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Alec is hungry, he's dehydrated, but not ravenous like he would normally be. Not only is his metabolism much slower without his transgenic abilities, but he's not unskilled at surviving in this terrain and circumstance. He was able to find them water, to hunt a small bit, to gather as they went. If he'd been by himself, he would have barely noticed.

But he wasn't, so he sits back when Lark tells him to, he huddles into that blanket, and he doesn't try to say anything until he's finished the broth - largely because he's not interested in talking past chattering teeth.

"I'm okay," he insists again. Although: "Another night out there was going to be a problem, so I pushed us today."

"You're okay," Lark agrees. If both their assessments are that Alec isn't going to die right here, then it's accurate. "But you'll be more okay once we warm you up. Tell me what's out there--animals, people?"

"Just us as far as people go," he answers, meaning barge passengers. He sets the bowl aside and huddles more tightly into the blanket.

"Plenty of animals. I'd have been fine if I had either my speed or more time to set trap lines, but we couldn't stop. There's something wrong out there though. Some of the people I saw weren't... Acting right."

"Aggressive?" It's going to take a few hours, he thinks, to stop speaking in the radio-induced staccato.

"Mm," Alec stalls, because it's not wrong, but for the encounter he's thinking of, not right either.

"Yes. But not like people are aggressive. Not quite." Honestly it reminded him of the anomalies, but he doesn't ever bring that up lightly, and he hates what it probably means if he's right.

Lark gives him a long look. "Meaning they can't be reasoned with?"

"Like they were sizing me up and decided I wasn't worth the effort." Humans as predators think differently than oh, say, wolves as predators. Real wolves.

"Like maybe they weren't desperate enough yet to try me but might if I stuck around."

"Wild animals, then." He closes his eyes, just for a second dreading things and gathering himself. "All right. We've got a fence, we have people on patrol. For the moment things are steady here."

"What is here?" Alec asks, because if anyone could get people back to camp alive without supplies it's Alec, but if anyone can figure out what the purpose of an abandoned camp in the Arctic wilderness is, it's Lark.

He massages his feet while he listens, checking like he has been obsessively for any signs of frostbite. His boots are sturdy and well made but they're not insulated for these temperatures.

He gestures around them. "Basically what you can see from right here. Shelter is the most important thing. I haven't been able to make heads or tails of what they were doing here."

Alec gives him a look.

"So what have you been doing for three days? Knitting an afghan?"

"Pining for you, obviously," he says, dripping sarcasm, his tone sharper than he'd meant it to be.

"Well obviously," Alec returns, but flat, because he's terrible at flirting like this.

But he does look up and tips his head.

"I just mean I know you. I know you were doing something. So what's been going on?"

"I've been taking shifts securing the perimeter. We have a fence and so far it's kept things at bay. I'm trying to keep a fire going, I've gathered whatever I know isn't poison," which would have been so much easier with his nose. "and making weapons. I've been treading water, basically."

Out of all of which Alec's take away is -

"So there's been trouble?"

"Not here. But people who have come in have said there are people from the Barge who are acting like wild animals."

"Great," Alec mutters, and he reaches for his boots again, straightening up without shrugging off the blanket. Yet.

"No rest for the wicked then. That must have been what the Admiral meant."

Lark holds up a hand; stay here.

"I have several concerns about the Admiral but we don't have time right now to go into them. After you've rested, do you think you can find more people? Take down any 'wild' ones to get them here?"

"I'm depowered, not fucking helpless," Alec... Doesn't quite snap, but doesn't quite not, and he ignores the silent order.

"I mapped the way in. I can start fanning out in a grid if there's anything at all like a map here."

Coupled with the way Lark had snapped at him just a few moments ago, Lark takes a moment to breathe in, breathe out. There's still a raw tension in his voice, though. "And I've actually lived depowered for most of my life. I'm not asking you to rest because I'm trying to baby you, Alec. I need you fed and rested before you go out again."

"Oh?" Alec presses, even though the rational, logical part of his brain knows this is true. Alec was without most of his abilities for only a week. Lark was born human and stayed on the Barge much longer.

But that's not the party of his brain governing his mouth right now. "Well last I checked I've been me all my life and I know what I can and can't do. We're here. We have a job to do, and not a lot of time to do it in."

"You've been you with powers, and they're gone now. You came in here hypothermic, so stand down and get some rest," he all but snarls.

A strong enough order at the wrong time can make Alec flinch when nothing else can.

Now, Lark snarls one at him and Alec does stop for a moment. He goes dead still, eyes flicking up to meet Lark's, second foot halfway into his boot.

Then he slams his heel home and hooks the laces, pushing to his feet without answering. It hurts, but what else is new? He ignores it too.

"Alec." He isn't moving, not closer and not away. "I need you to trust me right now."

"What, like you're trusting me?" he fires back.

"Take away a bit of speed and strength and endurance and now you think I can't hold up my end of what needs done?"

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