Delilah is a lot worse for wear. She all but collapses the moment we're in the cave. Her soaked limbs flop like limp ropes on the ground around her.

Sky leans on the cave wall near a meager fire, shoulder blades pressed against the curve as if they belong there. His goggles are shoved up on his forehead, emphasizing the crease between his brows, and his hand spins in an unending loop, fingers snapping impatiently. The moment he lays eyes on us the snapping halts and his forehead loses its stress crease. A wry smirk twists his lips when he sees Anushka.

"Funny, I thought Dieter was a dude."

"Stuff it," I grumble. I grab Anushka's arm and all but drag her to the back of the cave. Her feet scrape on the stone, but it doesn't make a difference. She's weak and light, and while she's here surrounded by kids who pack more power in their thumbs than she could dream of, the only defense she has is the gun in her holster. I push her in front of me. The force knocks her into the rock wall. I'm too rough and it's not entirely on purpose, but she doesn't need to know that. She turns, her face blank as it's been since Maverick decided to give her a chance. It's not until I reach for the gun at her side that she finally reacts. She sidesteps, face clouding over as her hand hovers protectively over the grip.

Maverick stops me.

"I got it, Trick," he says, "get some rest, you need it." He slides between me and Anushka easily, nudging me away.

The spot I'd curled up in earlier is open, I claim it again, easing my aching body to the floor. Piper has ended up at Delilah's side and is coaxing her closer to the fire. Half the group has stripped off their sweaters and shirts and spread them out to dry. I tug my soaking wet sweater and shirt over my head. They come off as one article, and it takes a bit of prying to separate the two so I can wring them out.

When I'm done, I contemplate the makeshift bandage around my shoulders and chest. The sodden fabric clings to my skin and rivers of pink-and-brown tinged water run down my sides when I move. It's not the healthiest idea to take it off, but it might be even worse to leave it on while it's soaking wet. Shivering, I pick at the knots with cold-dulled fingers until the strips come free. I have to peel the strips off, taking fresh scabs with them.

Stars, it's cold. I crush my hands into fists but that does next to nothing to stop my violent shivering. My teeth chatter. It feels like ice water drips through my veins and rests in blankets over my shoulders. I'm coldest where the grenade cooked off most of my skin. Maybe taking the bandages off wasn't such a good idea after all. Too late now. I crumple the strips up, squeezing rainwater and blood from them. The insides of the strips are stained with ugly red blotches.

The base of my neck twinges, an ache that settles in my stiff shoulders. I dig in my pocket for the pain pills. My hands meet with fabric and nothing else.

Frantically, I search the pocket again. I pinch the inside of both pockets and turn them inside out. Thin muck sloughs out and nothing more. The bottle of pain pills is gone.

I bite my tongue, holding in a bitter curse. The bottle must have fallen out while we were out in the storm. It could be anywhere by now, I'm never getting those pills back.

Unusual tightness pinches the skin across the back of my ribs. Without medication to numb it, the burn is going to hurt like hell. Without medication, all of me is going to hurt like hell. As if on cue, the pins and needles that have been plaguing me since before the storm begin to escalate into searing pain.

I glance up at the others. They're all bedding down on the cold rock floor of the cave, making the most of the thunderstorm by catching up on the sleep they lost last night. Nobody noticed my outburst, not even Maverick. Good, I don't want to be the one to cause another delay when we have no time to waste. I'll keep my trap shut. I can worry about getting more pain pills when Elle is safe. I pull my damp sweater on to hide the injury and gain as much heat as I can. For now, that's the best I can do.

I sigh and settle gingerly on my side, trying to find a position that doesn't press knots into my muscles. Normally I sleep sitting up and leaning on my back, but that's not possible with the burn. The cold seeps through the sweater, I shiver like a madman. I hope Elle is warmer than this, I hope that she at least has a bed. I close my eyes, clinging to these hopes.

Minutes into trying to rest, a creeping feeling sets my arm hair on end and makes my skin crawl. I shift, my eyes are drawn to the back of the cave, where Anushka is tucked into a corner that looks like it should be too small to fit her. Her crystal green eyes bore into mine, then flicker down to my shoulder. I follow her gaze, the neck of the sweater has drooped to expose the top of the shoulder she's staring at, where the swollen edges of the burn peek over. I narrow my eyes and tug on the sweater neck.

Anushka holds her tongue and as long as it stays that way there's nothing to worry about. Nothing at all.

It takes longer for me to let my eyes close a second time, but when they do, the plunge into sleep is instant.

I can't be asleep for more than a couple hours when the pain finally sinks its fangs to me. I wake to its claws in my breastbone, and the red-hot iron jammed up in my stomach, welding my organs together. The fire has dimmed to mere embers, and the storm outside has lightened to a shower.

I gasp as a paroxysm strikes like exploding cherry bombs up each individual vertebra. The spasm locks up my lungs. It doesn't last long but being robbed of the ability to breathe scares me. What if I suffocate to death in this instant and never see Elle again? The moment the spasm ends, I crush my palm against my mouth, partly to keep from waking anyone by shouting, and partly to keep from vomiting. Nausea twists my guts hard, and a headache throbs at the base of my skull.

Ow, that's a lot.

Another spasm clenches my abdomen, forcing me to curl up like a shrimp. But curling forward like that pulls my aching muscles too tight. I suck a harsh breath in through my nose, desperately trying to stay quiet. And, oddly enough, my back itches like hell. Bile rises in the back of my throat, and I rock to my knees, hand clamped even tighter. The new position helps my stomach settle.

"You cannot sleep?" A voice freezes me in place.

My watery eyes sweep up to find none other than Anushka staring at me. Her hair is down, hanging in tangled clumps over her shoulders. Mud darkens the platinum blonde and is smeared into the scrapes on her cheeks and hands. She looks as young and exhausted as the rest of us, if not for the fatigues she could be mistaken for an Experiment. She has a beaten look in her eyes that I'm used to seeing in others at the Compound.

I lower my hand and wipe the sweat from my forehead. Anushka's form blurs in time with the pulse in my head.

"Why are you awake?" I ask. Sweat forms beads on my forehead and slicks my palms. A bone-deep ache awakens in my hips, and my fingers are going numb. The pains haven't been this bad in years. I can barely think straight.

"Nightmares," she says.

"What do you have nightmares about, people stronger than your gun?" I spit back. The effort costs me, but at least she shuts up. Briefly.

"Your back will get infected," she says, folding her knees up to her chest. I shoot her a glare, but I'm not sure which of the swimming Anushka's to look at.

"It's deep, and it's not clean."

"Shut up."

"You won't be able to rescue your sister if you get blood poisoning and die."

"I'll be fine," I insist as if saying it more forcefully will make it true.

She gives me a curious look, her fingers twist the chain holding her tags. The scratched metal clinks together softly, reflecting dim orange light from the dying embers. She twists. The chain gets tighter around her neck.

"I am a coward," she says. "But I did not want to be a coward who kidnapped children."

"Then why did you?" I ease back, resting my weight on my heels. The conversation at least helps keep my mind distracted from the headache and nausea.

"For my daughter, she's only four, she needs a lot of stuff, and it costs a lot of money. The army keeps us housed and fed." Twist. Her hand is practically pinned to her neck now. A final twist, and it snaps. One of the tiny beads broke under the pressure. She tugs the tags loose from her neck, frees the broken section from the latch, and fastens the chain around her neck. Her hands shake.

"You look too young to have a kid," I say, flexing a cramped hand. Her gaze flickers over me, her fingers begin to twist the chain again.

"I am," she says. "I turned twenty the day we took your sister."

That stings, though I'm sure it's not meant to. "Then what's the deal, why do you have a kid?"

Anushka's face warps, her expression turning bitter where before it was empty. She grips the bead chain until her knuckles go white with the pressure "Do not talk to me about my daughter."

I almost apologize. I'll never be good or empathetic or diplomatic like Mav, but tonight I've been... mean.

"My name is Anushka Tatyanin." Anushka's shoulders rise to her ears and there's a tremor in her voice that I didn't expect. Her hand stays tangled in the chain. It twists. "I am a Sergeant in the thirty-sixth regiment of the Bloody Brigade."

I furrow my brow, a faraway look has washed over her features. From across the cave her irises look glazed.

"I'm twenty." Twist. "I have a daughter." Twist. She looks at me.

"Okay."

"I love her." No twist. A shudder creeps its way up her back. The light comes back to her eyes as she returns from wherever her mind took her. She opens her mouth as if to say something. Then she snaps it shut and drops the hand that was clenching her tags. Clearly this conversation is over. She melts into the shadows of the cave, her arms clasp tightly around her legs so she's curled up in a cramped little ball. I half expect her to start rocking back and forth after the episode she had, but she doesn't.

I turn my gaze to the mouth of the cave and stare at the rain falling in curtains outside. It's dark, and the temperature has dropped considerably. Thankfully, the nausea has alleviated, and the spasms have calmed to a dull throbbing. I take a few more deep breaths, then inch across the cave to the dying fire. There are unburned sticks mixed in with the embers, and with some nudging I get them all in one big pile over the glowing coals. I've never built a fire before, so I snatch a thinner stick from the stack and poke at the coals until a teensy flame erupts from the rippling orange embers. The fire catches, and the cave gains a bit more heat and light.

I sit for a while in the circle of light, prodding the tiny fire with my twig every now and then to keep the flames going. The ache in my bones pools in my legs and lower back. Moving hurts. Not moving hurts. Too much to sleep. Anushka shuffles in her teeny tiny corner, she moves like a puppet, all jerky and wooden. I turn back to the fire and roll my shoulders to ease the malaise, instead, the motion scrunches the burn, sending fiery prickles down my back. Anushka's warning coils in my mind.

Infection.

Gingerly, I turn my head to get a good look at the burn. Even as gentle as I'm trying to be, the movement hurts.

The first layer of my skin is gone. A crevice of scabby, fleshy mess sprawls down one shoulder and across my back. It ends at the base of my neck and encompasses both shoulder blades. Lesser burns decorate the backs of my arms where flames licked briefly. Angry red skin encircles the burn. The unburned, red skin is swollen and shiny from the tightness. When I poke it, pain sparks, and I yank my hand away. I bite my lip. I've spent enough time in the infirmary to know what an infection looks like. Anushka was right.

Sighing inwardly, I reach for the makeshift bandage strips to fasten them in place. The bandages are dried, but the spots of blood are crusty. I rub them away with my thumbs as well I can. Fibromyalgia rears its ugly head as I add more and more pressure to my back. What would normally feel like a slight discomfort is amplified to something akin to a vice crushing my chest. I grit my teeth and keep on re-tying the strips. These are all I have to keep dirt out of the wound.

I can only hope that the poor bandages and my immune system are enough to keep blood poisoning at bay for a little while.

"Need some company?" Maverick startles me when he comes to sit beside me in front of the fire. I fold my arms over my chest, shoving all thoughts of the looming infection out of my head. If he realizes what's going on, he'll stop me. Strap me to a tree and stick a twenty-four-hour guard on me until it passes. Sure, he'd send someone to rescue Elle, he'd go himself. But the idea of doing nothing while she's out there, alone and in danger, makes terror bubble under my skin like acid.

"What are you doing awake?" I ask, tilting my head to glance at him sideways. His hair sticks up at random and bags have formed under his eyes. His shoulders sag as if he's carting around a boulder.

"It's loud in here." He shrugs, staring at the fire. "The walls must reflect thoughts or something."

We sit in silence, letting that sentence hang in the air while the flames crackle. Mav shifts now and then and rubs a spot behind his ear the way he always does when his head aches from all the voices. Once again a knife of guilt for earlier twists in my chest. His finger traces a loose circle over the bone. I scratch at an itch on my elbow and squint at the fire, try to will the smoke to stop irritating my eyes.

"Does that mean they have physical form?" I ask, scrunching my nose.

"Hm?" he snaps out of his train of thought.

"If the thoughts are bouncing off the walls they have to be physical, like waves."

He lets out a short laugh. "Smart observation, for a dumbass."

He ducks to dodge a smack, narrowly avoiding searing his face in the fire. He hovers there for a moment, centimeters away from the flames. The skin on his cheek turns pink from the heat, and still he doesn't move, just works his jaw, pretending not to grin. When he sits up, the smile fades for real, and he's back to being Serious Mav, with too many responsibilities and not enough sleep.

"How are you feeling?" he asks as he folds his arms over his knees.

"Oh, we're back to the Mars agreement now, are we?"

That makes him roll his eyes, the effect is ruined by a huge yawn. "I don't have the energy to filter everything right now." He runs the back of his hand across his eyes. "I told you, it's loud in here."

Over in the corner, Anushka makes a noise that sounds suspiciously like a sob. We both glance over, expecting her to be awake but her eyes are closed. She's curled in a ball, her fingers clutching the dog tags like a lifeline and her leg twitches sporadically. She must be having another nightmare. She gasps again, quieter this time but no less sob-like and no less fearful.

"What's she dreaming about?" I ask without looking away. The line of her jaw is taut with the grinding of her teeth, and beads of sweat are forming on her forehead. Maybe she is dreaming about people who are stronger than her gun. Do I care? Should I?

When Maverick doesn't answer, I turn back to him to see that he's focusing hard on the fire. His face is a patchwork of bloodlessly pale and flushed red and his entire body is tense.

"Hey, you good?"

He opens his mouth to respond, then shuts it and squeezes his eyes closed instead. His breaths come shallow and shuddery. From the back of the cave Anushka groans, and Maverick winces in response. Whatever is playing out in her nightmare must be pretty damn bad. It takes a lot to make Mav flinch, he's seen more than the rest of us. He's been in all our heads. Another moment passes before he moves, scraping his fingers through his hair and prying his eyes open.

"It's too much right now," he whispers, "it's too loud in here."

I reach out to pull him closer. He breaks out of his trance, leaning into the hug until his cheekbone rests on my shoulder.

He lifts his hand and presses it to my forehead, "Think about something," he instructs in a trembling voice. His telepathy works ten times as well when he's touching the head of the person he's listening to. He used to only be able to hear that way. On a normal day I'd shove him off, but this time I tip my chin, ducking a little so it's easier for him to reach. On a normal day, there wouldn't be tears shining in his eyes.

The first memory that comes to mind is of the last conversation I had with Elle before the Compound was ripped open. As it replays, I linger on the better moments like her story about his visit the day before, and the way she went on and on about the boy she'd met earlier that day.

"He has glowing eyes, they look like two little stars." I remember her saying. I'm still not sure what that means.

"His name's Carver," Maverick says when that part plays out.

"Who?"

"The kid with the glowing eyes, his name's Carver. He was brought in last year. They made him photokinetic."

"Oh." I wonder if Carver made it out of the Compound alive.

Maverick takes his hand off my head. I shouldn't be as relieved as I am about this, but it's getting harder and harder to mask the pain snarling in the back of my mind. I don't want to admit it, but his weight against my shoulder is starting to hurt. His breathing is getting deeper, his head is getting heavier, it won't be long before he drops off, and I can move him.

The firelight grows dimmer and dimmer. The pattering of the raindrops keeps pace with the beat of the pulse in Mav's wrist. I wait until I'm sure he's asleep, then reach over to nudge him. Before I even lay a finger on him, he shifts, lifting his head a little.

"You didn't take your meds?" he asks abruptly, turning to stare at me. Blazing telepath, I curse silently.

"I lost them." I pick at a loose thread on my pant leg. There's no point in hiding it now, besides, as long as I'm alert and functional he has no reason to try stopping me. Withdrawal and fibro pains won't take me out, not as fast as an infection anyways.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"What would you have done, magicked them back into my pocket?"

His lips part, then snap back shut. His entire body deflates with an exhale, curling forward like a broken tree branch. Shadows are carved into secret lines under the edge of his collarbone and in the corners of his mouth, only visible in the flickering of the firelight. We sit in silence again, Maverick staring at the fire and me staring out at the cold drizzle.

Has it always been like this for him? Everything weighing down even when it's not his job to carry it. I know he's always been the one to take on newbies and watch out for his crew, but the game has changed now. Is he ready? Are any of us ready for it?

"You need to go to sleep." I pull him down, this time angling him so that he ends up laying across my lap instead of on my arm. He obliges, heaving his second gigantic yawn of the night.

"Is it my fault Dieter's gone?" His voice is thick with exhaustion but there's an unignorable urgency to his question.

Of course it isn't his fault, the very idea is ridiculous. Dieter got lost on his own, with help from whatever vengeful sky spirit conjured up that hellstorm. But it wouldn't take a master of telepathy to tell that Maverick doesn't see it that way.

"No." I shake my head, wincing when a sharp pain sparks at the base of my neck.

"I was supposed to look after him." He pauses, searching for something else to say. When he can't find the right words, he sighs. "He was a kid."

With that, he's out, finally too exhausted to stay conscious. His words hang in the air, taunting me. I guess I had forgotten that part, about Dieter being a kid. He's, what, three years younger than me? Four? One of us should have been watching him. I should have watched him, if for no other reason than to make sure he didn't make a run for a different mountain on his own. He could have made it out of the storm alive, if he was smart enough to take cover.

I hope wecross paths with Dieter again, if for no other reason than to ease Maverick'sconscience.