Roar, Lioness. Roar

The Traveler, Part 2

Dew watches the buggy bound over the crest of the sand dunes and bounce as the driver pushes the meager engine to its limit. The sandstorm moves in with surprising speed and it's definitely going to be a close race. The buggy dips down low and out of sight for a moment, and Dew uses the opportunity to scan her surroundings. There should be another hour of daylight, but the storm is going to eat that up like everything else in its path. As the shadows grow, the infected will stir. She needs to get inside soon.

"Come on, River," she says.

The angry growl of crude-gargling engines rumble over the sound of her buggy and the approaching winds. Dew sweeps her binoculars across the horizon, searching for the source. She hopes beyond hope her fears are unfounded and is quickly disappointed.

"No, no, no. River, don't tell me you brought the whole clan down on us?"

A Black Smoke tumbler comes over the distant dunes followed by a second and a third. Their foul engines cough clouds of noxious fumes in their wake. Dew can already taste the exhaust on her tongue, heavy and repulsive. She spits in the dirt and tries to get a headcount. Three drivers, two passengers. It's still five too many.

She hops down from her perch and runs through a narrow pass, too small for River and most other full grown women. On the other side, Dew emerges on a cliff summit overlooking a gorge, their gorge. The sound of River's buggy grows louder as do the engines of the tumblers. There isn't a lot of time to act. She runs along the summit and slides over to a complicated knot of thick ropes and chains. She pulls out her hatchet and starts shuffling through the different strands and anchors.

"Red, I definitely need red." Raising a chain and a rope, both marked with a red sash, she curses The Waste. "It always has to be difficult with you, doesn't it," she shouts.

In response the sky rumbles with word of the coming storm.

The sound of the buggy entering the gorge is welcome, but not the frantic honking of her horn. The Black Smoke will enter any second and Dew still doesn't know whether she wants the chain or the rope.

"You want the rope, Dew Drop!" River's voice echoes off the gorge walls.

The Black Smoke tumblers rumble in right behind it.

Dew blushes hearing her lover shout her nickname. With a smile on her face, she savagely hacks at the thick rope. The braid frays then unwinds until it snaps from the pressure. The cliff shakes closely followed by the sound of shifting stones. She stumbles to the cliff's edge in time to see her handiwork. A minor rockslide rolls down into the gorge, blocking the pass behind River's buggy. The first tumbler is too close to avoid the trap and is smashed by dozens of head-sized rocks. The strange vehicle is knocked sideways before it flips and is buried. The other two tumblers go up and over the rock debris.

"You could at least check on your friends, gongdo-heads," Dew grumbles under her breath. She and River aren't out of danger yet.

She looks back longingly at their collection of trap triggers, but they won't do any good. River and her pursuers are out of the kill zone already. Dew runs as fast as she can, with the rumblings of the sandstorm thundering in her ears. She climbs a collection of rocks and hops from boulder to boulder, skirting the summit of the cliff. A gust of wind snatches her slight frame and threatens to toss her off the side, but, by the grace of the Great Mother, she maintains her footing and keeps going.

She reaches a second knot of ropes and chains, positioned at the top of the area they call The Terrace. Someone long ago had taken the time to cut the mountainside into rows of flat steps starting near the mountain top and leading all the way to the desert floor. Pathways for water had been woven throughout and the ground made fertile. Whoever once lived on the mountain had planted vegetables and fruits, then found out the hard way that the infected are drawn to crops as feverishly as they are drawn to women. When River's mother found the place, it was barren save for weeds and bones.