The Sands of Borrowed Time

by Jeffry Winters

  They're going to follow for certain. They didn’t look like quitters, she thought. She then swerved to the right and off the track, off-road, back down the hill. She had to slow to a near standstill as the slope steepened, getting rocky, dead trees obstructing her way. Soon the dusty yellow road could be seen again, right below her as she slowly descended, the suspension and tyres struggling to absorb the stony terrain. She saw a stream of dirt come up the track not too far behind.

  Must be the bitch and her pooch, she thought. They had not seen her veer off the track, and so they mistakenly continued riding up the beaten track in search of her. Skylar got back down to the road as quickly as she could, her limbs now aching badly, her throat and lips completely parched. As she hit the road, she turned northwards, speeding up to 100 mph within seconds, not looking back. She continued in stunned silence for what seemed like an eternity, not looking back until the Sun began to dip below the horizon and twilight began to creep in behind its red glow. Not until then did she have the courage to stop and get her breath back.

  “Stop for no-one,” she slurred, breathing in the cooler evening air, exhaling painfully as her lungs and muscles ached. “No-one; especially mad dogs and witches on bikes!”

  Worried Guardians

  “Where the hell is she? It’s past bastard midnight,” Cain said, looking down into the embers of the encampment’s dying fire.

  “Don’t worry, she’ll be back. She’s not smart enough to go it alone,” Carla replied assuredly.

  “Fucking go it alone. You said earlier that she was fucking lost,” Cain snapped. “If she’s gone it alone, she’s lost anyway, and if she’s lost, she’s gonna have to go it alone, ‘cause she’s too fucking stupid to know which way is up or down,” he continued, looking upset. “What if the bandits get her? I dread to think.”

  “Calm down, Cain,” Carla replied irritated. “So yes, she’s stupid, but not daft enough to take a ride with bandits. She knows the score. She knows how to look after herself.” Cain sat down and looked Carla in the eye.

  “Daft enough to get caught, though. She wouldn’t see them coming, her head is in the clouds,” he said, raising his finger to his head and rolling his eyes.

  “We haven’t seen bandits for months. We have either caught them, killed them, or chased them away. They know they cannot compete with us.”

  “There will always be bandits to fill the void that we have created, that team up, organise, and compete, always on the lookout for pretty little titbits. She has no chance by herself, lost or as a runaway. She’s drank too much of that snow. It’s made her dizzy.”

  Carla tried not to smile. She found Cain to be witty, especially when he was angry and frustrated. Nevertheless, she did not envy the poor soul who dared laugh at his jibes when he was in such a foul mood.

  “Don’t worry, I doubt she will get far. She’s on foot, and there’s nothing out there as far as the eye can see. She’ll be back when she’s hungry.”

  “Maybe she’s had an accident? Slipped on ice and knocked herself out. Lying there like a frozen doll in the snow.” Cain could not imagine Kyla’s face without its chaotic expressions, that messy smile dead.

  “Let’s take a walk down the hill and back, just in case. If we don’t find her, we will take the vehicles and look further afield when it’s light,” Carla suggested, not particularly worried. Cain could see it in her face.

  “You don’t give a toss do you?” Cain said as he got up and walked from the fire towards the escarpment.

  “Not really; she’s backwards, a runt, nobody’s child,” Carla replied without emotion as she rose to follow him. “Her mum abandoned her. We found her wandering the plains, remember?”

  “Fucking charming,” Cain replied, not that surprised at Carla’s outburst. Carla had always resented his favouritism of her.

  “We don’t know why she was wandering the plains, as she’s never said. There are many orphans in this World. There will be many more,” he protested.

  “So, we’re an orphanage now?” Carla said, taunting him with a raised eyebrow and a wry smile.

  “She may come across as stupid, and sometimes I call her that, and you call her that, and for her age perhaps we’re right, but it stems more from innocence, lack of experience. There’s something special about her,” Cain said with conviction.

  “I guess so,” Carla replied with a sarcastic smile. “That something being of course?” holding her hands up in despair.

  “You don’t fucking see it, do you? You’re blind. You only look at others to see yourself?”

  “I see a weakling, led by the strong, who thinks she should be like them, and tries so hard to make it so, yet falls short, by a long, long way.”

  “She has a gift.”

  “Her only gift is to be impressionable?”

  “There’s so much energy flowing about in that mind of hers. Don’t you see it in her face; the ticks, the wavering smile, her enthusiasm in those bright, wide eyes, the clumsiness as she tries to control it all?”

  “All I see is a nervous, confused child, who hasn’t got over the trauma of being abandoned by her mum and left to die on the plains.”

  Cain saw an opportunity to close the divide. “But that’s it, you do see it.”

  “I see nothing in her.”

  “But you do, you do, you just hit the nail on the head.”

  “Nail on the head?”

  “It’s the trauma driving the energy. It just needs to be harnessed in the right direction, in the right way, and she could be a great woman, Carla, just like you.”

  “Like me. You compare me to that..., mistake!” Carla replied, pretending to be annoyed, beginning to find the talk of Kyla tiring.

  “Look at us, our childhoods, was there not trouble? Look what drove us; the thirst to survive. We had to survive. It’s fear that keeps us going. The trauma of our childhoods makes us strong, as men, as women.

  “Perhaps there’s potential in Kyla, I admit,” Carla conceded, tired of arguing. She pondered for a moment, deciding that she couldn't back down about Kyla, “But she’s too feral, don’t you think?”

  “Feral?”

  “Left alone for too long in the wilderness. She prefers to be alone, do her own thing, and look what’s happened tonight. She’s fucked off by herself. She’s not a leader if that’s your plans for her. She doesn’t even talk to no-one. Does she have any friends? I don’t see her hanging out with the other kids.”

  “I don’t blame her; she must find the others mind numbingly boring. She’s checked out of those groups ‘cause she knows they’re not interesting or fulfilling enough. There is great intelligence in that little head of hers. It’s burning like a fire, and if we don’t help her control it, harness it, the fire will burn out of control to our detriment.”

  “So what do you suggest?” Carla asked, “School lessons?”

  “Course fucking not!” Cain replied, red in the face.

  “We direct and control that energy into something useful, ‘till she learns to control it herself.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know, maybe we should ask her.”

  “Maybe she wants to become a ballet dancer.”

  “Oh, fuck off!”

  “Come on then, let’s look for the little runt,” Carla suggested. “Let’s ask her what she wants to be when she grows up,” she continued with her sly smile.

  “Oh, shut the fuck up! Cain said with a hint of humour as they continued to the summit.

  When they arrived there, they looked out into the darkness.

  “Let’s see what you can show us my little beauty,” Cain said as he lit a flare. They both watched it scream high into the air, exploding into a luminous sphere, floodlighting the plains below. They both scanned the plains with their scopes, looking for signs of Kyla.

  “There’s fuck all out there, nothing but snow and water for miles,” Cain said with frustration.

  “Tis true,” Carla added. “Let’s wait for the
dawn and take the buggy for a proper look.”

  “What, with all that water. It’ll get all fucked up! She can’t be far. No way could she have waded through all that.”

  “Let’s scout the entire escarpment then, but in the morning, when there’s plenty of light,” Carla demanded. “That flare won’t last long, and we’d be wasting our time in the dark.”

  “For fucks sake,” Cain said, “no one, and I mean no one, goes out alone again!”

  They walked back to the encampment, Cain looking furious that Kyla, his favourite, had gone.

  “You think she was happy here, anyway?” Carla asked, goading him.

  “’Course she was happy here! She was one of us!” Cain replied, instantly throwing his fists around.

  “But we don’t see her?”

  “She’s out stretching her legs.”

  “Stretching her legs?” Carla replied, unable to contain her smile.

  “She needs to roam, explore. When she finds something, she’ll come back to tell us.

  “Really,” Carla replied, almost laughing. “What delusional talk is this?”

  “Mark my words, when she returns, she will tell us something special,” Cain said, looking dreamy eyed. “She knows something, and she’s out there looking.”

  “Really, come on. You liked her but…”

  “Liked! he grunted. “As I said, there’s great intelligence in that head. She needs to have the space to let it grow.”

  “Stop Cain! Stop it!” Carla sternly interrupted. “You’re beginning to scare me with this silly talk, this mumbo jumbo. She’s just a kid for Christ sake!”

  “Child or not, she’ll be back by her own accord, or by force if need be. I will scour the hills and plains until she is safely back in our hands.”

  Carla looked at Cain worried, knowing that finding Karla would most probably be a long and tortuous road. Cain would never give up until he found her. She conceded to herself that Kyla was probably brighter than most kids her age, but she would never admit that to him. Cain ignored her worried glances, instead looking up at the supernova, contemplating what can happen when one burns too bright.

  Time to Leave

  “Let’s do it!” Jeff said eagerly as he finished his soup.

  “Not sure,” Laren replied.

  “Sounds too dangerous,” Callee added, looking on sheepishly as she continued sipping the hot broth from the side of her spoon.

  “Come on girls, it would be an adventure, a chance to explore what’s really out there!” he continued with a stern face, pressing his fist down into the sand. “A chance to get away from this boring, friggin place!” Callee put down her bowl and tightened her blanket around her as the cold night air billowed through the flames of the campfire, suffocating its warmth.

  “What would we eat?” Callee asked as she began to yawn, raising her hand from her blanket to cover her mouth.

  “We would take some of our own, from here, carry it in bags, rucksacks, take plenty, and water. Then at the next town get more, and so on, and on,” he answered with fervour.

  “Is that what Kyla’s doing?” Laren asked.

  “Sure, of course, everyone's going to bolt from here. Kyla was the first; she's smart, and we don’t want to be the last, the dumbest. We need to go now before Cain tightens his grip,” Jeff continued, clenching his fist.

  “Carla thinks she's dead,” Callee said, searching Laren’s face for reassurance that she was not. Laren looked down towards the ground not knowing what to say.

  Jeff opened his mouth with disbelief, “Bullshit! Codswallop! Why would she be dead? She's too smart. She chose the right moment and bolted like a wild horse into the wilderness; running hard, never looking back, or coming back. She's gone for good, and good for her!”

  “That’s what Carla told me, also,” Laren said, poking the burning wood with a stick, breathing air into the embers, making them glow red hot with a sizzle. “She said that’s what happens to dumb animals that stray too far from their homes.”

  Jeff waved his hands in the air in defiance, “No, no, no! She’s just trying to scare you, trying to keep you here, stop you from running like Kyla, like she said, we're animals; we're their pets!”

  “You think she is alright, then?” Callee asked expectantly, her sad, brown eyes reflecting the red, shimmering embers.

  “Kyla, alright?” Jeff said. “Of course she’s alright. She’s the only one of us that is, out there in the wilderness, free to do as she pleases, when she pleases, to go where she likes, all on a whim! Imagine that girls, moulding a life of your own, where you like!”

  Laren looked towards Jeff with a sunken smile, “Maybe that’s ok for her. She was a bit of a wild card. Anyway, it’s so bleak out there. Why risk it when we have everything here?”

  Jeff couldn’t believe what he was hearing as he pulled his nails down his cheeks, “Wild is where the heart is, or so they say. She’s out there, seeing the world with her own eyes, not theirs, looking for something better, with courage and tenacity.” He stared at Laren and then at Callee with despair in his face, taking a deep breath. “And look at us, the three of us, sitting here like dumb sheep, waiting to be put to bed, and one day we will be put to bed, once and for all,” he said with a knowing glare, looking into the fire. “Come on!” he continued. “Do you want to be pawns of Cain and Carla, all your lives? They don’t care about us. All they care about is themselves, elevating themselves at our cost; eating the best food, the cleanest water, the very food and water that we go out to look for and collect. Not them, us for Christ’s sake!”

  Laren and Callee glanced at each other nervously, unsure what to say.

  Callee gulped, her eyes watering, “You make it sound so easy as if we could just up and leave right now,” she said, looking across at Laren, sighing before looking up to Jeff. “I’ll go on one condition.” Laren glanced across at her with anxious surprise, Jeff opening his arms and hands, raising his eyebrows in anticipation.

  “That we look for Kyla. It’s not good that she’s all alone, out there by herself.”

  “Done!” Jeff said, slapping her sternly on the shoulder.

  “And you?” he said, looking Laren straight in the eye.

  “For fucks sake, we must be mad,” she answered, Jeff quickly interrupting her,

  “I’ll take that as a yes,” hugging her.

  “Well, if you two go, and it's looking unlikely that Kyla’s coming back, I guess I have no choice,” she said grudgingly, shrugging her shoulders.

  “That’s my girl; you, Callee, Kyla and I can look after ourselves. We don’t need them; Carla, Cain, or anybody else for that matter!” he said with excitement. “This will be our tour de force. When all this shit has died down, people of a new age will look back and see us as heroes!”

  “Calm down,” Callee laughed, “or they will see each of us as another fool who perished trying to cross the desert.”

  “Don’t say that,” Laren said, “I’m shitting my panties as it is.”

  “What shall we take?” Jeff asked, looking around the camp.

  “Well, like you said, our food and water,” Callee replied.

  “Yes, we will need to take our food and water,” Laren repeated. “You're not filling me with much confidence with your lack of plans,” she continued, looking at Jeff.

  “No, I mean which vehicle, which one? Shall we take the van, buggy, bikes, car, or would you prefer to walk across those hot baking sands, filling your lungs with stale air!” he said.

  “They’ll crucify us when they catch up with us,” Laren said, shaking her head.

  “They’ll need to find us first,” Jeff replied, smiling.

  “And I’m sure they will,” Laren said. Callee nodded her head in agreement, folding her arms sternly across her chest. Jeff continued smiling at the girls until Callee could stand it no longer,

  “Well?” she asked. “You obviously have some tricks in mind.”

  Jeff broke his smile, replying, “I certainly d
o, do indeed,” rubbing his chin before continuing confidently and slowly, “We take the van, the large, black van.”

  “The van! Why?” Laren asked, looking perplexed.

  “The van and all the fuel,” he said. “All the fuel for us, and none for them, makes them slow and we so fast; does it not girls?” Laren and Callee glanced across at each other, not looking entirely convinced.

  “Maybe,” Callee said, “and just how did Kyla get away so fast without assistance from such a vehicle, tell me that. Is that not odd?”

  Laren nodded in agreement, “It certainly is odd, even Cain and Carla couldn’t find her scouting in the buggy.”

  “Ah, but odder still, they didn’t come back with their buggy,” Jeff said raising an eyebrow. “How weird is that? You leave in a buggy and come back in Bayliss’s van.”

  “Carla told everyone that the weather was so bad up north, that it got buried in the sand, and that they will dig it out another time.”

  “Really, that was weeks ago. Have you seen them go back out to retrieve it, send anyone back to collect it? Do you see it back? No, because it's never coming back. It's gone, like magic, the magician being Kyla.”