The first step outside was always the hardest.
Especially when it was so cold out that all you wanted to do was go back to bed and curl up under a crap ton of covers.
The window groaned open with Zubair's help, his heat causing the ice to curl away from the frame in hiss and steam. The air that pushed its way inside of the building didn't carry any scent.
Well, that wasn't strictly accurate. Everything smelled like a cold so deep that if froze your nose hairs the moment you breathed in the outside air. But that wasn't to say it wasn't clean.
It was clean in the way of untouched places, sharp enough to cut a lung.
Sera ducked through first, her boots crunching against the ledge before she lowered herself onto the ice. The moment her weight landed on the freshly formed ice, the frozen sheet answered with a massive bang. Like the sound of a rifle shot—one sharp crack, then a long, rolling groan that faded into the distance.
