CHAPTER 3

It was just after six thirty when Le scrambled up over the edge to join Nikita who had arrived only minutes earlier, but already almost finished setting out their simple breakfast.

"I've got hot tea and muffins," she announced, finishing by pulling out t wo tea bags and dropping them into the cups of hot water she had poured from the thermos, "and we're just in time for the sunrise."

The grey sky was beginning to give way to a soft orange glow, and pink already streaked through the sky. They really weren't that far from the cabin, but the sunrise appeared totally different from here. Above most of the trees, they could clearly see as the sun peaked over the horizon from this breathtaking new angle.

"It's really nice," Le commented. "I don't think I could get up in the middle of the night for this every day, but I would do it again some time."

Nikita simply smiled and sipped her tea. "I would too. We don't have a view anything like this in the city."

In the city- Le had nearly forgotten she had to go back soon. It had been nice having someone closer to his age around at the cabin, even though she had a tendency to drag him into crazy things like this.

The sun continued to rise higher, its warmth chasing away the crisp night air, and he knew it was going to be a warm day even though it was mid-November.

"I guess we should start heading back," he suggested. As much as he didn't want to, they still had a long trek back, and before lone people would be wondering where they had gone.

\A/

"Hand me the spatula, will you?"

Saint John did so, catching a whiff of the warm bread. "Where'd you learn to be such a good cook anyway? I can't get you to touch a steak, but it can't be because you can't cook it. Everything is always so good."

"I have a few dishes I've worked on," String conceded, "but it's nothing too fancy."

"I don't know; nothing that I make is that good," Saint John answered, pulling out a stack of plates for the French toast. "You don't give yourself enough credit." Saint John set glasses and juice on the table and turned back to his brother. "Anything else I can do?"

"Call Nikita and Le. If we don't hurry up, it won't matter how good the food is, we won't have time to eat it."

\A/

Climbing back down from their breakfast ledge was surprisingly more difficult than expected, but now both Le and Nikita were nearing the end with less than twenty five feet to go.

Feeling for a new handhold, Le felt several small rocks and dirt hit his hand, sliding down from where Nikita was just a few feet above.

"Careful, Niki," he called up, but it was already too late.

Nikita lost her grip and rock crumbled beneath her, leaving her nothing to hold onto and sending her slipping and tumbling toward the ground. Le stuck out his hand, hoping to catcher her. She reached out for him, but missed, still knocking him off balance, and nearly causing him to join her fall.

"Nikita," Le called out, realizing she wasn't able to stop her decent. She hit the ground below hard what seemed like an eternity later, while in reality he knew the whole thing had happened in a matter of seconds. Nikita still gave no answer. Nonetheless, Le made his way down the mountainside as quickly as he dared. Sliding the last couple of feet, he reached the bottome and knelt down beside Nikita.

At first, she made no movement, making him fear the worst, but after a few minutes, she regained consciousness, although remained somewhat dazed and disoriented.

"Where..." she raised a shaky hand to her forehead; it came away sticky and covered in dirt and blood. "Did I fall from-" she didn't indicate any particular direction, but it was clear enough.

"Yeah, you did," he answered, more anxious to figure out what they were going to do than establish what had just happened.

A delayed grimace of pain showed on her face and tears welled up in her eyes, but she managed to choke back all but a muffled sob.

"What's wrong?" Le queried, trying to find out what he could do without hurting her any further.

"I can't move my leg," she whimpered.

There wasn't anything outwardly wrong with it, thankfully, so for now Le decided to assume it was broken but now a compound fracture. That did mean they needed a way to splint it and keep pressure off of it to avoid making the injury worse.

"It's probably broken" Le answered, hoping his facade of knowing what he was doing and having a plan would be comforting and help put her at ease. "Here," he said, sliding the now battered backpack toward her. "Find the sheet we ate on, and try to ct it off into long strips. I'm going to see if I can find a couple sticks to make a splint."

In the woods it didn't take long to find a suitable pair of branches. Before long, Le returned to Nikita just as she was finishing the last strip of the sheet. He positioned the thick limbs on either side of her injured leg and secured the make-shift brace as well as he could, then used the remaining strips to wrap around some of the worst cuts and scrapes as bandages.

With his limited medical supplied and knowledge, he had done all he could, but Nikita still didn't think she could walk on the injured limb, certainly not for a several hour hike, and still appeared to be in a lot of pain. He could leave her and go on his own for help, but if anything were to happen, Niki would be left on her own out in the open, and he didn't want to take any unnecessary chances.

"We better be on our way," Le announced, knowing it could easily take twice as long as their hurried trip had earlier that morning.

After several minutes of finagling and more than one ungraceful attempt, he got Nikita on his back and started the long trip back home.