DISCLAIMER: I do not own Rizzoli & Isles nor any of the characters from the show. I am writing this purely for entertainment, not profit. Rizzoli and Isles are property of Tess Gerritsen and TNT.
Please find the full disclaimers in the beginning of Chapter 1.
Chapter 7
Jane sat by the border of the destroyed mattress, a hand gently moving Maura's hair away from her face.
"Maura?"
Maura just curled up further, as if she wanted to disappear.
"Maura… It is 6PM, and we need to get going…" Jane added, on a soothing voice. She realized her already low voice was hoarser, and touching her neck she could feel the bruising from the soldier choking her last night. She could see the same bruising showing up on Maura's neck.
Maura's eyes fluttered open, as she focused on Jane. She grunted when she tried to move.
"Are you okay?" Jane asked, concerned.
"Everything hurts. My body is protesting, that is all." Maura dismissed. Jane knew the meaning of it. Every muscle in her own body hurt. Biking like they did, digging like they did, fighting. None of these were everyday occurrences for any of them.
Maura stood up, but had to hold on to the wall.
"Woa, woa, what is wrong?"
"I am dizzy, weak. Might be because we have not drunk or ate anything in more than twenty-four hours…" Maura offered, her head low, breathing slowly.
Jane carefully opened the lid of the dried nuts tin.
"I found this in the library. I already ate my ration of a handful…" Jane lied.
Maura looked at it, and the shadow of a sad smile showed on her face as her eyes welled in tears.
"My father… he loved dried nuts. He always had a tin of them in the office or in the library at his reach." She put her hand in the tin, and brought a handful out.
Jane closed the tin, and put it back on the backpack, while Maura munched slowly on the nuts.
"We have our thermos, our extra socks, the backpacks, the medicine pouches, and this tin."
"Let's share a thermos, then we can fill it with snow, and then we share the other thermos later, while the snow on this one melts." Maura suggested.
Jane accepted. They shared the water, although Jane made sure to leave more than half to Maura. Her head was killing her, and the less on her stomach, the less she had to throw up if it came to that.
"How is your head?" Maura inquired seeing Jane's strained face.
"I put another handful of snow under the hat. It as fine as it can be…" she dismissed Maura's concern. Maura seemed to accept that. And Jane knew that was another tell-tale that Maura was just functioning, but barely. "We should get going." Jane checked her watch again.
They descended the stairs slowly, and Jane extended her hand for the key from Maura. Maura handed it to her, and Jane opened the door, signaling for Maura to stay inside. Jane looked outside, and the snow seemed pristine, not a single footprint left from them or from the soldier, as it had slightly snowed non-stop all they long. Jane picked the empty thermos they had consumed, filled it with the soft untouched snow from the side of the house, and closed it, placing it on her backpack.
She nodded to Maura, and taking over their bikes, they pushed them out of the house, that Jane locked again from the outside, before handing Maura the key.
They mounted their bikes, and without talking got away as quickly as their stiff legs could take them from the house – afraid other deserters might have been lurking around.
Luckily, they gained the road without any interruption. It was snowing lightly like the previous night, but now they had tailwinds. Jane hoped they could make to the Austrian border before the sun was up. She tried to push the throbbing of her head to the back of her mind, focusing on the mindless circular motion of her foot on the pedals, her muscles burning with the effort.
Again, there was only silence, the muffled sounds of the tires crunching the soft snow, and the rustle of their parkas.
They had been biking for almost an hour and a half when Jane heard a metallic snapping sound and Maura yelping in pain. Jane immediately stopped and dismounted her bike, leaving it on the road, and approaching Maura.
"What happened?" Jane whispered, urgently. "Are you hurt?"
"The chain…" Maura raised her eyes welled in painful tears to Jane.
Jane looked down, seeing where Maura was holding her calf over the pants, and seeing the broken chain from the bike.
Damn it… It probably had snapped with the cold.
"Did it break your skin?"
"I don't think so." Maura answered, trying to examine her calf through the thick pant.
Jane helped her dismount, leaving the bike fallen, and saw how Maura winced when placing weight on that leg.
"Maura…"
"The muscle was hurt, that is all." Maura dismissed Jane's concern, limping.
Jane moved Maura to sit on top of her bike frame, in front of Jane. Then, Jane mounted her bike. Since she was taller, Maura's feet didn't touch the soil, and Jane, with her long legs, still could manage to pedal by keeping her legs slightly more open.
Jane got moving quickly again. She didn't want to attract any wanted attention, and the fateful invasion of that soldier to Maura's parents' mansion the previous night was a bitter reminder that they had been just lucky by not having had any other unpleasant and unexpected encounters.
It was about after another hour and a half that Jane heard the same metallic snap, and felt a burning whipping on her calf, yelping in pain and stopping the bike abruptly.
"What happened?" Maura looked at Jane, confused. She probably had been dozing.
"The chain of my bike also snapped." Jane assessed the bike, while her gloved hand reached for the spot that felt like it had been hurt by a red-hot iron on her calf. "This fucking hurts." Jane rubbed on top of the spot, hoping it would help dissipate the pain a bit.
"Did it break your skin?" Maura tried to inspect.
"It does not make a difference now anyway." Jane dismissed.
She gave a hand for Maura to stand off the bike, and Jane dismounted it, letting it fall to the ground.
Jane tried putting weight on her injured leg: it hurt badly but it was possible to walk. She made Maura try hers too. It seemed viable.
They would need to continue their journey on foot.