Frozen Apocalypse: A Second Chance Novels & Stories

Through the heavy insulation, a horrific, low-pitched screaming sound was echoing—the sound of the real, unmitigated atmospheric nitrogen storm clawing at the concrete foundations of their sanctuary. ​Her golden finger timeline ledger flared with total, absolute clarity. In her past life, this specific sub-zero freeze had locked the entire continent in an unbreakable sheet of glacial ice for three months, forcing the remaining local factions into a brutal, primitive war for survival over coal repositories, insulated clothing, and medical supplies. To stabilize the region's atmosphere and stop the freeze from turning the basin into a permanent dead zone, they had to leave the safety of the b

After I was done, I quickly returned to my hostel to open up my box of bottled water. This was the big surprise I prepared for everyone. I wanted to see if they could survive the apocalypse with whatever was in the box, which was more than twenty bottles of hot sauce.

Crash! I stood over the fractured ice once more and swung the axe with every last ounce of strength. I hadn’t removed the camera from my helmet. Immediately realizing what I was doing, Luna screeched, "Sophie, are you crazy?!" I ignored her, continuing to raise my numb arms and swing them down, mechanically repeating the motions until… Crack! With a sharp crack, the ice split completely apart, exposing the heating pipe underneath. Taking aim, I lifted the axe high—

“Okay, I'm calm.” I only waited for her chest to inflate and deflate at a normal rate before I began talking. Alfredo just sent information to me that the underground tunnel through which we sell weapons had been destroyed. Ten thousand of my men were killed. Only a few could escape with major injuries. “We have to act fast. Our men are dying. Our doctors are attending to them but they can barely manage on their own,” Alfredo said. “A war has started,” I said. “Obviously,” Lisa whispered.

A desperate, terrible option. Because in twelve days, the apocalypse would begin. The temperature would drop to negative forty degrees. Power would fail. And in the chaos of a frozen world, people disappeared every day. Including hired killers. Including the Hart family. Maya picked up her phone with trembling hands and opened her notes app. She began typing, planning, calculating. If she couldn't beat them before the freeze, she would survive it. And in the aftermath, when civilization had crumbled and the old rules no longer applied, she would make every single person who had hurt her pay.

Cheers rose—and were just as quickly silenced by the stern voice of the Elders. “Phase Two. Commence.” Phase Two: Elemental Survival. I barely had time to shift back into human form before the ground opened beneath me. A trapdoor. A pit. I dropped into freezing darkness. The walls were stone and slick with ice. The floor beneath my bare feet was snow. Somewhere above, a gate slammed shut. I was alone. For how long? I wasn’t told. The cold pierced bone. I pulled my arms around myself, moving in circles to keep blood flowing. My wound throbbed, now clotting poorly with the cold. My breath came in gasps.

This collection was going to be a piece of cake, just as the rest of our stay in this post-apocalyptic world had been. Justine paved the charge to the front door, and Diana and Ricky separated to join Dr. Melendez in the control room to watch the gathering. We ended up waiting for Dr. Melendez to unlock the gate, and I almost shuddered. There was a new layer of accumulated snow on the ground, crunching beneath my shoes, and I drew my coat tightly about myself, struggling to remain warm. I only prayed my mittens wouldn't get in the way of my capability to squeeze the trigger on my handgun, but I couldn't take them off and jeopardize my fingers becoming desensitized and uncooperative.

She wanted me to escape the base. I caressed her arm. At least now I know my best friend never betrayed me. We went on another expedition, and Joshua's team tailed us, trying to scavenge for leftovers. I led them into a lair of Frozen Wolftigers, and once they were all injured, I lured them into a remote frozen cave, then I sealed the entrance with an Esoteric Divination formation. I watched them as they slowly turned into frozen statues, and satisfaction coursed through my veins. My smile never left my lips. "You want some threesome? Well, you can have an orgy now. Enjoy."

I still remembered his cold fingers gripping my jaw in that dark basement, the hatred in his eyes so deep it almost devoured me. "Nick Wheaton sent me this useless thing? Is he mocking me? Tell him—this game has only just begun." I died in the second winter of our marriage—my body covered in bruises, abandoned in the snow to starve. As my soul drifted above the frozen ground, I saw him standing over my corpse for a long, long time. There was no satisfaction in his eyes, only an endless, suffocating darkness. And I saw the Wheaton family thriving after my death, feeding off the fortune they had stolen from my mother's legacy.

How are we supposed to live like this? [Why isn't the government doing something? If it keeps up, people are going to freeze to death!] Cyrus shook his head silently. By now, the government had no strength left to care for everyone. From this moment on, survival could only depend on oneself. This was the moment the icy apocalypse truly began, the dawn of the Frostfall. Once modern society was stripped of both electricity and food, humanity would spiral headlong into mass death.