Anik’s heavy boots crunched in a thick layer of snow. The snow suppressed sound so all he heard was his own heavy breathing, and his winter clothing rubbing as he walked. Above, the sky was dark and covered the Earth like a big blanket. He held the Marlin 1895 deftly in his arms as he aimed it at the beast. The bolt-action rifle his father had given to him on his eighteenth birthday, which was only a few months prior. After practicing in the range, this was the first time he had been out, the first time he was going to use it for real. The 400 grams of weight felt heavier than usual and he knew a miss would likely lead the animal to bolt, so he had to hit it the first time.

The beautiful thick moose stood and chomped on some brambles; its huge antlers rose above its head like a Crown. This was the king of the icy glen, and Anik was going to commit Regicide. He crouched, and sneaked up to the rear and to the side, as his father had instructed him to do. When he got close enough to feel confident he would get a hit, he sank to his belly. He got the animal in the sights, and his gloved finger hovered over the trigger. He felt the steel on his finger and added a little pressure, just enough to feel comfortable. When Anik was fully settled, he took a deep breath, held it, and pulled the trigger. 

4500 pounds of energy was thrown into his shoulder, while it threw another 4500 pounds into the bullet. The projectile flew at supersonic speeds into the animal’s flesh, and exploded inside it, causing fatal damage to major arteries.

The moose sunk down onto its chest, stunned, and it looked to the heavens, as if to call for help, but no assistance was coming. It rolled to its side and fell silent; in this world, at least. Anik whooped and clenched his gloved fist in celebration. 

He turned to see his father watching him with stern eyes as frost developed on his brows.

“We do not kill for fun, son,” he said as he walked over. “We kill for necessity, and to preserve our Inuit traditions and culture. To kill is our way of life, but we never cheer.”

Anik gulped and watched the white, snowy ground. He dug his boot into the snow and scratched a pattern as he felt shame fall on him like snow.

“Sorry, father,” he said. “I… just… I was excited, you know. We were stalking this one for days, and I never shot a moose before.”

Father gripped Anik’s shoulder. “I understand, son, and I was excited my first time, too. God provided this animal to us. It is a blessing. We honour that by being humble,” he said, before walking back to the bright snow mobile that was already submerged under a foot of fluffy white powder. 

Father got on, powered on its engine and revved it to warm it up. “Now we collect our gift,” he said with raised eyebrows as he put snow goggles over his dark eyes. He nodded for Anik to join him on the back, so threw the rifle over his shoulder and joined his father as they drove down the white slope to the fallen Moose dragging the sled with them too. They would need to pull the 1400 pounds beast back to the pickup truck.

They jumped off the snowmobile and approached the downed animal that was almost submerged. They then used the sled like a scoop and had to drag the moose limb by limb until it rested partially onto the sled. As it was so heavy, it would be impossible to lift, so Father jumped on the snowmobile while Anik stayed with the sled and moose. Anik used the sled as a kind of scoop until it was fully on. Once it was, he rejoined Father on the back, and they headed away from the lake area to the parked truck. 

Once they got to the truck, they got off the snowmobiles and opened the truck’s lid to expose two cables connected to a motor. Anik jumped on the truck, while Father went to work and attached the cables to the sled. Anik engaged the machine, and it slowly dragged the animal while Father ensured all the moving parts, like the head, arms, and legs all were on the truck. As the heavy beast came onto the truck, it caused the suspension to compress down. Father gave the thumbs up, and Anik pulled the whole moose onto the back. Once it was fully on, Father closed the truck lip. Anik jumped down and went to go to the passenger side, he was stopped. 

“You can drive, son,” he said. “You have taken life, which means you are ready to take on more responsibilities as a man.”

“But I don’t have a licence,” Anik said with trepidation. 

“God has given you licence. Now take the wheel.”

Anik smiled and got in. He had always wanted to try his hand at driving. How hard could it be, he wondered? He had watched his dad drive a thousand times. You just put the truck in D, and press the accelerator; easy.

The track from the lake to their road was not far. Anik’s parents wanted to be close to the lake; to be close to nature, so they would always have that connection, despite being brought up in mostly urban Anchorage, Alaska. This meant Anik had a lot of leeway, as it was mostly just snow on flat terrain, so they trundled along slowly back to their suburban home, which was a few hundred feet away. 

Father got off the phone with his brother-in-law, Paul, who runs one of the butcher shops in town. 

“Take us home and you can go in and do your homework while I get the moose chopped up.”

Anik grumbled when he remembered his boring physics and biology homework.

“Oh dad,” he complained. “I wanna come watch you chop up the moose with Uncle Paul.”

“No Anik. It is getting late, and you need your sleep. Just be patient. We will fully butcher it as a family tomorrow, and you can cook the first piece of steak!” he said. “But we need the heavy equipment to chop the body into manageable parts first.”

Anik had always wanted to do that. “Okay,” he said.

Once in their driveway, Anik’s sister, Ila, appeared at the window and waved as a pleasant glow spilled out onto their snowy drive. Anik hugged Father and got out of the truck to go inside. He stood in the driveway and watched him reverse the truck, and head to the high street with the moose in the back. 

Once he was out of his snowy clothes, his mother, Andrea, approached with a cup of soup. 

“Hi Uneq,” she said. Mother was Irish-American, with blonde hair and blue eyes, which meant Anik was unusual as he had dark slanted eyes of the Inuit, but they dazzled like the icy seas, just like his mothers.

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“Uneq?” Anik said. 

She held up a book of translations. “It means son in Inuit, apparently,” she said without confidence. 

Anik laughed. “Okay, Ma,” he said. 

She punched him playfully. “Hey don’t laugh. I’m trying, and you know dad cares, which means I have to care too. You’ll understand someday.”

“Alright, sorry” Anik said and sat at the table and grabbed a spoon. “Smells good,” he said as the aroma of onions, garlic and other fresh herbs filled his nostrils. He tucked in.

§

The next day in the school cafeteria, Anik’s thoughts were dashed as the three boys came up to him.

“Hey Eskimo, what’s in the lunch box, dry whale meat?” Chad said to him from across the table with a sneer. Brad and Chuck, who sat nearby stuffing pizza into their face snorted with laughter.

“Hey, it’s sunny out. Isn’t your igloo gonna melt?” Brad said.

Anik ignored them all and bit into his ham sandwich. He smiled at the thought of chomping down on moose meat, one he killed and butchered himself. No one was going to rain on his parade today, not even Chad, Brad and Chuck.

The school bell rang, so lots of chairs moved at once as everyone headed to class. As he walked along the corridor to biology class, someone came up behind him and tried to trip him over. He turned, where Chad stood with his entourage.

“Your sister gone on any little sleepwalks recently?”

Anik was silent.

“Hey Eskimo, did you get a sled to school today? I don’t see your dogs out front?”

Brad got closer. “His dog left already. It was his mom,” he said, and laughed.

Anik felt fire go through his belly at the words and took a step closer to Brad until they were face to face, glaring at each other.

“What you gonna do Eskimo boy?” Brad said, as they were inches from one another. “Told you they were all barbarians,” he said to his friends.

The other two surrounded Anik, while other classmates backed away from the scene.

Anik and Brad glared at each other until Mr Thornberry came out of his classroom and into the corridor. “Boys, you’re late!” he said. “Get into class, now, please.”

“See you in training,” Chad whispered to Anik as he barged past him and towards class.

§

Later on in hockey training, Anik got on the pristine ice and did a short burst of speed on the ice skates with the hockey stick clasped in one hand. He got up such a high speed that the wind whipped on his face as the mostly empty stadium rows whipped past. Just like down at the lake, Anik felt at one with the universe when he was on the ice.

Coach Kathy also got on the rink and waited for everyone to file out around him, including Chad, Brad, and Chuck.

“We have the quarter finals against Roger’s Park High School in less than a week, and I want to be ready. Today we’re gonna play a full game, and I wanna see the same aggression you’re gonna put into that game, okay?”

There was a murmur of agreement.

“I said, okay?”

“Yes, coach,” everyone said in unison, including Anik.

“Good. Now come here and I’ll tell you what team you’re on.”

They filed around the coach as he gave them all instructions. From behind, there was a sudden pain in his ankle as Chad hit him with the stick. Anik faced him.

“Oh, I’m sorry, Eskimo,” Chad said. “Guess I thought you were a seal. How many seals did you kill this week?” 

Anik ignored him and faced Coach.

“I see your sister is turning into a woman,” Chad said close to his ear.

Before Anik could respond, his tormentor was gone, and the game began.

The two opposite teams of six floated on the ice, ready to take each other on. Coach sat on the bench area. Brad was going to be the ref. Chuck and Chad were on the other team, while Anik and his team got ready. Anik approached the centre circle, where he was met with Chuck, who approached, his sneer visible under the helmet guard. 

They got close and were ready to start the game. The referee held the small round puck in his hand.

“Urgh, I can smell your whale breath from here,” Chuck said.

Anik glared at him and got ready to take the puck. When the ref released it, Anik was too fast and whipped the puck to a team mate like a bullet. He then took a wide arc all the way around the other team without them noticing. Once Anik was close to the goal, he cut inside and Doug swung the puck his way. Chad watched in anger as the puck hit Anik’s stick and he tapped it into the goal before the keeper knew what happened. 

1-0. Anik pumped the air, and through his thick gloves, high fived Doug. 

“Chad!” Kathy shouted. “How many times do I have to tell you to watch those wide areas? You know Anik is fast as lightning,” he said and smiled at Anik.

This time Anik’s side was on the defensive, and he was close to his goal as Chad got close.

“Hey whale breath. If I see your sister sleep walking again, I’m gonna take her out to the lake and you’ll never see her again.”

His heart pounded in his chest and head. He gritted his teeth until his jaw hurt and every muscle tensed as all his hair stood on end. Then, in his mind, he felt as if he had connected to the ice in front of him; wrapping his consciousness around each individual frozen water molecules, and not just that, he felt like he owned them, as if he owned the frost. 

“We don’t want more seal clubbers breeding,” Brad said as he floated past on the ice.

The anger and frustration reached terrifying heights as rage flowed through Anik’s body like electrified plasma. Sound seemed to fade from his surroundings as fiery blood filled his head.

And then the pressure built up to a crescendo, and had nowhere else to go. The fury projected out of his body like an explosion and went into the ground, priming it, like a bomb about to go off.

Chad got close to his ear. “And if I see your sister going for one of her little sleep walks, I’m gonna bring her to my room and teach her the birds and the bees.”

The energy within him had nowhere else to go and flew into the sheet of ice in front of him where Chad was standing. Suddenly, the ground fractured into two and exploded up in the air, causing a shower of frozen water and ice to rain down on everyone like confetti. Coach stood from his seat in fear, and everyone gasped and shrieked at the utter chaos that was taking place in the rink. 

Anik watched in stunned silence as Chad and the ice were flown twenty feet in the air. Chad fell back down to Earth like a rag doll and smashed into the ice below. Once the dust settled and a cloud of white foam floated back to Earth, there was pandemonium. Many hockey players dashed immediately for the exits while Coach came to the ice to approach the lifeless frame of Chad. Anik just watched in silent horror.

“What happened?” He whispered to himself. “An explosion?” 

Coach was barking orders to everyone around him to get help and to call 911. After a few moments, people spilled into the ice rink from the main school building, along with security and other personnel. They had to remove huge chunks of broken ice that surrounded the silent Chad. Some players grabbed a stretcher and skated towards Chad, who still had not moved. His leg was twisted at an unnatural angle, and blood appeared on his trousers, as bone stuck through his skin like a broken splinter. They got Chad on the stretcher and took him to the rink’s edge. Other staff carried the downed boy out of the rink to the main office to await paramedics. 

Anik moved and headed back to the changing rooms in total disbelief at what happened. He was and confused, but also felt ill to his stomach at what happened. Once he got the skates off, he ran into the toilet cubicles and leaned over the bowl. He retched and threw up his stomach’s contents. He kept going until he threw up nothing but air as pain radiated through his wretched belly. Once finished, he collapsed next to the toilet and closed his eyes. With sheer exhaustion, he fell into a chaotic sleep.

New Member Unlocked: Anik

Race: Ice Warrior

Level: 1

Spells learnt: Ice Bomb