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“Thank you.” Garin lowered the strap around the crown of Sazahk’s head and brushed a few loose hairs from his forehead before tightening the band. Sensation skittered across Sazahk’s skin where Garin’s gentle fingers touched, and he quickly locked down his colors before they embarrassed him. “There you go.”
Sazahk stepped back as soon as Garin dropped his hand. “Are we ready now?”
“We’re ready.” Garin shoved his pack through the cave mouth. “You should be okay. It’s not too narrow, but if you have any problems, anything at all, say something and I’ll help you, alright?”
Sazahk looked into Garin’s green eyes and shifted his weight at the uncomfortable earnestness in them. “Alright.”
Garin held his gaze for a moment, then nodded firmly and crawled into the darkness.
Sazahk followed before Garin’s booted feet disappeared. Neither darkness nor small spaces made Sazahk nervous. Even if the walls had closed in around them and squeezed him between the stone, he would have kept his head. Immobility at the hands of nature wasn’t so concerning. His problem was immobility at the hands of people who didn’t care that he screamed.
And the walls didn’t close in on him, anyway. This was a solution cave, carved out over millions of years through the passage of water long since dried up. That water had fed a jungle once, before Sazahk’s ancestors had put an end to it. They hadn’t ended the cave, though, and it was still smooth and stable from its slow formation.
But even if the psychological effort of the crawl was minimal, the physical effort was gargantuan. Sazahk couldn’t imagine how he’d have kept up if he’d tried this before his time with Squad M. Months embedded in a Klah’Eel army unit had firmed his muscles and improved his cardio, but still his arms burned as he shoved his pack ahead of him, inch by painstaking inch.
“How you doing back there, Sazahk?”
Sazahk bit back his gasping exhale. “Fine.” Mostly. He was still alive, and he wasn’t about to ask for a break, so he was fine.
Garin’s chuckle bounced off the rock and back to Sazahk’s ears. “Not much more of this. We’re almost to the chute where I turned around.”
Sazahk ground his teeth and tried to slow his racing heart. He’d rather crawl another five miles than get to that chute.
Too soon, the low ceiling above them lifted and the walls on either side peeled away, and Sazahk joined Garin in a small room large enough for Sazahk to sit up on his knees in.
“You alright?” Garin swept his bright light up and down Sazahk’s body and Sazahk shielded his eyes.
“Yes, of course I’m alright. I’d have told you if I wasn’t alright.”
“I’m just checking. You cut yourself at all?”
“No,” Sazahk answered without thinking, then considered the question, did a mental scan of his body, and still shook his head. “No.”
“Good.” Garin turned his beam of light onto the other side of the room. “That’s where we’re headed.”
Garin’s flashlight illuminated a great pit that sucked every photon in the room into a black abyss. Cold sweat broke out along the back of Sazahk’s neck, and he forced himself to approach.
He remembered the Yelt trees in the jungle on Klah. He’d hated climbing those. The world had spun around him and every instinct in his body had screamed.
He’d always abhorred heights. He couldn’t blame that one on trauma. Even as a child, he’d refused to look out the window of a ship as it took off.
But this was worse than the windows or the Yelt trees. This hadn’t been constructed to be climbed. This?—
“Easy, hey, shh, easy.” Garin caught Sazahk’s shoulders as he scrambled back from the ledge. Instead of pulling away from his grip, Sazahk leaned into the firmness of it. It anchored his world and halted the spinning. “You’re okay.”
“I won’t be,” Sazahk stuttered out, pressing his back into Garin’s chest.
“You will.” Garin massaged his thumbs into Sazahk’s deltoids, and his now familiar scent saturated Sazahk’s senses. “You don’t have to climb. I’m gonna lower you down and I’m not gonna drop you.”
Sazahk opened his mouth, ready to deny Garin’s confidence and call out the absurdity of such a promise. Except he didn’t actually think it was absurd. He closed his mouth.
Garin wouldn’t drop him. Garin might be an overbearing, smothering, dismissive, frustrating man who never trusted Sazahk to get anything right, but he’d keep Sazahk safe. Sazahk didn’t doubt that. He doubted whether safety was worth the price, but he didn’t doubt Garin’s ability or commitment.
He nodded and Garin squeezed his shoulders.
“There you go, see? You’re alright.” Garin left Sazahk’s back and Sazahk turned to watch Garin retrieve his long rope. Garin was shorter than Sazahk and lean, smaller than Patrick or Bar’in, and far smaller than Fal’ran or Tar. A sudden pang of longing for his team hit Sazahk in the heart. This was the longest he’d been apart from them since he’d joined. He wished Tar was anchoring the rope.
But maybe he wouldn’t choose Tar over Garin for this. Despite his size, Sazahk knew Garin could hold his weight. And despite his protective fussing, Garin’s confidence was undeniable and soothing. If Garin said he wouldn’t drop Sazahk, then he wouldn’t.
