Redsand Canyon days of creation

Renard appeared to Colin in the same way Colin had appeared to Renard: an unassuming, quiet, before you weren't here, now you are sort of manner, the type of person to walk only within someone else's footsteps in the snow. He nods to them, too tired to speak.

They sit like that on the edges of each other's perception for a long time, or maybe only a few seconds. It's hard to tell.

Morning, Colin.

His head jerks up. Finley. If he wasn't sweating before, he's sweating now, and the back of his neck is cold. Good morning, he says in a voice that is half muscle memory and half croak, which leaves little to no room for anything impressive. Looking for a spar? 

It's an attempt at a joke that doesn't quite get off the ground-- no, doesn't even get its engine started. It turns over and over inside a hood and chokes in its own fumes, which he imagines that its staining his lungs black from the inside, drifting in thin wisps from his eyes, mouth, and ears.