Blacktail Deer Plateau I deserved that one.

Having been entertaining a low-level ire towards Harps, believing she had chickened out of living among them and vanished on her own free will, the knowledge that Rosalyn so bluntly imparted gave a new angle to everything. He felt the barest sense of guilt over his initial thoughts - and then nothingness. A blanking of his brain. He had not known the girl very well or for very long, but to hear that she was gone and dead shook him in ways Reyes could not put words to.

He was briefly slack-jawed, but then he shut his mouth with a click and looked away, in to the distance. Rosalyn had done the same; she was quiet, seemingly more interested in her son now that she'd given him the news. He did not know how to react and so he didn't react at all. And when the silence grew too heavy, he broke that with something that veered tremendously off-topic.

Why are we still here? He asks, yet still is unable to look at his mother. He feels sick to his stomach as he looks around at the pine trees and the snow. His voice is a touch more exasperated. Winter is almost over. The quakes stopped ages ago. We could go back home.