His blue eyes were glassy and frozen tears stuck to his face as if Nick had spent his last moments crying from fear and pain.

I spotted fish bones lying near Nick's hand. Now I understood why Cloud had stolen the fish. He had been feeding Nick.

I ran out to the edge of the cave, almost forgetting to stop and almost going over. I fell to my knees again and threw up over the side. Then I scurried over to Kevin. I was so scared and startled.

"What?" He asked, "Was it Nick? Is he okay? Where is he?" Kevin asked.

"He's…he's…" I couldn't make out words.

"Oh no…" He sighed and shook his head then got up and passed me and also crawled into the cave. I watched the entrance to the cave for what seemed like hours until finally Kevin came out. He had his back to me and I could see that he was dragging something behind him.

I thought it was Shadow who wasn't going to come unless she was dragged out. "Ah no…" I moaned as I saw what he was dragging. It wasn't Shadow it was Nick.

"He's still alive you moron. Didn't you even check for a pulse?" He hissed bringing Nick over to me.

I moved back. "He's not alive! He's not even breathing! His eyes are open!" I was disgusted.

"He's unconscious." Kevin hissed, "You're eyes don't have to be closed to be unconscious, besides, they're frozen open. Now let's get him back to camp before he does die!" He pushed passed me.

I didn't move.

"I'm going to need your help!" Kevin said.

I still couldn't move. I stared at the body of my best friend. White. That's all. Even his eyes were a pale blue. It was like he was looking at me. I had seen the look before, it was the same look Nick always got when we picked on him. When he felt alone I guess, and that tugged at my heart.

I noticed that the bottom of his bare feet were caked with dry blood and dust. Now that he was in the light I noticed that he was breathing slightly and I could see the air he breathed out of his nose.

Shadow was suddenly beside me. She nudged my arm and I slowly leaned forward and grabbed his feet.

It took a long time to get down the side of the mountain. But finally we all reached the bottom each in one piece. It was starting to get dim and the air was crisp and cooler than before in the afternoon sun.

"Looks like it's going to snow again." Kevin sighed looking up at the sky as we gently set Nick on the ground.

I couldn't take my eyes off of him. It gave me the creeps and he was cold to the touch. It was hard to believe that he was still alive.

"We won't make it back before nightfall." Kevin was still talking, "It'd be safer if we traveled while we can see. We should set up camp around here."

"Alright." I nodded. Shadow came down from behind me and she laid down across Nick's chest. All the way down the mountain I had created in my mind what had happened.

While Nick and Cloud had been out walking they went off the regular path. You gotta remember that Nick had only been by the stream once before and it hadn't really been a stream at that time.

When they got lost it had already started to snow so their tracks had already been covered. In hope that they would be able to see where they had to go Nick started to climb the mountain. Cloud followed.

But by that time it was already getting dark, not to mention cold. They stayed in the cave, thinking that it would be shelter from the snow and cold.

Cloud knew how to get home but Nick was too cold to move so Cloud came back on his own to get help but got too cold and passed out.

That's when we went to look for Nick. And at that time Shadow was trying to lead us to him but we didn't listen. We had found Nick's shoe in the river and left. Shadow had stayed. I hadn't really cared at the time. But now that I think about it, Shadow probably went up to keep Nick warm.

Cloud came back with us and took the fish the two times, taking them back to Nick so he could eat. They had been taking turns protecting my friend. Shadow stayed during the night and Cloud during the day.

"Hey, wake up!" Kevin shook me from my thoughts.

"Sorry." I looked up, then got up and walked around trying to find firewood. We gathered as much as we could then made a fire. Luckily Kevin had thought to bring the matches. We were running low on everything and soon we'd have to figure some other way to do things.

We made a small Quincy out of the snow, hoping we'd stay warm. It was still a little cool even with the three of us and the two animals, but we managed to fall asleep.