Sand Red

9

We started our journey before dawn. The sky cracked with light in the east as we tread. We shouldn't have been hiking in broad daylight, but none of us could have begun walking the previous evening and we did not want to waste the day, so we would travel all the way to the next dawn, and then bed down in daylight.

We plodded on. Od had a pair of crutches now, and he could walk by himself- courtesy of the Reds. His hip had been disinfected and bandaged. We carried a rucksack with the water and salt that Duke had given us. The desert stretched ahead of us, in hope this time, as if to say we would make it and find the children safe, and come to no harm.

I pondered my embarrassment with Aida from the night before. Why should I have felt ashamed of consuming the dead? It was nature's way. A buried corpse is a waste. There's few enough of us without K1 Georgia, in any case. And we didn't all have the luxury of farmland and groundwater. The rest of us had to survive. We did what we had to to survive. I revelled in my newfound supremacy, then felt angry at myself for my bitterness. I didn't like the mess of emotions in me about the Reds and especially Aida. She held herself with such contempt, like we were nothing. I realized I wanted her life. I was jealous of her and her life on the Red farms. I wanted to be able to live like her, on sweet fruit and grain, and look down on cannibals like myself and every other person I had known in my life. The thought made me hate myself. 

From behind me, Od cried out. I turned in surprise to see that he had collapsed in a mess with his crutches. He groaned as the stitches in his hip were stretched. I rushed to him, hoping no stitch had torn. Yul ran back from where he had been leading ahead and Od flung off my arm as I tried to help him up. He had been in a foul mood all morning. I'd let him have his space thinking his stitches hurt. Yul went down on his knees by his brother.

'What happened? God.' He lifted Od's shirt to check the bandaging. 'Did you feel any stitches tear?'

'It's the bloody crutches. They just won't stop sinking into the goddamn sand!'

I realized his problem. 'Oh. Should've told us before.'

'Yeah? What would you have done about it?'

That wasn't like Od. The silence simmered for a few seconds. Then an idea hit me. 'Put shoes on them.'

Od just stared at me.

I took off a worn grey shoe before realizing I didn't have socks. 'D'you have socks?' I asked Yul. I didn't want to ask Od for his shoes, though he needed them (on his feet) the least among us.

'What do you want with my socks?' Yul asked, not understanding.

'My shoes. We'll tie them to the crutches so they won't sink. I'll burn my feet without socks.'

'Ah,' Od said.

'I have socks.' Yul pulled off a boot. 'Here, take these.' He handed Od his ratskin boots.

'Give them to me,' Od said, gesturing at the mouldy grey socks. 'You two keep your shoes on, you'll burn your feet in the sand.'

'It's alright, the crutches can wear mine. I'll take the socks.' I told them.

'You think Yul's feet are more precious than yours?' Od asked, raising an eyebrow.

'No I-'

'We're brothers, all three of us,' he said sternly, back to his old self. 'Give me the socks. I need shoes the least.'

Yul wordlessly handed over his socks.

***

We trudged on and the sky got wider and wider until the sun had reached its zenith and then the day began to fall. The light receded and the hawks fell silent as they smelled the approaching dusk. I observed the day with interest. There was much detail in the earth and sky that I had never noticed before. The quivering of the thorn as a creature passed underneath, the movement of a thousand minute life forms within the sands: ants of a million species, each as different as red and blue, each surviving, unaware it was a miniscule part of a whole picture, on a dying planet. The way the sky shook between dark and light and the blood red form of the sun that almost covered the whole sky at noon, then waned, growing weaker and weaker and softer as time ran on with no end at all. The wisps of white in the stratosphere that would never bring us rain, betraying us, stealing our moisture, throwing our life force up into space. There was a blatant disregard for the billions of years of evolution, for our consciousnesses, for our sentience, our homes, our emotions, our people and me and mine. The sky neither knew nor cared. The creatures of the landscape knew this much better than I, and had known it far longer. They did not race to outlive the planet. They simply survived as they were programmed to. Who made us? Why were we here? What had happened to those who died? These were some of the questions I pondered as I observed the sun and the sky on our journey across the sands.

As the sky darkened, we passed the ration cup among us. My body shivered in ecstasy as the drug that is water slid over my tongue. I prepared myself for a sleepless night. The stars began to appear as dusk faded further into the past. I watched the galaxy grow slowly into being. Yul dug a hole for himself to sit in clear of thorn. He had not said one word to me all day. Not that any of us talked too much as we tread in the searing heat.

We rested for a few minutes with the water before standing up again. My knees ached from the effort. The night stretched on. The stars grew brighter and brighter until the sky was a river of jewels richly throwing off light in every direction, beautiful and marvellous, the loveliest thing I had ever seen. Jewels weren't worth riches anymore. The Diamond-Water paradox had ceased matter a long time ago. Water was the wealth as well as the necessity now.

I was hungrier than ever when dawn broke. We stopped and settled in our holes, downing our rations lighting quick. We didn't bother with watches. Not even a fool would venture as deep into the desert as we had come and there was no danger to our beings except, perhaps, a desert rat chewing holes in my sturdy jacket. I thought of the pregnant rat we had consumed raw. My stomach rumbled, torn between hunger and disgust. Nausea rolled over me.

My eyes were heavy with fatigue, but in the shadow of the dune, I couldn't sleep. The heat burned against my cheek and my stomach twisted painfully within me. I tossed and turned until sometime near noon, I finally managed to fall asleep.

I woke well after dark and sat up with a start. Od lay unmoving beside me and Yul was sitting up beside him, his knees to his chest, looking out to the blackness of the Redthorn. I threw my hair back and sand cascaded down my spine. I wrapped my jacket tighter around me for the chill. Yul looked around at the rustling of the fabric, then turned back to the stars at the horizon.

'They're beautiful.' My voice was heavy with sleep.

'Yes,' he replied. We were silent for a few minutes.

Well rested and freshly awake, I blurted out, 'What's wrong with you?'

His head turned slowly. 'You mean why won't I talk to you?'

'Yeah.'

He was silent a moment. His head turned to Od. 'I'm his brother, but I'm not special to him.'

'But you are,' I said, walking over to sit beside him. I considered it for a minute. 'If he ever had to choose- had to save one of us, you know it would be you.'

'That's not what he said.'

I forced a laugh. 'You know him. Kind to everyone. Moral and fair. He didn't really mean that.'

Yul shrugged, still not looking at me. 'Maybe. We have to start,' he said, getting up. He went over to wake Od and I remained on the sand feeling horribly hungry and empty and heart wrenchingly sad for what I had said.