Disclaimer: NMEC's

Thank you everyone for your reviews on my other H/T story Paper Wings they were all very much appreciated and reading them again today gave me the motivation to write this :D (Writing this is the first break I've had in about two months of bad writer's block)

This story is going to be a long one - no oneshots this time - prepare yourself for lots of action and adventure with a regular dose of butt-kicking and badass-ness!

"Trouble?" Holly called, her voice hoarse from shock and inhaled dust. "Trouble, you okay?"

She blinked in an attempt to see through the darkness surrounding her, searching frantically for some sign that the other elf had survived the fall as well. They'd been running from…something…something bad-

D'Arvit, she mentally swore. Why can't I remember? This is important brain, work!

Holly unconsciously began to grind her teeth, a habit she'd picked up from the late Commander Julius Root. Normally the grinding wasn't a problem, but the slight movement of her jaw brought a more serious matter to her attention.

"What the hell," she gasped in pain as her right temple began to throb like a demon with rabies.

That's gotta be a concussion…or worse, a more alert, detached portion of Holly's mind observed.

"Trouble?" she yelled again, her gut twisting in fear.

"Over here," the male elf coughed from somewhere on Holly's right.

"You okay?"

"I think I got knocked unconscious by a chunk of the cliff we fell off but my head isn't too bad, considering. Got a few cuts and bruises, of course, and what feels like a dislocated thumb. How are you?"

"Uh, not too good. I cracked my head on something too but it feels serious…"

"Got magic?"

"None left," Holly sighed in frustration. "I can't even remember how I managed to use it all!"

"You clinically died for three minutes."

"Oh, that would explain it…why was I dead?"

Trouble shifted from the awkward position he was lying in, causing a small avalanche of rock chips to slide from his standard issue Retrieval jumpsuit. "It's a long story, Holly. I'll explain it all once we're both out of immediate danger- and once I've had a chance to look at your head wound."

"You're worried about that too?" she whispered, straining her eyes to see Trouble picking his way through the rubble to get to her.

"A bit," he admitted. "You've only lost your short term memory which is good – in the grand scheme of things – but you might have fractured your skull and there could be bleeding in your brain."

The best response Holly could manage was a noncommittal grunt. Even though Trouble tried to downplay the potential seriousness of her injury, she could still hear the fears he left unspoken hanging like leadweights from every word.

"At least I've still got a few sparks left," Trouble continued, unfazed by Holly's silence as he weaved his way between raggedly shaped boulders to reach her. "I might be able to do some minor healing to keep you stable until we can get out and get help."

"You really think we'll get out of here?"she quietly asked, peering around the cavern they'd dropped into when the cliff face had collapsed. The rock walls were too smooth to provide any foot or handholds to climb out and the floor of the cavern was littered with a thick layer of debris. A fully equipped officer could get out rather easily using wings or a moonbelt and retractable pitons. Holly and Trouble, however, had no equipment.

"We will. How many times have we got into situations like this and survived?"

"Too many."

"See, we're not green recruits; we've worked as a damned good team in the past."

She knew he was trying to distract her, take her mind of the fact that she may well be dying, but she felt too exhausted to call him on it. "When we get back, I'm going to demand you be banned from going on missions with me – we always end up injured or almost dead when we work together."

"But we pull through," Trouble countered as he shifted a thick slab of stone so he could sit beside Holly in the dirt.

"Yeah, we pull through," she said, repeating Trouble's three word mantra for life or death situations. "Can you actually see my head through all this dust?"

"Sort of, but I don't really need to."

"What do you mean?" Holly frowned as a small spark of blue light began to radiate from Trouble's right index finger. "Oh-"

Before Holly could finish, Trouble gently grasped her wrist with his hand and let the tiny amount of magic he had left pour into her veins. The sparks took a few seconds to catalogue her injuries before they darted up Holly's spinal cord to her brain. As Trouble had suspected, she did have some bleeding in her brain and part of her skull was fractured and buckled slightly inwards which his magic immediately began to heal.

"Urgh," Holly moaned as her cranial bones grated together, sending shards of seering pain bouncing down her nerves. She tried to fight the pull of sleep as her eyelids began to flicker shut. Trouble noticed her 'bad patient' routine as his magic tried to shut her body in order to fix it and carefully leaned over to stroke her jaw.

"Sleep," he ordered as her eyes reluctantly closed, "I'll be here when you wake up."

"Better be," Holly mumbled, falling into unconsciousness.

The next chapter - and the ones after that - are all going to be a lot longer than this one and there's going to be a whole load of action and adventure with some good old fluff thrown in so make sure you add this to your alerts if you liked it so far!

And, yes, you will find out what Holly and Trouble were running from...just not yet :P Anyone got any ideas what it could be?

Reviews are really appreciated and replied to (*nudge nudge*) and you can review anonymously/if you don't have an account! :D