning? Either way, we need to decide where we're going to stay for the night."