Castaway Team

Chapter 4

Aisha and Julia had walked, aimlessly around the vast, infinite desert, only to find more sand than they believed could possibly exist. With not even one drop of water or food, their sanity seemed to be quickly deteriorating. With each dune they climbed came a slide downwards followed by an even bigger dune with an even bigger slide downwards. This pattern had seemingly continued for however many hours they had been journeying. It didn't seem like there would be any variation in their trail soon, but nevertheless, they continued their trail through the endless landscape of sand, sky and sun.

It was when the sun began to sink beneath the horizon and twilight became apparent that they saw it. Something that wasn't just unending, hopeless sand. There was a small splash of blue, surrounded by a vibrant view of greenery. Julia stopped with her eyes forced open by hope. It was an oasis.

Despite her extreme malnourishment, Aisha quickened her sluggish steps into a desperate jog. Julia soon exited her short-lived trance, noticed Aisha running and decided on joining her. Once again, their journey followed the simple, repetitive pattern. Down the dune. Then up the dune. This ceaseless rollercoaster carrying their ceasing lives continued yet again.

Continuously climbing mountains of sand further depleted their energy and the daunting impossibility that the oasis could be slowly moving away from them became a reality. Darkness had won the battle against the bright, blue sky and the lack of the ruthless sun called for the duller, but still intensely gleaming full moon to raise itself unhurriedly above the horizon.

From the top of their trillionth dune that they'd climbed, they watched as the oasis faded into nihility. It had simply vanished, leaving nothing but another flawless dune in its place, covered in a blanket of moonlight. Their now diminished and deranged minds had played a sick joke on them. Their desperate desire for water had demonically twisted it's way into their perception of reality.

Although both of them wished they could keep on going, they both succumbed to the fact that hallucinations were appearing erratically to both of them and attempting survival from this point on would merely be a pointless extension of their certain end. So they stopped. They dropped to the ground and looked up at the reassuringly unnerving night sky. They just lay there for a short period of time, wallowing in this peaceful but dismaying moment.  Then, shivering, they both silently shut their eyes for what was possibly the final time.