The slack in the rope ran out of the plane. Oswin braced himself for impact. ‘Any moment now Kevin is going to throw us both out of this plane’ He thought. However, Kevin was frozen, he stared down at the mile drop to the ground below. Oswin grimaced as his chest tightened. ‘I have to do this one myself’. He grabbed Kevin around the waist and jumped, putting them both into the sky.

  Kevin and Oswin fell directly above the crate of explosives. Would the explosives detonate on impact? Oswin didn’t want to find out.

  “Kevin!” Oswin slapped his friend's face from side to side. “Kevin, I need you to come back to earth.” Kevin did not respond. His glossy eyes started far into the distance. “Dammit, Dammit, Dammit” Oswin pulled the rope with all his might. It was far too strong for him to rip with his hands. Kevin might have been capable of it.

  “Ok, I need to cut the rope.” Oswin thought outloud. “And even after that. I need a way to distance myself from the explosives. No. One thing at a time.” Oswin padded down his pockets for anything that might be useful. His phone had no service, and his wallet was in a bag back on the plane. ‘Ah! My wallet. That’s just gone.’ He summoned his signature weapon. The quarter-sock was fantastic for bludgeoning opponents through armor, but lacked any sharp edges.

  He thought back to races he participated in previously. He remembered the circus theme. He hardly had the RAD to summon a theme change, so he localized the area of effect to a small radius. The black military rope around his hands transformed into an equally strong but far more welcoming yellow and red rope. ‘Not gonna work.’ Thinking back again, he recalled Brenna’s theme. Some nonsense with sand, oil and scrap metal. The outfits looked extremely uncomfortable due to all the sharp bits of metal sticking out at poorly fashioned angles. In this moment, it's what he needed.

  Oswin took himself back to that race. Themes are not created, but they are discovered. They always exist, whether or not a particular person has the ability to conjure them. Everyone describes the feeling of summoning a theme differently. This is especially true for those who can summon multiple themes. For Oswin, he would describe it as tuning a radio with an unbelievable number of buttons and knobs. His first encounter with Brenna’s theme was not super helpful, judging the dials of the radio based on only the interference running between Oswin’s theme and Brenna’s theme from a memory was impossible. But that was not Oswin’s only hope.

  At the party Brenna also summoned her theme. Oswin shuddered at the recollection, but walked through it. He was being torn between two dimensions. The normal theme with all dials set to 0, and a new one. ‘The left dial was set to 75, right dial was roughly 86. Increase the power inlet to 10 watts.’ Thought Oswin. The sleeve on his right arm transformed, suddenly being covered by a sheet of scrap metal with a hazardous edge.

  He sawed the rope, seeing progress immediately.

  “Yes, Yes,” he chanted.

  With a few more cuts, the rope disconnected. Oswin caught the piece attached to the bombs below. Since Kevin was tied to the rope further up, the two remained attached.

  “Can you help me out with this part?” asked Oswin.

  “Y-Y-Yes.” said Kevin fearfully. He attempted to move but his body refused to follow his orders.

  “Fine,” said Oswin. He climbed the rope towards the bombs. Once there, he proceeded to align himself to one of the sides of the bomb crate. He launched himself, and by extension Kevin, off the crate with the most powerful jump he could muster.

  “We are just going to have to tank the landing,” said Oswin. I don’t see a way around it. Oswin guessed they had 10 seconds of freefall left.

  “What?” said Kevin. “Summon a parachute.”

  “I can’t, I’m all out of RAD. Summoning clothing from nothing is expensive.”

  “Well you should. I should.” Kevin paused as he thought of possible solutions. His assessment of the situation concluded. He screamed incoherently. Oswin joined him.

  They landed in a thick canopy. The thick rope and their bodies caught on branches, slowing them down. The final impact point was a patch of mud, where they landed and were fully submerged in the mud.

  BOOOOOM.

  The payload of bombs contacted the ground. Dirt debris towered into a pillar hundreds of feet high, which turned into a mud rain as it fell.

  Oswin laid. He was content to sit in the mud, enjoying it’s warmth for as long as he could. Kevin tugged on his leg, dragging him out of the pit.

  Oswin rested his head on a patch of moss. He rubbed his face in it, using it as a makeshift rag. A skateboard broke through the leaves and embedded itself in the ground a foot away from Oswin. He yelped. Kevin's bike crashed through the canopy. It landed on a boulder, cracking it.

  Oswin stared at the skateboard, mouth agape. He rested his head on the mossy patch once more. They listened to the sounds of the jungle. No large animals were nearby. The only movement was provided by a line of ants that marched around the skateboard.

  “Ok,” Oswin spoke first. “Ok.” he repeated. “We have to get out of this.”

  Kevin pointed at Oswin. “Thanks for the help. Sorry for being so useless.”

  “Don’t worry about it. We all have our weaknesses. Yours is in heights and picking the worst tutor on the planet. Seriously, what were you thinking?”

  Kevin didn’t respond.

  “Man we both might die here. Like, for real. Augh. I have a skateboard.”

  Kevin avoided eye contact.

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  “At least apologize.” demanded Oswin.

  “I can do that. I’m sorry. This is not what I thought would happen.”

  “I also willingly followed you so I am at least partially to blame.”

  “So we are both to blame,” said Kevin.

  “I am not nearly as blameable as you are” said Oswin, throwing a pebble at Kevin.

  Kevin dodged by moving his head. “Yes, I did not mean to insinuate otherwise.”

  “So what is the plan now? Survival stuff?” said Oswin.

  “Yea survival stuff.” agreed Kevin. “You know I was a boy scout once.”

  “How long did that last?”

  “About 20 minutes. The meeting I was inaugurated at was raided by the cops since some of the leaders touched children. My mom made me quit afterwards.”

  “Damn. I’m afraid I also don’t know much about survival. I know bits and pieces but I can’t name the source of it, so I’m not sure if any of it is true. The most important thing is to remain calm. Are you calm Kevin?”

  “Relatively so.”

  “Ok good because I’m not. The other thing is that you don’t want to be alone, which I think we have covered, seeing as there are two of us.”

  “Easy enough.” Kevin examined his surroundings. They were under a jungle canopy. The trees were all thick, easily 2 to 3 feet wide with engorged watery moss that ran the length of the trunks. The calls of birds echoed around, but no birds could be seen. The floor was littered in rocks, with the occasional fern. Moving around would not be too difficult even without a machete.

  “Do you think Axel’s advice is worth taking?” asked Kevin.

  “Advice. I think he told us to go get killed.” said Oswin

  “That is not what he said.” responded Kevin. “He said our bikes will provide for us.”

  Oswin eyed the skateboard wedged in the ground suspiciously. It was a top shelf model. The bottom of the skateboard depicted Atlas holding up the world. “I could eat the skateboard. That's about all my ideas.”

  Kevin retrieved his bike. It was dirty, but functional. “We gotta trust in the rule of cool. It will guide us.” Kevin rapped his fingers on the metal frame of the bike. “Also consider: we are gonna get so much stronger doing all this.”

  “We are what now?”

  “You saw how powerful Axel was. This must be a part of how he became so powerful. I bet he did jungle training like this.”

  “I…” Mouth agape, Oswin’s voice trailed off with confusion.

  “And if we do get stronger, I think it would be worth it.”

  “Are you backtracking your apology?” accused Oswin.

  “I’m just saying hypothetically, if we both get through this and become world famous bikers, then that would be worth it.” said Kevin.

  “Hypothetically if I was a plank of wood with four wheels I would be a skateboard.” said Oswin. He yanked his skateboard out of the mud to display it to Kevin. “I would be this,” he declared. “Let’s just focus on survival for now. I’ll dream when I can see us in any part of a newspaper other than the obituaries.”

  “Well I’m gonna dream the whole time.”

  “Thats great, dream us up a new plan out of here.”

  Kevin climbed a nearby tree. While the trunk was tall, it was also covered in branches all the way up, making it a rather easy climb. On the thinnest branches at the top of the woods, Kevin surveyed the area, looking for anything that would catch his eye.

  “You see anything?” called Oswin from below.

  “Not really.”

  “Not really? Not really! What happened to all your dream talk?”

  “Well I don’t know what I’m looking for.”

  “That is–” Oswin was about to say ‘obvious’ but caught himself just in time. ‘What are we looking for?’ “We are in a mountain valley, how about we hike to the nearest largest peak and look out once more?”

  “Sounds good to me.” Kevin landed a few feet away from Oswin. “The highest peak I could see was that way. Let's get going.”

  The two hiked for an hour. Kevin dragged his bike along, and Oswin was thankful he only carried a skateboard. Sweat beaded and dripped off of Oswin’s face. The trees and moss all blurred together. Sometimes a rustle would catch their attention, but the source always ran off before they could get a look.

  Oswin wiped his face with his shirt. “Kevin, I'm starting to see a problem with this plan.”

  “Is it water?”

  “Yes”

  “I also am starting to see that problem.” said Kevin. He sat on a large rock and Oswin joined him. Oswin grabbed a patch of moss and ripped it off a trunk nearby. The moss was thick and heavy. It reminded Oswin of a wet carpet.

  “I think I saw someone drink from this once.” said Oswin.

  “Drink?” asked Kevin.

  “Yea check this out.” Oswin held the moss over his head and wrung out some water.

  “How does it taste?” asked Kevin.

  “Kinda bitter.” said Oswin, smacking his lips. There were more intricacies in the moss flavor than just that, but Oswin couldn’t find the words to do it justice.

  “That means it’s poisonous.”

  “No it doesn’t. I eat kale all the time and that's bitter as hell.”

  Kevin ripped off a patch of moss for himself and drained it into his mouth.

  “Its not just bitter. It's thick water. Highly viscous. I’m also tasting hints of dirt and grass. Lastly there is some wood flavor screaming at me from over yonder.” said Kevin.

  ”You spend a lot of time putting weird things in your mouth as a kid?” asked Oswin.

  “As a kid? I still do it.” joked Kevin. They both laughed.

  The hike continued until nightfall. By Kevin’s best estimate they were about halfway there. In the remaining rays of sunlight the goal of constructing a shelter was set.

  “Perhaps if I pour RAD into my skateboard I can transform it into an axe.” speculated Oswin. He swung the skateboard at the base of a large branch. His strike bounced off the bark and the impact reflected into his arms. Kevin laughed.

  “Hey I didn’t have high hopes for that one. I’m still thinking Axel’s advice was bullshit.” Oswin defended himself.

  “If we sleep in a tree I’m worried we are gonna fall out,” said Kevin. “So there's this bush over here. We can sleep under that.”

  “Just under the big fern?” said Oswin.

  “The big leaves will block the rain if it comes. I don’t have any better ideas.”

  They laid down, each making themselves comfortable by moving rocks and dirt around. The ground was moldable owing to the high amount of clay in the area.

  “You know I’m gonna start going crazy.” said Oswin.

  “Why?” said Kevin.

  “I need more social interaction.”

  “I’m right here dude.”

  “Don’t take this the wrong way but I need more than just you. I need a whole crowd. I’m an addicted socialite and I’m about to start going through withdrawals.”

  “Whatever man, just summon some imaginary friends. You can visit them in your dreams.”

  Kevin fell asleep first. In his dream he suggested that they should sleep in shifts with watches. It was a good suggestion, which would have avoided their harrowing awakening.