The island-wide audio reached them on the open ridge the way it always did.

"Good evening, contestants. What a productive night it has been."

Proxy looked up at the sky, not because the sky was the source, but because the absence of a source leaves you with habits. His habit was to assign voices to ceilings when none were provided.

"Two additional eliminations to confirm."

"Contestant designated Rampart, terminated."

"Contestant designated Crusher, terminated."

"Twenty-four competitors remain. We do love an efficient evening."

Another pause, shorter, tighter, like a breath instead of a performance.

"Now. For those keeping score at home, which our audience very much is. We have reviewed tonight’s events on the Mountain Ridge with considerable interest, and we are pleased to update the record."

"The tally, as of this broadcast. Nyx, three. Direct, thorough, all within arm’s reach. Our audience remains entirely unsurprised."

A beat, placed with intention.

"Proxy, two. Both via a bunker they were guests of, which they then reduced to rubble with the occupants still inside. For the record, our legal team’s working title for this methodology is creative infrastructure incident, number two."

"We note, for the benefit of the audience, that this brings our protagonists to a technical tie. We imagine that is information one of them will find more interesting than the other."

Nyx looked at him.

He continued looking at the sky, because looking back would have implied engagement. He wasn’t ready to concede either.

"We will leave you to process the implications of that at your leisure. Good luck out there. We’re watching."

The ridge accepted the returning silence the way a surface accepts rain, which is to say without reaction, but not without memory.

Nyx waited exactly long enough to make it clear she had already decided what she was going to say and was now choosing how to say it. That distinction mattered more than it should have.

"I’m ahead," she said.

"We’re tied," he replied.

"Three to two." Her tone had the patience of mathematics, which is famously intolerant of debate. "I’m first."

"The methodology used for me and you are different," he said. "I’m not certain they qualify under your personal criteria." He heard himself say it and recognized it for what it was.

She tilted her head.

"What bullshit methodology, they are making stuff up!"

"The criteria is evident," he insisted.

"Hmph, fuck the criteria," she said, closing the discussion with finality.

She matched his gaze for a moment, then added, softer and without irony, "I’m very glad you got them. It was a good solution."

He turned to look at her, and his face became one he wasn’t quite happy to describe.

There was blood drying along her cheekbone, a thin, uneven line where the gang leader’s plate had opened her skin during the fight.

He hadn’t noticed it then, because combat doesn’t reward attention to detail so much as survival.

He noticed it now in the way he noticed most things she chose not to mention, which was late and with a quiet irritation directed equally at both of them.

She noticed him noticing, which was predictable, given her.

"It’s fine," she said.

"I didn’t say anything."

"You have the face," she said. "The other one. Not the thinking one. Or the scheming one."

He opened the trauma kit, because continuing that exchange would only prolong a conversation he had already lost before it began.

She made a small, inconvenienced sound at the sight of it.

Then she stepped in front of him anyway.

He cleaned the cut along her cheek.

It was shallow, mostly clotted, but indecisive, as if the wound itself hadn’t committed to being finished.

The heat marks from the explosion were visible along her collar, faint red lines tracing exposed skin.

They were fine, at least comparable to his own wrists and collar, which she had not yet addressed and, based on precedent, would not allow him to ignore.

He worked through the remaining supplies in the kit, noting its gradual depletion with quiet dissatisfaction.

"Your right side," he said.

"Is fine."

"The armor hit it at the doorframe," he said. "And again in the corridor. And again in the escape."

She looked toward the rock face beside them, the direction she defaulted to when pressed by her condition.

"That’s three different ways of fine," she said.

"Show me," he said.

She made the same inconvenienced sound, consistent if nothing else, and lifted her jacket on the right side.

He placed two fingers along her rib line, applying steady pressure downward the way he had before.

She drew in a breath and held it, again mirroring the earlier instance.

Her attention was still on the rock face with unnecessary intensity.

"They’re not cracked."

"I know they’re not cracked."

"They’re also not fine."

"That’s your opinion."

He pressed a coagulant compress against her side and held it there without speaking.

She watched the ridge below them and said nothing.

The silence wasn’t empty. It was occupied, just not by words.

He held the compress for the full recommended time.

Then, when he was done, she turned, took both his wrists without asking, and examined the heat marks left by the explosion.

Her thumb traced the redness with care. She applied the last of the dermis sealant with the the patience brought to everything involving him.

Then she kept hold of his wrists slightly longer than necessary, her attention on them rather than his face.

He allowed it, which was its own kind of response.

They packed what remained of the kit and started moving up the ridge in the dark.

Both had independently concluded that the exposed mountain was not a viable place to spend the night.

She moved ahead within thirty seconds, because darkness is irrelevant when your perception is thermal and spatial rather than visual.

His vision behaved exactly as expected, which is to say inadequately.

"It’s a pity," she said from somewhere above and to the left.

Her voice went easily through the dark, warm with the implication that she had been thinking about this for a while.

"What is," he asked.

"That it’s dark," she said. "The view going up was very nice this morning."

A brief pause, suggestive.

"I had some ideas."

"Unsavory ideas," he said, repeating it because it sounded incorrect.

"I’m pretty sure you would find them quite tasteful," she corrected.

He found a handhold and pulled himself to the next ledge.

"I’m glad the darkness has curtailed your options," he said.

She made a small, warm sound.

"I’m consoling myself," she said, "by listening instead."

He kept climbing.

"Listening to what."

"To you climbing," she said. "In the dark. In the cold. Making the effort."

She paused, and he could hear her moving upward with ease that bordered on unfair.

"There’s something about it I find very appealing. The determination. The quiet breathing. The sounds you make when you’re working very hard at something and pretending not to."

Another pause, longer this time.

"It has a charm to it. A dark, determined, handsome charm."

He said nothing, which was safer.

"You can’t see me looking at you," she said, "because it is dark. But I want you to know that I am looking."

"Nyx," he said, which contained both a warning and a request, though he wasn’t certain which he intended.

"Mm," she said, and continued upward.

He continued upward as well, because there was, ultimately, no alternative.