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“We spent June and July in the Rockies, growing stronger, feeling feral in the untamed range of mountains.”
― Aspen Matis, Your Blue Is Not My Blue: A Missing Person Memoir

“They headed across the meadow, passing groups of students eating lunch. A mottled bird that looked like a cross between a chicken and a pheasant burst from the undergrowth. Ash watched it flutter into the trees, then land in the bushes.
“What in the world�?�
Vale followed his gaze to where the bird waddled through the undergrowth. “It’s a spruce grouse.�
Ash stared into the trees. A few steps away from the meadow, the light dropped by half. “What did you call it again?�
“Spruce grouse is the official name, though they’re sometimes called prairie chickens or fool hens.�
Ash chuckled. “Fool hens, huh?�
“Yeah. People think they’re kind of dumb—the way they let other animals get close to them. They’re pretty mellow.�
Ash watched it as it faded back into the autumn foliage, the plumage a match to the brown and orange leaves. “How do you know all this stuff?�
“I don’t know,� she said. “I read things, I guess.�
“I know that, but where’d you learn the stuff about birds?�
“I’ve got a couple books on wildlife. Books on the woods, and on camping, and survival, and…� Vale shrugged. “I just read a lot of stuff. Okay?�
Ash grinned. “Pretty cool.”
― Danika Stone

“While they rested, he searched for landmarks. The mountains they’d walked into were gone, a hazy gray ceiling of storm clouds in their place. It gave him the unsettling feeling of being caught inside a box. Ash turned and looked back the other direction. His attention caught on the forked top of a pine tree and he frowned. What the hellâ€�? That looks like the same tree we passed fifteen minutes ago. It felt for a moment like he was in a poorly designed game and had just come across a repeating landscape. His gaze dropped down to the path where they’d just passed. His stomach churned uneasily. The trail was a faded smudge, the line of it almost too faint to follow in the gathering darkness, but there was a small outcrop of rocks in the trees that also looked familiar.
His attention jumped back to the pronged top of the branches. “What theâ€�?”
― Danika Stone, Switchback

“Ash nodded. A moment later, sleep overtook him and he began to dream. He stood in the gamescape of Immortal Defenders, Vale in armor at his side.”
― Danika Stone

“The ‘Hypoxia Bluesâ€� can be a feature of living in high altitude cities.”
― Steven Magee, Hypoxia, Mental Illness & Chronic Fatigue