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and the waiting survivors. Truth was, she wanted to dance her way back, but the snow was still too deep for that. But already she could see the telltale wet glistening of a thaw.
    “Careful!” said MacAlister.
    “Careful, my ass!” she yelled out, grabbed MacAlister’s face with both her hands and, before either knew what she was doing, planted a smacker on his lips. She felt her face blush as the look of surprise on MacAlister’s face turned into a broad grin. To cover up her own embarrassment she grabbed Rhiannon and pulled her down into the snow with her.
    “It’s gone,” she yelled, kicking waves of snow with her hands at the two men in the doorway as if she was in a pool.
    “What is?” Jacob yelled back, frustration in his voice.
    “The red storm,” Rhiannon yelled back. “The red storm is gone.”

    No one knew when the alien storm had finally released its stranglehold on the planet. The only thing they did know was that when they looked out beyond the curve of the island, in every direction to the thin line where the sky met the sea, the blood-red clouds that had stained them for so many days were gone, vanished as though they had never been there. It had not simply faded away or subsided, there was no slow diminishing of its fury, nothing. It was simply gone, as if God himself had, with the sweep of a hand, brushed it from the skies.
    Emily, Rhiannon, and Thor joined the crew of the Vengeance in the courtyard between the buildings, a white fog of hot breath collecting above their heads. Two crewmen carried Jacob and his wheelchair from his room, swaying from side to side as the two sailors carefully picked their way over the melting snow, like he was some ancient pharaoh. As they set him gently on the snowy ground, Emily looked down at the man who had brought her here. He looked about ready to cry, and Emily felt something shift inside her. It was as if, with the passing of the storm, her anger for him had also diminished…at least, a little.
    It was still freezing out here, no way would they be ditching their coats just yet, but now that the blizzard had stopped, standing still for any period of time no longer meant you ran the risk of being frozen into a human Popsicle.
    And the view. My God, the view was breathtaking now that she finally had a chance to take it all in. A crisp white blanket of snow with a top layer of rapidly melting ice particles that scintillated in the light lay across the undulating ground of the island, stretching off in all directions seemingly until it met the blue of the sky. But Emily knew the island sloped away just a few thousand feet from where she stood, dropping gradually down until it met the Beaufort Sea. As Emily listened carefully, in the spaces between the excited chatter of the assembled group, she could hear the waves breaking against the shoreline in the distance.
    Everything looked so normal.
    Emily had tuned out the chatter of the survivors milling around the entrance to the hospital block, but now she allowed the voices to fade back in again.
    “…what’s it mean?…”
    “…you think it’s safe now?…”
    “…can we leave?…”
    At a nod from Emily, the two sailors flanking Jacob raised him up again and followed Emily into the hospital building, depositing him in the corridor of the sailors’ quarters. Emily took the wheelchair’s two handles and began pushing Jacob toward the main room where the rest of the survivors now waited.
    Jacob swiveled his head around and looked back at Emily with curiosity.
    “Don’t start getting used to it, just yet,” she told him.
    He looked at her with his sad eyes, the words almost forming on his lips, but instead he smiled. He faced forward again. “Onward James,” he laughed, with a pretty good imitation of an English accent, before adding “and don’t spare the horses.”
    What had been the hospital area was now filled with the sub crew. They sat on the beds or stood together in small groups talking