ROUND and ROUND...
ROUND and ROUND...

The Rocky Mountains of beautiful North Carolina are an amazing place to be. With spectacular white snow, large magnificent mountains, and miles and miles of endless quiet.

Well, that's not where the senior class of Redhill High School are going. At least, they weren't planning. A simply detour through North Carolina's large mountain range takes a deadly turn on this senior class trip. Their graduating celebration trip is cut short when the bus spins out of control, crashing into the side of a nearby mountain. The only survivors left are the high school football team's quarter back and the shy, nerd girl, along with a slowly dying class mate. When the teens find an abandoned cabin, with no help for hundreds of miles and no access to the outside world, they think they have found refuge. But in the end will they end of dying of hypothermia, starving to death, freezing to death, or will they be the cause of each others' deaths?

[imgleft]http://cf2.polyvoreimg.com/thing.23665275.l.jpg[/imgleft]
Jessalyn May Black was sitting in the very back seat of the bus on the left hand side, absorbed in the music blasting from her iPod. Unlike nearly every other senior on the yellow rectangle of hell, otherwise known as a school bus, Jessalyn, or Jess, remained quiet and unnoticed. Sure, she was excited for the senior graduation trip to New York City, but she'd always been a bit of an introvert, keeping to herself. Coming from a broken home where she dealt with a constantly working mom and a brother lost to meth and heroin, she didn't feel the need to spill the beans on her life with everyone else.

Moving to North Carolina, where the brunette went to school at Redhill High (home of the Rats!), was supposed to be a fresh start. Jess's mother had urged her to make friends and talk more, to not be so obsessed with grades and making valedictorian. Then again, that was mostly her mother's dream that she wanted to live through Jess. But Jess couldn't bring herself to introduce herself to the other kids, so she mostly blended, only having a few friends.

Ever so slyly, Jess popped a piece of wintermint gum into her mouth and chewed. Gum was like drugs to high school kids, and she didn't want to have to give her whole pack a way to everyone else. Balling up the wrapper in her fingers, she began to fling it onto the floor when suddenly the bus started rattling and spinning in seemingly demented circles. Pushing out a lean, long hand to steady herself, Jess rapidly blinked and glanced about. Screaming filled her ears even though her music was the highest volume levels, and she jolted forward as the bus collided with the snow white mountain.

---

Groaning, Jess woke up on the cold, blinding white snow. Wait, how did I get outside, she asked herself, mumbling a 'huh' as she rose from her unconscious slumber. Whipping her head left and right, the seventeen year old tried to make sense of her surroundings. Coughing on the smoke that filled her lungs, Jessalyn turned to look behind her and gasped when she saw the gruesome scene. The once long yellow bus was now a small square slammed up against the mountain side, smoking and partially on fire. Inside the windows... Well, she couldn't see inside the windows, they were covered with a dark substance. Finally, she realized that dark liquid coating the windows and open back door (which she must have been flung out of), was blood.

"HELLO?!" Jess called loudly in her soprano voice, praying to whatever god may be that someone else was alive, or that this was all a dream. The screams of her class mates echoed in her ears and head, but everything else was silent. The only noise was the soft crunch as she crawled backwards on the snow. She was a few meters away from the bus when she vomited everything she had consumed the whole day.

Hoping that someone was alive, even someone she didn't like like Madison, the head cheerleader, or any of the football players (groan), Jess let out a small "Oh my god," as she finished retching and looked once again at what was her bus. "HELLO?! Anyone?! Please," she called, her last word (please) being added softly.

Vance Michaels stretched his arms up, feigning a yawn. As he brought his arms down, he wrapped his left hand around the tiny little blonde cheerleader sitting next to him. "Vance! Knock it off!" Madison giggled as she shoved his arm off of her shoulder. They were not officially dating, but everyone assumed that something was going on with them. Vance laughed, letting his arm be removed, as he turned to face behind him where his buddy Brian was making very dirty jokes and looks to the rest of the cheer-leading squad.

The sound of at least a hundred students crammed into the tiny yellow box on wheels was almost deafening, but Vance relished it. This was his element. Being the star quarter back on the Varsity football team, he loved being in the limelight and having swarms of people around him, especially if said swarm happened to be filled with hot, and easy, girls. Madison, the current head cheerleader, was his current fling, but she wasn't the first, and if Vance had anything to do about it, most definitely wouldn't be the last.

"Dude!" The deep baritone of Brian broke Vance's thoughts and brought him back from his daydream of a naked Madison to the too humid bus load of kids.

"What?" He asked, his voice hard and most decidedly masculine.

"I asked you if you were excited to be hittin' the NY streets!" Brian was just as much, if not more, of a player than Vance was. Vance, at least, dated the girls he slept with, if even for a week, whereas Brian left before dawn started to light the sky.

At the question, Vance just laughed low in his throat, making it sound almost like a growl. "Are you kidding me? Two weeks of nothing but roaming around the Big Apple, tasting the more... feminine wares... I can hardly wait!" Brian tossed a look over to where Madison sat, her thin legs swung out into the aisle as she gossiped with a long haired brunette.

"What about her?" He kept his voice low, moving a few inches closer to where Vance was reclined over the back of the rubber seat. "Aren't you two an item?"

Vance scoffed. "I haven't said we are, so we are not, no matter what she or the rest of those booty-calls think." He shared a conspiratorial grin. "Nope, when we get to NYC, it's just gonna be you, me, and as many girls as we can find!"

"Amen to that!" Just as Brian finished his sentence, and the two boys had started to laugh and plan their first nights in the Big Apple, the bus lunged to the side, tossing Vance into the window, which cracked. He started to shout but his voice was lost in the other screams that flooded the small bus as it continued to spin and spin. Before Vance had time to register that they were spinning faster, they were flying off the side of the road, snow was being flung in every direction, and the kids on board were rolling around like rag dolls. Vance heard the sickening crack of bones being broken. Someone, his mind not registering who it was, crashed into him, knocking him back into the window, breaking it completely. As the bus did another three-sixty roll, he was flung out that window, the broken glass punching into his arms and legs, scratching his back and stomach.

-----------

Vance awoke, his head pounding with each heartbeat. Well, at least he was alive. before he moved, he took stock of his body. Having been tackled numerous times in games, he knew what to feel for, if anything was broken or sprained. He mentally moved down his body, pinpointing each hurt and scrape, and once he made it to his toes, he was very thankful that nothing appeared to be broken. His shoulders hurt more than anything, but that was just fine with him. Opening his hazel green eyes, he looked around, the glare of the sun on snow forcing tears to spring to his eyes. What he saw, he wished he hadn't. The bus was totaled, it didn't even look like a bus anymore. Bodies, or parts of bodies, were everywhere, and blood dripped from the broken windows.

His stomach wrenched, but he fought back his nausea long enough to get to his feet and take a few staggering steps towards the wreckage. Bright red spots of snow dotted the area, and Vance felt tears prick his eyes, but for a reason he couldn't blame on the light. These were his classmates. Granted, he didn't really like any of them, except Brian, but still... He moved towards the bus slowly, taking extra care to listen for breathing or groaning or... anything that would tell him someone was alive.

A sound invaded his ears. What was that? Vance turned and saw a girl standing by the back of the bus, her eyes wide with fear. It was her. She was making that noise! Vance felt like his head, mouth and ears had been stuffed with cotton. "Hello?" He called back, trying to recall who this girl was. He hadn't slept with her, that was obvious, by the mousy brown hair, too thin frame, and from this distance, only fairly attractive. It must be one of the goth chicks, or worse, one of the nerd ones...

"Are you alright?"

Suddenly, Jess's head snapped after hearing a new voice. She vaguely recognized it, as if she had heard it repeatedly and repeatedly, and not in the best way. She was still visibly shaken, but she tried to hide it. If the voice asked, she'd just state she was cold. Vulnerability wasn't something she liked to show others, especially being the shy new kid that she already was.

Finally, after squinting from the blinding white snow and contrasting, thick black smoke, the seventeen year old laid eyes on, who would've guessed, the high school football team's quarterback. Inwardly she groaned, she had hoped to at least be with someone who wasn't an egotistical, womanizing, steroid filled jerk. But, she was happy that at least she wasn't alone. It couldn't be worse than that, right?

"Uh yeah, I think. You?" She called back, her light soprano voice sounded raw and slightly crack. She coughed twice into her elbow and felt a sting on her torso when she twisted to the side to turn away to cough. Her eyebrows furrowed in a squiggly line of confusion. She gently lifted the double layered tank tops she had on and peered at her stomach. Her contoured and toned abs, proof of years of dancing, were slightly bloody from the long, deep cut stretching from the top of her left hip bone to the bottom of her right rib cage. Knowing better than to touch it, she pushed her shirt back down and glanced up, seeing Vance watching her. She flushed lightly and crossed her arms, rubbing them to be rid of the goosebumps all across her beige colored body.

Her mind raced as she tried to remember the average temperatures of the Rocky Mountains. Even though it was spring, the mountains were well on their way to below freezing. Right now it seemed about twenty or so degrees, and seeing as it would be nightfall soon enough, it would rapidly decline to the negatives. Running a hand through her hair, the brunette bit her soft pink bottom lip and blinked to keep the tears from spilling out of her eyes and cascading down her cheeks.

Vance watched as she pulled up her layered tank tops, a single manicured eyebrow lifting in question. What the hell was she doing? Stripping for him or something? His question was answered as he realized the long red stripe across her stomach was actually a wound. "You're gonna have to clean that out." He stated, taking a few hesitant steps towards the girl. As he drew closer, he realized who she was. The new girl. Great. What the hell was her name? Jacque? No... Jazz? Uh, no... Jess! That was it. Jess Black. She hadn't been at the school very long before it decided that the senior trip would be to New York, and most of Vance's friends, the popular crowd, were a little upset that the school was allowing the newbie to attend the trip.

"Have you found anyone else alive, Jess?" With little else in common, besides being what looked like the sole survivors of this hardcore crash, they had to work together now, as displeased as he was with the idea. Vance knew, his father being an EMT, that they had very little time to find any other students that were alive. If they were still in the bus, their oxygen levels would be depleting quickly because of the heavy black smoke curling out of it, and if they were wounded... well, it was better to not think about how quickly a person could bleed out.

Vance unzipped his varsity football jacket and took off his Nirvana t-shirt, leaving him in a black work-out tank. He tossed the now balled up shirt to Jess and put his jacket back on. "Tie that around your waist to stop the bleeding. I don't need you dying too."

'Even though I would rather be with anyone else in the whole school than you...'

Duh, I'm not dumb, she thought to herself at his comment, resisting the urge to roll her eyes. She knew he didn't like the idea of them being stuck together any more than she did, but they'd both have to deal. "Yeah, I know," she said quietly and caught his shirt as he tossed it to her. Unlike every other girl in the school, she didn't gawk at him as he pulled the tee shirt off. Turning slightly, she lipped her tank tops to just under her bra, bending to scoop up a handful of clean snow. Biting her lip, she lightly cleaned the cut with the snow, trying to ignore the warm blood on her fingers. After finishing, she tied the tee shirt around her now numb and freezing lean waist, double knotting it so it would stay secure.

Facing him again, she pulled her tank tops back down and glanced around. "No, I didn't. Did you?" She asked, gazing at the bus, watching as a fire from it's engine broke out and began to spread. She severely doubted anyone else was left alive, or at least critically injured. They were going to freeze to death soon, and there only option was to find some kind of shelter. Then again, she knew that laying in snow preserved body heat. She'd rather the first option.

As she was about to tell Vance that they needed to start moving, she heard a faint groaning. She furrowed her eyebrows and glanced around, raising an eyebrow at Vance. "Did you hear that?" She asked, not caring if she sounded stupid.

(sorry, mild writer's block)

{No worries, I thought it was great :D }



Vance resisted the urge to snap at her. 'If you knew that, you should have done it without me having to tell you.' He turned away, uninterested in watching her pull up her top, revealing her thin waist. She was a new kid, and from what he could tell, mentally lacking, and he just couldn't allow himself to stoop to hitting on her. She started walking through the snow, the soft powder crunching under his gray and electric blue converse. He started pulling the half frozen bodies of his once classmates out from the bus, noting that the fire was starting to spread to the rubber seats. The bus driver was already lost to the flames, and the smell of burning meat filled his nostrils the closer he got.

At the same moment Jess heard the groaning, the slight sound made it to Vance's ears. "I did." His hazel eyes searched through the wreckage, hoping to catch sight of movement, preferably away from the burning front end of the bus. "Don't just stand there, come help me get our classmates out of the bus." His face was grim, his pale red lips pinched together while his nose was slightly crinkled trying to keep the myriad of smells, each one more disgusting than the last, out of his lungs.

He continued to break windows, doing his best to ignore the chilled blood that began to slowly soak into his jacket. 'Well this jacket is ruined...' he lamented, attempting to keep his mind from realizing the fact that he was pulling dead kids from a burning bus. "Move them far enough away from the bus so they don't burn. I think their parents will want a proper burial." He said louad enough for Jess to hear, and he hoped that she didn't notice his voice was tight, and whether that was due to the choking smoke or emotion, he would never tell for as long as he lived.

[Haha aww, thanks]

Already Vance was getting on her nerves. He was being snippy and she honestly did not need that. Though she kept her lips pressed together to keep from saying anything rude. At times she had a rather dirty mouth, especially when angered, but was doing her best to keep her mildly short temper in check.

Making her way over to Vance, Jess began gently pulling the bodies out of the wreckage that once was a bus full of giddy high schoolers. She wasn't a girly girl, and even though the gore bothered her, she gritted her teeth and kept working. She was a strong girl, and it showed as she tugged seniors over double her size out of the bus. Ever so gently, she laid them out on the snow, making sure to gingerly close their open eye lids. Making sure Vance wasn't watching, she did a cross over her face and body, lightly touching the four points to form the cross. She was Catholic, and though she wasn't a pious kind of believer, she did believe enough.

"Yep," was all she said in reply to Vance, not wanting to lash out at him or break down. As more and more bodies piled up on the soft white snow, the groaning Jess had earlier heard became louder and more apparent. Wiping her now bloody hands on her jeans, she peered down into the back door of the bus where she was pulling her former classmates from. She saw a face looking up at her, mouthing the word please continuously. "Hey, help me," she shouted at Vance, then returned her attention to the other teen in the bus. With all her strength she pulled him out, taking extra care not to pull too hard or hurt him. When he was lying on the snow, she finally got a good look at him.

Adam was his name, and he was one of the 'average' kids. He wasn't popular, but not an introvert either. He had been nice to her on the first day she had arrived at Redhill, showing her where her classes were and making sure nothing bad happened to her. He had black hair swooping across his face, and watery gray eyes stared back at her. A large piece of glass was stuck in his stomach, and she gasped. She knew it was the only thing keeping him from bleeding out. "It's alright, you'll be OK," she whispered and dropped to her knees beside him, trying to comfort him.

{Sorry for uber lateness, been having writers block >.<" }


Vance's head snapped up at the call and rushed over, careful not to step on anyone in his haste. "What's the pro-- oh." He started to ask, but his own question was quickly answered as he neared Jess and the kid she was leaning over. Vance leaned over the boy, not wanting his brain to recognize who it was quite yet. There was blood everywhere, soaking through the torn clothing the boy wore. Vance desperately ran through what he knew about trauma like this from his dad. Staunch the bleeding, clean the wounds, apply pressure... He ran through the list at lightening speed, his hands working quickly.

"Jess, we are going to need water, and lots of it. Find a bowl or something, and whatever clean clothing you can find." He ordered, his voice rough as his body clicked into auto pilot. Vance starting ripping the boys t-shirt off, feeling along his chest for any broken bones, listening intently to the labored breathing, he was obviously in a lot of pain. Vance lifted his head and scanned the area, they needed to find shelter. The temperature's were going to drop far too low, and the last thing they needed was for this kid to go into shock or for them to freeze to death. As he scanned, a flash of light caught his eye, but vanished when he blinked. Looking again, he caught the flash again. Keeping his eyes focused on the area, he moved his bloody hand slowly up to his forehead to block out the sunlight. A cabin!

"JESS! There's a cabin!" Vance shouted, his voice filled with relief and joy. He shifted focus to the boy laying next to him and began searching his body for wounds with renewed vigor. When he heard Jess approach again, he said, [color=royal blue]"He's in poor shape, but not as bad as I feared. His left forearm is broken, at least two bruised ribs, his ankle I think is completely shattered and he has a ton of gashes along his legs... and this."[/color] Vances moved the boys hair out of the way to reveal a two inch gash at the hairline of the boys forehead. The skin was peeled away to reveal the white bone underneath. "This is what I am most worried about. We have to get a fire going, clean his wounds, set his arm and ankle, and somehow stitch that head wound. I think he's also got a concussion from the way his eyes are dilated... We have to get him to that cabin. Can you help me build something to drag him?"

Instantly snapping into action, Jessalyn hopped up and ran back to the bus. She began pulling out bags and bodies, trying not to think of the faces of her dead classmates. She couldn't find a bowl and bit her lip. She rifled through a bag, she didn't know who it belonged to, and pulled out a few pieces of clothing. A few tee shirts and a sweater were the best picks, and she threw them to the side. She peeled off her own upper tank top, not caring that only her gray cami was left on her chest. Holding the pile of clothes, she jogged back over to Adam and Vance.

"You're not worried about that," she asked as she pointed at the piece of the glass wedged into his stomach. It was long and thick, and all of the other injuries, including the gash at his hairline that Vince had pointed out, didn't make it any better. She set the clothes down gently and patted Adam's hand to try and comfort him.

When Jess heard Vance yell about a cabin, she jumped up and squinted her large hazel eyes so that she could see. Finally, after scanning the mountains in front of her, she saw what he was talking about. It was a small cabin, probably only having one bedroom, and most likely had no sort of phone or any form of communication, but it was shelter and that was all that mattered.

"We can probably build some sort of stretcher to drag or carry him on," she replied, turning her head this way and that so she could look around. She laid her eyes on two long branches which had fallen off of a nearby tree when it collided with the bus as it charged past. She smiled lightly and grabbed them, they were semi heavy, and dropped them near Adam and Vance. "We can tie the clothes together in the middle and around the branches so we can put him on it," she said and motioned in front of her.

((Sorry it's so short. At school))

{No worries! ^^ }


Vance looked down at the wound she had mentioned. "It's not as bad as it looks. Head wounds bleed much more than torso ones do, and glass comes out pretty clean anyway." He grabbed some snow, and pulled the shard of glass out in a vertical smooth motion. When the blood moved to fill in the gap, Vance shoved his handful of snow into the hole, then placed one of the shirts Jess had brought over it, applying pressure.

When she dropped the branches, Vance nodded. "Good job. Keep a firm hand on this." Meaning the ball of now ruined shirt on the boys stomach. The sudden shock of the snow would keep the wound from bleeding a lot, hopefully long enough to get them all back to the cabin. Vance waited until Jess kneeled down beside him and placed her hand next to his, their fingers grazing each other. His hazel eyes flicked to hers, then he stood abruptly, grabbing up a sweater and tying the sleeves to each branch.

Before long, Vance had a passable sled. "It's as good as it's gonna get I guess..." He looked up into the darkening sky and sighed. "It's going to snow hard here in a minute... Keep your hand on his stomach while we move him." Vance strode forward with a dogged persistence, grabbing the boy by the arms and lifted, using all the strength he could muster to move the body to the stretcher.

Jess nodded at Vance's statement. She wasn't a big medical person, to be honest. Though she did know a lot about survival skills, her was like a war zone, and that was starting to kick in. The temperatures were dropping fast and considering the terrain it wouldn't be long until it started to blizzard.

Slightly mesmerized, she watched as Vance pulled out piece of glass and used snow to almost clean it, then applied a tee shirt. She briefly wondered how he knew so much. Did his mom work as a nurse? His dad as a doctor? Maybe he was just interested in the subject. Then again, Jessalyn couldn't imagine Vance being even vaguely interested in anything besides football.

Jess went to the left side of the boy, Adam, and laid her hand down gently on the ball of shirt atop his torso wound. Adam groaned, making Jess wince, but she just pressed down harder. Her finger tips brushed against Vance's, meeting his ice cold palms and making her fingers tingle slightly. It was as if she had stuck her finger in an electric socket like she had done as a kid. Though this was a tad bit pleasant, but Jess would never willingly admit that.

Glancing at Vance, she drew her hand back a bit but then returned it, trying to act as if nothing had happened. And in a way, nothing really had. All they did was touch finger tips. Than why did it feel like something more? The brunette shrugged off the ideas and tried to focus her attention on Adam and getting to the cabin.

"Alright," she said simply in response to his command. Trying to ignore Adam's moans of pain, she pressed down on the tee shirt with her left hand and glanced at the cabin. "The hill we're on slopes downward towards the cabin. It shouldn't take too long to get down there," she pointed out, watching the tendon and muscles in Vance's arms strain and stretch as he lifted their class mate. "You'll be OK," she whispered to Adam, though she was truly unsure if what she was saying was true.

Vance bit back a scathing remark. It wouldn't take too long if they were just walking, without him having to pull along an invalid, whom he had finally allowed himself to recognize as Adam Sterling. He was one of the normal kids, not a geek, but most definitely not popular. In some ways, that was easier for Vance to handle. If he had been anybody else, especially one of Vance's friends, Vance wouldn't be able to be near as level headed as he was being.

Once Adam was on the stretcher, be began dragging it towards the glimmer of hope, the cabin. Vance caught Jess's eye and nodded his head in a silent beckoning. When she came close, he leaned over and whispered, "Keep on eye on that head wound. I'm afraid the lower we go in elevation, the more it will bleed. Don't worry about lying to him about his odds. He has to believe he will make it or he won't fight to live." That was one thing his father was always drilling into him. Even if the outlook is bleak, the patient must be willing to fight for their own life and that usually didn't mean telling them the whole truth of the situation.

"Can you cook?" The question came suddenly and at a normal volume. The thought struck him that if they were coming upon a usable cabin, it just might be stocked with nonperishables. Vance knew the basics of cooking, boiling water, making boxed mac and cheese, and he had a great talent at using the microwave, but that was about it. His mother was the chef in the family, not even his dad could cook.

At Vance's comment, Jess's eyes instantly filled with anger. She whipped her head towards him as he whispered in her ear and glared. Inclining her face closer to him, she made sure to keep a firm hand on Adam's chest. "I'm not lying to him. It's called having hope. You should try it sometime," she hush whispered bitterly. Jess was trying to be optimistic, and Vance's controlling and dark mood didn't make anything better, especially for Adam, who rolled his head sideways and smiled at Jess weakly.

Smiling back, Jess returned to Adam's side and glanced out at the cabin. It was swiftly approaching them, no longer a tiny dot in the distant, hidden between two mounds of white. She tried to imagine the inside of the cabin, but from all the recent events her mind wasn't working too well. It was like the wheels in her brain had been stopped as if someone had wedged something between them, like a piece of wood or a rock.

Acting as if nothing had happened, the brunette nodded her head at Vance. "Yeah, I learned from... Well, nevermind. I know how to cook," she said with little emotion. In truth she had learned from cookbooks, but had almost let that slip from her mouth. Her work-aholic, business woman mother only ever rarely made meals and froze them for Jess to thaw when she got home. Tired of freezer burn, Jess had studied every cookbook she could check out in her old school's library and even invented a few dishes of her own.

Looking back at Adam, Jess sucked in a breath as she realized how similar looking he was to her brother. The last time she had seen her brother floated into her mind.

---

"Jess?" Mick's voice pulled Jess from half-sleeping state. She stirred for a moment before opening her eyes slowly, blinking furiously to push away the sleep still crowing them. "Mick, what do you want," she croaked, watching as he slipped through the door and sat on the edge of her bed. She sat up, pulling the covers up to her lips and trying to raise an eyebrow at him groggily.

Cracking a small smile, Mick patted her knee through the blanket. "I'm going out," he said, and the loosely worded term made Jess's jaw drop. The last time Mick had gone out, he had been gone for three weeks, staying at a well disguised crack house for the drugs.

"Don't go, please," she begged quietly, resembling a seven year old version of herself. Her black haired brother shook his head and kissed her forehead before gliding out of the room, leaving Jess to stare at the door as if he was still there.

---

That had been a month and a half ago, six weeks. It was the last time Jess had seen her brother. Her mother, a well renowned attorney, didn't let a word of it slip to the press, or anyone else for that matter. The news would ruin her rising career, so the woman played it off like she had sent her son on a ski trip with some friends. Jess had no idea where her brother had gone, or if he was even still alive for that matter.

Jess shook her head, trying to rid herself of the memories. She glanced at Adam and Vance, then looked away uneasily, the flashback settling at the back of her mind as they trudged down the hill to the cabin.