by J. M. Page
“That was easier than I thought it would be,” he said, strapping himself back in the pilot’s seat to head back to the city.
As he took off into the dust again, he had to laugh at himself for being so anxious about it. “Modders,” he chuckled. “What a ridiculous idea.”
The speeder zigged and zagged, zoomed and zipped. He skirted around the dunes, waging imaginary battles in his mind. He whizzed through dense clouds, falling into oft-practiced formations and drills. Now that his mission was accomplished, the Prince let loose and enjoyed his flying time.
Ben knew there would be hell to pay when he got back to the city. He knew the officer probably reported the stolen speeder and if the King found out where his son had taken the stolen craft, he’d have a lot to answer for.
Not to mention the reaction the public would have to their prince taking a trip to the Wastelands.
But that didn’t matter. He was just happy to be out of the city and happy to be able to help his friend. To come even this close to flying again, even if it wasn’t quite the same as space flight. He didn’t want to think about consequences or obstacles when he had the opportunity to just be and fly.
Besides, there were some perks to being royal. He wouldn’t be going to prison, for starters.
Somewhere in his maneuvering, Ben looked down at the myriad indicators in front of him and realized something was wrong. The navigation system was his first clue, spinning around aimlessly, unable to find his position.
“Come on.”
He tapped the screen, hoping to coax it into behaving. It was impossible to see more than a few feet in front of the speeder and he was still too far to see the city walls. Without navigation, he didn’t have much hope of finding it again.
But Ben had too much training to give into panic that quickly. He could sort this out, he still had a working craft. He had the medicine, he’d just have to find another way to navigate.
Of course, that was with the assumption he had a working craft. His assumption was wrong.
The navigation system was only his first clue that something was amiss, and there were many more to follow it. The fine particles of magnetic dust clogged the speeder’s intake and settled on sensitive computer equipment making all instruments unreadable.
Still, it was operational and he’d flown in worse conditions. He could make it back, but he shouldn’t press his luck. That was the conclusion he arrived at.
Unfortunately for the Prince, the hoverspeeder was already compromised beyond hope. He watched anxiously as the panels all flickered and fuzzed to snow and the craft listed to the side, sputtering and coughing.
“You’re not gonna quit on me now,” he said, fighting to maintain control while warning bells blared at him.
The speeder skipped across the sand, jostling Ben as he clamored to find something to brace himself against, ready for impact. It splashed into a great sand dune, sending even more dust into the air as the craft shuddered to a stop.
Ben grunted and ran through his self-assessment, making sure he wasn’t injured before he tried to make the speeder come back to life.
The controls remained unresponsive, screens black and dormant, communications and navigation completely down.
“You wanted an adventure,” he scolded himself.
With a forceful kick, he broke through the windscreen and crawled out on his belly and elbows through twisted metal onto the desert surface.
He shielded his eyes, fighting to make out any shapes in the constant reddish haze present even at night, but finding none. Before he went anywhere, he unzipped his jumpsuit and removed his shirt, fashioning a turban of sorts out of the thin material before he zipped his suit back up. Every particle of dust that whipped around him at supersonic speeds was like a needle in his skin and he’d rather not be exposed to the elements if he could help it.
And with the knowledge that he’d made a horrible mistake, Ben set off walking, only the barest hope that he was headed in the right direction.
Chapter Three
Celine
Celine realized she held her breath and she hurried off in the direction of the struggling craft.
“Do you think they’re okay?” She looked over to Rufus who still hid in his shell, shaking and unresponsive.
“You scaredy bot,” she teased, one eye trained on the ship careening into the sand.
She didn’t even know if the craft was manned or not, but it opened up a whole world of possibilities for her. Between Celine’s infallible arm and the technology in that ship… Maybe she could get off the ground!
It was at least worth a shot. But first, she had to make sure it was safe for her to approach.
The ship dove forward with a lurch and skipped across the sand, finally burying itself into a dune as it came to a complete stop. The exterior was badly damaged and even from her distance, Celine could see there wouldn’t be any hope of getting the thing up and running again in any reasonable amount of time.
She edged nearer, her pulse echoing in her skull, drowning out even the monstrous roar of wind.
She paused, crouched behind one of the sand dunes, concealed from view of the ship. Sand erupted away from the ship in one quick burst and Celine watched in fascination as a figure crawled out, digging through the sand as he went.
He stood then, tall and broad shouldered in a dark gray jumpsuit that wasn’t at all suited for the Wastelands — it left far too much of his skin exposed, including his entire head. He wouldn’t last a minute in these conditions.
But before she gathered her courage to make her presence known, the man unzipped his jumpsuit, pulling a thin shirt from his body, baring his torso for the briefest moment.
Celine’s mouth went dry. She’d never before seen such a vast expanse of skin unmarred by mechanical parts. She’d never seen golden skin like his, or tight corded muscles like his.
She’d never seen a man so handsome — or so out of his depth.
He wrapped the shirt around his head, covering his exposed skin, his eyes, and mouth before he zipped his jumpsuit back up.
She watched his movements with awe, wondering where he’d come from and where he was headed.
Before she had a chance to dwell on the thoughts, he started walking. Celine found herself frozen in place and at a loss for what she should do.
The man trudged through the sand, directly towards her. If she didn’t move, he’d stumble right over her.
Trying her best to remain hidden, Celine ducked around the other side of the dune, watching the strange man try to get his bearings before he set off again.
Should she follow him? Warn him? Help him?
He didn’t stand much chance of surviving out in the Wastelands. Not without preparation and he certainly didn’t look prepared.
As the man disappeared, swallowed by the clouds of swirling dust, Celine had to make a choice.
Without wasting any time, she scrambled to her feet and followed in his footsteps, careful to keep her distance.
“Celine,” Rufus hissed, one lens poking out of his body to glare at her with angry red pixels.
She ignored him and trudged on.
“Celine,” he hissed again, more insistent this time. “What are you doing?”
That was a very good question. What was she doing? Following this human stranger for what? To help him find his way home? To watch him succumb to the dust?
Her stomach clenched at that thought and she shook her head.
“I don’t know. Trusting my instincts.”
Rufus’s other eye lens popped up and they tilted together to give him an angry look. “Your father—”
Celine huffed. “I know. Daddy thinks that all humans are evil and won’t hesitate to kill a modder on the spot.”
Rufus’s eyes flashed red again, but Celine ignored it.
“But he’s in trouble. Maybe I can help him? Besides, Dad says a lot of stuff and we don’t always believe him.”
“But… But… Celine!” Rufus whi
ned this time, trying for the pitiful route instead.
She patted him and pressed onwards. “I’ll make a note of your objections,” she said, fighting a little smirk.
More worrying than the urge to smile was the strange fluttering in Celine’s chest at the mere sight of this strange man. Something about him intrigued her, fascinated her, and propelled her feet forward despite Rufus’s protests.
Where did he come from? Was the walled city real? And he a citizen of it?
It seemed like a stretch to her, but he had to come from somewhere. Humans didn’t just fall out of the sky, unless her father was to be believed.
A familiar tug of impatience made her roll her eyes. Sometimes, her father was so old-fashioned. It was her father that insisted they all remain holed away in the tunnels.
He told a story to anyone that would listen. A story of a human doing just what Celine thought impossible: falling out of the sky. The man crashed and when Abatu, Celine’s father, tried to help him, the man turned weapons against him, threatening his very existence.
Of course, the way Dad told it, only his quick thinking and super fast legs had gotten him out alive.
“They hate us for being different and fear us for our advantages,” Dad always said.
Celine wasn’t sure she bought what the old man was selling. Even if the walled city did exist, it was a pretty big stretch of the imagination to think that a millennia-old prejudice still survived.
The man trudging through the dunes ahead of her stumbled. Every step looking to take more effort than the one before it. His feet sank further into the soft loose sand and he fought to free himself. Celine's chest constricted, wondering if now was her time to help him. Or if there was a time she should help him.
For all she knew, he could deserve this. Maybe he was a criminal on the run. Why else would he be venturing out into certain death?
She frowned. She didn’t think he looked like a criminal, though it would be pretty hard to make that judgement without another look at him. A long look.
He tumbled forward, face down in the sand, and Celine held her breath.
“What are you thinking?” Rufus asked, his voice more tart than usual. “I know that look.”
She thought it best not to answer that. He’d only protest more.
The man struggled to make forward movement, crawling on his stomach as the swirling winds began to bury him.
“Celine,” Rufus hissed again.
“I can’t just let him die,” she hissed back, edging ever closer to the stranger.
He still pulled himself forward. Slower and slower until he stopped moving altogether.
Ignoring the buzzes and squawks of protest from Rufus, Celine darted over to the man, scrabbling for purchase in the sand.
She arrived moments before he’d be completely buried and quickly set to work digging him out of the sand. She managed to get him rolled over and then hefted him up with her arms on either side of his chest, lifting him by the armpits.
One the one hand, it wasn’t so difficult to drag him across the sand, but that hand was mechanical.
On the other hand, Celine had a lot more trouble keeping her grip and soon her muscles reached exhaustion.
“Just…” she heaved him with her as she stepped backward toward cover. “A little…” she grunted with the effort of pulling him. “Further.”
Even her mechanical arm wasn’t really suited for this kind of heavy lifting and her shoulder screamed with a deep burning ache.
Just when she was sure she couldn’t possibly pull him another step, the sand underfoot gave way to solid rock and the wind quieted.
“Are you crazy?” Rufus trilled, unable to contain his alarmed whistles.
The stranger grunted, but remained otherwise unresponsive.
“Shh.”
Rufus had the good sense to look apologetic. As apologetic as a homemade pocket robot could look, anyway.
After a pause, Celine frowned at the still man and sent a worried look to her robotic companion. “Do you think he’s—?”
Rufus shuddered. “I don’t know!”
“Why don’t you check it out?” Celine said, taking Rufus off his perch on her shoulder. She set him on the floor of the cave and watched from a healthy distance.
Rufus inched closer and closer to the human man, needing constant encouragement from Celine as he went along.
Finally, Rufus nudged the man’s foot, but he didn’t budge.
Celine huffed, resigning herself to actually going over to the guy despite the strange crackling energy buzzing in her lungs.
It didn’t take her long to realize he was wheezing, every breath shallow, raspy and labored.
She propped his limp body up against the wall of the cave and used the position as leverage to work the dust from his lungs. She alternated between forcing water past his lips and swatting him between the shoulder blades to make him cough.
The third time she brought her canteen to his lips, the man’s eyes opened. For a long drawn-out moment the world hung there, suspended in time. The longer the moment went on, the more Celine was sure the pressure inside of her would make her explode.
But she didn’t explode. The stranger’s honey-gold eyes flickered to her mechanical arm — the one holding the canteen — and he flinched on instinct.
As quickly as they’d opened, the man’s eyes closed, leaving Celine alone without a clue of what to do. Again.
Only now there was another despair choking her: the knowledge that her father was right.
After Celine was satisfied that the strange man was breathing on his own without trouble, she ventured out of the cave, instructing Rufus to stay behind and keep an eye on the guy. He didn’t like that plan.
Without anything better to go on, she headed North. She didn’t have much hope of finding anything, but she needed time to think. Now that she’d saved this guy, what was she supposed to do with him?
He was crashed in the desert and not doing so well. Was she supposed to take him back home?
That would go over real well with her father.
She considered hiding him somewhere else in the tunnels, but quickly dismissed it. Rufus would blow their secret within a day.
But that still left her precisely where she’d started.
As long as she kept walking, though, she wouldn’t have to face that decision. Or the consequences it’d bring. So she kept walking. Trekking across the desert like her ancestors must have done thousands of years before her.
Though, if legends were to be believed, they were leaving the walled city. Not trying to find it. Celine shook her head at the entire notion of searching for a mythical walled city of legend to save the impossible human that fell from the sky.
The very same sky that she longed to catch a glimpse of, instead of the endless fathomless dust.
The same sky that seemed out of reach, even as the dust around her seemed to calm.
The sudden lack of dust should have tipped her off, but Celine was too wrapped up in her own thoughts and calculations to notice the change. Or the looming shadow that grew closer.
Something, she couldn’t say what, fired off a warning shot way back in the recesses of her mind, and Celine looked up, instantly stumbling backwards with a gasp.
“No way…”
It was an honest-to-goodness wall.
More shocking than the giant monolithic wall towering over her was the complete and utter lack of dust.
Celine cautiously unraveled the covering around her head, expecting at any moment to be pelted with tiny airborne needles.
But the stinging never came. Nor did the coughing.
In fact, Celine threw her head back and sucked in deep lungfuls of air, giving way to giggles.
It was real! The wall, the city… and somehow — miraculously — they’d figured out how to stop the storm from encroaching. She felt like dancing with the sheer excitement of it.
But there was no time for dancing. Now that she knew the cit
y was real, she needed to bring the stranger back to the wall for his own safety. Clearly he didn’t belong in the Wastelands.
Celine couldn’t ever remember moving so fast. Part of it was urgency — the man needed medical attention, and her father would be wondering where she was. Part of it was pure unadulterated joy.
The walled city’s existence opened up a whole new world of possibilities. She was excited to try to harvest parts from one busted up spacecraft, but they probably had whole fleets of those things. They probably left the planet like it was no big deal, all the time.
They probably…
As she neared the cave and Celine’s thoughts turned back to the man inside, she slowed to a stop. They probably would never let her anywhere near their city with her robotic arm.
She remembered the way his eyes had focused on it. How he’d flinched.
And as much as she hated to admit it, Celine knew her dad had been telling the truth about humans all along. If he was in better shape, who was to say this human wouldn’t kill her?
Just because he made her feel over-inflated and fizzy didn’t mean he wasn’t a bad guy. She didn’t know anything about him. Not even his name.
If he was the murderous kind of human, she’d probably be better off just leaving him to fend for himself. The city wasn’t far. He could maybe make it on his own if he knew which way to go…
She stepped back into the cave, still not sure what she was going to do beyond retrieving Rufus.
“Thank goodness you’re back!” Rufus said, rushing over to her to do figure eights around her ankles. “He kept mumbling something about ‘modders,’” Rufus said with a tremble.
Celine’s jaw clenched and she knew what her father would say.
“One less human to worry about.”
She sighed. Nope. No way she could take Dad’s route on this one.
With another great heave, she managed to get a good grip on his prone form and began to drag him toward the city, one exhausting step at a time.