This was the worst of it. There was no way it couldn't be. Karan stared into the fire of the cramped space she called home, surrounded by her friends, wrapped tightly in a cloak and fought the creeping feeling of cold in her paws.

If she was cold, they were freezing. It terrified her. She looked over at Stone, her eyes tracing the outline the lycanroc cut in the darkness. She was shivering the least, but she was still shivering. Thea had given the fire one last burst of life over an hour ago, and while it still burned, the intensity of the flames waned. They had brought as much wood with them as they could stuff into their home, but this was a wet storm. The heavy snow melted quickly in their warm home, filling it with steam and rehydrating the firewood they'd fought so hard to keep dry. They still burned but every fresh log was less receptive and more demanding of Thea's energy.

The braixen was spent now, after nearly nine hours of on and off work. Karan wondered briefly how the other tents were faring and felt her stomach turn. They'd have their work cut out for them when morning came. If they even made it that far. She looked at Valor, the chesnaught's miserable face appearing a decade older in the harsh shadows of the firelight, and whispered, "Are you alright?"

The chesnaught's head barely moved as Valor nodded, but said nothing.

Karan swallowed and said in a raspy tone, "Never got this cold in Lumiose."

Thea's eyes opened slowly and focused on Karan, but she remained reclined against Valor's enormous arm. Whatever she said was drowned out by the gale outside.

"I can't hear you," said Karan, more loudly now.

"Lucky you!" said Thea, half-shouting over the din. The braixen drew the cloak around her closer to her body, still shivering.

Karan offered Thea a morbid grin and shouted back, "Lucky? Really?"

The braixen averted her eyes and said, "Bad choice of words. At least you didn't-" She stopped herself. "What am I supposed to even say?"

The weavile shook her head, still grinning. "Bad way to start a conversation." She paused and shrugged. "Can't think well right now. Too cold."

"You're too cold?" shouted Stone, joining in. "Gods above, we're gonna fucking die, aren't we?"

"We'll make it," shouted Valor, looking around at all of them in turn. "I'm worried about who won't out there."

"Valor, how can you be sure?" shouted Thea.

"Because we're not done yet," he shouted back. "This isn't over. None of us are done. Especially not you, Karan." He looked over at the weavile. "If we're done…" He trailed off.

Karan held her paws out towards the fire and then rubbed them together, her face set in a scowl.

"This is it, I guess," whispered Stone, her lower jaw shaking. "Up against the shit, right?" She drew her cloak closer to her body, her body giving way to the shivers she'd been trying to keep hidden.

"What, that's it? Good luck? Here goes nothing, we've done all we could - nothing more?" asked Valor, looking at Stone over the fire. "There has to be more we can still do. We can't be done. Not like this."

"I'm spent, Valor," whimpered Thea. "And I'm your only source of fire here. We make it to tomorrow or we-"

Karan clutched the sides of her head, squeezed her eyes shut and grit her teeth. It felt like the pressure in her skull was going to split it open. She hardly felt cold anymore - there was too much anger boiling up in her. This could not be the end for them. She was almost certain she could make it through the night even if the fire went out and something blew a hole in their door. Her eyes wrenched open and she stared into the fire. The anger in her chest began to unravel and soak into her limbs. They weren't done. She wouldn't let that happen.

"We're not done. You hear that, Stone? Not going to die." She stood up and looked around at her friends, and shouted with a fire that roared higher than the one before her. "We're not done! I'm not done!" She leapt over the fire and bolted outside, ignoring the shouts of fear and worry behind her.

Her night vision meant almost nothing in this disaster of a storm. The flurry of snow whipping around her made the homes around their own little more than vague blobs. Faint lights could be seen emanating from many of them at least. Most of them even. But only most of them. She pushed the grim thought aside and turned towards her own home and began to shape a curved wall of ice up from the accumulating snow on the ground. She hardly needed to breathe her own jets of icy air - just enough to direct the intense chill around her.

She wasn't very good at building walls, but that hardly mattered. Even if she could only get it a few feet off the ground, as long as she was able to shield the length of the house, it would be enough. The cold in her paws was biting at her now. She could hardly remember a time when she was actually truly cold.

Well, there was the time she'd been left bleeding on the ground of Agilrad's throne room. The kind of chill only a hole in the heart can bring. She pushed the thought from her head and stared at the wall she'd constructed from ice. It was barely three feet high, if that, but it was already doing its job - blocking the onslaught of snow. At least a little bit.

Enough to make it feel like she'd tried. Like she'd done something. She had to do something, anything to keep them alive. To keep herself alive. Karan raced back into her home, and brushed a paw against her stomach. She had to stay alive. But at the threshold of relative warmth and safety she paused and looked back at the indistinct blobs. The last bits of a fallen city she'd long ago decapitated. They had to stay alive too.

They needed walls. Perhaps New Crag really was fitting after all. Karan rubbed her paws together and drew her cloak close around her body, tugging and tying strings clumsily around her midsection to keep her head bottled up - and her child warm. If anything happened to her, she wouldn't be the only one to pay the price.

No, this was her duty. And it had to be done.

Her feet were very cold after just two haphazard sets of walls, and she was already lost as she finished her third. The blizzard howling in her ears was getting louder, but the wind didn't feel any stronger. She was panting now, but she hardly had to breathe out to blow walls of ice up around the homes. Her hands were just as cold as her feet now. Perhaps colder.

This was a tree.

This was a boulder.

This was the same tree. No, it was a different one. Probably. Why did they build in a forest? It was her idea, wasn't it? Idiot.

This house, covered in snow, its glow missing. She passed by it and saw the door was ajar, but Karan turned her head and refused to look in. Who knew where she even was in their village at this point, she'd been wandering aimlessly from glowing mound of snow and stone to glowing mound of snow and wood. This last one got perhaps a single foot of ice wall out of her, but it was something. It was anything, really.

Her head felt light as she stumbled up to the door, the sensation in her paws dissipating. Safety was on the other side of a simple latch, but her claws felt four times longer on her frozen paws. Defiance flickered in her heart - she wasn't about to die because she couldn't navigate a simple godsdamned latch.

The door was open for a second at most, blasting fresh snow in as she shut it clumsily behind her. The indistinct shapes before her stared back, incredulous, as she offered the the most complete explanation she could in her state:

The room faded from her vision as Karan collapsed.

Stone sat up and let out a long, shuddering breath. She was still cold, but at least she wasn't dead. That was something. The fire was dead, but Thea's rising and falling chest and Valor's tired eyes and equally tired nod as she got to her feet confirmed they'd made it.

Karan was missing. They'd thought of going after her. She almost did. Several times. And each time, the look Valor gave her made it clear it would do nothing but kill her. The little bastard was right and she hated it. But the sound she'd been waiting for had finally come: none at all. The gale outside had died, and the light pouring in from the crack under the door made it abundantly clear that it was a sunny day.

"I'm gonna find Karan. If she's not dead, them I'm gonna fuckin' kill her. Can't believe she pulled that shit. Does she have any idea what-" Stone caught herself and turned away, blinking back bitter tears. "I'll be back." The lycanroc snatched a cloak and her sword from the floor and strapped them both on. "Stay inside. I know for a fucking fact you didn't sleep."

"And you did?" mumbled Valor, his eyes drooping.

"I enjoyed a night of laying on my side thinking my best friend might be dead."

"Then I'm coming with you," said Valor, lurching forward to stand up.

"You're not waking that fox. Stay," said Stone, wheeling around and pointing at Thea. "The village ain't that big, it won't take long."

Valor grimaced, but nodded. "Fine. Give her a good one for me." Stone nodded and closed the door to her home, spun on the spot and walked all of four steps into the snow when a voice called out to her.

Weird mounds had accumulated next to their home and several others. She inspected the one outside their own house and began brushing and shoving aside heavy pawfuls of wet snow. Her claws raked against hard ice and she began to dig more vigorously. A section of crude ice wall glittered back at her in the morning sun.

The blizzard had felt like it let up a bit after Karan had left. Was this what she was doing? Stone looked around. How many homes did she do? All of them? Couldn't be. She returned to her front door and looked for tracks in the snow, but found only her own. Of course, the blizzard didn't stop when Karan went outside. Any tracks she made would have been filled in over the rest of the night.

Time to pick a direction, I guess. Stone marched towards the house across the way. Or whatever a stretch of snowy ground could be called. The trees all around her were coated in snow, their branches forming sharp angles of pure white against a blue sky. It was beautiful, but she was too worried and too upset to care. As her oversized paw banged against the door to the home before her she shouted, "Hey! Wake up call! I'm looking for Karan! Is she in there?"

No reply.

Stone grimaced and knocked again, much more gently and said in a softer voice, "Hello? Is anyone there?" Still no reply. The lycanroc swallowed and lifted the latch - it was difficult, and the crunch of ice as she lifted it sent a rock sliding down her throat. It felt like a boulder as it hit her stomach at the sight before her: three frozen corpses huddled together in the far corner of the house, and a mound of snow where their fire should have been. The roof had partially given out.

Please, don't tell me Karan wasted time shielding this place. She stepped away from the frozen tomb and checked the house for a makeshift wall. Nothing. Small comfort, they were still dead, but wasted effort was wasted effort. Time to check another house.

This one had a mound beside it. A wall beneath the snow. She could hear faint voices even. She knocked twice on the door and shouted, "Hello? Everything alright in there?"

A voice from the other side of the door called back, "Do we have to open up? It's freezing outside and we'd rather the heat not get out."

"Is there a weavile in there with you?" asked Stone.

"What? You mean the Empress? No, why would she be in here? Her home is uh… well you can't see it, but I'm pointing towards it."

Another voice laughed and added, "Stop pointing, idiot. Her home is to the northeast. Why are you looking for her?"

"Don't worry about it," grumbled Stone, turning away. No luck here. She looked around the village and settled her eyes on Sava's house. A tree had fallen over onto it. Stone sprinted as quickly as the snow allowed her.

The lack of tracks leading out of the home only terrified Stone further. They can't have lost them, right? What the fuck would they do without Sava and Balsam? She paused, and looked at the tree. There was a much higher mound of snow on the side of their home, high enough in fact, that it had stopped the tree from landing on the roof of the structure. The ice wall had caught it. She didn't bother knocking - she couldn't stomach the thought of hearing nothing in reply. What if a branch broke off and left a hole in the roof anyway? The latch was smooth enough. She pushed the door open a fraction and then stopped.

What if they were dead? What if Karan was in here too, and this was their grave? It'd mean they were all doomed. The villagers, anyway. She couldn't stay here if Karan was dead. She'd drag Valor kicking and screaming if she had to. Thea too.

"In or out, but pick one," said a quiet voice.

Stone threw the door open and then slammed it shut behind her as relief washed over her body. "Sava! Balsam, you guys are alive!" shouted Stone, stepping inside. Alive was a tenuous term to apply. At least to Balsam, anyway. The breloom laid in Sava's lap, barely stirring, one eye half open.

"Ss...tone…" he rasped. A small smile formed on his lips.

"A bough crashed through the roof. Missed the fire but… He'll live," said Sava, stroking the mushroom on Balsam's head. Stone looked up at the roof - there it was, still tangled up in a mess of wood, stone and grasses.

The lycanroc knelt down and looked over the breloom's body. Discolored patches of greenish-black dotted him. "I can get the roof fixed for you, just give me some time. I need to get the tree that fell on your wall moved before it breaks apart and really comes down on this-"

"Tree? What tree?" said Sava, her eyes widening in alarm. "And what wall are you talking about? I thought this bough was blown in…" She stopped and swung her head around, looking towards a figure towards the back of their home. A cloak was draped over them, but brilliant red plumage in an arcing headdress gleamed back at Stone.

"Karan… is she?"

"She's alive." Sava looked back at Stone. "Did you say a wall?"

"Made of ice. A few of the homes have them, not sure how many, I don't know how many Karan got around to making but…"

"K-Karan made them?" asked Sava, her composure slipping. The mienshao's nose was twitching, and her eyes were slowly becoming bloodshot. "Sh-she… she made a wall for our home in that blizzard?"

"For several, I'd say. One of them was outside a home that didn't make it, though. No idea what caused their roof to collapse, 'cos I didn't see a tree. Just weight and bad luck I guess," mumbled Stone.

Sava pulled Balsam closer to her chest and whispered in a brittle voice, "I would have lost you."

"How did she end up here?" asked Stone.

"Barged in and then collapsed. We tended her as best as we could," whispered Sava. She continued to clutch Balsam to her chest. "She must have been exhausted. Or nearly dead."

Stone stood up and looked over at Karan, then turned on the spot. "I'm gonna move that tree. I can yell at her for being stupid later. Just keep your fire going and keep Balsam warm." The lycanroc stepped outside into the cold air of dawn and got to work. Or tried to, at least. She could try and shift it aside, slide it away and hope for the best but that could break the wall.

She continued to stare the frozen log down and then finally growled and muttered, "Fuck it." She trudged under it and dropped down into a squat, ready to spring up. Three. Two. One. She leapt as hard as her legs allowed, and swung her head up in an arc, headbutting the tree and sending it upright. She landed and immediately launched herself at it, doing all she could to ignore the stars in her eyes, and brought the tree down away from the home. It collided with several other boughs from other trees, breaking them off and eventually catching it in a tangled mess of locked and frozen branches.

The lycanroc slid off the log and wobbled a bit in place, her head pounding. That fucking hurt. She made her way back towards the front of Sava's home very slowly, taking measured steps and trying to will the dull ache in her head away. Built for it or not, it still hurt having to headbutt a tree.

Stone stood in front of Sava's home, still rubbing her forehead. Was probably best to give Sava some time with Balsam. Karan was asleep so Sava could do whatever she had to without Stone watching the whole thing. The lycanroc pulled a hard piece of jerky from her belt pouch and chewed pensively on it. The powdery white snow covering the homes of their village reminded her of postcards from gift shops back home.

She frowned. Unova had heating and proper homes built to withstand cold when the weather turned sour. They had crude wood and stone structures with fires in them. Sure, it's how they used to do it according to history books, but she also remembered hearing that winter managed to still kill humans even in whatever her old "current day" counted as.

"Stone?" said a voice. The lycanroc snapped out of her daydreaming and glanced at the source of the noise. A whimsicott, looking rather unusual in a very small cloak. Two tangela stacked atop one another stood beside her. Their cloak covered both of them well enough. The eyes peeking back at Stone towards the bottom of where the cloak opened up widest was comical.

"What's up?" asked Stone.

"We found a wall of ice next to our house. Any idea why?" asked the whimsicott.

"Uh, yeah. Karan made them last night. Not sure how many. I don't think every house got one, as far as I can see," replied Stone, looking around. More pokemon were filing out of their homes now. Some of them anyway. Several more pokemon approached.

They had the same question for the lycanroc. The ice walls were of varying heights and quality. Some were as tall as Stone, according to one group. Others were barely taller than a single tangela. One wall was too thin and had broken at some point, leaving the occupants of the home wondering why they heard ice shatter in the night. Another was so short it had done very little.

"Why would she make something so poor?" asked a delcatty, sounding indignant. "It hardly did anything."

"Some houses didn't get a wall. Why are you complaining?" asked Wuther. The altaria offered Stone a solemn nod as he drew closer. "Everyone in my shelter made it. Yours?"

"Yeah. We're good," said Stone, nodding.

"Great to hear. This gathering just questions about the ice walls?"

"Yeah, I think so. Karan's doing."

"Impressive. Frosmoth living with me told me it sounded like death out there. Was scared to leave if we needed more wood - she didn't think she'd make it to the storage and back."

"Karan collapsed in Sava's home," said Stone, much more loudly so the rest of the pokemon present would hear. "As far as I know, she's alive but…"

"She'll pull through. Balsam told me that weavile can take her lumps," said Wuther, turning his gaze skyward. He stretched his wings and groaned. "Clear skies are so inviting, but I know I'd start freezing if I went faster than a newborn chick."

"Balsam almost didn't make it," said Stone, her voice dropping.

Wuther looked alarmed. "But only almost, right? He's still kicking?"

"Think so. Looked bad though."

"Why's everyone gathered out here?" asked an all too familiar voice. Stone grimaced and turned in its direction. It was Valor.

"I told you to stay inside," she growled.

"You try staying inside after you start hearing a commotion next door," said Valor, dismissing the comment with a wave of a massive arm. "What's going on?"

"Yeah, we got sick of not being able to understand what was happening," said Thea, her head popping up from behind the single massive spike Valor still had on his back.

"Are you riding around on his back?" asked Wuther, amused.

"It's cold."

"You breathe fire."

"And?"

"Don't bother, she'll win every time," said Valor, offering the altaria a small smile before becoming serious once more. "What's happening?"

"Citizens wanted to know who was making ice walls for some of the homes to stop some of last night's shitstorm," explained Stone. "I was just offering explanations."

"Have we started checking the homes that haven't opened up yet? For…well, you know," asked Valor, his tone becoming grim.

"Found a caved in roof in one so far. That's it," said Stone.

Thea frowned and looked around the village. "We should start checking all the homes, then."

"I'll get on it," said Wuther, raising a fluffy wing. "Just have to grab the rest of my sheltermates. You all can make sure the Empress is okay."

"You hang out with Balsam too much," called Stone after the altaria as he retreated.

"Surprised he volunteered to go do something so morbid," said the tangela at the bottom of the stack. "His house didn't get a wall."

"The fact that houses even got walls was enough," said Thea.

"Can we go thank her?" asked the whimsicott. "That's why we went out in the first place. Well, second place. We were originally just going to get more firewood but then we saw the mounds and - well, you know the rest."

"It's cramped in there, lemme check. Just keep it quiet if Sava says yes. Balsam's not doing too good, so we don't want to wake him," said Stone. She trudged through the snow up to Sava's door and cracked it. "And close it behind you."

Stone peeked her head into the house and said, "Sava. Got a few citizens here. They want to thank Karan. We'll be quiet. That alright?" Sava looked up from the sleeping breloom in her arms and stared back at Stone with shining, bloodshot eyes surrounded by wet fur. She nodded.

"Karan. Karan. Wake up."

Karan's eyes peeled open slowly and began to water as the light from the hole in the ceiling filled her vision. She winced and turned away from the source of both the sound and the light. Exhaustion gripped her. The last thing she remembered was the door to her shelter opening up, a fire and fuzzy shapes. Then nothing.

"Get up. There are pokemon here to talk to you."

Karan knew that voice. "Stone."

"Yeah. Get up."

The weavile sat up and opened her eyes again. The blurry forms of several pokemon came into gradual relief in her eyes. The cloak she'd turned into a blanket was still draped across her. Good. "What is it?" she asked, looking at the citizens staring back at her. Somewhere behind them, she saw Valor towering above them all.

"Couple of things, but I'll yell at you for keeping me up all night worried sick later." The lycanroc gestured to the citizens present.

"Thank you for those ice walls," said the whimsicott closest to Karan. She inclined her head. "They helped. I think you saved lives. How many did you even make?"

Karan opened her mouth to reply, but was cut off by the tangela beside the whimsicott. The mess of vines her nodded in agreement, his entire body rustling and bouncing all the while. "We weren't sure what it was that made the blizzard more tolerable last night until we saw them. We thought we were about to be hit by the worst of it, really." His animated bouncing stopped, and his tone grew somber. "We were running low on firewood and worried we wouldn't make it."

A delcatty pushed to the front and nodded vigorously. "The wall we got wasn't very large but…" He paused and inclined his head. Karan recognized him - he was the same delcatty that had complained about the firewood storage some time ago. "It helped. It was more than anyone else did." He chewed his tongue and added, "Or could have done, to be fair."

"You were lucky to get one. Lots of 'em didn't," noted Stone, turning her narrowed eyes on the cat.

"I know, I know. Thank you, Empress. Really." He slinked back into the crowd, his thanks morphing into a chorus. Stone hushed them.

Karan's eyes slipped from one citizen to another, then finally to Stone, and then down to the floor. "You're…" She paused. Something in her stirred - the gratitude in their words, even in the delcatty's reluctant tone, resonated in her. It was painful, like it threatened to crack her insides apart. She cleared her throat and nodded. "You're welcome." She threw Stone a furtive look before focusing on the floor once more. "I'm-" She trailed off.

Stone stepped in front of Karan and said loudly, "She's had a really rough night. Doing all that might have killed her, and we're making too much noise for Sava and Balsam anyway."

"We'll leave you in peace," said the whimsicott, nodding. "Thank you." The pokemon filed out of Sava's home, leaving just Karan, her friends, Sava and Balam inside.

Karan looked up at the others and found Stone's eyes and nodded. "Good catch."

"You don't take thanks too well," mumbled the lycanroc.

"Citizens still died, and I couldn't get to all of the homes," muttered Karan. "And I almost died. Not ideal."

To everyone's surprise, Balsam sat up in his wife's lap and opened a single eye to train it on Karan. A pained smile split his lips and he rasped, "Yer alive." Karan nodded. Her body felt strange, like it was becoming fog. Weightlessness gripped her limbs, crept through her torso in tongues and lapped at her neck. "Thanks," he struggled out. "Hate to know… you died savin' me." He managed a weak chuckle and laid back in Sava's lap. "Good job, Karan."

Sava looked over at Karan, the fur around her eyes now soaked through. "You s-saved…" The rest of the words dissolved into mush as she hung her head and her body began to shake. Quiet sobs rose over the crackle of the fire. Whatever she mumbled next was incomprehensible, spoken more to the mushroom atop Balsam's head than to Karan. The weavile saw Sava's grip on Balsam's body tighten as the mienshao's sobs wracked her body.

Karan swallowed and chewed her tongue, trying to ignore the tightening of her throat. She looked away, determined to keep anyone from seeing her face. Shame immediately set in and wrenched her focus back onto Sava. She couldn't just ignore this. But the sight of Sava clutching Balsam, hunched over and shaking-

It took hold of her too, and she had nowhere else to turn. Karan turned to the ends of her cloak, fidgeting with them and the fraying ends. Wet patches began to blot across the fabric as tears fell from her eyes. Her breathing was shaky, a rapid series of inhales and exhales. Stone sat down beside Karan and pulled her close to her chest and said nothing.

Someone hid her face for her. She wrapped her arms around Stone and cried.

Painfully pure gratitude. It was something she had not received in a long time. As she tightened her grip around Stone and sobbed a widening patch of wet fur onto her chest, she did her best to mumble her thanks to her friend.

She was alive. They all were.