Starve a Curse, Feed the Soul

Chapter Three: Unwavering

"Sums! Are you there, Luv?! ...Sums!"

The woman unfroze herself after the repeated plead for interaction. She rubbed the blowing, bone chilling ice from her vision; her heaving chest felt like it was going to implode.

"B-!"

Summer repressed that exclamation. ...No. Not yet.

The calling was most definitely, his voice. And no other person had ever referred to her with those pet names, but him.

But... how was it him?

Temporally placing her sidearm and camping lantern onto the driver seat, the woman hurriedly strapped on the backpack, swung her jeep's door with her boot, and released a sharp, foggy breath to regain some courage.

"Baby?! Is that you?! Talk to me!"

After a tense minute of no response, the woman reluctantly put the pistol's safety back on, and moved it beside her snowy coat's pocket...

"Luv, I'm here!" was the distressed reply.

Firming her full lips to thin lines, Summer forcefully closed her eyes for some amount of composure. Hearing the longing, lost voice was overwhelming, but she had to focus. Focus for him.

"Baby, follow my voice, please!"

With the lantern held high, the woman trekked through the blizzard, reaching along the road to evade going further in the forest as much as she could. All the while doing so, she called out to the sounds of her beloved.

"Stay with me, Baby! Keep following my voice!"

"HELP! SOMEBODY HELP! SUMS-!"

"Baby-?! AH!"

The drastic, loud change of tone took the snow waddling woman completely off guard. For it was the matching cry contained within her continual nightmares, and the top of her boot had snagged on a long object, causing the front of her body to impact the cold earth.

Summer shuffled her hands under herself, and back to her hobbling feet. The left side of her face felt instantly warm, and after a quick touch with trembling fingertips, Summer knew the hard fall had scraped her cheek. After a worried wheeze, the woman recollected her protection before the storm made her lose sight of it. Luckily, the retrieved steel lamp was also durable and didn't break from the stumble. But when Summer had gotten ahold of it again, she subconsciously wished she didn't...

Ahead of the wide-eyed, gasping woman was ice-covered carnage of various wildlife. She could make out that some of the battered bodies were rabbits, groundhogs, and opossums; several of the latter were carrying lifeless young within pouches. The poor things were in way worse condition than the raccoon that lay not too far from her jeep. Because most of these dissected remains appeared... regurgitated.

And these rock-solid slain animals looked like they have been dead... or killed for some time. But what was most bizarre about the macabre scene was the fact that these fallen fauna were all out in the open. As if they were desperately attempting to retreat to safety... from the safety of their native dwellings...

On fear and reflex, Summer peered down next to her snow immerged boots and instantaneously juddered backwards. She had discovered that she didn't tumble over a broken large branch as she'd first presumed, but a big, bedraggled body. And it was not a defenseless animal. It's iced, short muzzle and glassy eyes were gapped frozen in a silent, defensive roar...

Summer barely managed to swallow down her panic.

A mountain lion. It killed a fuckin' mountain lion.