"I know how much it hurts. I know you want to lay down here and never get up again. I know it, 'cause I feel it. I can feel it. And that means that somehow, somewhere… you can feel what I'm feeling too. I love you. That's why you can't give up. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you… I love you…"
Riley slowly picks herself up. The frozen ground melting away as her fingers lift. Cold wind stings, blowing her back from her face, freezing her tears in place. The van seems so far away now and what she thought she could do no longer seems possible. Her memories, broken and jagged, cut into her like a thousand pieces of glass. She clutches her baby, her dead baby, to her chest. She clutches Will, her dead Will, to her chest. But he isn't dead, just sleeping. And she finds the courage to walk once more. She knows that she is the only one and knows that this is what it is to be alone. Cold biting into your skin, wind whipping your hair, endless mountains and snow, no cluster. And she never saw the winter as being lonely before, never saw it as isolating despite all of her losses. But now, with the absence of the rest of the cluster, way up here, in the clouds, now all she can see is what her eyes see. And that is Will, an unconscious Will, and the long road ahead. Pulling herself into the driver's seat takes more effort than it should and it almost breaks her- again.
The road stretches long and wide in front of her. Twisting and turning, never ending. She looks to her right and sees Will. She looks to her left and sees Magnus, driving frantically. She sees the car flip over a snow bank. She sees Angelica, standing in her night gown, a pale ghostly figure, mouthing "Protect them." And she wishes more than anything that she knew how to. How to protect people like Will or fight like Sun or use a gun like Wolfgang or hack like Nomi or lie like Lito or help like Kala or be hopeful like Capheus. Oh, how she wishes she could be hopeful.
Sven stands at the dock, some way, somehow, by some god ("Maybe Ganesha" the Kala at the back of her mind tells her), he knows. Maybe not everything, probably not everything. But he knows, knows that she needs help and safe passage. He doesn't question who Will is, doesn't inquire about his health, just lays a hand on her shoulder and looks her in the eyes "They would be proud of you." He doesn't have to say who. He doesn't have to say how proud he is of her- she can see it in his eyes. She knows he will tell her father for her. Tell him how much she loves him and how much she misses him. Knows that he won't tell him that she might never come back. Not because she wouldn't want to, but because she wouldn't be able to. She knows that he won't tell him that there is a chance- a very large one- that she will end up dead. He knows that. She knows that. But there, on the boat, with Will's head resting in her lap, the others standing with her as Iceland fades into nothingness, she finds that she doesn't care. There is no place she would rather be than with them by her side. And as long as they are with her, she knows that she will never feel lonely again. And somehow, winter doesn't seem like such an isolating prospect anymore.