Copperoton - The Snatcher Saga

Episode 3 - A Rock in a Lake! ~ The Glacier Falls

As soon as the giant explosion occurred, I hit the deck immediately, terrified about what was to happen after this. We were living on a glacier, after all, which was already very dangerous. The booming died away and as I laid there, I began to shakily rise to my feet, terrified about our situation.

"AIR!!" I called out, "we need to leave this town immediately!!!"

Suddenly, the ground below us began to rumble, and the breaking of glass and the clattering of metal objects could be heard from within the shaking cabins. This same rumbling also cued many to start screaming in confusion and horror.

Air yelled from inside her house, "OK!!"

I had read in an old book left astray in my cabin for ages that was about a distant planet's icy continent, and how it had glaciers much like ours. This place had moving glaciers that would break off over time due to gravity, only to produce more of the same icy structures again over a very long period of time. This was definitely not the same as what we're familiar with on our planet, because our glaciers are formed by a different kind of ice that contains many strong minerals to keep the ice from moving.

"We're about to crash into the ocean! Come on!" I yelled again at Air being logically impatient.

Immediately after I yelled at her, she popped up out of the rabbit hole leading to her house. At this, Air and I quickly dove into a swift slide toward Jack's cabin. Luckily we found him along the way trying to rally people from their houses, so I stopped and jumped up to my feet. As soon as my feet landed upon the thick snow, the glacier began to rumble again and a violent cracking sound began to resonate in and through the cabins of Nossrunn village. Jack made eye contact with us after he regained himself and yelled amidst the penguin's cries of terror: "We need t' get these sheilas 'n' blokes off the glacier b'fore the bloody thing falls off!"

"You don't say?!" I yelled in ironic agreement.

Jack ignored my sarcasm, "Start rallyin' these chooks 'n' get 'em outta this bloody hell!"

On Jack's orders, we immediately started getting people out of their houses and into the snow-paved streets, where we could rally them out of the village quickly and efficiently.

Once I finished up leading a middle-aged couple out of their home, I looked across the street to a neighboring cabin, where Air was seen leading a young family from their doomed home. They wore a look of utter horror while their chicks poured out tears of the same feelings.

I started toward Jacen's cabin. And so, I dove on my belly and slid through the snow-paved streets in the direction of his home. Amidst my sliding, the ice once again began to crackle and rumble under our village, comically making me roll over into the upper wall of a nearby cabin. I was getting used to this procedure, so I got up on my feet to gain a faster pace going down the streets. I was unfazed by any more disturbances in the glacier as I raced through the town center. Here, I found Jacen leaving the grocery store with a heap of frozen fish.

"HEY, JACEN!!!!" I yelled from across the street.

Jacen's head took a sudden jerk into the direction I was standing and yelled in reply, "Hey!! Just grabbing some provisions before this town goes under!"

"Good! We've gotta hurry! Everyone's gathering at the outer rims of the village to migrate outta this place!" I had almost finished my thought when a feeling of dread dawned upon me. "Hey, Jacen, any idea where Jed went?"

Jacen paused for a brief second. "That's a no from me! You'll have to try your house, that's the last place I saw him!"

Without any further questions, I immediately sped to the northern part of the village where my house was buried. To my fortune, Jed laid buried in the collapsed rabbit hole leading to my house. I could only slide carefully toward him because a bitter south-Arctican wind picked up out of the blue, whipping and taxing my body all the more. Eventually, I managed to stumble toward Jed and make my first attempt to pull him out.