Heavy Snow

There’s a haunting silence that comes with a fresh, heavy snow. When you’re out in the elements, that silence can be deafening as you trudge harsher and harsher ground, with only the crunching of your footsteps to let you know you can still hear anything at all.

***

“Y’know there’s actually a scientific reason why snow makes it so quiet.” Josh chimed in, as he so often did. 

“Is that so?” Kyle asked between breaths. 

It’d been a grueling weekend but they were in the home stretch now. As Kyle started growing up he lost that boundless energy that they all had back in the scouts. But he still loved the outdoors. And exasperating as Josh and his endless stream of fun facts could be, he still always looked forward to their yearly tradition. 

“The snow actually absorbs the sound, sucks it right up. Stuff you can normally hear from far away trails off and you can only hear stuff when you’re up close.” He himself trailed off as he got farther ahead.

“Hey, hold up a minute!” Kyle exclaimed. 

He came to a stop and Josh wheeled around to meet him.

“Isn’t this a little weird? All this snow I mean?” Kyle said as he started to catch his breath. “I mean it’s August. Shouldn’t things be warming up by now?”

Josh looked around at the piling snow. What had started as flurries just an hour ago had steadily become a thick blanket of white. The pine trees surrounding them stood tall and grew ever whiter, providing no good sense of direction. 

“Well in the mountains it can snow outside of the winter. Some mountains can even stay snow capped year round.” Josh offered, but without reassurance.

“Yeah but this isn’t one of those mountains.” Kyle said with a little worry. “Besides, we’re supposed to be going downhill. This whole valley shouldn’t have been more than 30-minutes across.”

Josh had started fiddling with his map but it wasn’t much use. The faint outline of the trail stretched in either direction but the only other thing in view was trees, seemingly endless trees. He squinted against the falling snow.

“My GPS isn’t working either. Must be the snowstorm or something.” Kyle said with a shrug.

“Actually weather doesn’t affect GPS signals enough to mess with their accuracy.” Josh corrected.

“Well then we better just keep moving before the snow covers the trail. I don’t want to be some confused bear’s first meal out of hibernation.” Kyle said. And they kept moving. Without another word they both started picking up the pace a little. Josh wasn’t one to spook easily, and Kyle knew that. Knowing everything and being prepared for it affords you some confidence. If even he was getting nervous then Kyle knew he wanted to get out of there as soon as possible. 

***

The sun hung lower in the sky and the light was starting to fade. Despite hiking for what was starting to feel like hours they appeared no closer to the other side of the valley.

Josh cut through what felt like ages of crunching against the snow. 

“What’s that up ahead?” he called out. 

The snow had only gotten thicker and heavier. It was beginning to feel like they were in the middle of a full blown blizzard. Kyle had to squint against the weather to see what Josh was talking about. But he could see it. There was something up ahead, right in the middle of the path. Something big and dark. 

They stopped for a second. Josh stared ahead. 

“I- I don’t think it’s moving.” he stammered.

As they crept closer they could see clearly that it wasn’t moving, and that it wasn’t going to start any time soon. It was a grizzly bear, but not all of one. It was laying on its side but something had torn it apart. By the look of the crimson all over the damp snow, it hadn’t gone down without a fight either.

Josh looked like he was going to be sick.

“I thought grizzlies were the baddest things out here. You said they were ‘Apex’.“ Kyle started with a slight crack in his voice.

“Apex predators, yeah.” Josh corrected, turning away from the grisly scene. Despite having spent plenty of time in the wilderness, he was visibly shaken. “They might fight each other here and there, but they don’t do this. There’s nothing in this state that should be able to do this to a grizzly this size.”

The two of them stood for a moment. Despite the snow continuing to fall, everything was eerily still. Gone were the birds and bugs they’d heard just this morning. And it’d gotten cold, real cold. The sun started to warm them as it rose that morning but that time felt very far away. As they stood still a sound started to pick up around them. You can always hear wind in the trees before it hits you. Before they knew it the wind was picking up and the snow was stinging their cheeks.

That’s when they heard it.

An otherworldly howl broke the silence like a battering ram, echoing from the same direction the wind had just come. It was like nothing Kyle had heard before. He swore as they both dropped to a crouch and started searching the trees in the direction it came from.

“Josh. What on earth was that?” Kyle asked, grasping for a comforting explanation as the fear began to grip him.

Josh gulped hard and replied, “Nothing on earth I’ve ever heard of.”

“Look!” Just as he’d replied Kyle spotted something moving out in the distance. It was hard to see through the wind and the snow. At first it looked like one of the trees surrounding them, swaying in the breeze. Tall and slender it teetered back and forth. Josh didn’t understand why Kyle had singled it out until he realized that it was picking up its feet.

Almost as soon as the horror rose up from his core the thing loosed another howl and started moving faster. Without sharing another word they took off. Hurdling around what was left of the bear they tore down the path without looking back. The frigid wind seemed to change directions as they ran, throwing stinging ice in their faces. Through the tears forming at the corner of his eye Kyle saw something weaving through the trees to their side. 

He saw Josh running fast ahead of him and in a tall blur of black he was gone.

The wind whipped into his face as he quickly slowed to a stop. In a moment, just as quickly as it came on, the wind faded. 

Kyle was left standing in the silence and the white. Alone.

He cupped his hands in front of his mouth and shouted into the forest, “Josh?!”

He spun around, desperately looking for his friend. He called out again. As the pure panic subsided into dread he looked around at where Josh had been. He saw their footprints end just ahead on the trail. But theirs weren’t the only marks. 

Cutting across the trail were long sweeping gashes in the snow. They were almost the width of his own but they looked like they’d been dragged at an incredible speed. They led off into the forest.

He was faced with a decision. If that thing was what happened to the bear, then is there even a chance that Josh was still out there? If there was, could he ever forgive himself for not trying to help?

He steeled himself. Whatever this thing was couldn’t have taken Josh far. If he got there quickly then maybe the two of them could fend it off. He clutched the bear mace on his belt and took off into the woods, following the tracks.

They wound down towards a gulley, deeper into the valley. After a few minutes of jogging the tracks started getting shorter. He had to be getting close. Just as the treads started to lengthen once again, Kyle saw the bright colors of his friend’s jacket and froze.

Josh was standing up ahead. Upright, but still. 

Kyle called out to him but as he did the wind once again rushed in. He squinted hard against the rush of air and snow. He started to fight against the gale, towards his motionless friend. But as he did, something felt off.

He’d been behind Josh all day, but now he didn’t look right. As he got closer he could see that his clothes looked ragged, and his body wasn’t quite at the right angles. Josh slowly spun on his heel and turned to face him. 

Through the blast he could see that he was gaunt and thin, his face expressionless and hollow. 

Kyle barely had time to see the blur out of the corner of his eye before he felt the impact. And everything went dark.

The wind stopped, and everything was quiet once again.

There’s a haunting silence that comes with a fresh, heavy snow.