Wow, thanks for all the reviews guys! It's like Christmas Bliss quantity all over again :D

I have an announcement:

I need to leave Fanfiction. Not right this second, just soon. It's just taking too much time from my life, especially from dating and practicing other talents. I've had an awesome time here writing and reading stories, and definitely learning and making friends, but I've been in the PnF section for long enough. Don't worry, I still have a few more chapters to post, but I do have a possible job offering for someone:

There are still a few final chapters of this story that I have planned out, but have not yet written. I have an idea of what will happen, and there are a few key events that will take place, but there are still lots of decisions to make. What I'm asking is, when I leave, Would anyone like to finish writing Frozen Reality for me? This is just an idea of mine, and I will be picky on who can write it (I know which authors can write quality chapters and which ones need more experience). Again, I already know what will happen; you can just add your own creativity to it. PM you if you're interested.

Before we get to the good stuff, there's one thing I need to make clear: Yes, Phineas loves Isabella. But not in the romantic way, more of how a brother loves his sister. Even though they had a little moment in the last chapter, they're not together. It was a friendship type of thing, no matter how much Isabella would have liked it the other way ;)


Chapter 9: The Ravine


Isabella's scream was sucked out of her as she hurtled into into the pitch black ravine, scrabbling and slashing at the icy, rough stone walls in a desperate attempt to stop herself. The cold air streaked past her face like a cold branding iron, and her hair whipped violently around her. Her hand chafed against a sharp rock wall as she fell, but she barely registered it, more intent on her life flashing before her eyes.

But her life wasn't flashing before her eyes. She was just plummeting ever downwards, time seeming to pass on forever as she picked up speed. No regrets coursed through her, no wishes, no pleadings. Just the darkness swallowing her into its midst.

And then, only seconds later—though it felt like minutes—Isabella felt herself collide with the crevice floor. Except, it wasn't a floor.

With a tremendous splash, Isabella was submerged in a warm underground river, her momentum pulling her deep under the water. Her eyes shot open to see nothing but black water, and she fought to swim upwards. But she couldn't tell which direction was up and kept tumbling through the water until she spotted the faint sliver of light coming from the sky high above her.

Isabella felt herself going dizzy, yet she still swam towards the light. But it was fading, and she had gone so far under. The strong currents forced her into an underwater somersault, but then, with a huge gasp, she finally found the river's surface and looked around blindly for anything to hold on to. Her arm hit a side of the ravine, but it was too slippery to find a handhold, and once again, she was sucked under. She gasped again and swallowed water, and she felt a sharp rock slash across her stomach, creating a fresh wave of pain.

Somebody let out a yell just as Isabella bobbed up to the surface again, being pulled into a faster current. She was thrown down a small waterfall and was pushed under yet again, and amidst trying to reach the surface, her head slammed into a solid wall of rock. Her racing thoughts of survival were immediately wiped out and replaced with a lungs screamed for oxygen, but her weak, throbbing muscles weren't strong enough to bring herself to the surface. Her thick winter clothing was pulling her down and was zipped up too tightly to shake off. With a final, faltering stroke, Isabella felt herself begin to drift into the river's depths.

But then, Isabella was jerked upwards, being pulled around her waist by some unknown force. Seconds later, she broke the surface, coughing up water and sucking in deep breaths of clean air. Somebody was yelling something, but it was hard to make out. She dipped under the surface again but was forced back up.

"Swim, Izzy, swim!" Isabella finally understood the distant, strangled voice, and she obeyed. One by one, she forced her heavy, flailing arms and legs to propel herself forwards, and willed herself to continue. She got another breath of air and continued, thinking of nothing but going on. She swam and swam, tilting her head to breathe between strokes.

All of a sudden, the raging waters began to spiral downwards and Isabella felt her body beginning to tumble down a turbulent, much larger waterfall. It was too dark to see much anything and her arms fell uselessly before she landed in the river below, narrowly missing a jutting rock.

Isabella felt herself shutting down. Her muscles were losing feeling, now only subject to the occasional spasm of dull pain, and so much water had trickled into her lungs that most breaths were stifled by fits of hoarse coughing. She couldn't tell whether the water was hot or cold anymore, but it was sapping away at her energy. Her mind was going fuzzy, almost in a peaceful sort of way, and she had the urge to just stop and enjoy it. It felt nice, relaxing.

But just as she was letting her eyelids close one last time, Isabella saw a sliver of bright light even from under the water. Without thinking, without even remembering the slightest reason why anymore, she swam towards the light. Left arm. Right arm. Breath. Left arm. Right arm. Breath.

After what seemed like hours, Isabella felt a smooth rock coming up beneath her, and let herself pancake onto the shore. Somebody was dragging her out of the water while her own body lay limp. And then she was out of the water and shrouded in dazzling sunlight, coughing and spluttering for fresh air and laying on the ground in a heap. The rough rock supporting her body was tantamount to heaven. She didn't have to do anything to stay anchored on it, didn't have to fight to stay above the water any longer.

With tremendous effort, Isabella cracked open her waterlogged, bloodshot eyes and could just make out Phineas gasping beside her, one of his arms still in a deadlock around her chest. He was holding onto me? she thought faintly, not at all aware of his earlier presence. With a loud sigh he let his arm go, and it flopped lifelessly to the side. Isabella tried to speak but couldn't form the words.

After several minutes, Isabella forced herself to sit up, reclining against a rock wall behind them. They had managed to clamber onto a thin, flat piece of rock, water still lapping over it occasionally. Phineas struggled to move beside her, still shivering and gasping virulently.

The crevice had miraculously led them outside. Out of the dark, claustrophobic crack in the ground, and into the side of a narrow valley in the mountains. It was confined, as steep walls stopped them from leaving in most places, and surprisingly contained almost no snow. The underwater river emptied out through a small tunnel in a mountain and seemed to pool here before rushing on further into the unknown.

Phineas slumped over onto Isabella's shoulder, apparently even more weary than she. He had, after all, pulled her through what seemed like a mile's worth of water. "Phineas," she murmured, trying to look over at him, "You saved us." He muttered something incoherent and stared unnaturally into the rushing water at their feet.

Something was wrong. Phineas's breathing was shallow, and he wasn't talking back. His eyes were glazed over and unfocused.

"Phin, what's the matter?" Isabella panted, trying to examine him while ignoring her the growing pain right below her chest. He moaned and leaned further into her, and she noticed that he was clutching his stomach. With tender force, Isabella removed his hands and let out a horrified gasp.

A gaping hole had been ripped through Phineas's coat, the frayed edges of fabric around it tinged red from blood. Isabella frantically unzipped his coat and rolled up his soaked orange shirt to discover a puncture wound going through his right side, in and out. Phineas had been hit by a bullet, and blood was still seeping out of each side of the wound. It was too far out to cause serious damage and probably didn't break any ribs, but it was still an emergency nonetheless. He was probably suffering from shock.

We need to call an ambulance, she thought instinctively, but that obviously wasn't an option. Still, she had been trained in emergency medicine years ago, and remembered most of what to do. "You're okay Phineas, I'm here. Just sit tight," she instructed curtly, temporarily forgetting how debilitated she really was. She tore off her thick, sopping coat and used it to dress the area, then used the white scarf he had fashioned for her to wrap his waist tightly and stop the blood flow. Phineas hissed and stiffened as she held pressure on the wound, gripping her knee tightly for support, but he let her work. She added another long strip of fabric from the hem of her dress and tied them together so that no more blood would be lost. A few minutes later, she made a final knot and had a primitive but working bandage around his abdomen.

Isabella flopped back to the side, absolutely exhausted, but her mind was racing. The snowmobiles seemed like a distant memory in comparison to the unnaturally hot river. How had Phineas known about the danger they were in? How had he pulled her through and out of the water, even after being shot?

Phineas read her mind. "I got hit … up there," he rasped, "After those gunshots started. … I don't know how … I kept going." He shifted himself up and let out a small moan. "Adrenaline, I guess."

Isabella gaped at him. He had saved her from the snowmobiles, pulled her through that raging river, all the while suffering a bullet wound?

"Phineas," she panted, "you've got some serious guts."

Phineas half-smiled and tried to laugh, but the pain made it come out as more of an uneven groan. Isabella blushed, realizing how unfitting that must have sounded, but decided to ignore it.

"Does it hurt?" she asked tentatively, hoping her bandage wasn't uncomfortable. He didn't answer, but Isabella knew he was holding back a moan.

"Are you hurt?" he mirrored back. Isabella glanced down at herself; she had several cuts and bruises and a throbbing headache, and her dress had been ripped where the jagged rock had sliced her stomach, revealing a long but superficial cut. It had been lightly bleeding before but had stopped on its own, and luckily, neither of them had broken any bones or life threatening wounds.

"I'm a lot better off than you," she muttered back.

Isabella had a burning question in the back of her mind, something she knew Phineas couldn't answer either.

How are we going to get home if our rescuers want to kill us?

She still wished that she could be the leader, as she always had for the Fireside girls. She wanted to be the one providing the answers and hope, not the questions and fear. But this was different from before. This was life-or-death, not in a controlled environment like her past experiences, and Phineas obviously had a better grasp on things. Right now, she just felt like a helpless teenage girl.

"I've got ... some food in my coat," Phineas muttered. Isabella reached behind him into his quashed backpack, trying not to nudge him and cause discomfort, and found six remaining protein bars grotesquely mashed together and one tiny fruit cup. They now had at most three days before they ran out, as most of their supplies was probably now with the enemies or swept away by the river.

At least it's warm enough by the river, she thought, We'll survive without the sleeping bag. The water was definitely warm, Isabella could now recall—she hypothesized that it could be pressure-heated deep underground—but the rest of their situation was looking grim.

Isabella could see a shimmering pool of water not too far behind them, surrounded by what looked like whitish bubbles growing over the stone ground. Too tired to wonder what species of unknown plants they were, she placed an arm over Phineas's shoulder, and together they limped towards the pool, both cringing in pain.

When they finally reached it several minutes later, Isabella tested the bubbles with her bare feet—her boots had been lost in the river—and found them soft and spongy. They didn't have the capacity to safety check them as they had promised, and collapsed onto them at once.

Isabella knew that it was stupid not to check for surrounding dangers or amenities, that it was too early to fall asleep, but they needed to recover. She helped Phineas remove the remains of his still-wet snow gear and his shirt, then set them and her gear to the side to dry. Without a second thought she curled into Phineas's bare side, no longer for warmth, but just to be with him. It was warm enough that they didn't need to sleep together anymore, but now they wanted to.

Something had changed between the two of them, and Isabella knew it. She felt closer to him than ever before, much closer than flirtatious best friends. It had taken a few awkward nights, but they were now used to sleeping together, even when they no longer had to. And needing to depend on each other to survive had strengthened their bond even more.

"We can still get out of this," Phineas said, pulling her out of thought. "I made you a promise, Izzy, and I'm keeping it."

The comfortable setting gave Isabella enough confidence to open up on the issue that had been nagging her. "Do you think there will be earthquakes down here too?" She had meant to sound indifferent, but it came out a little wobbly.

"Even if there are, I'm here to protect you, Izzy." He draped an arm around her, making her feel warm and secure.

"I love you, Phin," Isabella mumbled, laying her head on his chest.

To her surprise, Phineas did something Isabella never would have thought capable for someone as romantically challenged as he. He craned his neck forward, and kissed her softly on the forehead. "I love you more," he whispered back, making her heart melt, and together they drifted off to sleep.


Let me reiterate: They aren't boyfriend/girlfriend yet, they're just getting closer and closer without realizing it. Or at least Phineas isn't quite realizing it.

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~Word of the Week~

Tantamount tanta (rhymes with manta-ray) + mount Verb

-equivalent, as in value, force, effect, or signification.

This word is almost a formal version of the word 'like'. From the story: "The rough rock supporting her body was tantamount to heaven." We could replace 'tantamount' with 'like' (or even 'comparable to') and it would still make sense: "The rough rock supporting her body was like heaven." Tantamount means that something is comparable to something else. For example, "her eyes were tantamount to the stars in the sky" would mean that her eyes were as bright as the stars in the sky, or comparable to them.

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Guest Review Responses: (Holy cow lots of guests!)

3/23 Guest:That's why I post them once a week :)

Red Dragon: My other story "Christmas Bliss" covers both Phineas and Isabella's POV's if you'd like to see how Phineas thinks a little more. Did my comment about Phineas and Isabella 'loving' each other help clear up that concern of yours? And yep, their pictures are 'supreme' to everyone elses XD

midnight: No but I left it like that once I saw it XD Phineas just loves her as a friend, because he cares about her :)

Ferb: That's the spirit I'd like to hear!

Phineas: Whoa, are we gonna get a whole group of cartoon characters reviewing? Don't worry about being 'corny' ;)

Izzy Isabella: Lol I can't guarantee any of that, sorry!

3/24 guest: I hope my post helps you understand how Phineas 'loves' Isabella. I don't know, will Perry or Doof join?

3/26 Guest: Phineas thought it was corny because he was saying something 'romantic', and in my story, he correlates anything romantic with being corny.

Terra: Lots of good questions, but I'm afraid I can't answer them or that would spoil it!

Phinbella Fan: Thanks :)