In the center of town, in the dead of night, a great snow man stood built by all the town’s children. A little celebration for the first big snow of the season. A worn hat topped its round head and stones made up its lop sided smile. The branches that made up the snow man’s arms were absurdly long and would touch the ground if they hung down instead of sticking straight out to the sides. The eyes were made of red, broken colored glass as well and reflected the light of the moon that peeked out from behind the stormy clouds. The townsfolk felt they had built a masterpiece.
As the moon clouded over again the air turned suddenly much colder around the snow man. Then, a dull thud sounded though not loudly. The sound came from no discernable direction but seemed as if it was from all around. Of course, only the snow man would have heard it if it had ears.
Proceeding the thud by only a second a gray mist wafted up from what appear to be a crack in the very air itself. The mist swirled around the base of the snow man, climbing upwards and finally dissipating as the swirl crested the old worn hat.
The Snow man stood still but had a strange presence surrounding it. If one were to look now at the lopsided smile it had a malicious, sinister edge to it. The glassy eyes appeared to now have a dull, ruddy glow of their own.
Born of the darkest nightmares of earth, born in the time of the dark rift, the snow man had a fiendish intellect born to it as well and began to plot how to exact its hatred on this place of its creation. It never questioned the hatred itself. It knew only that it was driven to this end. To chase, to stalk and to kill all that held the light of life.