“Sweet,” he says, trying to act like he hasn’t just royally fucked them all over. “We traverse this here and then we’re just about home free. Good work, guys.”

His bullshit is totally transparent.

“I’m not crossing that,” Kyla says, arms crossed. She’s leaning against a slightly less sheer cliff as she takes a drink of water.

“Me either,” Evan says. “This is freaking nuts.”

Brandon nods in agreement.

Dawn looks at Warden, whose face is inscrutable. She looks at Lucas, who appears to be terrified. Alex looks from Christian to Amber like he’s hoping common sense will prevail somehow; only Brielle doesn’t look fazed, but she doesn’t exactly look enthusiastic, either, from where she stands at the back of the Pack.

Amber nudges her way to the front. She surveys the ledge.

“Oh, man,” she says, “I don’t think we can do this, Chris.”

Christian laughs. It sounds forced. “Of course we can,” he says. “It’s like a thirty-foot traverse, max.”

“The drop is like fifty feet,” Lucas says. “Minimum.”

Christian ignores him. He’s looking at Amber, who is staring at the narrow outcrop of rock her partner is proposing to, you know, traverse, and looking sick to her stomach.

(And when the Ambers in your group start to look scared, you know you’re screwed.)

“Well, we can’t turn back,” Christian announces before Amber can say anything. “Those chimneys we climbed? Twice as dangerous going down as up. Best thing we can do is just tough this one out and then go down the easy way.”

“The easy way?” Brandon says. “You said this was the easy way.”

Christian huffs. “I meant the standard way.” He looks at the Pack, one at a time.

(Even Kyla.)

“We’ll take it slow, guys,” he says. “Nice and easy. Don’t look down, and it’s like walking on a sidewalk.” Then, before anyone can mount another counterargument, he turns and starts walking.

Lucas gasps.

“Goddamn stupid idiot,” Kyla mutters.

Amber reaches for Christian, but he’s too far gone already. He hugs the rock on his right side, leans into it and presses his palms against the face, searching for cracks and handholds. Slowly, carefully, he makes his way across.

And then he’s on the other side, arms raised, like ta-da, a big shit-eating grin on his face. “See?” he calls over. “Nothing to it.”

“My ass,” Kyla says. “I’m still not doing it.”

But you know how guys are. As soon as Christian proves he can make it across, Warden and Brandon and Evan—and even Lucas and Alex—get this look on their faces like their manhood’s in jeopardy if they don’t also, you know, send the traverse.

So they do.

Warden goes first, obviously, and he looks better doing it than Christian by a mile, objectively and subjectively.