Kinkaide grimaced and held on tight to the cargo net, bracing for impact as he anticipated meeting the ground at near-terminal velocity. And waited. And... waited. He opened one eye and looked around in confusion as the cubicle continued its journey toward impact, a journey that should have ended ten, fifteen, twenty seconds ago. And still he fell.<br/><br/>What the everloving fuck?<br/><br/>Thomas released his grip on the cargo net and stretched out toward a small hole in the cubicle wall; after six minutes of solid freefall he was already dead. It was just a matter of his body catching up with the physics. All he wanted now was to satisfy the curiosity of where the hell his corpse was about to crash and he strained to see through the dark and the wind and the whipping snow, but even the slowly fading adrenaline that flooded through him wasn't enough to grant superhuman vision. Kinkaide snarled in frustration at his own helplessness and pounded a fist against the wall, furious that this should be how it ended.<br/><br/><em>'Shoulda just bought it in Nicaragua,'</em>he thought bitterly as he pushed off the wall and angled his body to return to the cargo net, his finely honed survival instincts unwilling to simply surrender even in this completely hopeless-- *WHUMP* The cubicle finally touched down, with a fraction of the force it should have developed during its flight. Thomas was thrown from the net and went sprawling across the cubicle's floor, his head cracking against a loose crate of MREs. He rubbed away the soreness on his crown and rose to his feet, found the little MOBA still in his pocket and knelt back at the small hole in the wall. Yeah, he'd touched down, all right, but unless there was a convoy waiting outside for him with a fifth of bourbon and a Big Mac he was still dead. Just slower now.<br/><br/>The cubicle door was stuck shut, probably jammed from the impact. Thomas took a couple of steps back from it and suddenly lunged forward, bringing up one heavily booted foot in a solid side kick. Two more strikes convinced the door to swing free and Kinkaide walked outside to see what fresh hell he'd been dropped into. "What in the fuckin' name of Jesus and the Mexicans...?" the Staff Sergeant muttered as he wandered among the other cubicles, as ragged and beat-up as his own, and the slightly impossible cloudless snow. The air felt cold, but not just cold; it felt...<em>sick</em>wasn't quite the right word, but it would have to do; Kinkaide wasn't in the mood to freeze to death while playing Scrabble.<br/><br/>The sound of tortured metal giving way snapped Kinkaide's attention to another cubicle and he ducked behind one of the unopened boxes. He watched, wary, as another suited figure stumbled out into the deep freeze. Part of him relaxed a little as the figure shouted and he realized it was a woman, but he remained on guard; just because he wasn't armed didn't mean she couldn't be. On the other hand, a nice peaceful bullet wasn't exactly sounding unwelcome at the moment.<br/><br/>Thomas stepped back around the cubicle's corner and leaned against the frozen metal before she turned to see him. It was too dark to see her face even if it wasn't completely covered by the suit's hood and goggles, but he had a feeling she was surprised to see him anyway. "I don't suppose you've got an Icebreaker cruise ship or a Black Hawk chopper stashed in your pocket," he called out, then took a couple of easy steps forward. "I'm Staff Sergeant Thomas Kinkaide, U.S. Army Rangers," Kinkaide said, introducing himself. "Who are you, and do you know what the hell we're doing out here?"