|
Amidst snow and ice and an endless cold, the Frost Vark lay dormant within a permafrost covered burrow, awaiting the arrival of fresh prey to sate its insatiable hunger for heat. So, when Hiroshi Randa’s team set up camp near an undiscovered entryway to the Axis Mundi system which also happened to be within the Titan’s territory, the armored predator emerged and quickly siphoned most of the blindsided humans dry of thermal energy.
Another group followed Hiroshi’s path. Another group fell prey to the Frost Vark’s aggression.
The new group’s plane suffered first as thick claws tore through the craft’s wings. Then, unable to fly, the Frost Vark fed upon the aircraft’s radiant energy, taking the life of the pilot within the craft. Other humans lingered at the monster’s periphery so with predatory hunger still guiding the Titan, the Frost Vark hunted for those final beacons of heat.
Frustratingly, the meager prey evaded the Frost Vark until stars and darkness crept across the horizon. Familiar thermal sources drew out the beast from his burrow where the predator found not only the humans, but a new source of tantalizing energy. Walls of flame were quickly consumed, yet as it gorged itself upon the grand thermal buffet, the humans once again made a break for safety in the form of a nearing helicopter. Unwilling to let its prey escape, the Frost Vark burrowed through the ice as fast as its claws would allow but, in the end, the pursuit was in vain.
The humans escaped. A meal forever lost so without a new target; the Titan waited for the next source of heat to step unknowingly upon its territory.
Such a fortuitous stroke of luck occurred several days later. Explosions drew the Frost Vark from slumber, but unlike the past hunt, the closing of the Alaskan Rift overcame the Titan’s ravenous hunger. Into a vortex of power the creature entered, its current fate unknown within the Axis Mundi system. |