Alternative Ending 2: With a Jolt
There is nothing more disorienting than getting knocked out in low orbit and waking up in a tree.
Emily woke with a jolt. As her eyes adjusted, a blurry picture of the world around her emerged. It seemed to be twilight, or just before. The weak sunlight filtered through the branches and leaves of the dense jungle canopy that surrounded her, painting everything a dark, glowing green.
Wait, jungle? She froze, shook her head and pressed her eyes closed, counting to ten. When she reopened them the scene hadn't changed. Jungle.
And what's more, she wasn't really in the jungle, but suspended above it in the jungle canopy, swinging freely a good hundred feet off the ground. She raised her eyes and saw that the ropes and lines of her parachute were twisted hopelessly into the branches above her. Unthinkingly, she tried to twist around in her harness to get a better look. She let out a cry of pain as her wounded thigh objected to the movement. Clutching at it, she realized that whatever Snow had stabbed her with to keep her thigh from hurting had worn off.
"Well, the silence was nice while it lasted." a sardonic voice sounded through the leaves.
"Snow?" Emily couldn't stop herself from smiling.
"The one and only." he replied, still invisible.
"Where the hell are you? Where the hell are we?" Emily called out, looking around as best she could without moving herself.
"I'm up here, in this giant tree, and we're in downtown DC, exactly as planned." Snow replied snidely. Emily located his figure standing a few feet above her on a wide branch. He motioned in her general vicinity.
"Any chance you can just, you know, rescue yourself? Just, for a change?" He asked, puffing on a cigarette and fiddling with his lighter.
"My leg...it hurts." She replied lamely.
Snow rolled his eyes and sighed in an overly dramatic fashion before pocketing his lighter, and edging out on his branch towards where her lines crisscrossed through the canopy. He passed out of her field of vision and disappeared into the leaves.
"What are you doing?" She asked finally, when the long seconds of silence finally got to her.
"Well, I'm gonna cut these lines, let you drop, and then use your dead carcass as a mattress to get a well earned night's sleep." Snow replied from somewhere above and behind her. Emily couldn't help but smile at that.
A few moments later she felt a tug on one of the lines on her rig. It went tight, then her entire left side lurched upwards. For a split second, pain shot from her thigh to every nerve in her body, then she was fighting back screams, fighting the blackness that was edging into her vision. She fell limp as the darkness won.
Snow cursed as he pulled her dead-weight up to his branch.
Some people are just lazy. He muttered to himself as he hauled her over the limb of the tree. He laid her out and inspected her leg. It wasn't bleeding too badly, but it needed a new bandage Snow judged. He decided that she wasn't too badly off when her eyes slid partly open and she started to return to consciousness. Then, eyes still half shut and unfocused, she started to talk: she babbled. Snow raised one amused eyebrow at what words tumbled out...
Emily woke with a jolt. As her eyes adjusted, a picture of the world around her emerged. It seemed to be nighttime but a glorious, bright, full moon hung low overhead. The moonlight filtered through the branches and leaves of the dense jungle canopy that surrounded her, painting everything stark black and shimmering white.
Wait, jungle? She froze, shook her head and pressed her eyes closed, counting to ten. When she reopened them the scene hadn't changed. Jungle.
Then she remembered, the fall from space, waking up in her rig, Snow pulling her up into the canopy. Pain.
"Snow?" she called nervously.
"Well, that certainly knocks power-of-observation off your employable skills list."
She nearly jumped out of her skin because his reply came from right behind her. Emily suddenly became very aware that she was sitting cradled between his legs, one of his hands splayed casually across her stomach holding her pressed up against him. She tensed and sat up away from him. Pain shot through her leg at the sudden movement, her head began to spin, her balance seriously threatened to quit. Quickly, Snow leaned forwards and held her still. Emily felt his strong arms wrap around her torso and in a moment of blind panic she struggled against him, against her pain, against everything, her breathing uneven and ragged, her heart racing.
"Christ, don't get excited, I just didn't relish the thought of how loud and long you'd scream if I let you fall." He held her steady as the forest swam around her eyes and she struggled to get her balance and not pass out. "Relax. Jesus, breath!"
"Leg hurts. I feel...dizzy." she summarized between haggard breaths, trying to relax against him and finding it immensely difficult. "So dizzy."
"Yeah, you were babbling about that earlier."
"So sorry...I know...you like your quiet." she breathed sarcastically, her vision beginning to clear at the edges.
"Yeah, your babbling generally sucked, but.." Snow leaned in so her head was next to hers, his mouth in her ear "...it was interspersed with some other rather interesting comments."
Emily's heart stopped. Snow continued, his voice low in her ear "I like my scruffy facial hair too, I'm so pleased you noticed..."
"Oh god!" Emily cringed and shoved a laughing Snow away from her. She held her head in her hands and did her best to ignore the pig behind her. With her head down, she noticed the new wrap that had appeared on her thigh while she was unconscious. Snow had rebound the wound with some faded blue fabric. She cocked her head to the side to read the writing that twisted along her inner thigh.
Warning
Offensive
"You should be honored. That was my favourite shirt." Snow commented. Emily's breath hitched again. He's topless. Her mind started to race. Distract yourself she thought quickly.
"Where are we?" she asked again, it seemed like a safe topic.
"I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say we're in a tree." Snow replied.
"Yes!" Emily realized aloud – missing his joke altogether. She look around in the hazy darkness and trailed her fingers along the bark under her legs. "I recognize this kind of tree. From the biodiversity garden in DC. It's a rainforest tree...South American...I think..." then it dawned on Emily what this meant. They were nowhere near DC.
"What do we do?" she whispered, twisting around to face him, her eyes wide. Snow shrugged.
"I'm all for playing damsel in distress and just waiting to be rescued." Snow suggested, he relaxed back into the tree trunk, hands behind his head, naked torso on full display. Emily quickly turned to face away from him again, blush rising in her cheeks. Snow smirked.
"Should we get down?" Emily asked tentatively, leaning over to peek over the edge of the branch to the jungle floor below. Snow's fingers grabbed onto her shoulders suddenly as she leaned.
"Don't- don't do that. God, I hate heights." he murmured, snaking his arm around her stomach he pulled her flush against him again, away from the precipitous edge of the branch. "And besides, you're what? fifty percent broken and dizzy? I'm not really picturing you climbing down to the ground...unless you'd like to jump-?"
"So we wait." Emily cut him off.
"Yup, we wait." Snow confirmed. He once again splayed his fingers across her stomach, holding her firmly to him, and she once again tried desperately to calm her racing thoughts.
"What's your name?" she blurted out.
"Snow." he replied tersely.
"What's your first name?"
Snow sighed and rolled his eyes and the two of them lapsed into silence. Soon, the warmth of his body and the darkness of the sky lulled her back into sleep. Snow felt her relax and decided to close his eyes too, just for a minute...
Snow woke with a jolt. Emily had started to move in her sleep. Twisting and whimpering. He rolled his eyes at the situation: his body was already threatening to react to her proximity and warmth and softness, but the motion, the wriggling, was trying his self control.
If she keeps this up... Snow couldn't even come up with a good ending to that particular thought so he closed his arms around her more tightly, stopping her movement and whispering in her ear.
"Emily? Emily wake up." he tried to be gentle, but Emily was deep in her nightmare. She cried out and fought against his arms, her breathing laboured with terror. "Emily, wake up!" he demanded, more urgently this time, her writhing needed to stop or things were going to get awkward. "Emily," he begged, whispering directly into her ear "you're safe, I've got you, wake up."
As Snow held her, he noticed again how very small she was.
Emily woke from her dream with a rough jolt, clunking her head into his. It was pitch black, the moon hiddenly entirely behind a cloud and the jungle completely hidden from sight. Snow felt her hands flail and land on his thighs, where her nails bit into his legs right through his pants.
Softly pressing his fingers across her stomach to drive home the point "Relax, you're safe, I've got you."
Emily tried to open her eyes, but in the pitch black it made no difference if they were open or shut. Her head spun and she pressed her fingers deeper into Snow's legs.
"Dizzy." she managed to say.
He gently moved his hands onto her shoulders, thumbs gently rubbing the back of her neck. Her pulse slowed at his minstrations and her head started to clear.
"The dizziness will pass. It's just from the bloodloss, and exertion, and lack of eating, and lack of drinking, and lack of sleep, and probably shock..." Snow paused. "Actually...okay...it might not pass."
"Thanks for that. Your bedside manner is impeccable." Emily replied dryly. Snow smirked into the darkness.
"Well I may not be good beside the bed..." he insinuated. Emily elbowed backwards into his gut, but it was so halfhearted and weak that he just laughed at her attempt and kept rubbing her neck. She groaned, half from the dizziness, half from the feeling of his hands working at her tired muscles, she'd had scarcely little pleasure in the last few days.
"Thanks for not letting me fall now, and for, well, for everything else. I really appreciate it all and-" she started to go on, so Snow cut her off.
"In other news, you should eat that apple I gave you." Snow suggested in a bored tone. Emily squirmed around and extracted it – amazingly not punctured or broken – from her back pocket.
"Is this just another thinly veiled attempt to get me to shut up?" she asked as she slurped at the "apple."
"Not so thinly veiled."
Emily woke with a jolt. As her eyes adjusted, a picture of the world around her emerged. The sun was just peeking through the trees. The golden-red colour of morning filtered through the branches and leaves of the dense jungle canopy that surrounded her, lighting up everything it touched.
She took stock of herself: her head was clear and though her leg ached but wasn't as overtly painful as the day before. It was amazing how much better she felt after a good night sleep and an "apple."
"Snow?" She glanced over her shoulder. He was asleep, not just dozing but completely passed out. His arms still wrapped tightly around her.
I just won't wake him up yet. He needs rest too. Emily thought as she slowly peeled his arms off of her stomach and shifted to put some distance between their bodies.
It didn't work.
In his sleep, Snow felt her movement and instinctively tightened his grip on her, pulling her closer to him with one hand curling across her stomach while the other latched onto her hip. He muttered something that sound like a very grumpy "Five more minutes!" and she giggled, big bad Snow is not a morning person, she realized. She snuggled back into him, opting to be a non-morning person too. She closed her eyes and tried to sleep.
But only moments later she became aware of a new sensation: his thumb was lazily drawing circles on her hip. Warmth spread out from that spot and Emily smiled, she was quite happy to simply enjoy the feeling, and how it seemed to make the throb in her leg recede.
But moments later, her eyes flew open as his other hand moved. While one hand was content to merely make circles on her hip, his other fingers started drawing languid lines along the edge of her waistband.
"Snow?" she spoke aloud. "Uh? Snow?" She seized his hand just as it dipped beneath her pants and she groaned – half in pleasure and half in frustration – as she sharply drew his hand away from what it sought. Suddenly, both his hands froze.
Snow woke with a jolt. The jungle was lit up in a beautiful array of colours, but he was far more interested in how his body was spooning against Emily's warm, soft form...and that she seemed to be removing his hand from her pants.
"Emily-?"
"Ahck." she squeaked, flushing beet red and shoving his hands completely off herself. Snow shook his head and yawned.
"Not that I mind, but–" Snow started, but Emily cut him off.
"That is not what happened!" Emily's voice was so panicked that even Snow had to take pity on her.
"Yeahsurewhatever." He said neutrally. He stretched and yawned. "Think you can manage to not fall out of the tree for just a little while if I go take a look around?"
Emily nodded, face still glowing red, and Snow awkwardly got up and climbed to the next branch in the tree, then the next, until he was out of sight.
As soon as he was gone, Emily let out a breath and felt her pulse return to somewhere approaching normal. She scooted backwards on the branch until her back connected with the trunk of the tree. Swinging her legs over the sides of the branch she stared off into the greenery and did her best not the panic.
Snow climbed from their tree to the next and then the next. As far as he could see there was just a sea of green. Nothing to navigate by except the sun. He sighed, and hoped that their trajectory had been tracked and that a helicopter was on its way.
Snow made his way quickly back down the tree. Through the greenery he heard a sudden curseword hurled from Emily's lips. Then another. Then she screeched in frustration. Confused, he peered thru the greenery and then burst out laughing.
A monkey was hanging five feet above Emily's head and smacking Emily with the long stick in its hand. She gave another aggravated screech as the monkey landed a blow square atop her head. Snow watched as she yelled, cursed, and dodged, all while trying to grab at the stick, but the monkey hung just out of her reach and continued to badger her.
Snow sat back on his branch and laughed, this was much too good to interrupt. Emily spotted him and shot a furious look in his direction.
"It could be rabid!" she cried, fending off its repeated blows and trying desperately to grab the stick. "Snow, don't be an ass! Help me!"
"Hey, I'm not your daddy, it's not my job to protect you from every monkey who wants to tap you with his big stick." Snow mocked. A moment later Emily managed to snatch the stick from the monkey who, deprived of his toy, went swinging away into the trees, hooting and hollaring as he went.
"ASSHOLE!" she shouted after the monkey, brandishing the stick at it. Snow chuckled and climbed down to her level, seating himself astride the branch facing her.
"Well done, you uh, you sure told him." he deadpanned. In a moment of extremely poor judgement, Emily lashed out and swung the stick with both hands at Snow's head.
With a raised eyebrow and a bemused look on his face, Snow easily countered her attack. He deflected the stick with his left hand and caught both her wrists with his right. He moved towards her on the branch until he had her crushed between himself and the trunk of the tree.
"That" he forced her hands open, "was" he took the stick from her, "pathetic." With one hand he pinned her wrists together at his chest and with the other he dangled the stick teasingly above her head. "Do you want my big stick, Emily?" he inquired, teasingly.
"Fuck you." she spat out, jerking her hands out of his grasp and shoving at his chest. She may as well have been pushing at a wall, he didn't budge.
"Oh yeah, you certainly babbled about doing that, when you weren't going on about my scruffy facial hair or perfectly formed ass."
She glared, he quirked an eyebrow at her, and then couldn't take it anymore.
She burst out laughing.
The monkey, her pathetic attempt to hit him with a stick, her unremembered babbling, all of it on top of being stuck in a tree in the middle of a goddamn jungle, Emily laughed until her sides hurt, until she was just giggling and limp and flushed with mirth, her head lolling back against the tree trunk, a silly smile across her face. Snow cracked a smile and watched her go to. She was kinda beautiful when she lost it.
Finally, through her giggles, she tried to get back on track with the important mission of insulting him. "Anyway, I think you must have misheard my babbling, I'm sure I must have said that you are an ass—" but she never finished, Snow silenced her, his mouth on hers.
And then she wasn't laughing, she was kissing him back, her hands around his neck, reveling in the skin under her fingers. She drew her fingernails down his biceps and wrapped her arms around him, crushing her chest to his and deepening their kiss.
Snow trailed his hands down her sides, past her hips to her legs. He hooked her knees up and towards him, pressing his hips hard against hers. His arousal was hard and evident and Emily wrapped her legs around his waist and drew him closer, rubbing herself on his erection. Snow groaned into her mouth, and she slipped her tongue past his lips and ran it lightly over his tongue. Snow groaned again.
Bring on the blunt rocks he thought as his hands closed under her tight ass.
Emily broke her mouth away from his and dropped kisses and soft bites on his jaw, his neck, his shoulder. "I have wanted you" she murmurer between kisses "since you told me that a simple thank-you was enough." She smiled mischeviously and nipped at his earlobe "Did I babble that yesterday?"
"Not quite so eloquently, but you had some neat ideas involving the straps on the inmate uniforms." he replied.
"I did not!" she laughed. Snow grinned and gently brought her chin up with his hand, kissing her more softly than she expected. In truth, he had wanted her since she had passionately fought with him about saving the hostages, particularly since she threatened to write it out for him in crayon. But he wasn't going to admit that.
Snow's hands found the bottom of her tank top. Slowly he drew it up and off of her perfectly formed body. After a moment's fumble, her bra followed suit and then her naked torso was against his and their mouths crashed together again. Their tongues wrapped around each other as Emily roamed her hands down his back, to the edge of pants, and her fingernails dug into his hips, pulling him towards her. His hands slid up her body, dragging trails of heat from her hips to her stomach and up to her breasts.
Snow broke his mouth away from hers and dropped kisses along her cheek, one playful kiss on the tip of her nose, before lowering his head and sucking on the sweet spot where her neck met her shoulder. Emily mewed and ground her hips into his. His face dipped lower. His tongue was circling around one nipple while his forefinger and thumb gently pinched the other. Emily arched her back, her eyes closed tight, her fingernails biting into his shoulders. He drew his head back and surveyed her, half naked and writhing. Her eyes opened, they were dark with arousal, mirroring his own.
Emily took advantaged of pause to push Snow gently down onto his back. He was sexy as hell, half naked lying out on a jungle branch. She wanted more.
Her hands fumbled his belt open and delved into his pants. Snow's eyes rolled back in his head and his hands clenched onto the branch as her delicate hands closed over his erection. Her fingers played across his head before she smoothed her hand over the length of him. Snow watched as she lowered her head, gave him a single long seductive lick from base to tip and then stared straight into his eyes.
"So...what should I call you?" she asked. Snow let out an audible groan of frustration and stared back her. She smiled mischeviously and started to move her head away.
"Goddamnit!" he cursed, running his hands over his face. Suddenly he snapped up, pinning her back against the tree trunk. He seized her in his arms and kissed her with force and passion. One hand swept down across her body, slipped past her waistband and into her underwear. A finger crooked inside of her and she cried out, breaking the kiss, pressing her forehead into his. A second finger joined the first as he latched his mouth onto her neck, sucking and biting as his thumb found her clit and started marking rough circles. Emily groaned and inhaled sharply at each round of his thumb, her hands clinging to Snow, her hips shaking.
"Oh god!" Emily cried out. Snow stopped roughly, she opened her eyes and looked at him.
"You could call me that." he said casually. Emily groaned in frustration and closed her hand over his, begging him to continue. He more than happily obliged, scissoring his fingers deep inside her and sliding his thumb over her soaked clit.
Just as her back was arching and her eyes scrunched shut Snow removed his fingers. Before she could object to the absense of his fingers, he slid her pants down to her knees – while thanking the gods of spandex, and, cupping her ass, he lifted her off the branch and onto his cock. Emily's eyes fluttered open and they both moaned in pleasure as she encased him. She drew up away from him and then let herself sink down again, reveling in the sensation.
Snow grabbed her hips and started to move her, thrusting up into her tight wetness. Snow's grip on her hips promised to leave bruises for days, but all she felt was pleasure as they fucked in the jungle canopy. She caught his rhythm and soon was meeting him thrust for thrust. Snow groaned and watched her writhing on his lap. She was hot, wet, tight and enthusiastic: it was like a dream.
Winding his hand between their bodies, he again found her clit. Gentle strokes had her eyes rolling back and she met his thrusts harder and harder. Soon he felt her clench around him as her nails raked down his back and she bit into his shoulder, stifling her scream. It was the bite that undid him, her groaned and came hard, face buried in her neck and cock buried deep inside her.
They stayed that way, limbs wrapped around each other, him still inside her, until the distant sound of a helicopter's rotars met Snow's ears.
"I've never been so sad to be rescued." he murmured.