“Dylan, the rope broke.”

”What do you mean it broke? What are you saying?”

”I am so sorry. She’s gone. We’re too high up.”

“No. No, no, no.” Dylan dropped to his knees. The wind whipped up over the peaks. A light frost dusted the route they had just finished. “We have to go find her. You don’t know.” His voice broke as he looked at Matt.
Matt hugged Dylan and let the tears fall from eyes.
“We should get moving before that storm rolls in.” Dark clouds swirled in the distance. The sun teased its descent as the sky began to dim.
Dylan wiped his eyes and nose with a beaten up green Patagonia jacket.
“I’ll be ready to go as soon as you are.” Matt nodded at him and checked the ropes.
The brothers had climbed together for years. Only in the last sixteen months had Matt seen Dylan begin to light up— and that all started with Eliza. She managed to drag him out from his camper van and back into the world of humans on his non-climbing days. He even began to shower semi-regularly, which was a coup for the rest of their friend group.
But more than that, Dylan began to push for higher peaks and bolder strategies with Eliza’s gentle support and easy laughs. If Dylan were the crags of a mountain, Eliza was the waterfalls.
“Everything is ready— are you okay to do this?” Matt said.
“I have to find her, Matt. She’d never leave this mountain if I was lost. I know you’d do the same.” Matt nodded and began the descent.
Night fell as they made it down the mountainside. The ice began to thicken and the winds whipped up as the stars burned like wildfire overhead. The two brothers were focused on the area their headlamps lit up and nothing else.