The dirt wall thinned before my eyes. A moment later, it collapsed completely.
“It’s gone.” Graham arched an eyebrow. “It just vanished.”
“Stay on your guard,” Beverly said. “You never know when another one will pop up.”
I turned the ignition. The truck sputtered for a moment, choking out dirt. Then it sprang to life. Shifting gears, I pushed the accelerator. The truck lurched forward.
After a short drive, a couple of flimsy wooden structures appeared on the side of the road. Dirt swirled around their bases, erasing them. From where I sat, it looked like the buildings floated in mid-air.
I eased off the accelerator. Drooping wire enclosures occupied both sides of the road. One enclosure contained nothing but dry, cracked soil. Someone had carved out dozens of tiny saucer basins in order to contain precipitation. But the basins, like everything else in the area, were bone dry.
Long wooden posts supported the other enclosure. A single black bird perched on a post, facing inward. Following its gaze, I saw what had caught its attention.
Dead cows. Dozens of them.
The skeletal remains lay on parched ground. I didn’t see a single blade of grass or drop of water in the vicinity.
We drove past the remaining enclosures. Then the road twisted to the northwest. Still following the plane’s flight path, I directed the truck off the pavement and onto the parched soil.
Beverly glanced at me. “Are you sure about this?”
I frowned. “Not really.”
“What about Lila?”
“What about her?”
“She told you to destroy the reliquary, right?”
I nodded.
“Then why aren’t we doing it?”
My fingers tightened around the steering wheel. “Because I don’t know if I believe her.”
“It doesn’t hurt to be safe.”
“It might.”
She arched an eyebrow.
My face felt warm. I knew what she was thinking. I’d destroyed numerous artifacts in the past. So, what was keeping me from doing the same thing to this one?
Obviously, I couldn’t be sure the reliquary constituted a threat. But that wasn’t the only reason behind my hesitation. There was something else, something I’d only learned in the last few weeks.
Something that hit me on a very personal level.
I thought about telling her the truth. But I’d barely had time to process it, let alone accept it. So, I decided to take a simpler approach. “What if the reliquary could solve some long-forgotten mystery?” I asked.
“What if it’s just an old stone box?”
“It’s still a part of history. And that makes it important. More important than me, more important than all of us.”
She glared at me, her eyes boring holes into my skull. “Is that right?”
This is simpler?
“In the grand scheme of things, we’re nothing,” I said after a long moment. “Just three people out of billions. But the reliquary is unique.”
“I’m not unique?”
“I’m not saying that.” My face grew warmer. “Look, the world is screwed. We can’t save it. But we can still save the past. That reliquary will improve our knowledge of history. Society as a whole will benefit.”
Her eyes narrowed to slits. “So, society matters more than me?”
“No. It’s just …” I paused, trying to figure out a way to make my point. “Okay, here’s a hypothetical question. What if you had to choose between saving my life or one hundred lives?”
“I’d choose you,” she said without hesitation.
I arched an eyebrow.
“That’s what you do when you care about someone.”
“Okay, what if it was between me and every living person on Earth?”
“That’s a stupid question.”
“What would you choose?”
“It’s a stupid question. It doesn’t deserve an answer.”
“You just don’t want to admit I’m right. Nobody would allow billions to die just to save a single life.” I shrugged. “At some point, the needs of society outweigh our own needs. That exact point may differ between people, but we all reach it.”
“Like I said, it’s a dumb question. How could I even be sure your death would save all those lives?”
“It’s not meant to be a real question,” Graham said. “It’s a thought exercise. You know, like whether it’s okay to torture a person in order to locate a ticking time bomb.”
“That question is just as dumb,” she replied. “How can we be sure the torture will actually yield the correct location? What about blowback? And do you really think —?”
“You’re missing the point,” he said. “The idea is to force you to choose between your principles.”
“Look, I don’t want anything bad to happen to us,” I said. “But I got into this business to save artifacts, to save the past. If I wasn’t willing to risk my life to do that, I wouldn’t be very good at my job.”
The wind picked up speed. Particles of dirt slashed against the windshield. “How’s my direction?” I asked.
“Hang on.” Graham pressed his eyes into his binoculars. “Okay, I’ve got a visual on the wreckage. It’s about two hundred yards away. Keep straight and watch out for the hills.”
“How’s it look?” Beverly asked.
“Intact for the most part.” His fingers tightened around the lenses. “Also, strange. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
The truck jolted as it shot over a small hill. My teeth clashed as the tires smacked against the soil.
In the distance, I saw a series of large hills and small mountains. Abruptly, their bottom halves dissolved into darkness. Then the desolate land in front of the hills started to fade from view. Glancing upward, I saw the night sky grow darker.
Beverly took the lenses from Graham and lifted them to her eyes. “It’s another dust storm.”
“How big is it?” I asked.
“Huge.”
I drove around a steep hill. Then I turned the wheel again and pointed the vehicle directly at the swirling, rising sands.
Graham chewed his upper lip for a moment. “Maybe we should break off, make a run for it.”
“Won’t work,” Beverly said. “It’s too big, too fast.”
“Pull over then.” Graham glanced at me. “We’ll wait it out.”
I didn’t like the idea of exposing the reliquary to another dust storm. But if I had to do it, I wanted it to have additional shielding. And the plane’s fuselage would provide some protection from the wind and blowing dirt. “We’re not waiting it out.” I stomped on the gas pedal. “We’re going to drive straight through it.”
Chapter 18
“One hundred yards to go.” Using the binoculars, Beverly studied the terrain. “Angle us two degrees to the right.”
I twisted the wheel to match her instructions.
“The fuselage is in pretty good shape,” she said. “It looks like the pilot was able to make an emergency landing.”
I continued to drive. But it wasn’t easy. The headlights barely penetrated the darkness. To make matters worse, the terrain was bumpy and pockmarked with rocks, hills, and other obstacles.
A shadowy aircraft materialized out of the darkness. It was about fifty feet long and stood fifteen feet tall. It lay flat on the ground with its fuselage partially buried in dirt. One wing had snapped in half while the other one angled high into the air. Based on the surviving wing, I estimated its original wingspan at about forty to forty-five yards.
The air popped. The truck veered to the right. I twisted the wheel, struggling to keep the vehicle under control.
The vehicle shot back to the left. Looking ahead, I saw the plane just twenty feet in front of us.