I reached Erin and pounded on her belt buckle until it popped open, then pulled her away from the flames.

We were even lower, now, barely clearing the tops of hills as we passed over them. I started to haul Erin back to my seat so I could strap her in. But the chopper tilted, our feet skittered sideways…

And we fell straight out of the open door.

23. Erin

23

ERIN

One second, there was metal under my feet. The next, I was tumbling with just freezing air on all sides of me, flailing for something, anything to grab onto. Danny was next to me for a second but then he was gone and…

Oh God I’m falling. I could feel the air rushing past my face but all I could see below me was white: there were no features, nothing to gauge distance. Oh Jesus—

There was a thump that knocked the air out of me and then I was rolling, seeing sky and then snow, sky and then snow. Finally, I slowed and stopped.

I climbed to my feet, groggy and unstable. Everything was blurry but I could see a massive mound of white in front of me. A hill. I’d landed on top of a hill and rolled down it. I could hear the chopper high above and searched the sky for it. There: a black dot, trailing black smoke. Small and getting smaller. The noise receded and then there was nothing but the whisper of the wind. The realization hit me and I wanted to throw up: I’m on my own!

I looked around. Why is everything so blurry? I felt my eyes and gave a groan of horror. My glasses! I spun around and then looked back up the hill. They could have come off as I fell, or as I rolled: they could be anywhere, buried under the snow. I was alone and I was half blind.

Where’s Danny? Hadn’t he fallen from the chopper too? “Danny!” My voice was horribly small in the emptiness. I waited: nothing. “Danny! Danny!”

But there was no reply.

24. Danny

24

DANNY

I blinked. Focused. I was looking at glittering snow from an inch away.

My head throbbed and I rubbed at it. It definitely felt like I’d taken a knock, and maybe blacked out. I was bruised but nothing seemed to be broken. When I managed to roll over onto my back, I was looking up at walls of snow. Maybe eight feet above me, I could see the sky. I’d landed in a massive snowdrift.

I trampled down the snow until I had a slope I could climb up, then clambered out into the icy air and looked around. The chopper was nowhere in sight and I was at the base of a huge hill. Erin! Where’s Erin?!