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tasha's eyes narrow through the snowstorm. no, it's not alexei. it's a woman. even more unmistakable is the oppressive aura of blood in the air, attuned to only by tasha's sudden affinity for blood in the aftermath of the awakening. a wounded woman wandering the tundra aimlessly, nursing her arm and dressed so poorly for the environment that tasha can hardly believe it. how could this possibly get any worse?[break][break]

tasha bites her tongue, eyeing the hulking, leering silhouette of a massive, skyscraper-sized beast on the horizon beyond the trees. they should be quiet if either of them wants to make it out of this place alive.[break][break]

all suspicion and wariness evaporates as tasha lurches forward, off the rocky cairn and onto the snow alongside where miyah now drinks dark liquid from a bottle. tasha hates the look of it, hates the look of a stranger, hates the appearance of a person instead of her dog, but father always taught her never to abandon a person in need, and she will not tarnish his memory. it's with a deep, steadying breath that tasha winds her gloved palms up beneath her crimson coat to remove it from her shoulders—and with it goes her power.[break][break]

"tasha," she introduces herself in a low, gruff tone, evidently not accustomed to speaking at length with somebody she doesn't know. "will not kill you. we are far north, farther than i've ever been."[break][break]

soon thereafter, she unceremoniously dumps her coat atop miyah, leaving her clad only in her thick utility pants and her insulated long-sleeve shirt. the cold seeks to bite into her flesh as soon as she does this, but tasha wills it away, baring her teeth and shaking her head in the process. "you will freeze. put the coat on," she intones, and raises her head to warily scan the horizon before briefly glancing back down at miyah and the bandages around her arm. "you are injured?"

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bleeding for fun?[break][break]

tasha narrows her eyes at miyah. 'it doesn't look very fun' are the words that die on her lips as soon as she recognizes the tell-tale signs of a bitter grin on the woman's face. ah, a joke. humor. yes, tasha knows all about that. she matches miyah's smile with an awkward baring of her teeth that can hardly constitute an expression of joy or even laughter. the process seems about as foreign to her as the new world she's found herself in.[break][break]

both women move beyond this strange interaction quickly thereafter. as miyah draws tasha's coat over her shoulders, tasha drags her eyes like thorns across the horizon, ever the watchful vanguard. the only thing to distract her from this inimitable task, however, is miyah's story. her words drag across the imagined face of a middle-aged russian man that immediately sparks into tasha's mind at the mere mention of his trigger finger. tasha's first thought is that, fortunately, this wounded woman is no stranger to strife, marking her as a beneficial ally. second, tasha remarks that miyah certainly has no fear of death, a trait they share. the pale huntress laughs, this time genuinely. miyah has managed to catch tasha's wily, guileless attention against all odds, if only because stories have always been the fastest way to her heart. "none of my people have it—'trigger discipline'," tasha barks out with a jagged, awkward smile. it evaporates as soon as it appears, suffocated by the immense cold that defines the woman's existence. "we are both lucky i have no trigger with me."[break][break]

then she says his name. alexei.

tasha shakes her head rapidly. her eyes go glassy. "no," she answers miyah's questions on who alexei is to her—no brother, no party member. the windswept girl can't help but curl her nails into her palms to the point of pain. "he is a dog."[break][break]

miyah recovers quickly, tasha notes. quickly enough that she's even offering to help find alexei with her, an extension of good faith that sends tasha's head into a tailspin. miyah reeks of wandering, awash with the sense of somebody who has never belonged in claustrophobic cities and studio flats, just like tasha, but this line of similarity does not implicate a sense of innate and intimate trust within seconds of meeting. what is the game here? what does miyah want from her?[break][break]

the huntress stumbles over herself in her desperation to reply. "not even sure if he is here," she admits with a stammer, glancing away from miyah's face with a cold purse of her lips. "haven't seen him since... since the thing. have no idea if he is even alive at all."[break][break]

but i've got to keep trying, her mind chimes in, ever the source of good hope and faith.[break][break]

tasha's glad for a distraction from the pit in her stomach that grows with every day she is without alexei. she exhales deeply, and her breath wafts through the air in a puff of smoke that rises from the ridge before her very eyes, hazing across the hulking masses on the horizon. one steps forth in the distance, and the glaciers beneath rumble with the force. "hostile, yes. slow, also yes. deadly?" tasha's eyes harden. "very. is best to avoid. you really hope to help me find alexei?"[break][break]

this is the first time she's made genuine eye-contact with miyah since they've met. her yellow gaze is seeking, hopeful, bitter in the way it clings to a shred of good faith. she needs only to confirm that miyah has no bad intentions from this point forward.