Cold

Cooper cautiously stepped onto the ice of the lake with a quiet sigh. Even though there were several inches of snow between him and the cold hard ice, he felt his anxiety creeping up on him at the situation. Sparing a glance to the left, he saw the skeletal remains of the bridge outlined against the falling snow.

Cooper shook his head and turned around to wave Twilight closer. "Alright, I think we'll be good. This water should be frozen all the way though, but this part of the lake always seemed to be moving, so there's a chance it could still be water under there. We're just gonna have to take it nice and slow."

"Are you sure there isn't any other way across?" Twilight asked, her eyes darting back and forth through the snowy landscape.

"Well, you could just fly across, but then you'd just be waiting on the other side for a while." Cooper shrugged.

Twilight blew a strand of her mane out of her face. "Not happening."

"Well, then, let's get moving. It shouldn't be too far across. Maybe just a few hundred yards or so." Cooper replied, turning and taking another step onto the ice.

"How is the ice not buried under ten feet of snow, like almost every other open area around here?" Twilight mused, following in Cooper's steps.

"It gets really, really windy out here in the open, at night. The city breaks up the breeze enough to keep from freezing us all to death. But, out here the snow just gets blown away... plus it doesn't snow all too often anymore. It's just dark gray skies for the most part." Cooper answered her, walking with a steady, yet still somewhat anxious, pace.

Twilight placed her hoof in Cooper's boot-print as she followed. "Really? I mean, it feels like it's snowed every week since I got here."

Cooper paused mid-step and turned his head around. He raised an eyebrow at Twilight before chuckling. "You haven't seen anything yet. The entire first year after the bombs fell... I think at one point it snowed for three months straight."

Twilight stared wide eyed at Cooper as he turned back around and made his way forward. After trying to sort her thoughts out for a moment, she pushed forward and quickly caught back up with him. "That... that's insane... that's like when the Windigos tormented Equestria." Twilight muttered.

"Well, I'm pretty sure there aren't any Windigos around here, whatever they are." Cooper replied over his shoulder.

Twilight shook her head, "Well, regardless, I can't believe you survived that. You humans are a really strong species for not having any fur. I haven't had a trim in months now, and I'm freezing." She complained.

"Trust me, my fingers are starting to lose feeling. My plate carrier used to keep my hands warm, but I lost that back at the settlement. Now, my entire torso is cold." Cooper muttered, flexing his fingers to get some blood flow.

As they continued to talk, Cooper and Twilight covered good ground over the frozen lake. The idle conversation worked wonders on taking their minds off of their current precarious status, and allowed them to keep their attention focused elsewhere, as well.

They continued on for several minutes until Cooper could just barely make out the edge of the lake and the land beyond it. He turned around to Twilight to speak, but just as he turned to face her, a sound reached his ears. It was quiet, almost too quiet to make out with the soft patter of the snow against his ears, but as the seconds ticked by, the sound grew louder.

"Hold up." Cooper whispered, his voice coming out like ice.

Twilight froze in place. "What is it?" She asked, her ears flicking back and forth as she looked around for the sign of Cooper's sudden change in tone.

"Hear that?" He asked, holding up a hand for silence.

Twilight strained her ears to hear, but for a moment there was nothing. However, after a moment, her right ear flicked to the side, and her eyes widened.

"Is that-" she began, only to stop as the crunching sound of something running through snow grew louder, and louder.

Cooper and Twilight turned to the side just in time to see a figure leap towards them, moving so quickly that neither of them could identify it. Cooper just barely lunged to the side in time to avoid the creature as it leaped past him, it's jaws snapping shut where his throat would have been a split second earlier.

As the blur of fur and teeth whizzed past him, Cooper stumbled and regained his footing. He quickly shouldered his rifle and pointed it in the direction the beast had gone, only to find nothing there. Snow continued to fall, obscuring any trace of the creature as it ran about through the snow.

"What the hay was that?!" Twilight exclaimed, rushing over to Cooper's side.

"I don't know. I think it might have been a wolf, or maybe a really big dog. It moved so damn fast, I couldn't tell." He responded, his eyes flicking back and forth through the white world around them.

The sound quickly reached their ears again and they both turned just in time for the blur of teeth and fur to jump between them. This time its jaws were aiming for Twilight. Taking the half second of warning she had, Twilight immediately dove away from the beast and into the snow, but not before feeling its teeth brush through her mane.

As Twilight dodged, Cooper aimed his rifle and migrated his finger to the trigger. However, just as he turned to fire, the blur disappeared into the snow once more. He let out a frustrated huff as Twilight got back to her hooves and pressed her barrel against his leg.

"I can't get a shot on this thing. It's too damn fast." Cooper grumbled through grit teeth.

"Are you sure this thing isn't a Windigo?" Twilight asked, hey eyes darting back and forth as she unconsciously pushed herself into Cooper even more. "Knowing this world, I wouldn't be surprised if your Windigos had teeth and claws."

"Like I said, probably a-" Cooper started, only to be cut off as the creature leapt at him from the side. He barely managed to raise his rifle high enough to block the teeth that were aiming for his jugular. The force of the animal slamming into him threw him off balance and he fell on top of Twilight, taking her down with him.

"Gah!" She cried as the weight of Cooper and the creature came down on her back.

They collapsed into a pile of thrashing limbs, claws, fists, hooves, and teeth. Cooper struggled to keep its jaws away from his face as the creature bit down again and again. He shoved the beast off of his chest with all his might, creating just enough space to finally identify just what he was being attacked by.

The wolf, if it could even be called that anymore, was clearly starving and malnourished. Its ribs were visible, and its coat was excessively mangy. Several scars along its shoulder and face, along with greying fur around its muzzle, indicated that it was an old wolf.

It's lips peeled back in a feral snarl that sent a chill down Cooper's spine. Lastly, a pair of piercing amber eyes stared back at him with such ferocity and intensity that seeing them left a pit in Cooper’s stomach that made the hair on the back of his neck stand up.

"What in Tartaurus is that thing?" Twilight wheezed under Cooper's weight, her eyes trained on the wolf as well.

"It's hungry." Cooper answered, before the wolf lunged at him again.

Cooper quickly moved to shoulder his rifle, but the wolf was too fast, and too close. It covered the distance in less than a second, pinning the rifle against his chest and clamping its jaws down on the first thing that it could reach. Cooper managed to thrust his forearm out to block the feral animal's bite before it could reach his throat, but nothing could prepare him for actual impact.

Feral teeth cut through Cooper's jacket and into the flesh of his forearm. Lancing pain instantly shot through the limb as the wolf clamped down with all its might, nearly breaking Cooper's forearm in the process. He screamed in pain as the teeth dug deeper into his flesh, ripping and tearing as the wolf thrashed its head from side to side.

With his rifle pinned and his left arm in the wolf's mouth, Cooper released his grip on the pistol grip and balled his hand into a fist. He punched the wolf in the muzzle as hard as he could, but the impact only seemed to make the wolf bite down harder. Another cry of agony escaped his lips as the wolf chewed on his arm once more, its teeth scraping against the bones of Cooper's forearm in the process.

Under the combined weight of Cooper and the wolf, Twilight squirmed to break free. Her ears splayed back against her head as Cooper's screams raked at her brain and she felt her heart threatening to pound out of her chest. She pressed her hooves into the snow and pushed herself into as upright a position as she could before rolling out from under Cooper.

Once she was free, she immediately got to her hooves and turned to face the struggling man and wolf. Her eyes darted to Cooper's forearm as a sickening snap reached her ears and Cooper’s arm bent to an unnatural angle.

Cooper screamed once more as his blood seeped down his sleeve and onto his chest.

"Get off of him!" Twilight snarled, leaping forward with all her might.

She angled her head downward and pointed her horn straight at the wolf's ribcage. It paid her no attention until her horn pierced through it's flesh and into its chest cavity.

Immediately, the wolf released it's vice-like bite on Cooper's forearm and yelped in pain. Sickly crimson fluid poured out of the hole as Twilight's horn punched all the way through its chest and into one of its lungs.

Twilight froze as warm blood poured down her horn and soaked into her mane, quickly dripping down onto her muzzle and over her eyes. She grit her teeth as the wolf turned and bit down on her wither, its teeth sinking into her flesh and spilling her blood as well.

Tears dripped from her tightly closed eyes before she felt the wolf pry itself from her horn. Only a microsecond later, she felt her world spin as she was thrown to the side, knife-like pain lancing through her shoulder the whole time.

When Twilight could finally see straight, she found herself a few feet away from Cooper and the wolf closing the distance. Blood dripped freely from the hole in its side, a sick gurgling sound emanating from its throat with every wretched breath. Twilight tried to push herself to her hooves again, but stopped short when she found that her leg no longer responded to her commands.

She looked down in horror to see her own shredded flesh, the tensed muscles underneath, and the blood freely flowing out to the snow below.

She tried again to get to her hooves, but only managed to sit up slightly, putting all of her weight on her good foreleg. Each step the wolf took slowed time down until its jaws were only a few precious inches from her eyes, and all she could do was stare in horror as they came to take her.

A flash, followed by an explosive blast, raked at her hollow ears and the wolf lay dead before her. Twilight could only blink at how instantaneously the beast had fallen.

As she stared blankly ahead, she felt each breath leave her body in slow, raspy wisps. Her eyes slowly fell to the man lying not five feet away, his rifle held in one hand and smoke billowing from the barrel.