Looking down at the earth below, and getting a little dizzy while doing it, being so high up, Jon saw them moving over Central America, then South America. It seemed that they would indeed be in Peru at any moment. But then, suddenly, out of nowhere, what looked like a hole in the sky appeared, with a bright red light emanating from it. Santa tried his best to veer away from it, but it was no use. The sleigh, the eight reindeer, Santa, Jon, and Karyn were all swallowed up by the hole, and suddenly they were somewhere else ... somewhere strange and alien.
Santa managed to set them down on the landscape of rocky and twisted land, but it was no easy feat. After the ordeal of trying to land safely, Jon turned towards Santa and asked "Where are we?"
"Jon, I never wanted you to see this place. No mortal should. But this is where I'm from."
"The North Pole?" Karyn asked. This didn't look like the North Pole to her.
"No, that's where I live, not where I'm from. This is the Hinterlands. The place where all magical beings were born. Some good, some evil, but this place is no place for the non-magical, for people like you and Karyn," he told Jon. "Though, you have used the stone, which is magical, so perhaps ..."
"Santa!" came a nasally voice.
Santa turned and saw a reindeer with a glowing red nose flying down towards them. "Rudolph?"
"Wait, Rudolph is real too?" Jon asked.
"Of course," Santa said. Then to Rudolph he asked "Were you the one who brought us here?"
"Yes, I did. I had to warn you. Supay knows that you're coming."
"He does?" Jon asked.
"How? Rudolph, you have to tell me everything you know," Santa said.
