Next, he stripped off his pants.
“Now?” I said incredulously. “You want to fuck now?”
He tripped me over and lay on top of me.
“What are you doing?” I said.
He placed a hand over my mouth but his attention wasn’t on me.
It was on a shining white object, cresting one of the larger sand dunes.
Sunlight blinked off its shiny white hull.
The rushing sound grew louder at the machine’s approach.
It was the origin of the noise.
A drone.
It didn’t take me long to figure out who the drone belonged to.
By the direction it flew, it had to belong to the prison, and therefore, the guards.
They’d found us already? I thought. So much for the great escape.
The drone hovered overhead, kicking up plumes of sand from the tallest peak.
“Halt!” the drone bellowed from tinny speakers on its underside.
It must be controlled by the guards back at the prison, I thought. And if they had already found us, there was no chance of escape now.
“What should we do?” I mumbled around his hand still clamped over my mouth.
“We can’t move,” he whispered. “If we do, they’ll see us.”
“Are you kidding? They can see us already!”
“No, they can’t.”
It was only then I noticed how hot his skin had become, and the strange dotted discoloration of the flesh of his hand.
“Do not attempt to run!” the drone yelled through its electronic speakers.
One moment, the drone was hovering above us, and then suddenly, it dropped down on the other side of the sand dune.
My breaths were hoarse and strained through Egara’s hand.
I glanced at him out the corner of my eye.
He hadn’t moved, so neither would I.
His attention was still on the sky, over the giant sand dune to our left.
I wondered what he was waiting for.
Surely now was the time we ought to run?
Now, while the drone was distracted by something else?
Or was the drone attempting to flush us out?
Suddenly, there was another rushing sound high above us.
I couldn’t see it without moving my head.
But the whine of its miniature engines was enough to let me know what it was.
Another drone.
It sailed overhead and descended so close it made my clothes flap.
The sand it kicked up stung my skin.
And still, Egara did not move a muscle.
I wondered what he was thinking.
Couldn’t he see the drone had spotted us?
“Halt!” the drone directly above us snapped in a hostile tone.
Halt? I thought. We weren’t even moving!
Another prisoner came bolting up from between the huge sand dunes, a terrified expression on his face.
He glanced over his shoulders at something on his tail.
A red light blinked on the second drone’s underside.
The prisoner ran as fast as his legs could carry him, his feet churning up the stream’s pebbles.
He tripped and fell to his knees.
He crawled on his belly until he regained his feet.
Panting and exhausted, he returned to running.
He saw the drone ahead, the one directly above us, and his eyes widened.
“Halt or we will be forced to fire!” the drone said, so loud it was deafening.
The prisoner heard the warning but he didn’t slow, never mind halt.
He bolted to one side in an attempt to avoid the drone but it was no use.
Zaaap!
A flicker of blue struck the prisoner full in the chest.
He collapsed immediately, landing face-first in the cool polluted spring water.
His eyes rolled into the back of his head and his body shuddered with the shock fire.
The second drone approached and slapped a pair of metal cuffs on his ankles.
There was a loud whining noise as both drones activated a powerful magnet that drew the metal cuffs upwards, and each of the prisoner’s feet attached to the underside of a drone.
The prisoner blinked, coming awake.
He peered down at us and saw us immediately.
He waved and pointed at us.
“Wait!” he said. “Wait! There are others! Right there! There are others!”
The drones paid him no attention as they sailed off into the sky, careening back toward Ikmal prison.
Only once the dull rushing air of their powerful propellers had dissipated did Egara climb off me.
I didn’t get to my feet.
I rolled onto one shoulder and listened as closely as I could to the surrounding area.
Hearing nothing, I peered up at Egara, who pulled on his shirt and pants, covering up the sandy appearance of his skin.
“You’re a shifter?” I said.
“No, not quite,” he said.
“But your skin…”
“I can change it to the color of the sand, of my surroundings, but I can’t form different shapes. That would be a real gift.”
“I don’t know, camouflage seems pretty cool to me.”
“Come on,” he said. “We should keep moving.”
I dusted off my clothes and followed after him.
Once again, he had saved my life.
I wondered how many more times he would have to do it before all this was over.
And would I get the chance to save his in return?
The heat from the sun was nothing like anything I had ever felt back on Earth.
It hit me full in the face like a laser beam set to kill.
What I wouldn’t give for some sunblock.
Egara had no such concern.
His skin was already bright red, used to conditions like this.
I grew up in California and was used to hot weather but nothing like this.
Egara noticed my discomfort and removed his shirt.
He did the top button up and placed the collar for the neck over my head, so it was like a veil.
Only my hair faced the sun now and it was already heating up.
At least now my face and neck were protected.
The desert was a beautiful place, but you soon got tired of it when there was no shade to protect yourself.
Even worse was the harsh breathing from my mouth and lungs.
I could hardly keep myself from exhaling one breath before I had to take another.
It was like my throat was clenching shut tight, unable to process the oxygen, which struggled to even descend down my windpipe.
Egara cast a look over his shoulder at me several times but never said a word.
Twice already, I had spotted carrion circling overhead but none showed much interest in us.
It
