THE slopes were quiet as the gentle wind carried snow in swirls through the air; the lifts were frozen in place and all of the cabins had been fled in a hurry, but the entire setting seemed trapped in time, as if the apocalypse hadn't happened.

Suddenly two figures appeared at the top of the highest snowy hill, and upon closer inspection one could see that it was a boy and a girl, wrapped tightly in skiing clothing, a backpack on the girl's back and a young child clinging to the boy's. They paused for a moment but the girl shifted uneasily on her skies as she constantly glanced at the sun above them - soon it would be setting, and they would need to be inside by then.
"Time, Hannah?" the boy asked quietly and Hannah fumbled to push her sleeve back and squint at her watch.

"Four thirty five, Cayson." Hannah reported nervously. Cayson nodded his head, unsettling the young toddler clinging to his back as he readied himself to ski down the hill, and fast. They needed to get to their cabin before the sunset, when the Night Creatures would start their reign over the ski hill.

"We needa get down there fast." Cayson mused. He rolled his shoulders back and the young girl tightened her grip on his shoulders and around his neck, nearly choking him. The boy waited patiently for Hannah to start down the hill and followed her, pushing off the hill and crouching, leaning forward to gain speed. The sky was getting darker as they raced down the hill. Snow stung Cayson's eyes as they moved down the hill - it was the toughest hill to ski at the lodge, but was also the home to the best cabin on the resort, where he, Hannah, and May had made their home after the Night Creature attacks.

His family as well as Hannah's had been skiing at the resort when the attacks started, and their parents were out skiing the first night. They never returned and they assumed the worst after two days of just waiting for them to return. When they didn't, Cayson took the problems into his own hands and decided that he and Hannah were going to survive if it killed him.
After deeming that the Night Creatures could only venture out during the night, they started to go through all of the other cabins at the resort and stripping them of the necessary supplies. The fourth day Hannah had found May, who had been left alone during the first night locked in her room, left alone by the devil-like creatures. They brought her back to their cabin to live with them, after much protesting from Hannah that they just couldn't leave her alone, after all, she was only six.

Their cabin came into sight on the left edge of the hill as the sun started to set. Hannah swerved into the narrow pathway that lead up to the backdoor of the cabin and Cayson followed. The pathway was downhill, which was nice to get into but a damn hard path to get back onto the slopes during the day. As soon as they reached the backdoor they hurriedly took their skies and boots off, then scrambled inside, dragging their equipment with them.

Cayson locked the backdoor and didn't worry about the other doors; the back one was the only door they ever left unlocked, and that was just during the day. If they left any of the locks open during the night, the Night Creatures would get in... and they would be dead within the first few minutes of a break-in.
Hannah had headed to the kitchen to unpack her backpack and put away the food they had collected. It wasn't much, and soon they wouldn't have enough to support all three of them. She numbly moved to the living room, open to the kitchen, and started the fire with a match before moving back to the kitchen to arrange a dinner for them that night.

Cayson put May down on the couch near the fire and took off his coat and snow pants before collapsing on the couch next to her. Hannah joined him, sitting on his right side, a plate of hotdogs set down on the coffee table ready to be cooked in the fire for dinner.
The sun set outside, the resort was thrust into a thick blackness.

There was an immediate scratching at the door. They all three tried to ignore it while Hannah cooked their hotdogs. May looked up at Cayson with large sad brown eyes.
"Will this end?" she asked, and he found himself shaking his head no.

Hannah set down a plate of cooked hotdogs back on the coffee table and sat back down next to Cayson, with May in the middle. The two reached behind the girl to hold hands, and Cayson suddenly felt better.
It was what he had always wanted since he met Hannah at the young age of four, but if they had so little time left, he wondered why his dream had come true just then.
If it was the end of the world, then why was he content?