'No Time Like the Pheasant' by Leigh Loveday

The ring-necked pheasant struts from the hedgerow onto the narrow bridge, sees the car, turns and runs. It runs in a straight line ahead of the car. Of course it does. The driver revs the engine, hits the horn, finally gives up and accelerates. There’s no time for this. The pheasant panics, entirely unsuspected survival measures awakening –

The road vanishes, along with the bridge carrying it. The car lands heavily in the riverbed beneath an ancient, mossy tree that wasn’t there seconds before. Bewildered and irate, the driver gets out, stumbles on uneven ground and faceplants into nettle-laced undergrowth. Something roars. He starts yelling. The pheasant panics again –

Both of them plunge into the bitterly cold, silty water of a deep estuary. The shore is far distant and the car immediately starts to sink. The man flails and panics. Unprepared, associating water with flight from predators, the pheasant also panics –

Ice seizes them. Inescapable ice with vast bands of the planet in its grip. A frigid silence prevails with no thrashing or yelling or panic. In a few thousand years, the thawing will begin. The pheasant may well react badly.