Okay, so- Winter's back. It was 4 when I woke up this morning and quite frankly, I'm tired of writing about it so I figured I'd post one of my short stories instead. This is one I wrote for my creative writing class at school. I hope you all enjoy it!

Frozen

            Dugan pushed back from the table after he finished eating, his belly full of the savory moose stew and home made biscuits that his wife Greta had prepared. He packed his pipe and touched a match to the bowl, clouds of thick, heavy smoke filling the air as he relaxed after his meal. It was warm in the cabin, something to be greatly appreciated living in the middle of the wilderness in Alaska like they did. The woodstove was roaring, eating almost an entire tree a day to keep the cabin at this temperature. The thermometer hovered at around 65 in the house, quite an impressive feat for the stove since the temperature outside had plunged into the -40 range. Dugan reached over and grabbed the coffee pot, which was bubbling madly, and poured two steaming cups handing one to Greta and taking the other for himself. He watched her as she prepared hers, two spoon fulls of sugar and enough powdered creamer to cut the thick taste of the heavy black brew. He laughed like he always did. “Gonna have a little coffee with your creamer, Hun?”

She smiled at him, her features lit by the flickering oil lamp on the table. It was mid January and there was no more gas being delivered until at least March, so running the generator was reserved for very brief periods such as watching a movie together or going online to shop for supplies. “You know I can’t stand drinking that tar that you make without diluting it a little, Dug. That stuff will stand a spoon straight up until it melts it.”

He looked at his cup thoughtfully, puffing on his pipe. “Yeah, I guess you’re right, it is a little thick. I better cut it down some myself!” He winked at her as he grabbed the bottle of Crown Royale on the shelf and poured a liberal shot into his cup. He tasted it and sighed in satisfaction. “Now THAT is coffee!” Suddenly, over their lighthearted banter the howl of a wolf was heard. His bearded face went white as he listened for a moment and he bolted to his feet, coffee and pipe forgotten as he shrugged into his parka and stepped out into the frozen night.

He stood outside for a few minutes, listening. The northern lights flamed above his head, blazing streaks of green and blue dancing in the heavens as he stood completely still, ignoring the stinging cold on his face. It was quiet. So quiet that it was deafening, the silence an almost tangible thing that wrapped around you and squeezed until you nearly wanted to cry out, just to make it stop. The only sound for several minutes was the strange, deep booming of the Aurora as they put on their show. Greta stepped outside, a bit more careful to bundle up first, and came up behind him, handing him his thick fur hat. “Was it him?” She asked softly, a tinge of fear in her voice. Suddenly the howl came again, sharp and distinctive. He was close this time, just over the ridge. The sharp yaps of the first howl were quickly joined by several others, a ring around the small cabin of eerie, echoing howls. “It’s him.” Dugan said tersely. “Dammit, I was hoping that sonovabitch would have died over the summer. Sounds like he’s got himself some friends, too.” Greta slipped her gloved hand into his, squeezing his hand gently. “It’s not your fault, Dug. I thought it seemed like a good idea, too. Crossing a wolf and a husky just made sense. He should have been a great working dog. Hell, He probably would have been, if he hadn’t broken his chain that day and started running with the pack.”

Dugan offered her a brief smile for the encouraging words. “Yeah, I know, Greta, It was a good plan, but now we’ve got a 200 pound wolf dog running out here that isn’t afraid of us or anyone else. He’s taken on the alpha role of that pack, too. They’re dangerous now. We have an entire pack of wolves that have completely gotten over their fear of people. He’s going to have to be dealt with. I’m going hunting in the morning.”

As they lay in bed that night sleep eluded Dugan. The next day he was going out after an unknown number of wolves, tracking them for as long as he needed to kill Ole Blue. Finally he fell into a fitful sleep. Suddenly the door to the cabin burst open and the huge form of a wolf leapt up the 6’ distance to the loft where their bed was. Greta screamed as the wolf grabbed her, teeth gleaming in the muted light as he tore into her throat and begin shaking his head viciously. Dugan felt her hot blood spray across his face as he punched at the wolf, screaming in rage and frustration. Suddenly he sat straight up in bed, hair matted with cold sweat as he heard that howl again, off in the distance, taunting him. He looked over at Greta who was still sleeping peacefully and sighed in relief. Just a dream, but far to real a possibility as long as that damn animal was alive. He slid out of bed without disturbing her, climbed out of the loft and poured himself a cup of coffee, sipping it and trying to ignore the shaking of his hands as he lifted the cup to his lips. He finished his coffee quickly and set about gathering his things. As he put the layers of clothing on he thought about what his plan was going to be. Blue had been hanging out up on the ridge, among the rocks and hollows where the snow wasn’t as deep. He was going to have to climb up after him. He wrapped the belt around his waist which had his pistol and knife already attached, checking the load in the pistol and making sure the knife was free in the sheath, easy to remove if he had to. He made a quick breakfast of leftover stew and biscuits from last night and climbed up into the loft, kissing Greta gently. “I’ll be back as soon as I can, Luv.” He whispered to her. She opened her eyes sleepily and looked into his for a moment.

“You be careful out there, Dugan.” She said softly. “Don’t you go making me a widow because of some damn wolf.” He grinned at her and shook his head. “Nah, It would take more than a wolf to make me not come back home, Hun. I like your biscuits to much.” She slapped him playfully on the shoulder and he winked at her and went down the steps. “I’ll be back soon.” He grabbed his rifle and his bag, fastening his thick fur hat to his head as he stepped out into the darkness. It was 6 A.M., it wouldn’t be light for hours yet so he turned on his headlamp and quickly put on his snowshoes, heading into the mountains. He climbed quickly, being used to walking on snowshoes. By the time dawn came, around 10:00 he was already at 600 feet high. He slipped on his sunglasses to shield his eyes from the brilliant reflection coming off of the pure white snow and started looking around for any signs of the pack. He found their tracks before very long and began to trail them, pausing for long periods to glass the hillside around him. Finally, around 3:00, as it was starting to get dark, he spotted his target, far off in the distance, around 700 yards away, to far for a clean shot. He started moving quickly toward them, hoping to get a shot at the monster he created before dark. He should have been more careful moving over the ridge. As he was cresting a snow berm it broke underneath him, his weight quickly taking the entire drift down in a mini avalanche, carrying him over a 50’ cliff in a matter of seconds. He felt himself falling suddenly, letting go of his rifle and tucking into a ball, waiting for the inevitable painful impact. There was a sharp pain in his knee as the snowshoe twisted, popping the joint with a painful Crack of electric fire up his leg. He was very lucky, though. Instead of breaking his body on the jagged rocks he landed in a massive drift of powdered snow that had been left on the far side of the lake after the last huge wind storm. He lay for a while, bruised and bloodied from the fall, his knee throbbing in pain. By now it was fully dark, the moon casting eerie shadows over everything as he slowly dug himself up out of the snowdrift. He thought about his situation for a moment. He was several miles from home, his knee was throbbing and would never support his weight, his rifle was gone, somewhere under several feet of snow, and there was an angry wolf pack in the area that wasn’t afraid of people. He sighed, not happy with his situation. “Well,” He said out loud to himself, “I guess we do what we gotta do, Dugan.” He removed his snowshoes and quickly began digging himself a snow cave, using them as shovels. After his shelter was completed, packed and firming up, he turned his attention to firewood, half crawling, half swimming through the snow to reach some nearby trees. He still had his knife and his pistol and he quickly used the knife to cut some dead wood as well as some live spruce branches to make smoke for a signal fire. He dragged the wood back to his makeshift camp and dug into his bag, taking out fire making supplies. Quickly he had a small, warming blaze going that reflected heat back into his snow shelter quite well. He chewed on a piece of beef jerky and drank some water, occasionally feeding another stick into the flames. He sighed. “Well, It could be worse, I suppose.”  He wrapped himself in his emergency blanket and fell into a fitful sleep. Sometime in the night he was awakened by a low growl. Cold chills ran down his spine as he opened his eyes and saw the dark shadows of several wolves just outside the dim red light of the ashes of his campfire. “Hello, Blue.” He said softly, his hand moving slowly toward his gun. “I guess it’s about time we finish this, you and I, Huh?” The largest of the wolves moved closer to him, eyes gleaming green in the dim light. Dugan reached up slowly and flipped on his headlamp, raising the gun at the same time and pulling the trigger. Nothing happened. The cylinder of the pistol must have gotten moisture into it in the night and was frozen solid. No matter how hard he tugged on the trigger, it wouldn’t move, wouldn’t fire. The sudden movement spurred his monster to life, though, the huge wolf/dog hybrid lunging forward, teeth bared in a fierce snarl. Dugan hit the beast on the nose with the barrel of the pistol, receiving a satisfying yelp of pain in response, and then threw the useless gun at another member of the pack that was considering joining the attack. He yanked his knife from its sheath and dove at Blue, wrestling the beast, stabbing viciously even as he felt the animal’s teeth sink into his shoulder. He yelled in pain, pulling the wolf’s head back as he buried the knife in its chest. The others in the pack, stunned by the cries of pain from the Alpha dog, backed away in fear, finally turning to run as Dugan yelled at Blue hysterically, quite insane from the pain and adrenaline coursing through his system as well as in shock from the vicious bites he’d taken. “Dammit, Blue! I didn’t want to do this, you made me do it! It wasn’t supposed to be like this, you stupid mutt! You were supposed to be Man’s best friend, you son of a bitch, not some kind of crazy man eating monster!” The dog finally went limp, staring up into Dugan’s eyes as he died in his arms, blood soaking into Dugan’s clothes. He lay back, exhausted, sore, and dizzy. He had done it, He’d faced his monster and won. The pack would know fear of people once more, they would no longer be a threat. He closed his eyes, relaxing, consciousness fleeing for a while as the body of the wolf lay over him, warming him, his blood and the wolf’s blood mixing freely. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been asleep when he heard the sound of a snow machine in the distance, Likely Greta out looking for him since he didn’t come home last night. He piled green spruce branches on the coals of his fire, blowing on it carefully until billows of blackish/grey smoke lifted into the sky. He grinned widely as he heard the snow machine coming closer, limping from his snow cave and waving as he saw he come over the horizon. As the snow machine pulled up alongside him he gazed regretfully at the cold, dead wolf laying in the cave. He nodded once in respect to the once proud animal and, gathering his few belongings, collapsed the cave around the beast, offering him a respectful burial. He smiled at Greta and limped over, half collapsing onto the seat behind her. “Let’s go home, Luv.” He said. “I’m starving.”