They were speechless as they realized that Craig was right. The insanely powerful snowstorm was nowhere to be found. A storm of such magnitude as the blizzard was could simply not have blown itself out in a short time interval. There was something else as well, something subliminally odd—there was a lack of anything. No noise, no wind, no clouds, no precipitation, just the rolling geography of the snow.

“I’m getting a strange feeling about this,” Timothy voiced.

“No duh,” James shot back. “Which way’s north? We’re going to have to figure out something, compass notwithstanding.”

Craig looked up to the sky. The sun was on its way below the horizon, but there was still plenty of usable daylight. After a brief pause, he pointed. “There,” he affirmed. “That way. There’s north.”

“And how do you know that?” James demanded.

Craig sighed, his breath visible in the extreme cold. “The sun rises in the east and sets in the west.”

James shrugged and shouldered his box. Wordlessly, they began to walk.