The Soulmate Curse

Perseverance - Part 3

It took a while for the sound to get through to Zhen's brain! It took a while to realise that Finn was screaming her lungs out in agony. She was alive? She was alive! Adrenaline flooded Zhen's blood and she almost flew to the boulder.

"Finn!"

"Get it off! Please! Zhen! Get it off!"

Zhen had her fingers under the boulder, trying to pull it up and off Finn. It was an impossible task. The rock was many times larger and wider than she was. It didn't even budge. After a few minutes of trying, Zhen had to stop or risk hurting herself. She couldn't help Finn if she hurt herself worse than she already was. At this point, Finn had stopped screaming. She was breathing hard and fast. A wave of fear suddenly overtook Zhen when she realised that she would have to watch Finn die, being slowly crushed by that rock. At this thought, Zhen's stomach revolted, and she ran out of the creek, to the shore, throwing up everything she could. Tears were streaming down her face as she listened to Finn whimpering behind her.

Wiping away the tears and gritting her teeth, Zhen knew that she had to be there for Finn to the very end. She hobbled back to the boulder and took a few moments to assess the situation. That's when she saw that the boulder was covering Finn up to her chest, but it wasn't crushing her body. She was lying in a space created when one side of the boulder had landed on a few rocks in the creek. That gave Zhen some hope. Maybe she could just pull Finn out. That hope fizzled out when she realised that the edge of the boulder that was on the creek bottom was crushing Finn's right shin, just above her ankle.

"Please, Zhen. Please get it off me," Finn begged. She wasn't even crying. She probably couldn't because she was already so dehydrated. Zhen's heart shattered into pieces inside her chest, making it had to breathe.

"I need a lever!" said Zhen.

Zhen dropped her backpack and ran into the woods on the opposite side of the ridge that they'd descended. Without a blade to cut down a thick trunk, she had to rely on what she could find on the forest floor. She soon found a branch that was as a little thicker than her arm and tough. She dragged it back to the creek and to the boulder that had Finn pinned down. She positioned its end under the boulder, braced her knees and pushed as hard as she could. The healing gash on her left leg split open and blood dripped down her thigh, but Zhen didn't care.

Adrenaline poured into her blood stream and she could feel that miraculous strength that gives mothers the strength to lift cars off their children build up in her. She could feel the boulder budge just a tiny bit and then, crack! The branch snapped clean in half. Finn screamed. Zhen had just helped the boulder settle further on her shin. She rushed to Finn's side.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," Zhen kept repeating the mantra over and over again, until Finn stopped screaming. She was breathing hard and fast again. And she was shivering now too, despite the hot midday sun.

"Zhen," she whispered.

"I'm right here," Zhen said, cupping Finn's cheek.

"I'm cold."

Zhen realised that water from the creek was flowing under Finn, taking her body heat with it. She looked up stream and decided to try and dam the creek. She spent the next hour and a half building this stone dam and creating another path for the water, away from Finn. When she was done, she rushed up to Finn's side. Finn's eyes were shut. Zhen's heart was thudding painfully against her chest as she gently cupped Zhen's face.

"Finn? Finn? Wake up Finn. Please, wake up."

Finn hummed and her eyes fluttered open.

"Oh, thank you!"

Finn closed her eyes again.

"No, don't. Finn. Stay awake."

She opened her eyes again, staring at Zhen with an unfocussed gaze.

"Yes. Stay awake Finn. Don't sleep."

Finn's eyes finally focussed on Zhen. She moaned. The pain was evident in her gaze.

"I shouldn't have crashed the plane," Finn whispered.

Zhen laughed. "Probably not."

"I don't want to die here, Zhen."

"You won't."

"But if I do..."

"You won't."

The sun was setting. Zhen considered leaving Finn to go get help, but she couldn't imagine leaving her to face the darkness alone. Instead, she packed the space between Finn and the boulder with her jacket to try and keep Finn warm. Then she went and gathered reeds and grasses and started packing those as far as she could into the space for more insulation. The temperature was dropping. The cold was seeping through Zhen's shirt, but she ignored it. Right now, all that mattered was that Finn was warm.

They were both exhausted beyond belief, but Zhen worked to keep them awake through the night. The sky was clear tonight, but it was incredibly cold sitting there against the boulder trying to talk so that they wouldn't go to sleep. For the second time in two nights, the rain woke Zhen up. Her eyes shot open and she immediately noticed that there was a little light in the horizon that heralded the start of morning. However, the rain didn't let up. Instead, it started falling harder. Zhen watched her little dam start to overflow and was struck by the horrifying thought that she would have to watch Finn drown. Finn was awake too, her eyes wide with fear.

Zhen sprang into action. It took her a while to fight through the rain and find what she was looking for. She ripped the plants out of the ground and used her teeth to cut off the ends as cleanly as she could. She tested them to make sure they were properly hollow and then rushed back to Finn. Zhen couldn't believe what she was seeing. That little dam had burst, and the water was flowing above Finn's head. She jumped into the river and rushed to Finn's side. She took a deep breath, dipped her head under the water and kissed Finn who immediately let air out of her nose, which allowed Zhen to release her held breath into her lungs.

Zhen grabbed one of Finn's hands and pressed a reed into it. Finn took the reed and placed it on her lips and blew out a breath then took in another. With Finn breathing through the hollow reed, Zhen sat back into the flowing creek water and took some time to breathe. She sobbed. This was insane. She wasn't sure she could endure any more.

The rain finally let up. Zhen rebuilt the dam higher, lowering the creek water enough for Finn's head to get above it.

Finn looked up at Zhen and whispered, "I can't... please... I can't take much more of this, Zhen."