No Man's Land

Chapter 8

Meanwhile somewhere in Arizona...

She coughs as fresh air streams to her lungs. Her eyes start to open, the blinding sunlight forcing them to close quickly. She moves her hands around to cover her face, stirring up the dust from the red, rocky soil beneath her. She coughs again, and uses her arms to slide herself up to sitting. She winces as her eyes take in the cloudless blue sky above her, the sun seeming a little less blinding than before. The sound of the gentle breeze across the desert is the only thing she hears. Her eyes open wider as she takes in the soaring rock formations around her. Aside from the occasional cacti, there is nothing else in sight.

The wind picks up, pushing her hair in front of her face. Blonde. How did she know that? She takes her hair and holds it to her eyes; so soft, so much longer that it usually is. She pauses.

What is its usual length?, She thinks. Her mind goes blank. It is as if her life started right here in this moment... She looks down at her legs. The red dirt is all over her. She uses her hands to brush it away. Black, she recalls as she looks at the fabric covering each leg. Her head tilts slightly to the side as her fingers slide through a small tear in the fabric. She traces the fabric along her calf until she hits a different material. It is the same color, but smooth. She follows this sturdier material around in an ovular shape... Foot, She remembers, Boot.

She kicks out one foot, bending at the knee. Somehow this seems natural, yet so unknown. She lifts her body to stand, her other foot instinctively planting itself into the ground. She wobbles as she gets higher, her arms swinging out to the sides to keep her balance. Suddenly, the struggle ceases as she stabilizes. She hesitates for a moment before taking a step forward. She feels her face widen. Instantly, she pats along the sides of her head to feel the muscles extending sideways.

"Smile." Her face falls and a hand falls to her lips that are still tingling with the vibration of sound. Sound bubbles out of her throat as the smile reappears on her face, "Laugh."

She takes another step and another and another until she is able to take her focus off her feet and onto the horizon. Suddenly, something her foot catches on something, sending her down into the dirt. She brushes herself off, when something catches her eye. Another black object in the soil. Her curiosity gets the best of her, and she pulls it out of the soil. Dirt falls out of its center as she lifts it in the air. Somehow she recognizes it, "Hat..."

Her fingers trace along the brim and she finds metal along the sides... it almost looks like, "Wings." She looks above the wings to see a circle with some sort of figure inside. An insignia of some sort? Instinctively, she flips the hat over and looks at a tag that has been sewn into it.

"Zinda Blake," She reads, "Blackhawk Squadron."

A rumbling in the distance drives her away from the nearly faded letters. All she can see at first is a cloud of dust. Sandstorm maybe? She looks at the clear sky again; no that wouldn't make sense. As the cloud moves closer, her hands immediately go to her right side. She freezes as she tries to remember why she has such a reflex, but there is nothing at her side to help her mind find a solution. She looks up again to see that there is a vehicle of some sort emerging from the cloud.

A Jeep, Zinda remembers. They used Jeeps all the time in the field. Her brow creases once more... Who was "they?"

The Jeep drifts to a stop a few feet away from her. She winces as dust flies at her face, sputtering out some that got past her lips. As the dust settles, she sees the driver: a young muscular man in what must be pajamas because his sleeves are missing and his pants are cut off at the knee. He smiles at her as he swings himself out of the Jeep.

"You alright, Miss?" He asks.

Her mind goes blank, why was she out here? "Uh..."

"You lost?"

"Yes. I am very lost." She states as she smiles up at him.

"If you want I can give you a ride back into town."

"That would be great, thank you kindly."

He walks her over towards his car and offers a hand to help her into the passenger's seat. Zinda isn't phased by it and grabs onto the top of the Jeep and swings herself in. The stranger smiles. "Well, okay then." He jumps into his seat and starts the engine, "You have a name, Miss?"

"Zinda Blake."

"Nice to meet you, Miss Blake. My name's Jeffrey Thomas."

"Nice to meet you Mister Thomas."

He snickers as he adjusts his sunglasses, "Please, you can just call me Jeff, Miss Blake."

How informal. Odd, "Alright... you can call me Zinda then if you'd like."

"Say, what kind of name is Zinda? Any kind of meaning behind it or anything?"

She is silent as she tries to remember. Her heart aches as she struggles for an answer, "I don't know actually..."

He nods, "I totally get it. Hey, maybe when we get to town you can go to the library and use the computers there to look it up."

"Your library has computers?" They are available to the public now?

"Yeah, we got a few older ones down at the library as people in town started upgrading theirs... not worth havin' a Windows 2000 if ya have a tablet or a laptop, ya know?"

Zinda nods, pretending to know what a Windows is. "Yes, of course."

"You're funny, Zinda."

She smiles at him, "I don't find myself very amusing."

"No, just the way you talk. It's not like most folks around here. Where are ya from? If you don't mind me askin?"

Her mind blanks again. "I'm afraid I don't know that either..."

"I'm sorry... I didn't know you were an orphan..."

No. Somehow every fiber in her being told her that an orphan was something she was not. "No, Jeffrey..."

"Jeff."

"Jeff, sorry-"

He smiles, "S'okay."

"What I mean when I say I don't remember is that I quite literally cannot remember anything. I know I must of had parents because that's a fact of life... but actual memories of anything before you found me out here? Nothing. It's like I didn't exist or something."

"Of course you exist, Zinda," He smirks as buildings start to appear over the horizon, "It's a fact of life, and whatever it takes to help you figure all this out, I'll be there every step of the way."

She smiles back. Somehow this feeling seems familiar, but she cannot place it. Maybe it is simply being able to depend on the kindness of a stranger. She sneaks a glance at him as he stares off at the road. Yes, that's all it is.