Cold (Section VII)

    Unbridled terror blossomed in her chest, threatening to freeze her massive heart as she beheld the bone-thin and withered forms of the nest-thieves as they leaped clumsily down from the sides of her nest, their clawed hands greedily clutching the forms of eggs – her children. Never before had she experienced such dread – the abject horror of knowing that the last remaining chance for her failing specie's future within the darkening world was being carried away by creatures fit only to be taken as prey. The very thought of such a catastrophic moment would have been enough to fill her resting mind with terrible visions. The reality blinded her with the focused instinct of a mother determined to not let the last of her offspring be carried away into the billowing drifts of strange, gray rain by the crested eaters-of-children that had descended upon her territory. Yet, regardless of the chaos that consumed her mind, her bone and sinew – every fiber of her being – cried out, urging her to action regardless of the physical cost.

    Even though a small part of her mind was aware that all but one of her eggs no longer carried the promise of life, she could not, would not, stand by and watch them be taken into the night as prizes for starving scavengers. Regardless if they had been filled with the cold of failed life, they were hers - and she would sell every last drop of her blood in vicious combat for their protection. Pivoting her massive, emaciated form to face her nest and the warbling thieves that had beset it despite the pain that raced through the ragged and bleeding tissue upon her ankle, she drew a great breath into her aching lungs and gave forth with yet another, thunderous bellow – the otherworldly cry shuddering outward and causing the very air to quake. With the air-splitting declaration of her rage, she willed her body forward, every thunderous step claiming yet more of the precious little energy that still clung to her body and sending flares of pain coursing through the shredded tissue just above her foot. However, nothing at that moment, not even the strange light that had burned the sky and stolen the warmth from the air, could have halted her advance. She would run down and kill each every one of the crested prey-creatures that had dared to violate the sanctity of her lair. Before the pale, cloud-hazed sun disappeared beyond the horizon this day, the black and gray land of her domain would be streaked with the blood of nest-thieves.

    As the air-breaking echoes of the titanic bray peeled out over the decaying land, the nest-thieves, once certain of their raid's success, faltered as they began their descent down the slopes of the great nest. Warbling in terror as their bobbing heads swiveled about, their eyes beholding the nightmarish image of the massive guardian they'd roused to wrathful action bearing down swiftly upon them, the nest-thieves immediately succumbed to sheer panic – milling about and stumbling over one another as they began to flee in a disjointed flock. Yet, even as they raced to evade the enormous pursuer that caused the very ground to heave beneath their feet with each of her charging steps, the thieves maintained their jealous clutch upon the eggs they'd pillaged – the utter end of starvation forbidding them from relinquishing what was likely the final chance to sustain their lives.