The memory of her forces a laugh from my beaten chest, but my stomach lashes out in agony. The realization of my task weighs heavy on me erasing the remnants of my smile.
I miss her.
I miss normal.
An hour or so passes before we find a place in the wall of 34 chipped enough to possibly climb over with a little help and a perfectly placed pile of rocks. The lingering heat from the warm, roasted sand soaks deep into my skin in the early moon’s light. There is a stillness present. I never realized how calm the Outlands were. The sound of our shoes sifting through the sand is the perfect melody to the backdrop of a clear indigo sky. The stars are just beginning to peak down on us. There’s barely a cloud overhead.
“It’s beautiful,” awes Jacee, her head pointed towards the shimmering pieces of earth stuck in the starscape. Her voicing losing focus at the end, like a transmission, slowly fading out.
Every so often, for a few seconds just after sunset, the sun aligns perfectly with the pieces of land that got blasted to space when the meteor hit. The floating masses of land bend the light into something beyond divine.
“I remember the first time I saw it.”
She nods back, still captivated. Eyes glued to the cosmic light show.
“At the time I was a fresh born like you. Had no one, and nothing more than a job and a name tatted on my arm. Then I looked up. I saw right in front of me the evidence that something beyond beauty can come from something tragic.”
She turns to me, takes a step, and wraps around me tightly. I let my arms fall across her back. My heart hurts for her.
We stayed like that for a while, silent. I think she needed it, maybe we both did.
“Why’d you do it?”
“Do what?” she asks.
“Why’d you get yourself banished for me? You should have stayed quiet… kept your head down.”
She takes a step back and pierces the sand with those sinking sapphire eyes. “I don’t know,” she pushes her bangs around her ear. “I guess I thought I was doing the right thing. Maybe, I thought I owed you or something. You know.. you’re not the only one tired of the way they treat us.”
“You don’t owe me anything though. It’s not your fault. None of this is. You should’ve kept out of it.”
“And do what? Continue slaving for Lethe until it’s my turn to disappear? I’d rather take my chances with you,”
We decide to rest before our heist. She lies next to me in the black sand as we wait for the shroud of darkness, both of us hopeless.
The roar of a shuttle rocketing over wakes me. We must’ve fallen asleep. Tiny sandstones crumble to dust around me as the engine overhead stirs the ground and vanishes into the midnight moon. My muscles scream in anguish. My body feels even more broken than earlier. Existence is pain.
From the corner of my eye, I see something move behind some boulders a few meters away.
“Jacee?” I yell.
She doesn’t reply.
Maybe it’s not Jacee. Maybe Lethe has come back to finish the job? Why not kill us at the gate?
My eyes catch another glance of something moving on my other side. They have me surrounded. Here we go.
Using what little strength I have left, I back myself up against a small boulder embedded near the wall in the Outlands. Armed with a jagged stone, I wait for the attack.
My ears hear nothing for several minutes outside the wisps of wind feeding on stray grains of sand, but I know they are getting closer. My voice cracks as I cry out, “What do you want from me??”
Something suddenly appears from around the boulder. Insidiously, it creeps towards me. It doesn’t make a sound. Standing over me, nearly 7 feet tall, a monster draped in rusted trash and bone armor shifts even closer to me. Its face is a fleshless skull. I peer deep into its eyes and darkness stares back. The creature’s body is marked with a muddy paste, strange blue symbols from its neck to its legs. I’ve never seen markings like that before.
What is this thing?
What does it want from me?
Its human-like body wields a large metal rod that’s dripping liquid sparks of purple electricity at the sharpened tip. Hands like a giant. The creature moves closer as I impulsively back further into the sandy rocks behind me.
Another beast appears from my left wearing a slightly different variation of painted junk and bone- this one wears a red hooded fabric around its neck just as a human would.
The first slams its staff into the ground at my feet. Two more of the creatures emerge silently.
“What do you want from me?” I cry out desperately. With each loud thump of my heart, my chest flinches in pain from the soreness.
“Look who I found,” sings Jacee coming into view around the creatures.
The one with the red hood removes his bone mosaic helmet. He stands firm bursting with confidence, taller than me, but only by a few inches. His eyes remain hidden in the shadows.
“My name is Xander,” he declares reaching his rugged hand towards me.
I cautiously shake his hand in disbelief.
“Nice to meet you. I’m.. umm, Palin.”
Jacee looks oddly enthused. We don’t know these people.
“Oh, we’ve met before,” he says as he steps into the light. His face reveals a scar embedded under his left eye stretching to the corner of his lips.
He’s the infirmary intruder! Stumbling back a few steps, I raise my fist ready to strike.
“Easy there, guy,” he laughs.
“What were you doing in the infirmary that night?” I ask straightforward with obvious suspicion. “How’d you get into 34?”
“Palin, relax. He’s here to help us.”
“You have every reason to be cautious. I get it, but I come in peace with an offer for you,” says
