“That’s what you saw?”
“Yeah.”
“Men are strange.”
Ten minutes later, Peary brought the sarfer to a halt near a strange outcropping of stone that jutted up from the sand.
“This is interesting,” Peary said. “The sand must not be very deep here. I don’t know when’s the last time I saw something like this. Maybe when I was a boy. Or maybe only in a diver dream.”
Peary staked down the sarfer while Marisa rearranged the provisions and water skins so they could be tied down properly. Keeping the supplies from shifting around becomes a difficult proposition when a sarfer bounces and jumps over the low dunes.
They were just finishing their tasks when the sound of a distant explosion rolled through the blue-black night and caused them to turn back to the east, the direction from which they’d come. The sound had been slow in traveling, and when they turned, the towering fireball in the far distance had already reached an immense height against the black sky. Dark smoke blotted out the stars, giving the fireball a surreal cast.
Marisa gasped and her hand came up to her mouth.
“I’ll be…” Peary sputtered.
“He…” Marisa said.
“I should have known,” Peary replied. “I should have known.”
“He waited until we were far enough away,” she said.
“He took ’em to Danvar,” Peary said.
The next morning, Peary and Marisa set off to the west again, but managed only a couple of hours before they found themselves unable to proceed any further with the sarfer. Unthinkably, the sarfer had run aground on a sloping, unending patch of solid rock and soil, and here and there boulders as big as a tent jutted up around them. It seemed that the sand—that immutable, ubiquitous truth that had ruled their whole lives—was now behind them.
The sun was barely beginning to show itself, just a glint of pink to the east, and the air was heavy, like a wet blanket or a towel soaked in warm water. As Peary gazed back the way they came, the pink glow began to disappear, and a roiling, black-blue sky occluded most of the light of dawn.
“Something’s happening,” Marisa said. “What is it?”
“Something… I don’t know.” He sniffed the air, unable to identify the damp humidity saturating it. “Something new.”
He darted over to the sarfer and began jamming provisions into backpacks for them to carry.
“We’ll have to each haul a water skin,” Peary told her as he tossed her one of the packs. She caught it smoothly and swung it onto her back.
“Whatever it is, it’s coming closer,” Marisa said, looking back toward the east. The air was becoming even heavier on their skin.
An updraft of cool, wet air, cooler than most mornings, pushed over them then, and the wind stirred up dust, and other biological material that Peary and Marisa knew nothing of, into the air.
“I’m scared,” Marisa said.
“Don’t be,” Peary said. “We’ve made it this far.”
“I know.”
“We’ve cleared the sand.”
“I know.”
“Then don’t be afraid.”
“How do I do that?” she asked.
“The Poet said that the worst thing in the world would be to die in the sand.”
He had to raise his voice for that last statement, because the thundering wind and approaching strangeness pushed over them like a primitive force, driving them to look for shelter.
Securing their packs in place, Marisa and Peary quickly left the sarfer behind and continued west on foot. The firm, unyielding soil felt foreign to their sand-accustomed legs. They moved at a hurried pace, although it was clear that they couldn’t outrun whatever phenomenon was headed their way.
Marisa felt it first, and when she did she stopped—she had to look down at the bare skin of her arms.
Peary felt it then, too. Water, in tiny droplets, whipped by the wind.
“There must be ground water near here,” Peary shouted as he reached back to take Marisa’s hand. He pulled her forward, and the wind and moisture doubled with each step.
“No,” Marisa shouted back. “It’s coming…”
“What?” Peary shouted, looking back at her.
“It’s coming from the sky!”
At that moment, the sky above them opened up, and water fell like peace and grace and mercy altogether, falling from on high, drenching them entire like a poem. A sand hawk screeched, and they could hear it above the wind, but they could not see where he came from or whither he went.
The two dropped to their knees as one, clasping hands, looking at one another, tears forming in their eyes. And the water from heaven joined with their tears, and soaked deeply into the hungry earth.
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Other Books by Michael Bunker
The Pennsylvania Omnibus
The WICK Omnibus (with Chris Awalt)
Osage Two Diamonds
The Last Pilgrims
Legendarium (with Kevin G. Summers) (A Bombo Dawson Adventure)
Three By Bunker (3 works of Short Fiction)
Hugh Howey Must Die! (A Bombo Dawson Adventure)
Futurity (Novella)
From the Indie Side
Synchronic: 13 Tales of Time Travel
Copyright
© Copyright 2014 by Michael Bunker
All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form, except for brief quotations in reviews, without the written permission of the author.
Cover Design by Jason Gurley
Editing by David Gatewood
Formatting by Stewart Stonger
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For information on Michael Bunker or to read his blog, visit: http://www.michaelbunker.com
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