Though it was the middle of summer, a chill traveled down your spine. You had come out to these woods in order to have a nice hike, but something felt off. The sun beat down on your body, but its warmth felt far more muted than it should. This entire portion of the woods was colder than expected - and it was a little worrying.
Your breath fogged in the air. When you last checked the weather forecast, it said it was about 35C. A rather hot day, but you liked to work up a sweat on your treks through these woods. Your phone still read the same temperature, but you knew that was wrong. You looked around the patch of the woods you were in, dread beginning to edge into your mind. The wind had slowed, it seemed. The rustling in the trees had slowed.
Staying still would do you no good though, so you continued walking. The air itself felt oppressive in its chill now, almost a wall. Even the most humid air you’ve waded through didn’t feel as thick and awful as this. You tried to walk faster, but it was getting harder by the second. The rustling of the trees had totally stopped at this point. The wind was still. Every single part of your brain was screaming out that something was horribly, terribly wrong right now.
You kept walking, struggling with every passing step. Your habit of going off-trail hadn’t caused you any problems in the past, and usually lead you to seeing a lot of fun animals. Mostly deer, but you had seen the occasional moose. So once again spotting a moose wasn’t what had shocked you. The fact it was absolutely still even as you got right next to it was. You could see it was still breathing, albeit slowly. It was frozen in place like some kind of statue in every other way though. Frost had begun to form on the fringes of its fur. Something was very, very wrong here.
As you stared at the moose, you couldn’t help but notice how everything was growing dimmer. To your eyes, it was like someone was slowly lowering a light switch. Your brain screamed even louder that you were not supposed to be here. You struggled and took a step backward away from the moose. The ground crackled underneath your feet. You slowly moved your head to look, and you couldn’t help but feel a spike of fear. More ice. And things only kept getting darker.
The muffled sound of wings echoed out above you. It was hard to move your head to look at whatever was landing, and even harder to see now that most of the light had vanished from your vision. Everything was so cold. But you managed to see a gigantic shape land on the opposite side of the moose, and it moved far faster than anything should be moving. Your vision hadn’t totally vanished yet, though. And as you finally finished moving your head, you could see it.
Glittering white scales peppered with deep purple. Wings that blotted out the pinprick sun you saw. An aura of horrific cold, deeper than the heart of the worst blizzard you had ever experienced. Something primal. Something hungry.
A gigantic claw wrapped around the moose’s neck, and you watched as it was summarily executed. Its blood seemed to spray out in slow motion, freezing into solid droplets mid-air as they slowly meandered their way to the ground. The moose still stood, though. The great beast - the dragon, you realized - loomed over the moose now. And then its eyes locked onto yours. There was a cold intelligence there. A mind that was deeply foreign and yet you could tell it understood exactly what it was doing and what you were. There was no malice in its gaze, you thought. You hoped for that, at the very least. It stared at you for what felt like an eternity, its frigid breath clouding what little vision you had left.
And then its jaws went wide and it clamped down on the moose’s midsection. This time there was no blood - the moose was still absolutely still. With a beat of its mighty wings, the dragon lifted off the ground. The syrupy, almost solid air did nothing to slow it down. The terrifying ice dragon simply ascended up and out of view, dragging its quarry along with it.
The air slowly grew thinner and warmer. The light of the sun went back to what you expected for midday. Within a minute, it was as if nothing had happened at all. The only hint that anything had happened was the few drops of moose blood on the grass. A shudder went down your spine again. Whatever that was, if it wanted you dead it would have killed you. It easily could have. Quietly, you thanked whatever deity listened that you weren’t something that monster would want to eat. You resumed your hike, thankful for the warmth once again.
i blame @lorenziniforce for this one specifically. very much because of this post. thanks girl for inspiring me to be self-indulgent too. cool girl shit.
