Nathanael opened his eyes as the next day arrived. He put on his clothes. He ate the breakfast that was made ready for him. And then was faced by Lydia.

“While your head recovers, you are free to do anything in the house. But don’t touch anything that might cause problems for Seth,” Lydia said and left him on his own. She was heading outside with thick winter clothing. He didn’t ask where she would go in these empty lands.

Seth wasn’t in the house. The harsh weather outside settled down, only a light snowfall with little to no wind.

Nathanael took the chance to walk to the back door, and look out to the plains of snow while not going further than the fence. As much as he squinted with his eyes, he couldn’t see any change in the landscape ahead of him. The skies were cloudy, not a single spot of the blue beyond.

Perhaps he couldn’t see as far as he thought, or perhaps it really was an endless plain. But as he took a look to the right of the platform, he did see something tall piercing the heavens. They were mountains, tall and big, with sharp vertical peaks that could also be described as traps for giants.

It was quiet. The scene before him was an endless mute, not a single sound of life. The only thing that could be considered as noise, was the wind touching his ears. Other than that…

Nothing.

Nathanael tried as hard as he could to hear something past the wind. Static and a hum, something to fill in the silence that his mind created. Just an endless emptiness. A white noise, covering the quiet place of the plains, mixed with the crackle from a record player, and static.

Shivers came and made him jump, the eeriness of the land was too great. He felt the need to look away as if the world told him to stop staring at its secrets. He felt his stomach churn, the view was slowly tilting before him.

A hidden cruelty amongst the snow. Something staring. Something wanting him to go forwards. Something telling him he didn’t need to think as he followed that path beneath the snow.

He felt cold.

Nathanael turned around after a while, the snow and icy wind pierced his clothes and finally woke him from a sudden daze that he barely managed to escape from. He closed the door and drew in the curtains, hiding the view he didn’t know what to think of.

He found a book and decided to sit down and take a gander at its text.

Looking around the house for nearly an hour, he noticed there was little to nothing to do. But there was a bookcase in the living room with only a handful of books, it felt rather sad seeing the empty slots.

Nathanael opened half of the books in the bookcase, but he didn’t understand any of them. Tried as he may, but the words were completely unknown. Perhaps his memories haven’t surfaced about reading, or it was a completely different language. He felt as if he would understand them but still wasn’t sure.

Paper and pencils were in his drawer back inside his room, so he decided to try and find out if he could write.

Sitting down and holding a sharp pencil in his hand, he stared down at the paper. Thoughts started to rise, words he understood but couldn’t exactly depict them. But when he started to mark his first page, his mind finally came out.

My name is Nathanael.

Then nothing after that came to thoughts. After just four words. Nothing.

“Free to do anything in the house…” Nathanael echoed Lydia from the start of the day. “What though? I can’t read the books here. And I don’t know what to write, or perhaps I just don’t have anything to write about. And looking out the windows… makes me feel weird…”

He wanted to speak to Seth more, but he was somewhere outside. And Lydia was somewhere else as well. There were five personal rooms in the house, Nathanael knew three of them were taken. Perhaps there were others he has yet to meet? Or are they empty? His room was unoccupied before he was found in the snow, so his thoughts of them being empty could be correct.

Seth did say I was allowed to look around the house, then it wouldn’t hurt to take a look inside these rooms… Right? Nathanael thought, and slowly turned the handle on one of the doors – one of two closest to the stairs.

The room didn’t look to be Seth’s nor Lydia’s. It was completely empty of any indication of being used. It was similar to his room, though. But with the lack of bedding and light sources. Drawers completely empty, wardrobe with only unused hangers.

A sharp creak was heard as he ventured around that room. The noise was just part of the wooden floor, a loose nail that sometimes came off.

“Let me check the next door before I fall through the floor…” Nathanael jokingly muttered to himself and closed the door behind him.

The next room facing the first was similar to the last one. Nothing really to note, except that it was dustier.

Then, adjacent to that one, seemed to be occupied by a person. No one was inside, but Nathanael could figure it was being used by Lydia. The open wardrobe had women’s clothing. On top of a table was a small, intrigued chest with a lock, pen by the side. A vintage clock ticked every second as a weight swung left and right, Nathanael didn’t have a clock of his own in his room.

Potted flowers were what caught his attention the most, and there were a lot; All with a different variation, and all at the back, with a few in each corner of the room. Some with small petals and others with big ones, thick and thin stems, each flower pot with different aromas as you got near. All looked to be in perfect and healthy conditions, with no dying leaves and none that were missing any sustenance. Artificial light hung over the plants, electric cables ran down and into a small generator that silently hummed its activity. Plant enthusiast, that is what he could only describe the person after seeing all of this.

If they have electricity, couldn’t they use something else than candles to light the house?

Facing Lydia’s door was Nathanael’s, and to the right was the end of the hallway with the last and fifth door; Seth’s personal room.

Nathanael hesitated when his hand reached towards the handle. It felt wrong to look inside this room. Like as if he was taking a glance at Seth’s mind, which should be only accessible by that man alone.

That sharp pause ceased after he reminded himself he was allowed to freely look around, Seth himself told him, and he was most likely the owner of the house.

Though with the thought of being allowed, he still felt uneasy and worried if he was walking into a room that only Seth should enter. But that feeling dissipated once he tried turning the handle, and finding out the door was actually locked.

“Guess I’m not going to find out more about him right now.”

He quickly turned to go back downstairs, he didn’t want to be found idling by Seth’s door. He took a quick glance towards the ceiling. The attic was something he wanted to look through, but only if he found anything to pull the trapdoor.

The day went by slowly. A minute felt like an hour. He badly wanted to do something other than sit on the couch in the living room. He tried distracting himself by counting the lines between each wooden plank on the ceiling and floor, then going back to the first line and continued counting until he reached around two hundred. That didn’t help his boredom.

He had the paper and pencil on the table in front of him, still with nothing but My name is Nathanael. He did try to think of something to continue after that but wasn’t sure of what that next line should be.

“Say something about Seth and Lydia? About the house? About the snow? I think that wouldn’t help get back my memories, they’re all about the things I already know…”

He laid down on the couch. His eyes followed the weight below the sixth hour, an endless loop to keep that clock running.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

No wind to be heard from the outside.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

No voices to be heard. No animals near.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

The hour was a few minutes past four. He hasn’t seen Seth or Lydia since breakfast. They were somewhere outside the plains of snow, that chilling and eerie panorama. Unmoving snow that felt like a painting, a painting with only white as the first half, and grey as the second half.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock…

The ticking of the clock grew louder and louder, such a bothersome sound, at least there was something to hear.

His eyes were turning drowsy, and he fell asleep after covering his ears with a pillow.

Nathanael dreamt. People stood by in shadowy forms. Their bodies were big and small. A space of nothingness was all around. They floated but looked to stand in the air. Lines of static covered the scene, missing parts that once were images he should know. Giant cylindrical objects fixed around them, a blocky mess of what he could only think of as lights tried to take away the shadows it should be able to claim.

He tried to clear his mind of every obscurity. He tried to fix every broken image. Of every abstract painting. He managed to brush only a margin of those static lines, motions became more aware.

Nathanael could finally count the shadows. They were seven in total. He couldn’t distinguish their features, only their ghostly figures. He could tell roughly that they were old and young, just from their figures.

“Who are you, people?” Nathanael asked. But their shadows only stirred.

This scene suddenly started to expand. Their figures became smaller and smaller. Nathanael was floating away from them, further and further he went. He called out to them. He wanted to know who these people were. Nathanael felt as if he should know them, or have seen them somewhere before. But their faces were still blank.

Nathanael woke up after the shadow figures disappeared from view. The time barely passed, not even an hour gone by.

He took a small glance around and saw that Seth was back. He looked like he had just come inside. He placed down a heavy-looking bag on the ground.

“Nothing to do?” Seth asked as he put away his white coat.

“Yeah… And still, no memories are coming back.”

“I see. It is only your second day here, it could take more time.” He opened the bag and pulled out thick clothing, one with a fur-trimmed hoodie. “Try putting this on.”

“Are we going somewhere?”

“Tomorrow, you’ll help me. Of course, you don’t have to if you don’t want to.”

Nathanael didn’t think once of denying this opportunity, he immediately gave his answer.

“I’ll go.”

Nathanael put on his new warm clothing. The coat was comfortable to wear, and the real fur inside would keep him warm from the harsh, cold temperature. His trousers had many pockets, but Nathanael didn’t see any use to any of them at the moment. At the end of his trousers had straps that he tightened around the top of his shoes, to keep the snow away. Double layer of socks and leather gloves. And, of course, a warm hat.

“Remember this. Night times are the most dangerous. Without fire and shelter from wind and snow, you’re dead. Just like that.”

Nathanael also had two, thin-layered sweaters, and also thin-layers within his trousers. Being in all of this while still being inside the house made him much warmer than needed.

They walked outside, and that cold breeze hit his face quickly and hard. He could already feel his nose start to freeze up. He pulled up the scarf he wore around his neck, only his upper face was left exposed. Thankfully, he was given goggles he could use for the exposure, but it was rather hard to see through as it has been used for a while.

Also, he was given a gas mask that he hung around his neck.

“What’s this for?”

“You’ll never know when the air becomes toxic. We likely won’t be needing them for where we are going. But it won’t hurt to bring them if actually needed.”

Before they left the vicinity of the house, Seth showed Nathanael a second house that he didn’t notice through the windows. He likely didn’t see it as it was directly facing the front entrance of the house.

It looked to be a small warehouse or a workshop as Nathanael saw the inside. There were many various tools on the walls and table. Some tools he had no clue what they were for. Metal and wood materials were stockpiled in a corner. Pickaxes, axes, shovels, and other equipment for gathering hung neatly in their stations. A small sled with sticks sticking out a bag. And a rifle that was located within a locked, glass case.

What stood out the most was in the center of the workshop. A snowmobile, half-covered with a tarp. Its rear tracks were removed and on the floor, gears and other parts missing. Most likely it was being fixed.

When he wandered closer towards the vehicle, Nathanael started to notice damages than just missing parts. There were small holes on the side of its plating, which looked to be pierced from the outside. One of its front lights shattered. And scrape marks covered its left side.

Seth pulled the rest of the cover over, concealing it from view. The man ignored the questionable look on Nathanael’s face.

“The two sleds over here,” Seth said, diverting the attention away from the hidden object. “We’ll be taking this with us. The wood inside the bag is essential for nights and extreme colds. I’m not saying we are going to be out at night time, but like I said before, who knows what could happen.”

The sled was made to carry goods, not to be ridden. A tight rope would be around Seth’s waist, towing it through the snow would be no problem. And the sled was connected to another sled by rope, making a small train behind the old man.

Most of the space was empty, a sign they would be taking something with them back.

Nathanael would be carrying a backpack, containing food and other supplies. But for now, he kept that in the sled. The sled was also equipped with two pairs of hiking poles strapped to the side.

Seth took a pair for himself and gave the other to Nathanael.

“And with that, we’re off.”