AN: This is the twenty-fourth installment of my personal challenge to write a tag for every episode. This is a tag to 2x03, Roulette Wheel + Wire. It takes place before the episode begins. It's on the shorter side, but I still like it, and my next tag will be substantially longer. I hope you enjoy, and please leave a review!
To say it was freezing was an understatement. Jack wasn't sure if he had ever been so cold in his life. The kid looked just as miserable. As much as he tried to hide it, his shivers were wracking his whole body. He was trying to build a radio out of snow mobile parts, but his hands were shaking so badly Jack thought they might fall off.
"Come on, bud. Let me try to help you," Jack said, taking off his gloves and grabbing Mac's hands, and taking off the kid's gloves too. His hands felt frozen to the touch.
"Jack, I have to build this if we want to live," he replied, weakly trying to pull his hands away.
"Well you're not gonna be building anything if you lose your hands to frostbite," Jack said. "So, you're gonna let me help warm them up." Jack lightly gripped the kid's wrists and pushed them up his own coat, trapping them between the layers of clothing.
"Come on, this is weird," Mac complained, once again weakly trying to pull away. Jack wouldn't have it.
"It's not weird if it saves your hands and our lives," Jack said. He pulled Mac to his chest and gripped him tightly, trying to give the kid as much warmth as he could. Jack would gladly lose all his fingers and toes if it meant that Mac got to keep his own.
After a tense minute, Mac finally relaxed into the embrace. His shivers began to lessen, which Jack hoped was good in this case. He was meant to be giving Mac warmth, but Jack was glad to be feeling a bit warmer himself. About ten minutes later, Mac claimed that he felt warm enough to get back to work on the radio. Jack wasn't so sure, but he let him. It was the radio or death after all. If the cold didn't kill them, starvation would. They had plenty of water due to the snow, but because it was so cold, even that was a bad idea.
Night was the hardest part. Jack thought he had been cold before, but the frigid air at night was something else entirely. He and Mac were both beyond hungry, but had nothing to eat. Seeing Mac shivering so much was the worst of it, but at least he could help. The kid was lying on the ground on his side, exhausted. Although it wasn't the best idea to sleep when they were so cold, they had to keep their strength up if they wanted to survive until help came.
Jack crawled over to his shivering partner, and laid down right behind him, his chest against the kid's back. He put his arm around Mac's chest and held him close, and swung one of his legs around to keep Mac's closer to his. Mac melted into the touch, pressing himself against Jack as much as he could. They both knew they would warm up faster if they took their shirts off and had more direct bodily contact, but that wouldn't have been a good idea due to the severity of the cold.
"Th-th-thanks," Mac stammered, still shivering violently. Jack held him tightly in an attempt to both warm him up and lessen his shaking.
"It's gonna be o-okay, bud," Jack replied, stammering with shivers himself. He could tell that the kid was scared. This was the coldest either of them had ever been, and if Mac couldn't build the radio and contact someone, it was over for them. They would die, no question about it. It would only be a matter of time, whether from hypothermia or starvation. Jack briefly thought of that soccer team whose plane has crashed in the Andes mountains all those years ago. The survivors had to eventually resort to cannibalism of their dead friends in order to survive. Jack shivered again at the thought. He could never do that. Whether or not Mac was already dead, Jack could never do that, even to save his own life. He would rather die. If something happened to Mac, he would die. He would die alongside his partner, no matter what. Jack just hoped they would be rescued in time, and it wouldn't have to come to that.
He gripped Mac impossibly tighter to him in response to all of his dark thoughts, as if somehow holding him even a fraction of an inch closer would save the kid's life. Jack was bigger, so he had more body heat to give, and he would give it all to Mac.
Mac suddenly broke the silence between them, saying, "t-t-tomorrow, you should b-build an SOS s-sign." Despite what it sounded like, Mac's tremors had actually gone down a little.
"Sure thing, bud," Jack replied. He relaxed into Mac as much as he could, and the blond did the same. Jack knew he would likely wake up sore, with the way he had his limbs contorted, but it would be worth it if it helped Mac. The kid had a death grip on Jack's arm that was across his chest, but that actually helped to keep it warmer, so Jack didn't even mind at all. Then again, he didn't mind anything as long as it helped Mac.
Within a few minutes, the two were asleep. Throughout the night, they remained as tangled up in each other as they had been when they fell asleep. And when they woke up, they were both much warmer.