Author's Note

This is my first attempt at a romance clopfic, so don't expect anything too spectacular.

Chapter 1 -- Stardust [E]

~~ Equestria; Canterlot ~~

Nighttime in Equestria; it was a heavenly part of the princesses' daily routine that made their residence in Canterlot. By day, the castle that hung out on the side of a remarkably tall mountain revealed its true elegance. The white sandstone and granite walls and floors criss-crossed and arched their way all over the foundations, while in contrast the supports underneath didn't look like they could hold up all of the weight. The spires and odd shapes of the castle interior was an even greater sight, with the tall towers marked and crested with awe-inspiring designs and features that accented the true nature of the castle. It was built to support the greatest and most powerful beings that ruled the lands from the arctic north to the southern wastelands, as well as from sea to sea.

Jutting out on the furthest of the castle's support trusses was Princess Celestia's quarters. Much of the interior tower was vacated and reserved for herself. Only a small portion of the tower housed a handful of her royal guards. Celestia was the princess of the sun, and was tasked with the rising and setting of the sun. An enormous responsibility for an otherwise innocent looking creature of unfathomable wisdom.

At night, the castle took on a more meaningful and alluring approach. The fires of the torchlights created a wonderful atmosphere that invoked a sort of beauty all its own. The stars above flickered with pulsating brilliance, aiding to the euphoric mood cast upon the castle interior, as well as beyond.

Celestia's sister, Princess Luna, had a greater role to fulfill. She was tasked with the raising and setting of the moon, which motioned forth the night. She was also a dream walker; she was given the privilege and power to look upon the dreams of the Equestrian commonfolk, keeping a watchful eye on anything strewn out of the ordinary. Some of the memories she hoped she wouldn't dare to see ever again, while others were much more peaceful, unassuming and alluring.

In all cases, Equestria was in a relative state of balance. Nothing went wrong most of the time, and when troubling situations did arrive, they were easily suppressed by the help of instantaneous resources that were at the princess's disposal.

One fateful night, Luna stood out on the balcony of her sister's tower, gazing up at the stars. She tried her best to connect herself with one of the many convoluted stars, yet she could never reach them on her own. She needed someway to reach out to them, but she didn't know how. She then thought that her sister would know.

As if by a mere coincidence, Celestia clambered her way onto the moonlit balcony and stood next to her sister, eyeing Luna rather precariously as she took note of her younger sister's contemplation toward the stars.

"Something bothering you, Luna?"

Luna tore her gaze away from the stars and peered deeply into her elder sister's own eyes. It didn't require words for Celestia to understand what her sister was so distraught about. She was suffering from an internal battle within; she needed somepony to comfort her. Nopony in Canterlot, or, for that matter, Equestria, would dare come to terms with a princess shrouded by her own beautiful night. She understood Luna's pain completely after her return to Equestria-- following the events of Luna's alter ego, Nightmare Moon, and the disheveled confusion that took place in the last Nightmare Night event.

Celestia leaned over to Luna, lightly grasping her with a wing to comfort Luna's wallowing heartache. "There, there."

Luna whimpered silently in Celestia's ear. "Sister, we want to talk to the stars, to share our discoveries, and tell of our stories and experiences with them." Tears ran down her face and doused Celestia's fur in small streams of salt water "Maybe... they could return the favor with their stories and experiences, as well."

"Maybe so," Celestia cooed. "Perhaps you've heard of the ancient tradition of 'rock throwing?'"

As if a figurative light bulb shined brightly above Luna's head, she let go of Celestia's embrace and wiped away her tears. Her sister had provided the answer to her relentless questioning. Rock throwing; sending celestial messages out into the vastness of space in hopes that other sentient beings would happen to encounter them and return with similar messages of their own. It was brilliant, and Luna grinned happily. "An astounding idea, Tia!"

Furling her lips in a wryly fashion, Celestia angled her head up toward the stars. It was quite a distance to reach the nearest floating specks of rock that floated aimlessly in the dark cosmic soup. Fortunately, there was a small cluster of rocks nearby that would serve as the perfect agitators for their first few throws into deep space.

Celestia's horn lit up, grabbing a few rocks all at once. Once she was happy with their hold, she forced her magic upwards, sending the rocks flying out into the deep parts of space, headed towards undetermined locations. She wasn't going to do just three, though. Luna shortly joined in, grabbing one rock at a time and flinging them in an equally random direction-- making sure that two were not accidentally sent back to back from each other. They only needed one rock to convey their messages. Rock tossing proved to be a fun past-time, and both princesses thoroughly enjoyed it. They laughed and giggled together as they threw rock after rock out into the speckled darkness.

After about twelve tosses from each, Luna thought of another idea for her final toss. "Tia. Perhaps we could laden the last rock with a transportation spell? If there was really something else out there, we could perhaps converse with them personally."

Celestia thought hard about Luna's inquiry. "I'm not quite so sure that we should meddle in the affairs of other worlds directly, sister."

"Tiiaaaa..." Luna said, blinking innocently.

Celestia blushed slightly. "Oh, alright." She winked. "But only this once."

Luna giggled gleefully. "T'is fine by us, dearest sister."

Satisfied by Luna's remark, Celestia's horn became enveloped with a stronger magical aura. Luna felt the magical hold grip the rock she held onto. The bonds tightened, embedding a simple spell within the inside of the rock. Once finished, Celestia nodded her head, signalling her sister to toss the rock wherever she pleased.

Luna studied the night sky hard, figuring out which star to chuck the magically imbued space rock toward. She spotted a rather peculiar star. It was a bright yellow, flickering star on close inspection, and it was brighter than any other similarly yellow star in the sky.

"How about... that one?"

Celestia took note of which one Luna was pointing at. "Are you sure? There seems to be other bright stars up there as well."

"This one we have been studiously observing for many decades, even before our imprisonment."

Celestia sensed that Luna was entirely certain of her decision. "If that is what you wish, I won't stop you."

Luna forced out all her magic that she could onto the rock, which was then jettisoned clear out of her grasp within minutes. She sighed heavenly as she watched the twinkling yellow star dance amongst the others in the sky.

"May we hope that we see thee soon, whoever finds our special message."

~~ Earth; Arctic Circle ~~

You know those field trips where you get the chance to go to the one place that you’ve never been to before, and that you’ve always yearned to see?

Well, I got that opportunity, but it wasn’t under normal circumstances.

The NORAD headquarters in Colorado went stir-crazy, when their satellites detected an asteroid cluster bombarding the Arctic tundra—a few miles shy of the North Pole. For me, it was just another ordinary day in the office. The only hiccup was that the circumstances were anything but ordinary.

Several years after the last transmission from Curiosity was received, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (yes, NASA) gave the green light to send a team of astro-geologists and biologists to Mars to investigate a particularly odd discovery of a certain cluster of rocks—just before Curiosity kicked the bucket. In truth, no one was surprised about its impending shutdown after being caked with layers upon layers of Martian dust.

In any case, after the team’s arrival, we were expecting a sample meteorite from Mars several days later. A small cluster of fine algae-like bacteria was found hugging the underside of a small rock on the red planet’s surface. Nothing special to note this time, as Curiosity found many similar samples beforehand. However, one of the astrobiologists noted that the amoebic formation on the rock had a chemical makeup unlike any other Martian sample sent to us.

At least, that’s what I was told by my fellow work colleagues, who kept themselves glued to their tablets and up to date with the latest mission details non-stop.

The team fired up the catapult. The launch was successful, and the shipment left Mars on its way to Earth—no surprises there. It was during the middle of the sample’s shipment that things spiraled downward. Apparently, the space agency on Earth misplaced the location of an unmarked meteorite that was on a collision-course with Earth as well. They didn't even take into consideration that the meteorite's approach path completely intersected the shipment's path.

Talk about dumb luck, eh?

So, as a result of that technical boo-boo, the shipment was bumped off-course—by bump, I mean forcefully ripped apart from the collision, which inadvertently caused the meteorite to split apart. The meteorite wasn't that big to begin with; it was reportedly only eight feet round, but it's still a serious issue since it did cause a massive delay on NASA's side. The fragmented meteorite really rustled everyone’s backsides back in Colorado, since now there were fragments of an unmarked space rock headed straight for Earth.

Fortunately for us, they were expected to land in the middle of the Arctic. No harm, no foul, right?

Of course, that’s what any other person in any other profession would say. Me? Well, I would say the same, but because there was geologically sensitive equipment parked deep into the reaches of the Arctic Circle, who knew what kind of damage could happen?

I happen to be a part of a dozen other groups reporting for clean-up and damage assessment of the meteor strike, working for the United States Geological Survey. The Nautalis II, one of our oldest working and highly prized seismometers, had suddenly gone silent at around the time the meteorites hit the ice shelf—just shy of the North Pole. Several other instruments from different agencies were hit as well, causing a massive tectonic blackout along the Northern ice shelf. It was as if a theoretical bombshell had gone off the hook when those warning alarms went off, sending nearly half of the world into panic and confusion—a sort of faux-doomsday alert.

It was actually quite humorous, come to think of it. We humans were, admittedly, gullible when it came to sudden hysteric and awe-striking sights, such as a massive asteroid cluster striking the Earth. There were so many headlines all over the world, including some truly whimsical articles from a few noteworthy, two-timing news publishers. Titles, such as, “Asteroid Cluster Bombards North Pole; No Presents for Christmas This Year,” and, “Asteroid Cluster Lands in Arctic Circle; Signs of an Impending Apocalypse?” caught my eye. I couldn’t blame them for making such theories, because we were sort of expecting ‘something’ to happen for a good while now. Then again, I personally just wanted to go up to each and every one of those publishers and give them a good ol’ whack in the head.

Maybe it was just the case of frigid cold temperatures starting to wrap around my head. I’ve been to the Antarctic a few times to repair equipment down there. The atmosphere was much different, and I actually got up close to some of the wildlife there. My last trip ended up with me walking up to a faucet from the return trip to wash off a good spray to my pants. Trust me, penguin piss smells horrid, though not as bad as a skunk’s mark.

At least the damn thing didn’t spray me in the face. Oh, god… why did I even think about that?

To get back to the matter at hand, this was the first time that I’ve been to the Arctic and, suffice to say, the stories I’ve heard about it seemed to be just about what I expected. Having gone to the other end of the world and back, I figured that the north end would be just about the same. The only noteworthy difference was that the entire landscape was just one huge iceberg covering the top portion of the world.

That didn’t really phase me much, despite attempting to wrap the back of my mind around a giant floating iceberg in the middle of an ocean. I really only had one task dominating my thoughts: investigate the silenced seismometer and repair it. If it ended up that we couldn't repair it, I would guess that our agency would have to fork out a whole bunch of money to get a replacement. That wouldn’t be so bad, if seismometers weren’t so heavy and sensitive, and if we weren’t in the middle of the Arctic. Transportation was already difficult as is, with the nearest land-based airport being at the northern-most edge of Alaska, between Wainwright and Barrow.

Between our main base and where the instrument was camped, the landscape of the arctic climate was rough. True, it was snowy in the arctic, but because there’s always wind blowing around at one point or another, most of the snow gets stripped off of the hard packed ice, exposing the near-concrete shell. If someone fell out here, it’d be akin to hitting a brick wall.

Several hours of preparations and briefings later, we arrived at the site of Nautalis II. At first, I was just expecting a big old hunk of rusting metal dug deep into the ice, with a huge crater surrounding it or creeping up next to it. I swear, I should question the nerves of the people who first planted the instrument when they first began monitoring the ice shelf’s movements.

Now I’ve dealt with pretty hairy situations before, but the sight before me easily made my previous delves look like icing on a cake. Three gargantuan spires jutted around the diameter of the meteor. Fortunately, the spires had been there for thousands of years, theoretically, so it was to no surprise that they’d still be held up. The crater looked like it was part of a set for some science-fiction thriller. Rings of ice, in all their different shades of blue and white from age, lined the walls and edges of the crater. In the middle was a fragment of the meteorite.

I’m quite surprised that it hadn’t punched a hole right through the ice. I guess it was too thick to begin with, but still.

If it wasn’t for the lovely brunette woman’s observations, who was standing a few feet in front of me in her red parka and her loosely brushed lock of hair, I wouldn’t have noticed the crushed remains of the seismometer that had once been at the surface between the base of all of the spires.

What luck, eh?

“Looks like we’ll have to get a new one, right?” I said, reluctantly.

Erin, the brunette, gazed right back at me, slightly distraught. Her pearl eyes accented beautifully with her hazel brown pupils. If it weren’t for the muddy red parka hanging over her shoulders, I would’ve found it pretty hard not to look at her. We’ve worked together once before, during our last venture to the Antarctic. She almost lost it when the penguin squirted me with a fine mist of territorial cologne.

That little asshole. At least there weren’t any penguins around for as far as the eye could see, so there shouldn’t be any mishaps this time around.

“Looks like it,” she replied, in agreement. If you’ve ever heard how a French Canadian speaks, she would be the perfect example of one; not only that, but the way her voice sounded almost reminded me of a Celtic singer—without the singing, of course.

Something caught the corner of my eye. It wasn’t Erin, or anything else about her, though I did appreciate her subtly tight hindquarters. I’ll never forget that night a few weeks ago just before our deployment out here.

It was the meteorite itself that garnered my interest. Upon a second look, it seemed as though it had some sort of a lightly pulsating lavender aura around it. This I found odd, considering that most residual radiation left unchecked would have caused some strange reactions. It hadn’t even occurred to me that we should’ve carried a spectrometer with us just in case. With our current transportation being limited to snowmobiles, it would've been more of a hassle to bring along.

“Guys,” I said, grabbing the attention of Erin and a few others. “I think there’s something really odd about the meteor.”

That was the best my mind could come up with? At least I could’ve thought of better words to use. At least my simple message was conveyed easily, as they also noticed the meteor’s subtle glow.

To my surprise, Erin was the first to speak. “It’s… beautiful…”

I would have to agree. As far as space rocks go, she was right.

It took me a few seconds for my mind to register her next set of movements. She was already cresting the lip of the crater, gently sliding down the slope of the icy wall with the back of her boots. Now, if it weren’t for the metal claws strapped to the bottoms of all of our boots, she’d be sliding feet-first right onto the meteor at high speed. Getting injured out in the middle of the arctic was the last thing we wanted.

I noticed that the wind began to pick up speed slightly the more she got closer to it. It came to a point where she stood up and walked the rest of the way towards the glowing rock. I decided to follow suit—following safety standards for unidentified objects. I’m not sure what’s gotten into her. Had she never seen a meteor in person before?

The wind continued to pick up speed gracefully. I looked around to find the source of the wind. To the east, I saw a wall of white clouds bellowing out right towards us. It was an enormous distance away from us, but the steady increase in wind speed meant that this wasn’t an ordinary windchill. Fear soon began to fill my heart.

It was an arctic explorer’s nightmare—a blizzard.

Most people would associate a blizzard with a heavier snowstorm not normally forecasted—that is particularly true. Out here, though, a blizzard takes on a completely different, and deadly, form. If it wasn’t for the sheer flatness of the landscape, most people wouldn’t hear the droning of a distant warning siren. Despite being deep in a depression on the ice, I could clearly hear the passing attack call of a Federal Signal Thunderbolt 1000T from our base—a few miles to the south of our position.

Erin, however, was completely locked in with the meteor. I could tell something was really off with her at this point. I couldn’t tell if she heard the siren or if she chose to ignore it. Did the space rock somehow do something to her mind? She almost looked like one of those slow-walking zombies from those old horror movies, except that she wasn’t making any scary, gurgling noises, nor did she have her arms raised up in front of her. Instead, she shuffled her feet along the icy floor, scraping the metal hooks along. I thought for sure that would wake her up from her delusional gait.

She stopped, just feet from the glowing rock. My heart was pounding. Every passing wave of the siren dug in deeper within my own body. It would only be a matter of time before the edge of the storm covered the nearest hilltop, which the base of one was only a few hundred feet away from us to the north. She raised her right arm out towards the rock.

“Erin?” I called out, gently, hoping that a familiar voice would help.

She continued to take a step forward, inch by inch. I could finally see the profile view of her face from the side. She had the most awkward smile and gaze that I’ve never seen before. It almost scared me to death.

“Erin??” I drew closer to her, waving my hand in front of her field of view.

Her mouth closed, yet she still had the same smile. She looked up to me with humble innocence. “Mark,” she said, a slight trembling in her voice. “This meteor… we could be rich.”

Oh god. This was what I was not hoping for. She was taking things a little too seriously now. I mean, I really liked her and all, but this was getting awkward real fast, and scary. I needed to snap her out of her delusional mess. If she really wanted a taste of fortune, it’d be back at base—not in the middle of nowhere, which we really needed to haul our asses out of.

“Erin, we need to get out of here! Can you not hear the siren? There’s a blizzard coming!”

Her face became somewhat disconcerting. She looked out to the direction of the coming clouds. She inhaled, as if she was about to scream at the top of her lungs. Thankfully, she didn’t really do so. It was clear that she was snapped out of whatever daydream she was stuck in, but it was a moment too late for both of us. The ice below us began to crack in several directions.

‘Shit…’

Before either one of us could react, the floor below us gave way, creating another depression that centered itself toward the meteor which sunk deeper into the ice. She was sent sliding towards the center of the depression head-first toward the dark, yet glowing, rock, while I kept my feet pointing towards the ground. Unfortunately, neither of our hooks on our shoes could hold on to something, and I clutched myself tightly. I listened to Erin’s ear-piercing scream, before everything went silent...

~~ Still in the Arctic...? ~~

Aside from the rushing wind, it sounded unusually, and unnervingly, quiet. There was the absence of a woman’s scream, and no droning of any siren. There wasn’t even any shouting from my partners. I was strangely sliding down a snow-packed slope. The snow felt softer than usual. I was just in the arctic tundra not a moment ago, and all of a sudden the landscape changes just like that?

Not only did my surroundings change, but the acoustics as well. I couldn't hear Erin near me, or next to me, or even at all. I didn't hear her sliding down the same slope. Was I daydreaming this time? This was certainly a weird one if I was.

Suddenly, the slope ended at an edge. Well, things couldn't have been any worse than falling to your death in the middle of a frigid cold wasteland. The ambient wind sure picked up, though it wasn't hardly as cold as the arctic. It only took a second before both my feet planted themselves right into the soft snow. It's pretty lucky to land on soft snow compared to ice, though it was likely because of my unusual daydream, which I really started to doubt at this point.

I felt my right leg slightly twitch to the side on impact, though my ankle took more of the force. I screamed at the top of my lungs at the sudden jolt of pain rushing through the entirety of my leg and up my spine. Twisting your ankle was never a good feeling; I may have likely broke it too.

Fortunately, it was only my ankle and not my whole leg. That was more than enough to be able to do me in, though. Once more, I emphasize this all too much, but the point had to get across somehow: getting injured out in the middle of the arctic was pretty much a death sentence. Having reduced mobility meant that I couldn't cover as much ground as I liked, if I could even get up at all.

For a few long minutes, I rolled around in the pillow-soft snow, reeling in pain and panting fervently. There was a benefit to being out in the cold—you didn't need to fish for an ice pack to cover bruises. So, in a sense, I'm a little lucky to be out here. After I was done grunting and cursing like a madman, I pulled back on my snow pants a bit, so that I could get to the boot buckles easier. It was a tough struggle, because it felt like I could just tear off my foot with the boot around it. Fortunately, because it felt somewhat warmer than the North Pole, it made it easier on me to actually unstrap part of my thick fur boots, which are normally hell to put on and take off.

I just wanted to pack some of the snow inside to mend my bruised ankle. When I pulled the top of the boot apart, I scooped up a couple handfuls of snow and packed it all down towards the bottom of the boot. It was definitely cold, but the chilling sensation against the throbbing pain felt euphoric. Thank goodness I still had my socks on to keep the snow away from my skin. Even though the snow was a remedy for this kind of injury, I still didn't want it to come in contact with my skin. It wasn't a whole lot either, so it'd all melt within a few minutes.

I actually started to feel better, as if I could walk on both feet again. I knew that I shouldn't be getting too far ahead of myself. Just because it was a bruise didn't mean that I could walk at my normal pace.

I had to be cautious here, wherever I was. I took a good look of my surroundings, to see if I could spot any familiar landmarks or people. The first person to come to mind was Erin. I glanced carefully in every direction that I could. All I could see was the same flat snowy landscape. The precipitating flakes made visibility very poor, as I could only see a short distance away—by that, I mean less than a mile.

There was no sign of a red parka, or a brunette woman in tight black spandex, or anything that could be even closely related to her. There wasn't any sign of blood or any unusual struggle. Thank god she wasn't mauled by a polar bear.

On that thought, I did the first thing that was on the Arctic Survival Checklist: check for any wildlife. Surely, a polar bear or an arctic wolf could sniff me out for several miles. I saw nothing move across the land; nothing but the swirling white powder, which was picked up and blown around by the gentle wind gusts.

With the threat of wildlife visually nonexistent for the time being, I pulled out my smartphone. Oddly enough, there was no signal to be picked up. The phone relied on satellite signal for reception. There was nothing, not even a single bar. So, I turned to the next best option. What's better than a cellphone?

I took out the small handheld radio, turned it on, and switched it to the agency's broadcast frequency. The radio crackled a bit, and then it went silent afterward. Of course there would be some residual feedback upon setting it up.

"Erin?" I spoke through the tiny microphone embedded within the radio. No response.

"Erin, can you hear me?" Still, nothing. Only the wind managed to howl lightly across the frozen desert.

"Taylor? Ryan?" No response from either. "Anybody??"

You know that feeling where you feel like absolute shit after realizing you're all alone somewhere in a place you don't recognize?

Yeah, I was feeling that right now, only made worse due to the fact that I had neither any cell signal nor any sign of a response through my radio. I turned the channel to the international frequency, in hopes that someone was listening. Again, there was that brief feedback after switching channels, which made my heart skip a beat. I vaguely remembered the emergency distress call format, plus the stress and the subtle pain made it that much more difficult for me to think straight.

"Mayday, mayday, mayday. This is Matt Haraway of the United States Geological Survey maintenance crew. I am currently lost and out of orientation from the rest of the maintenance crew, including senior geologist Erin Shaw. I was last at the site of a meteor crash upon the remains of seismometer Nautalis II." Come to think of it, where the living hell was I? There was absolutely no known geography for as far as the eye could see.

"Repeat, I am separated from the USGS repair managment team. This is Matt Haraway." Once more, there was no response. Aside from the comforting, yet chilling, winds, everything was dead silent. I could feel tears running down my cheeks. The memories of my life began to flip through the back of my mind.

"H... hello??"

Nothing. I slowly lowered the radio down. I looked up at the pearl white skies, letting the soft flakes fall gently on my face. I remembered Erin's soft touch of her hands when she first got close to me. Her velvety red lips felt smooth against mine. I would never look back and regret that day. Now that we were separated by some unknown bond, I couldn't help but think about that tender moment. It was harsh, but I guess reality can be a complete bitch sometimes.

"HELLOOO!??"

I yelled at the top of my lungs, with as much volume as my throat would allow me. It was a shame that the powdery snow absorbed most of my voice, so it wouldn't travel as far. The pain in my ankle began to swell gradually. I knew that I had to walk somewhere. Oddly enough, I could feel the faint presence of the sun's gaze. I took out my compass (thank god I still had this), and checked the reading.

'What the...?’

Okay. I sincerely hoped that Earth's poles hadn't suddenly shifted on me in the past few minutes, because North was pointed in the direction of the sun. Well, maybe I wasn't going crazy, but it was still hard to tell if it was all a daydream and that I was in some sort of a coma from falling onto the space rock. The only hiccup to that assumption was that my ankle was sprained. Usually you'd be yanked out of just about any kind of sleep or nap from a sudden jolt of intense stimuli.

Either I was out cold, or I was really somewhere that I did not even recognize. If the latter was true...

Man, wherever that meteorite came from must be a truly remarkable gem. Maybe Erin's alright, if that would be the case. I wonder if she landed in a different part of wherever this awkward place was.

That would probably explain why my cellphone, radio, and compass weren't working. Lack of a cell signal? Strange. Lack of radio response? Very awkward. A compass pointing towards the sun? Well, I guess that made it easier to find it. Nevertheless, that was the really strange part of all this. Actually being able to feel where the sun was at was something even my colleagues would have had a hard time digesting.

If I wanted any chance of survival, I would have to start by getting out of the tundra. If the laws of gravity applied here, I'd have to go south if I wanted any chance of arriving to some sort of sanctuary. I would not enjoy spending months or even years out in a frozen desert just because of some strange space rock.

So, I headed in the direction that I guessed would be south, walking perpendicular with the sun.

Oh, god.

There are many problems with being alone. First, there's nobody to talk to; that's an obvious no-brainer. There's also no fresh pair of eyes or more keeping a lookout for your surroundings; you could only see in whichever direction your eyes were pointing at. Second, multitasking many essential survival skills by yourself can be very tough, especially when caught out in the middle of nowhere, where the amount of resources may be next to nothing. Third, I'm out in the middle of the fucking arctic. There's no warm body to huddle yourself up to, and no way to keep yourself warm.

For me, this is the worst day of my life, and it well could be my last. The more I walked on, the more that reality sunk in. I tossed the daydreaming theory out the back door once hunger settled in. In dreams, you could be hungry for a little bit and then be satisfied by false stimuli. If you were desperately starving, your body would pull you right out from sleep.

In my case, I don't know how far I walked, but it didn't look like the scenery changed much. I was making progress, but the sprained ankle made my progress agonizingly slow. I really wanted to run, not drag my right foot all the way across the powder-coated flat lands.

At least I had something warm on, but that was beginning to turn into a sponge. Water and cold temperatures do not mix well, especially if that water gets into your clothes. My own brown and gray woolly parka began to sag its increased weight on my shoulders the more I walked. To make matters worse, the batteries on my electronics were dangerously low. If I had to make one last desperate act, I'd have to film myself, parting my soul and my world with a last will, with my phone.

The more I pressed on, the greater the burden became. My parka became so heavy that I could even barely drag my sprained foot off of the fluffy snow. At least I had boots on, but didn't really help much. If I had built my body up a bit more like those guys in the TV infomercials for those personal home gym systems, I'd probably get by just fine without having to worry about a sprained ankle. Too bad I wasn't one of those guys.

I was just a guy in my late twenties, performing odd jobs for the government and getting paid a fortune for doing so-- all the while, risking tooth and bone trying to fix sensitive equipment in the most extreme environments on Earth. At least I was anyway. Now, me and Erin are probably presumed dead or missing, or possibly both. I wonder what the headlines back at home would have read? Man, I was seriously having a tough time trying to concentrate with my damn stomach howling at me. My brain was probably cursing out my gut, and telling it to quit whining like a little schoolgirl.

I must be honest here—it was definitely a lot better when your own body was telling you what's up, even if the problem was blatantly obvious. In my case, fuck yeah it was serious. I needed to find food, like right now.

Trouble was, I was only a few minutes short of really running on empty. With reduced mobility, it made progress that much slower and more difficult. Why did I only have a few minutes?

Well, the sun doesn't stay up in the sky forever. The clouds began to dim, and the light around me started to fade. Fortunately, snow was light enough for me to see, even in perpetual darkness. The only difficult part was that rough features were that much harder to spot. You'd expect to step on a completely flat surface when you end up misjudging its distance and send your whole body weight forward into a divot in the ground.

I think I may have jinxed myself there, for as soon as I thought of that, my bad foot (fuck you, karma) shot down right through a soft patch of powdery snow. This twisted my ankle more, causing me to twirl my entire body in order to suppress the jolt of pain. Unfortunately, this caused me to lose my balance and, already weakened of starvation, caused me to tumble forward onto the soft patch. Thank god it was pillow-soft snow, although now I was completely rendered immobile. Why?

One, my ankle was shy of being broken if I ended up twisting it again in the wrong direction. Two, I was fucking starving. I had nothing else to eat since sunrise at base camp; damn granola bar hoarders. Then again, I probably would've been one myself as well (fuck you again, karma).

If it wasn't for the insatiable feeling of wanting to fall to sleep, I grabbed hold of whatever energy I had left and turned myself around so that I could lie on my back. By some miracle, I managed to free my sprained ankle from its awkward position without snapping it clean from its joint. However, I had another problem. That same leg also had a partially tweaked knee joint, so now I was really rendered immobile. This time, I'm gonna say it as clear as day in my mind: fuck you once more, karma.

With the last of the sun's rays barely making it past the clouds, I saw a shaft of light peer over me through a gap between the overcast skies and the horizon. It was the most remarkable sight I could ever witness. I thought that I would have never seen anything more heartwarming in my entire life, especially with being nearly brushed by death's hand. I tried to take my phone out of my pocket, but since I wasn't moving, I wasn't generating enough body heat to really keep my extremities warm. My fingers fidgeted with the phone, attempting to get a good grip.

The chilling winds didn't really help. I slid the phone out of the front pocket and gripped it as tightly as I could. The battery level was just shy of ten percent. I could try and take a picture. I lightly tapped the screen, which opened up a photo app. At least the phone was working as it should and didn't display an entirely different scene through the camera lens. How awkward would that have been to see a completely different world through the lens of your camera?

The phone emitted a shutter noise and the screen froze to show the image shot. This would have to do. Islowly put the phone back in its pocket, fidgeting around with the snap-on button. My fingers almost felt like meat popsicles at this point.

I gazed back at the last few minutes of light, watching the illuminescence filter onto the rolling slopes of the snow-covered hills. What a life I led. At least I've got up close to the woman of my dreams, so I guess I hadn't really disappointed myself all too much. Then again, I would've preferred dying with her by my side rather than by myself.

There was this strange sensation tugging at my mind—some little voice in the back of my head telling me to close my eyes. It sounded... feminine. It wasn't Erin's voice. It had some sort of archaic tone to it. It was only about as quiet as the wind gusts that blew right over me, yet I could still make out the words. The faceless beauty was apparently singing, something I wasn't even expecting from a brush of death. From what I was told, death's touch was not harmonic at all.

I had nowhere else to go and nothing else to do. In the end, I could only do the one possible thing: obey the voice inside my head. And so I did, and I gently fluttered my eyes shut as the last of the sun's rays disappeared from below the horizon. I settled into a dreamy and heartwarming sleep in the middle of a frozen plush bed, awaiting death's grasp in order to whisk me away from this dreadful grave I had dug myself...

...that is, until something, frighteningly and unexpectedly, remarkable happened...