Information

mutilated has a minion!

the Arctic Frost Ptarmigan

mutilated
Legacy Name: Mutilated

The

Common Experiment #10010
Owner:

atempause

Age: 6 years, 9 months, 2 weeks

Born: July 5th, 2017

Adopted: 1 year, 2 months, 3 days ago

Adopted: February 21st, 2023

Statistics

Level: 33
Strength: 82
Defense: 82
Speed: 80
Health: 81
HP: 81/81
Intelligence: 84
Books Read: 84
Food Eaten: 0
Job: Unemployed

the tundra is no longer safe

Something horrible has escaped the old sealed tomb. A frozen corpse crawling through the cold desert at night. It hungers for the warm blood which once flowed through its body.

Gary was doing his best to take shallow breaths, so the white tendrils of steam wouldn't give away his position any more than was strictly necessary. His companions were dead, every single one. Where once there had been five, now there was only one. Five fearless explorers who were just idiots messing with forces they couldn't hope to understand.

They had done this. Unleashed this thing on the world, all for the sake of idle curiosity. It had seemed like such an innocent project. Exploring a network of tunnels beneath the tundra. A fun weekend for a group of scientists whose careers had stuck them inside a lab for too long. They would reclaim that adventurous spirit that had attracted them to science in the first place. They would make a discovery that wouldn't simply get them a mediocre paycheck and a notation in some scientific journal that less than one-tenth of one percent of the population would ever read.

No, they were going to make a mark on the world. National news, pretty girls fawning over them, all that jazz.

Idiots.

It was the word floating in his head as he felt the chill on the back of his neck that was so much more than simple fear.

The creature was coming for him.

*****

Lars had been the instigator (as usual). Jakki, Rolo and Gideon would always go along with their fearless leader who looked like he belonged in some add for tanning cream, not in a lab coat that could barely contain his biceps.

Not that Gary had opposed the plan, exactly. He'd maybe thought it was a little ludicrous. Spend a whole weekend tromping through icy tunnels so they could maybe find a few frozen fossils? A Battlestar Galactica marathon sounded like a better use of their time. This was Lars, though. When Lars put his persuasive powers to use, people listened.

Gary had flat-out refused to join his friends and colleagues on the outdoor supply shopping expedition. Lars might feel at home among the aisles of GPS equipment and boxes of ammo. Not Gary. He'd never in his life used a gun, though his sister was a sharpshooter down in Texas.

Gail and Gary never could settle the debate of who was the weird one in the family. Since they were too old for her to throw him in a headlock anymore, it would probably remain a point of contention between them...

Until my dying day? That shouldn't be long.

Gary blew into his hands, shivering as a blast of icy air filtered through one of the overhead vents. This creature, it was smart. It had used its environment to build a metropolis, right underground. One where the creature would have probably lived out its unnatural life in peace if the five would-be heroes hadn't been such...

Idiots!

Massive doors carved with some sort of runes that even five power-nerds couldn't understand. All their fancy devices had lost signal almost as soon as they'd entered the maze. Two hours in, they'd come across that pair of doors that almost looked like something from another world.

Of course they'd smashed the ancient-looking seal on the door.

Because we were such idiots!

The only reaction at first had been a kind of collective shiver that went up their spines when they were hit by an icy blast of air. Lars had made some stupid joke. The other four had laughed nervously, as much to keep Lars in a good mood as to convince themselves that, despite their many viewings of every sci fi and horror film ever made, this was the real world and there were no such things as monsters.

Rolo had hung back. Too many energy drinks, he'd claimed. They'd admired a mosaic that appeared to be preserved in ice and speculated on some strange tools made out of a material that almost looked like moon rock.

A horrible, strangled scream in the distance.

What was left of Rolo looked like a mummy that had been encased in ice for a couple hundred years.

Gideon had a panic attack. He'd never been what one would call strong-minded, but the last thing they needed was a fool screaming his head off. Lars had only meant to knock him out for a while, to keep him quiet until they could figure their way back to the entrance of this seemingly endless labyrinth.

Maybe he didn't know his own strength...or maybe he did.

Either way, Gideon wasn't screaming any more.

Jakki (his full name was Jacksonian but he never went by his full name) swore he wasn't going to die down there. He was a wiry, high-energy genius who could never sit still and who came off as Rambo in any first-person shooter game. Lars put Jakki to the rear and himself in front. Gary quite liked having a bodybuilder to the front and a trigger-happy survivalist to the rear.

Until Jakki was pulled down through what had appeared to be solid stone floor just seconds early.

That was pretty much the point where Gary stopped having faith in anything.

Lars clung to that leading man persona to the end. He insisted on staying in the lead, on carrying the torch and on calling out which direction they would take. It quickly became apparent the guy couldn't navigate his way down a one-way street.

The look on Lars' face was almost one of relief when the strange, icy mist wrapped around him in a cyclone that left behind only a pile of bones.

Now it was down to just Gary and this creature with no discernible substance and no motive.

Unless murder was its motive.

*****

Had it been days? Weeks? Months?

He didn't know. He could barely remember his own name.

He'd run out of food...how long had it been? Did it really matter? Even cleaning out the backpacks of his long-dead friends hadn't made a difference. Water was easy enough to come by. He still had a few matches, for melting the ice. But there was nothing to eat and sleep? Forget it. If he started to nod off, even for a minute, an unearthly moan would seem to rise from the very ground.

He was convinced the creature was toying with him, though he couldn't imagine why.

A shift in the light broke through his aimless pondering.

The doors to the temple.

The sun.

He started forward with a strangled sob, his arms outstretched, as if to embrace a lover.

The light brushed the tips of his fingers...

...only for a violent wind to rise and knock him to his knees. The doors to the outside world slammed shut with the finality of a tomb being sealed.

He looked on the icy blue vapor slowly taking shape with mad eyes, realizing that this had all been part of the creature's game. He could have almost sworn it wore a savage smile shaped from icicles and blue flames as a cloak of rotten brown and skin of icy blue became visible to his weary eyes. The creature's putrid black nails gently stroked his cheek.

This creature would go forth, seeking the warm blood of the tundra but not before it shared a cold-hearted sort of gratitude with the fool that had set it free.

Gary could feel his warmth, his very essence, being devoured as he surrendered to the endless cold.