Life isn't always what you think it'd be

(Thoughts. Speech)

Panic swelled inside Quinn's mind, his heart racing like a bird's, eyes glancing back and forth at his paws and his family, the cold of the ice seeping into him as he stood there, watching as his paws made the ice weaker and weaker. All the worst thoughts were coming to mind, "What if I fall in and they try to rescue me? What if they pull me out and I die of the cold? What if they fall in with me?!?! What if-" "Q, DON'T MOVE!" he suddenly heard his brother call out, and looked up to hear Caed and Eir telling him what to do. Suddenly, his mind sharpened, the panic dulled its fangs and he looked straight ahead at the shoreline as he lay down to slide forward, he had to survive, he had to live, for them...

As he creeped along, he could feel the ice give ever so slightly under his paws and elbows with every move, but he kept moving forward, trying not to let the fear set back in and slow him down. His breathing was difficult, having his stomach flat on the ground like this, and the ice was so cold, it dug at him as if it could shred his fur and touch him directly, leaving him shivering and tired as he moved.

when he was just a few yards from the shoreline, he heard a *CRAK* as his back left paw fell down, into the ice, he didn't feel any water, but that didn't help him calm down any more. He grimaced and slid backward, saying: "Watch out and be ready to grab me!" and he used his now gained leverage on the hole made by his paw to push himself forward as fast as he could, breaking into a sprint on the pads of his feet which stung with each impact on the hard sheet below him, and with each impact, he felt the ice crack under his paws again, leaving a dent where he last stepped.

He barreled forward until he hit the shoreline, bracing himself for impact and trying to dig his claws in to slow himself down, but he realized one second too late that that was the wrong move, and he slid sideways into his brother, amazed that he didn't knock him down with the impact. "I'm sorry, Caed, did I hurt you?" He asked, before glancing out to the lake again and seeing, as he heard a loud crunching noise of ice giving way, the ice falling down in a thin sheet to reveal what had been a pocket of air, just under the surface, where he had just been, and more, thicker ice beneath it.