Tag: writing prompt

It has taken Liam a whole lot longer to get down to the crashed vehicle than he’d been expecting. Without gear and his team he’d had to play things as safe as possible, because as desperate as he was to help the driver of the car, he was no help to them if he wound up falling and injuring himself.

With any sunlight that could filter through the storm gone now, visibility was awful. The lightning had burned itself out so there were no helpful streaks of light to illuminate his way. The wind had whipped up, the rain continued to pound, slivers of sleet and ice speckled amongst it, stinging against his exposed skin.

Not only had he been drenched within seconds of leaving his car, but everywhere he went to put his feet had turned into a slipper, muddy mess.

This had to be a suicide mission. “They probably didn’t even survive,” he muttered to himself, the wind stealing his words as soon as they left his mouth.

But he couldn’t in good conscience give up.

What if the driver had survived?

What if there were other passengers who had survived?

No matter what he wasn’t leaving until he confirmed the status of any people in that other vehicle. Besides, he was already soaked through, wasn’t like he could get any wetter.

While he didn’t have his climbing gear in his car, he did have a bag fully packed for a weekend away at a remote cabin. So he had enough outerwear to stave off hypothermia, unlike whoever was trapped in the car in whose front end was in the river.

Even if they’d survived the initial crash could they survive being stuck in the icy water? As he’d climbed he’d kept watch on the car so he’d know if anyone got out and he could yell at them to stay put that he was coming for them.

No one had climbed out of the wreck.

Now his feet touched flat ground, the dangerous descent behind him, and he wasn’t ready to consider how he was going to get back up to the road, possibly with an injured motorist.

Running as fast as he could, Liam slipped, and slid his way across the grassy bank to the river’s edge. There was no way to check and see if the occupant was alive without getting into the water. In the storm the currents looked strong, one wrong move and he’d slip right on under.

But he hadn’t come this far to back out at the last second, so he balanced himself against the wrecked vehicle and inched into the freezing water. It was so cold it stole his breath for a moment and it only lapped around his knees.

Reaching the door handle, he yanked on it, and the door creaked, but swung open, giving him a view of a young woman with light blonde locks plastered to her skin, slumped over the steering wheel.

His hand was trembling, and not from the cold, as he ripped off his glove and touched his fingertips to her neck, praying he found a pulse. Just as he made contact with her skin, the woman blinked open her eyes, and then she was staring up into his crystal blue eyes like she just knowing she was dreaming.

Screams.

Trees.

Rain.

Pain.

Then nothing.

When Cara slowly blinked open her eyes, it was to ringing in her ears, pounding in her head, and agony consuming her body.

Panic threatened to steal her breath, and she looked around to find that her car was now at the bottom of the ravine, tilted at an angle with the water of the river lapping around it.

Worse, the icy water was already pouring in around her ankles.

Gasping for breath as pain had each breath feeling like she was inhaling shards of glass. She had to get out of the car, but her body didn’t seem to want to cooperate.

Clumsily she grabbed at her seatbelt, pressed the button to release it but it wouldn’t budge.

Trapped.

Terror had her vision narrowing until it was pinpricks of muted light. Whatever lingering light from the setting sun could get through the heavy clouds was enough only to cast her surroundings in a creepy half light.

The thing of nightmares.

Which was exactly what her photography trip had turned into. She was injured, trapped in her car, and about to drown and nobody even knew she was out here and needed help.

Blackness tugged at the edges of her mind, trying to pull her down into unconsciousness. Maybe if she didn’t fight against it death would come for her while she was asleep.

It had been a really long season and they were only halfway through winter.

Working search and rescue was a dream job, Liam loved the outdoors, loved hiking and rock climbing, loved the rush he got when he and his team rescued families lost in the dense mountain forests, or found an injured hiker.

But as much as he loved his job he needed a break. This season had already been tough for him work wise, they’d been unable to reach a lost family in time, and it has been rough for him personally as well. The girlfriend he’d been going to propose to he’d found out was cheating on him, and his dad had suffered another heart attack, while he was still alive his health was shaky and the whole family knew it was only a matter of time.

Which was why he needed this weekend away.

While he lived in town, he owned a small cottage deep in the forest. It was a log cabin, one large room, with a huge stone fireplace. It was off grid with a generator, and plumbed into a nearby stream. It was quiet and peaceful and exactly what he needed right now as he grieved the loss of the relationship he thought was going to last forever and prepared for to grieve for the father he loved and idolised.

Rain pounded down, and he wouldn’t be surprised if it turned to snow some time throughout the night. Slowing down as the already muddy roads quickly deteriorated, he took a turn, noted another car further up the winding mountain road, and then Liam watched in horror as the car lost control on the muddy road.

It slipped and slid, ramming into trees as it went, before crashing into the river at the bottom of the steep decline.

Fear for whoever had been inside had his heart rate bumping up several notches. Was there any way they could survive that crash?

Already figuring out how he was going to safely get down to the car, because whether or not the person or people inside had survived he needed to get to them, he reached for his cell phone only to find he had no service.

Great. He was out here alone, in a storm, with no cell service and no gear. How exactly was he supposed to help whoever was in that car, assuming they had survived?

“How on earth did they get stuck in this calamity?” Cara said with a laugh looking at the kittens staring balefully at their mother.

How the tiny little things with adorable sticking out fur, and little tails that pointed straight up managed to get themselves stuck in a basket load of laundry she had no idea. As she watched on the camera feed of her living room she saw her cat jump into the basket of clean laundry and carefully lift out first one kitten then the other.

What she wouldn’t give to be warm and cosy in her house right now instead of out here on this freezing cold mountain with the wind howling so loud it hurt her ears.

Why did she ever think being a photographer was a good idea?

As much as she loved her career there were times like right now when she almost wished she had done what her family wanted and taken on a “normal” office job.

Of course she didn’t really mean it. It was an absolute dream to be able to make a good living doing what she loved. Art had always been her passion, from the first time she was big enough to hold a crayon in her chubby little hand. Her specialty was landscape photos that she then painted and presented side by side where it was almost impossible to tell the photo from the painting. Her work had been well received and she made a good living from it, but being out in the late autumn weather, shivering, and trying to get the perfect shot to take home and paint definitely made her rethink her life choices.

Shutting down the app monitoring her cameras at home, as the sun shifted to the right angle to get the shot she wanted, Cara got lost in her craft. Moving left and right, up and down, getting the perfect image of the sunlight streaming through the trees, it wasn’t until an ominous crack of thunder caught her attention that she realised a storm was brewing.

Happy with the photos she’d taken, and sure there was a gem amongst them, Cara packed up her stuff and hurried back to her car, sliding inside right as the clouds covered the sun and the rain began to pour down.

Already dreaming of snuggling her cat and the two adorable new little kittens Marshmallow had given birth to four weeks ago, under a blanket, in front of her fire, with a steaming mug of hot tea in her hands, Cara wasn’t paying enough attention to the slippery roads as she wove her way down the mountain.

One second she was navigating the quickly turning into mud tracks, and the next she was losing control of the car and sliding down the steep embankment.