A/N: Something about this couple always has me coming back to it lol. I kind of forgot where I was going with it halfway through and slightly irritated by the lack of romance, but maybe I could make something more of it, maybe not. I haven't decided on that part just yet.
"Pretty sure I'm going to die out here."
She chuckled lightly at his remark and tried to keep herself moving through the inches of snow that practically clung around her legs. The oncoming new flakes were battered by the harsh winter winds that would lift her green locks and whip them about almost painfully. The overnight snow had hit them hard and fast with no one really able to predict that it was even headed their way. But here it was. Cold, wet, and miserable.
"Yep, they're going to find my body frozen out here. Or I hope they at least find my body."
While most of the time she preferred silence…his words were humorous and helped her to at least ignore a bit of the environment around them. At least his voice was more comforting than the howling wind around them. At least it gave her a bit of hope that they were going to be able to make their way back to the camp without losing a limb to hypothermia. Not a lot of hope but, at least she wasn't out here by herself, right?
"What if they never find my body? That would almost be awesome if I didn't have to die in the process for it."
Pausing slightly, she turned her body just as another howling gust came through. Any uncovered flesh was struck harshly by its freezing pierce and was stung to the point of pain by the chill. Her face felt numb at this point and she was almost certain the feeling to her fingers and toes were gone. At least she had enough feeling in her legs to keep moving, straggling and limping a bit but still moving nonetheless. It felt like her hands couldn't close around her lance, which was almost tugged free from her hold by the wind alone.
He had a point though. If they didn't make it back to camp soon…no one would find them till the snow was melted away, which could be a few weeks to three months at this point. It was hard to tell.
"You know, if this storm didn't have the potential to kill me, I'd probably enjoy it."
"Are ya always this optimistic?" Nephenee questioned.
"I just have a very open view on a situation and people tend to like it." Boyd replied as he pulled the fur-lined collar of his jacket up higher around his neck. "Or at least they tend to pretend to like it and just kind of shake their heads in disappointment later on to save my feelings."
Another soft chuckle left her as she tugged at her helmet to help protect her eyes a bit more from the stinging gusts. "If we don't make it…well at least it was in good spirits."
"True that…but just for the note, we should probably at least attempt to make it before we settle on dying out here." he started. "But you know, if you want to confess a few things ahead of time, I don't have a problem with it."
She glanced over at him at the remark, almost finding his figure more blurred from the onslaught of snow sheets that fell down all around them. "Meaning what exactly?"
"Nothing, I'm just saying if you want to confess something that you think needs to be said before we may possibly die, I have no problem listening to it." he defended. "Here, I'll start off with an example, this one time I spit in Soren's drink because he pissed me off."
"Eww."
"Yeah I know, but if we make it out of here, don't tell him I did that." he chuckled. "But you know, something like that, if there's something you want to say then go ahead and say it. This could be your last chance."
It sounded silly and it wasn't like there was much she had to confess anyways but again, if it kept her attention off of the snow and the bitter coldness…there couldn't have been too much harm in it, right? "This one time, I purposely upsetted one of the horses so it would throw off a neighbor boy I didn't like."
"Remind me to never get on your bad side." Boyd remarked. "Then again, I don't own a horse…so I should be okay. I did once piss off a horse before and made it throw off its rider. Oscar still hasn't forgiven me for doing it."
"You did it to your own brother?" she questioned with a stifled laugh.
"Well it's not like I meant to, I just didn't know his horse was that skittish." he shrugged. "Also this one time I managed to break all of Rolf's arrows without him noticing me."
"That's horrible."
"That's what he gets for hanging out with a drunk." he replied. "And this one other time, I polished Gatrie's shield with saddle oil so he couldn't keep a grip on it throughout practice. Best day ever."
"Seems like you make yourself to be quite the troublemaker." she remarked with a soft smile.
"Well you know, being a mercenary isn't always so adventurous and fun sometimes. But I guess you would come out looking like a saint compared to me."
"I wouldn't say saint…" she started.
"Well then I guess that means you should start spilling it then."
"Okay…but just one more." she spoke as she reached up to push her battered, wet bangs from her face. "Once before…I removed the wheel of our neighbor's wagon and loosened the horses' reigns just so they couldn't get into town before we did and get the good livestock on sale."
"You monster."
"I didn't spit in anyone's drink." she reminded.
"Whatever, you weren't there, you didn't see how he deserved it." Boyd replied as he paused slightly to gain a better footing against the roaring winds. "Damn, in all my life out here, I have never seen a snowstorm like this before. Then again, I haven't had to march my way through one...nor have I gotten lost in one before..."
"We can't be too far from camp though, right? We didn't travel that far."
"They'll be sending out rescue parties for our bodies. Well at least I remembered to shave this morning."
"It's hard to concentrate on the positives with you." she remarked.
"It's hard to concentrate on anything with the snow all over the place and the inability to feel my legs anymore." he commented as he watched her pause now to regain her own footing. Her green uniform almost appeared to be soaked by the heavy snowfall and her long, matching strands were almost held completely straight by the extra weight of water in them. "You have got to be freezing."
"I'll live." she spoke as she continued on at his side. Her winter stockings did little against the cold but she hadn't predicted that they would make it this far in such little amount of time so she didn't plan on packing much of her winter gear. That plan was certainly coming back to torture her now. "It's nothing I haven't gone through before."
"Yeah well...Titania wouldn't let me breathe another day if she found out that I didn't offer you my jacket." he started.
"What? No, you keep it. I'm fine." she declined.
"Are you kidding me? It's like you're only wearing stockings out here and your clothes look thin anyways. Just take my jacket." he continued as he started to loosen the buttons on the front.
"Stop that. I'm not taking it."
"Don't worry, I've got a lot more body fat to keep me warm than you do." he managed to strip the front of it loose and shuddered slightly as a harsh gust of wind seemed to strike only his flesh. At least he remembered to dress in layers so he wasn't going to completely freeze or anything. "Let me just get my arms free and...hang on, I might have gotten myself stuck."
She only shook her head and continued on without him as he tried to wiggle himself free from the heavy jacket. "I'm still not taking it."
He let out a long, exhausted sigh over it before he managed to pull one arm free and then easily freed the next one. Despite her objections though, he really didn't feel like he could continue on if she wasn't wearing the jacket- after all, her clothing wasn't one that was meant for winter work anyways. Hell even he got lucky in remembering to bring this one. "If I have to wrestle this on you, I will."
"No."
Since when the hell did she start talking so much anyways? Not that he was complaining, her country accent was pretty cute. Normally she was just really shy but...maybe since it was just him and a blizzard, she really didn't have any other choice but to communicate with him. "Okay fine, then I am just going to sit down in the snow and wait for you to put on this jacket."
She paused for a moment and turned back towards him; taking note that he seemed fairly serious in his threat. "You wouldn't..."
"Oh yeah? Well then, I think I might make a few snow angels while I'm down here." he replied as he seemingly threw himself backwards into the snow behind him. "Oh man, this snow just cushioned my fall, there's gotta be at least two feet a snow right here."
His entire figure almost seemed to disappear beneath the white surface as she hurried back towards him. "What are ya doing? Get out of the snow before you get yourself a cold."
"At this point, I think a cold is the least of my worries." he shrugged; looking up as she leaned over him. "Wanna have a snowball fight?"
"Of course not, now get out of the snow!"
"Nah, I mean if I die, I want there to be a snow angel around me."
"You're being ridiculous." she sighed.
"I'm being ridiculous? You won't even take my damn jacket." he reminded as he attempted to toss it at her. "Why won't you just take it? It's just a jacket, not world peace."
"I just...it's not how it works. I can't just take something." she explained.
"Then trade me something for it. That works right? I mean, we're both getting something out of it."
"...okay, what do you want?"
He narrowed his eyes slightly in thought as he tried to figure something out. Anything little thing to get this whole stupid thing over with. "Okay uh...give me your red, necktie thing."
She raised her fingers to touch at the red material. "This? Why this?"
"Because I wouldn't fit in your stockings, I don't know." he answered. "I just chose something so we could get over this little episode and move on. Now take the damn jacket."
Carefully loosening the material, she pulled it free and handed it to him as he pushed his jacket into her hands. It certainly wasn't a fair trade but he seemed pretty content with the piece, either that or he was just celebrating in silent victory as she fitted herself into the oversized jacket. It was certainly warmer than what she was wearing now, despite it being just as dampened by the snow. "Come on, let's get you out of the snow now."
"That sounds like a good idea." he nodded as he pushed himself out of the snow and slowly got to his feet. "I could probably wrap this around my face and keep my nose warm."
"I...I don't think this sounds like a fair trade anymore-" she started.
"You can't take it back; I've already bonded with it." he interrupted as he finished tying the material around his neck. "You would be ruining a delicate process if we traded back- besides, I wouldn't accept that jacket anyways."
She could only shake her head at this point as he proved to only be more difficult than before. "What if we...shared the jacket?"
"Where are those two? It's getting late."
"It's Boyd; he's probably already lost somewhere out there." Ike spoke as he tightened his jacket around his cold neck. He watched as the red-haired woman turned to look at him with that certain 'you're not helping' look in her eyes. "You know how he is. When everything seems lost, he somehow still manages to come out alive."
"You're right about that." she chuckled for a moment before she turned her attention back to the dark forest around them. Camp had already been set up by the first members to arrive and had slowly been added to by every other following member. The entire establishment was set up and the soldiers were either busy warming themselves up in front of the fires or in their tents- hopefully by themselves. A few parties had been sent out before to scout out for any enemy movement, but that had been hours ago and just before this sudden downfall happened. Most of the members returned but...a few hadn't, and that had her worried.
"If there's one thing I know about Boyd...well a good thing I know about him, he's usually bound and determined to out strength anything out there- that includes the weather." Ike continued as he tried his best to bring some comfort to the woman. "And Nephenee knows a lot about surviving in the wilderness, with those two combined...I'm sure they're bound to get back soon enough."
"I know, it's just...I can't seem to stop worrying about them." Titania replied. "You know how he can be sometimes..."
"Yeah but even Boyd's not stupid enough to try something out in this weather." he remarked. "He's not going to do something stupid in this kind of weather- I mean, he hates the cold enough as it is, he wouldn't want to stay out any longer than he needs to."
"You're right." she nodded with a tired sigh. "I'm going to check on Rolf and make sure he's settled in for the night. I'll make sure Mist is too."
"Thanks. I'll just wait here for them." he spoke; watching as the woman slowly disappeared into the maze of tents around them. He let out his own sigh and watched as his breath came out in a white cloud. The temperatures would be dropping below zero tonight, which would not be something he was looking forward to. It wasn't the first time he had to battle the cold, but he had hated it the many times before, so this wouldn't be any different. "Come on Boyd, where the hell are you?"
Almost as if on cue, he turned at the sound of something breaking the nearby branches in the forest line and watched as a single figure stepped free. Already, well at least one of them came back. That didn't sound right, hang on...where was the other one?
"Let me be the first to say that if there were any enemy movements around us, they're probably already frozen somewhere back there." Boyd started as he walked into the camp; the front of his jacket protruded outwards as the green-haired Halberdier was partly tucked inside. "Also, I can't feel my legs."
"Well...it's nice to see you made it back alive." Ike replied. "Titania will be glad to hear the news."
"Yeah, tell her we're back and tell her I remembered to share my jacket."
"Oh don't worry about that...I'm sure she'll notice."
"It was her idea."
"Uh huh..."
"I'm serious."
"I'm sure you are Boyd, now if you'll excuse me..."