“Shit.” Cat began to look around the cabin for something she could use to stabilize the knee.

“Look in my bag,” Norton half yelled. “I?ve got a few splints in there. It?s the orange one.”

Cat dug in the requisite bag and came out with a long knee brace that had Velcro straps to hold it together. “This one?”

“Yeah, that?ll work. Strap it on tight or it?ll just make things work.”

Going back to Dylan she knelt down and wrapped the knee, placing the bandage over the tan pants that seemed to have a bit of blood splatter on them. “Are you hurt some place else you?re not telling me about?”

“No. I think that?s your blood.”

“Sorry.”

“Don?t worry about it.” She jumped a bit when Cat tightened the splint.

“Too tight?”

“No it?s just right, thanks.”

Cat sat back on the floor and wiped her eyes. It was all she could do to keep from crying. “Damn.” She looked up, “Are you sure we?re going to be okay?”

“I promised didn?t I?”

“Yeah.”

Dylan grasped Cat?s hand and smiled. “C?mon,” she said, hauling herself back to her feet. “Let?s get the hell outta here.”

After about ten minutes of pushing and banging on the crumpled cabin door, they finally pushed it open. The night air was cold and wet, the rain was steady but not hard. The sky was dark and the clouds kept most of the natural light of the moon from shining through.

Cat pushed the steps over the side, and they hung in a jumbled mess halfway to the ground. Luckilly, the plane had taken a belly landing and the ground wasn?t that far below. Cat jumped down easily. Dylan bit back a groan of pain as her injured leg briefly bore her whole body?s weight.

Both turned as one to see the wreckage the crash had wrought.

The nose had been all but ripped off, as were both wings. The tail section was crushed and torn away from the plane but not ripped completely off.

“We?re screwed,” Cat said, then sneezed, a gentle reminder she was still sick as hell.

Dylan silently shook her head. “Okay, first things first. I don?t know where we are, but Horace isn?t gonna make it if we just sit here on our asses waiting for a rescue that we don?t even know is coming. We need to get moving.”

As Dylan hobbled away, Cat caught up to her and stopped her with a hand to her arm. “Dylan, wait.”

The coach stopped and turned to Cat, eyebrow raised. “Yes?”

“I think it might be better if we made some sort of shelter here and waited. No wait, hear me out,” she continued quickly as Dylan looked prepared to argue. “You?re right when you say that we don?t know where we are. For all we know, we could take three steps in any direction and blunder off the side of a mountain somewhere. It?s dark, it?s raining, and we?re lost.”

“And Horace Johnson is dying,” Dylan replied, voice tight. “I might not like the bastard, but I can?t sit by and do nothing while it happens.”

“But the satt phone?.”

“You said yourself that you didn?t know if the signal would penetrate the storm. I can?t risk it, Cat. Much as I?d rather just sit here and wait, there?s no way of knowing when, or even if, we?d be rescued. We need to move.” Her lips turned up in a wry smile. “Hell, this is America. I remember reading somewhere that there isn?t a place in this whole country that doesn?t have a maintained road within several miles.”

“But you?re hurt?.”

“So are you. And so is Kelly. But none of us is hurt as badly as he is.” Dylan?s eyes softened and she grabbed Cat?s hand in her own, squeezing it gently. “I have to try, Cat. I can?t just sit around waiting. Not when someone?s life is on the line. I just can?t.”

After a long moment, Cat sighed and nodded. “Do you promise to take it easy, and stop if it gets to be too much for any one of us?”

“I promise.”

Smiling, Cat stood up on tiptoe and kissed a stunned Dylan softly on the lips. “I believe you. Now let?s go take care of business.”

With that, Cat trotted off, back toward the plane, leaving a wide-eyed Dylan behind.

Dylan, Cat, and Kelly, despite their various injuries, made quick work of salvaging the wreckage of anything that would be of use, and strapping Johnson to a backboard stretcher that had come through the crash miraculously unharmed. Of the secretary, who Cat discovered had the totally fitting name of Tawny, there was little effort to help, as her constant whining had forced the doc to dope her up with some potent antianxiety medication that had her huddled off to one side, humming to herself and grinning idiotically at nothing.

“Well, we won?t starve,” Dylan commented as she tossed the gear out the door.

“Got a Big Mac in your pocket?” Cat teased as she picked up a couple cushions they decided would make good pillows.

“No, but I imagine by the time we get out of here, I?ll even be willing to eat one of those.”

“Funny, I was thinking if we were gonna be here too long you could make soup from roots or something.”

“Well, after a few days of that I might even be convinced to eat pizza.”

“We could do vegetarian on half.”

“You?re on and I?m buying.”

“It?s a date.” Cat grinned, thinking that this was the most absurd way she had ever been asked out. “It is a date isn?t it?”

“You bet it is.”

Dylan handed the solar blanket to the doctor to give to Horace to keep him warm. “He needs this worse than we do.” She didn?t know how, but the bigoted old bastard was still alive, though deeply unconscious and gray as ashes. “You ready?”

“Guess so.”

“Let?s go.”

With Norton, powerful flashlight in hand, taking point and Dylan and Cat carrying Johnson?s stretcher between them, the small group began to make its way away from the plane?s wreckage and, hopefully, toward some indication of civilization.

The rain had slackened some, but the night was still dark and moonless. The scent of evergreen, damp and sharp, filled their otherwise dulled senses. They followed a game trail that sloped steadily downward at a gentle grade.

Dylan?s knee felt like it had been filled with broken glass, shooting bright spikes of pain through her body with every limping step she took. Every time she was almost ready to call a halt, however, she would look down at Johnson?s gray and pain wracked face and push on, figuring that while she could worry about her knee later, Johnson simply didn?t have that kind of time.

They continued in this vein for almost an hour before Kelly Norton held them up with an upraised hand.

“What is it?” Cat asked. “Why are we stopping?”

“I?m not sure,” the doc replied, voice slightly muffled. “I can?t see much, but there?s something about this that I don?t like.”

As if by providence, the moon chose that moment to sail out from behind the rapidly dwindling clouds. By the moon?s eerie, ghostly light, they were all able to see that Norton?s instincts had undoubtedly saved their lives.

“Holy Jesus,” Cat breathed, looking down an almost sheer cliff face that dropped off below them not more than five steps away. “I guess I wasn?t kidding when I said I was afraid we?d wander off a mountain, was I.”

Dylan slowly lowered her end of the stretcher, prompting Cat to do the same. Once Johnson was safely on the ground, Dylan came around his prone body and walked almost to the edge of the cliff. “Long drop,” she remarked softly.

“You?re not kidding,” Norton replied eyeing the almost bottomless well yawing before them.

“What do we do now?” Cat asked.

A low scud of clouds crossed the moon, painting the world black again.

“I think it?s best if we stop for the night,” Dylan said, her voice discouraged. “I know it won?t help Horace any, but we can?t risk walking any more in the dark. It?s just too dangerous, now that we know what we?re up against. We can start out again at dawn.”

Cat nodded and touched Dylan lightly on the back, knowing how much it had cost her coach to make that decision.

“I?ll have to agree,” Norton said, turning away from the chasm. “Let?s move back to that little clearing we passed through and pray that no one walks in their sleep.”

While Kelly Norton took care of settling Johnson and tending to his needs as best she could, Dylan and Cat took care of gathering as much fallen wood as they could. Many of the branches had been sheltered from the worst of the storm by the trees towering above them, and they both soon returned with armfuls of kindling with which to start a fire. Norton leant them her Zippo and soon a warm fire was blazing in a good sized clearing in the woods.

“With any luck,” Dylan remarked, “any rescue passing overhead will see this and know where we are.”

“I hope so,” Cat replied rubbing her arms with her hands as her teeth chattered. “God, I?m freezing!” Then she doubled over with a coughing fit that left her cheeks an alarming shade of plum. “S-sorry b-bout that,” she said when she could finally straighten.

Dylan moved to her smaller friend, expression deeply concerned, and opened her arms. “Come here.”

Cat moved to her and they settled down together next to a downed tree and near fire. They booth looked at Norton, who gave them a grim thumbs up.

“He?ll freak if he come to and sees this,” Cat remarked between the shivers, as Dylan drew a coat over them.

“Ask me if I give a flying fuck at the moment.” Dylan felt her knee really starting to stiffen and visions of more surgery flashed through her mind. “Are you getting warmer?”

“Yes, thank you. You?re a great hot water bottle.”

“Well, sharing body heat is about the only way we?re going to ward off hypothermia, so feel free to cuddle all you like.”

“You know you didn?t have to order a plane crash to get me to put my arms around you.”

Dylan chuckled and kissed the top of Cat?s head. “Well, you know me, when I do something I do it big.”

As the night wore on, Cat finally fell into a restless slumber. Dylan remained about half awake and could hear Cat?s cold coming back with a vengeance as she began to cough and wheeze. She held her tighter, relishing the feel of the smaller woman in her arms, and rested a damp cheek against Cat?s soft hair.

Please God, get us out of here.

Dawn was still many hours away when Dylan was roused from a light, very fitful sleep by a sound out of place with those around her.

As she blinked the sleep from her eyes, she cocked her head, willing the sound to return so that she could identify it.

The rain had stopped, allowing the normal night sounds of the thick forest to take over once again. A soft moan came from slightly below her, and Dylan looked down to see Cat huddled tightly against her, face streaked and shiny with sweat. She was mumbling incoherently within the grip of some fevered dream, and her body was emitting a great heat.

“Shit,” Dylan swore softly through gritted teeth as she shifted slightly, trying to make a more comfortable nest for the uneasy Cat.

“Dylan,” Norton called, sharply. “Help me. He?s coding.”

“Wha—?” Carefully, but quickly, easing herself away from Cat, Dylan half ran, half stumbled her way around the fire to where Johnson lay, ignoring the agony in her knee.

“You need to help me. We have to start CPR but with this broken arm, I can?t do compressions. If you can do them, I?ll work on mouth-to-mouth, okay?”

“What about her?” Dylan asked, pointing to the platinum blonde head that peeked out from beneath the solar blanket as she awkwardly knelt down beside Johnson.

“Dead to the world. C?mon, Dylan, I need your help.”

“Alright,” Dylan replied shortly, getting into position and placing the heel of her hand on the lower third of his sternum as Norton knelt at his head and tilted his head back, opening his airway. “Ready?”

Nodding, Norton bent her head and delivered two quick breaths. Coming up, she nodded to Dylan, who began compressions, counting each one out in a slow, liquid rhythm. After two rounds of compressions and rescue breathing, Norton called a halt and felt for a pulse.

There wasn?t one.

“Shit. Ok, start again.”

Several more rounds continued in the same vein. With the same result.

They were getting ready to resume when Dylan stiffened and cocked her head, listening.

“What is it?”

“Helicopter.”

“You?re kidding, right?”

“No, listen.”

As Dylan continued compressions, Norton looked up through the leafy canopy, then grinned when she saw a large searchlight playing back and forth in slow arcs over the ground. “They found us!”

“Not yet they haven?t.”

Taking a deep breath, Dylan briefly rested all of her weight on her injured knee and lashed out behind her with her good leg, impacting the stuporous body of the blond bimbo behind her.