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Fire

And we're back! How are they faring? Time to check up on the survivors in "Alaska", oh my! I hope you'll have a good time reading, and I look forward to hearing your comments.

*

"And one two three - lift!"

"Oww fuck!"

"Hold him firmly, and don't let that leg go, David!"

"Owww shit this hurts..."

"I'm trying to be as careful as I can, Ramon, but since the leg's not splinted yet, this is going to hurt a bit."

"A bit!" the jaguar yelped as he was suspended in mid-air by three of his fellow survivors - Ivan the polar bear holding him from under his arms, David, the Rottweiler, by his uninjured leg and Neil, the fox, keeping a particular hold on the jaguar's broken foot. The cat hissed and flailed his tail against the rocks of the barren shore that'd become their final resting point for now.

"Let's keep going, best to get him over there as soon as possible," the fox spoke again.

"Fucking hurry, won't you?"

They crossed the distance of about fifty yards without much difficult, except for the litany of curses coming from the jaguar. The small campsite was at the edge of the forest, shaded by thin pine trees that clung to the landscape with purpose, more sheer determination to survive in this harsh land, rather than the particularly fertile earth. The ground was covered in brown, dry fallen pine needles and patches of lichen and the occasional moss sticking onto rocks and mounds of turf covering the gravely land. There was nothing that made that spot different from the lakefront other than a small ledge of stones, of turf, stone and moss that projected outwards and created a shallow wall about two feet tall for a length of about five yards - the only windbreak they could find within the few hundred yards surveyed, brief as it was.

"NEIL!"

"I'm coming, Glenn!" the fox yelled.

Their approach had been noted by a wolf sitting on the meager shield provided by the wall of turf, knees pulled up to his chest and staring forward. The sighting of the fox nearing made his ears perk up.

"Are you okay? Do you need help?"

"We're okay!" the fox replied.

they reached the makeshift camp and lowered the jaguar as carefully as possible onto a blue pillow, found lying near the water on the area strewn with wreckage and debris from the plane. It offered little comfort, they all knew, but it was better than nothing. Ramon hissed a final fit of curses as he was placed onto the ground and slumped his back against the wall of earth behind him.

"About time."

"Keep the leg straight," Neil instructed, "I'll check the pulse again soon and I'll figure out how to splint it."

"Thanks," the jaguar grumbled.

Ivan moved to pick his rumpled yellow coat from where it'd been left nearby, and draped it over the jaguar again.

"You need this more than I do," he said.

"Gee, thanks," the jaguar snorted from under his covers.

"Where's Diane, Glenn?" Neil asked from the wolf.

"She went somewhere," the wolf replied," she told me not to follow. I asked her if she needed help."

"She can't have gone far," David mused.

"Maybe she went to take a leak," Ramon snorted.

"No, I told her to find firewood," Ivan grunted. "And I told her not to wander away."

"Well she probably didn't go far," Neil said, "does she even have proper shoes on?"

"Even Diane's not stupid enough to travel on a plane wearing high heels," Ramon said. "She's got sneakers on."

"Well we'll find out where she is," Ivan said. He lifted his paws over to his muzzle and yelled. "YO, COUGAR CHICK!"

"DIANE!?" David barked out.

"She can't have gone far," Ivan said.

"DIANE?!"

"HELLO!" a call reached them, making rounds of their ears with perks, while the heard the noise.

"There she is," Neil said.

"WHERE ARE YOU?" Ivan bellowed.

"I'M COMING BACK!"

"Don't think she's far," David said, "should we still go to find her?"

"Only if she starts screaming," Ivan mused, rubbing his big paws against his thighs.

"We should keep working," Neil said, "we have to get the fire going, and go back to search the plane for more useful things. We haven't found the emergency supplies yet."

"I couldn't find anything on the tail," David said, "I looked around pretty carefully."

"It was probably thrown out of the plane during the crash," Ivan suggested, "smashed to bits. Or maybe it sank to the water. There's still stuff floating there."

"So we'll check again," Neil said, "we could've missed it. We'll all go together and search the nose, the tail and the shore together. Put all our eyes to it. There has to be more. At least enough to make him a splint."

"Well, we already got...what..." Ivan pointed at a messy pile near where Ramon and Glenn were resting, "...a couple trash bags containing empty soda cans, life jackets, a broken cell phone, a pillow, a plastic tray, someone's underpants, not mine, unfortunately..."

"I need something stiff to make the splint, and something to tie it down with," Neil said, "I'm sure we can find some pieces of wiring or the like."

"There's plenty of that on the cockpit section," Ivan said, "The avionics are all smashed up."

"The what?" Neil asked.

"The computer bits that make the plane do what the pilot tells it to," the polar bear replied. "I do read stuff. It's like a spaceship."

"I'd really like a space blanket," Neil retorted.

"...what are you all talking about?"

They all turned to look at the appearance of the cougar, clad in her outrageous white fur coat, and with a black plastic bag hanging from her paw. She almost looked like she'd popped to Gap...almost, if you didn't take into account the harrowed look on her eyes, or the rapid swish of her tail.

"What?" Diane hissed. "You told me to get firewood, so I got some."

She stepped over towards them and then put a paw into the bag to produce a few little sticks, lichen, and a piece of tree bark.

"See?" she said. "Kindling and tinder. For making the fire."

Ivan looked impressed.

"You're not entirely useless, are you?"

The cougar gave him an icy look and dropped the bag to the ground.

"Well I have decided to be on the cover of Italian Vogue before I'm 21, so I'm not going to die here only because you didn't take my Girl Scouts skills seriously!" she snorted. "Now, be men and get me some round rocks to put around the fire pit!"

"Way to go, Di," Ramon chuckled.

She didn't seem to care for the jaguar's remark, but instead dropped to her knees and began to scrape the ground.

"I'll need the lighter from whoever has it, too," she said, "and some sticks, lichen, tree bark, anything dry we can use."

"I've got the papers from...Casey's pockets," Neil noted, "and his lighter."

"We'll have to use them, then," the cougar replied without a pause to her clumsy digging on the hard earth under her paws.

"You heard her," David rumbled, looking at the other men standing there.

"Right, then," Ivan, "I'll help with the digging, you guys go find her some wood."

"Don't forget the rocks!" Ramon chuckled.

"Can I help?" Glenn asked.

"No, you should rest until your memory starts working again," Neil replied, firmly, but with a kind smile on his face. The wolf looked at him and nodded, quietly.

"Okay."

"We better do this quickly, too," Ivan said, "as soon as it gets dark, it'll get even colder than it is now. We'll freeze solid without the fire and shelter."

"How are we going to get more protection from the weather?" David asked. "Try using the plane?"

"The nose is smashed up and the tail is in the water, it's no use," Ivan said. "We have to stay on the land, and preferably off it. The ground is cold. It sucks up our body heat."

"We'll put something between us and the land," Neil commented," moss, branches, any stuff we can find."

"Maybe we could get some stuff off the plane?" David suggested.

"Have to start the fire first," Ivan said, "Fire first, further shelter then. The fire will help before the night falls. It'll get very cold then. You better watch out for hypothermia even now. Shivering, stiffness, feeling strange, unable to concentrate, or sleepy...oh, and if you see anyone starting to strip, that means they're pretty much fucked."

"Strip?" David asked curiously.

"I ain't stripping," Diane snorted, crouching by the fire she was making.

"I read about that," Neil said, "in the end, you start feeling hot and start taking off your clothes even though you're about to freeze to death."

"Thanks for the image," the cougar didn't sound amused.

*

Thank you for reading! I hope you had a good time, and I look forward to your comments!