We Leapt Into the Sky

Chapter 15

Kendra woke in an unfamiliar room. She blinked and rubbed the dust from her eyes. Her outer protective gear, helmet, and comms were gone, leaving only the thinner armor she wore underneath. She pulled herself to her feet, stumbling as she reached for the wall. She remembered the pain of rocks pinning her down. The rest was hazy.

"Bria! Seph?" she called and then coughed on the sand in her throat.

Kendra ran her hands through her hair, searching for wounds. She found none. Her long-sleeved top and trousers were free of rips and tears. Beneath her armor, her abdomen was dusty but uninjured. That was amazing; she expected to be completely covered in bruises at least. Was she lucky? Had a well-placed rock shielded her from the brunt of the impact?

She surveyed the room. It was small and rectangular, clearly constructed rather than natural. Carvings in the walls emitted a soft blue light, and upon closer examination, they resembled circuitry. The walls were studded with the same blue marks they observed in the main chamber, though these glowed while the others had not.

Nearby lay a rectangular vat of an unidentifiable golden liquid, which flowed in through pipes in the wall. The liquid was reflective enough for her to see herself in it. Her hair hung down in a mess around her shoulders, but she failed the spot any obvious scrapes or bruises.

She backed away. The liquid looked viscous, and she had no desire to touch it.

Vents were carved into the walls high up, suggesting an entry point for the machines. The room lacked an obvious door, but the circuitry clustered around a point on the wall. She held her hand up to it, wondering if it contained some sort of point for the machines to interface.

The wall slid open, and she jumped.

After she exited the room, it slid closed again, blending in with the rock. She traced her fingers over the solid wall; the hidden door was invisible to her eyes as it had been to their scanners.

She was in the sprawling central chamber of the ruins. The floor was intact, masking any trace that the crystals were ever there. Light spilled in through the new holes in the ceiling, but the stone previously littering the ground was gone. The passage outside was clear as well, though her feet still sunk deep into the sand as she walked. The wind buffeted the plateau, kicking up grit that stung her face as she combed the sand.

By the time the sun was setting, she located the place where they'd set up their field station. There was little left, namely indentations in the rock where they had anchored their tent. She crouched, digging through the sand, searching for anything remaining from their tent, any message left behind.

She found nothing.

Frustrated, Kendra collapsed inside the cave, the coolness soothing after hours in the heat. Someone had removed the equipment they'd left in the desert. But she had no way to contact anyone. The moons were visible through the hole in the ceiling, if barely; they were waning, with only thin crescents left. Her eyes fixed on the larger of the moons. Something was odd.

Upon their return to the ruins, the sky had glowed red with the early morning, and the moons had been full. It didn't make sense for the moon phases to be this different. Kendra paced the ruins, trying to make sense of it.

She had been trapped under the rocks, which meant Bria would have sent the evac crew here. But in that case, she'd be on the medical ship now.

The cleanliness of the ruins suggested the machines had been there, though she hadn't seen them since waking. Who else could have pulled her out and left her in that room? Had she been put into stasis? She lacked the characteristic malaise that accompanied time in stasis.

Even beyond that, whatever happened when the ceiling came down, it had hurt. She ought to have been scraped up and bruised. Physically, she felt little of note, no hunger or thirst. But there was no food or water in the ruins and no sign anyone was coming back.

The research station was far, close to thirty-five miles. But she knew the way, and she recognized the rock formations that marked the route.

She set out from the ruins.

The ground was solid and easy to traverse near the cliffs, and her nervous energy propelled her forward. She needed to know why she's been left behind. Had her colleagues been unable to find her? It was standard practice to leave behind supplies if someone went missing. Food, water, some sort of beacon to send a message out.

The light from the waning moons was enough to illuminate the white sand, and it reminded her of snow. She had nearly reached the edge of the cliffs by the time the sun rose. Exhaustion was setting in, and she needed rest. Kendra slept through the heat of the day, nestled in a small cave in the cliffs. It went back only about ten feet, but it was cool and dry.

She departed in the early evening, when the temperature returned to a manageable level. As she left the cliffs, the wind picked up, sending sand biting at her face. It stuck to her lips and crunched between her teeth.

Though she followed the path through the rock formations where the sand was shallow, the desert still slowed her pace. She stumbled when the sand grew deeper. Kendra glanced back at the cliffs on the horizon. It was a view she remembered from every trip to the ruins, and it marked the halfway point to the research station.

Dunes emerged in front of her. Her boots sank deep into the sand with each step, and a strange numbness spread through her skin. She was used to the burning in her thighs from hiking up rocky stairs, but the sensation felt blunted. And she wasn't thirsty, despite being awake for nearly two days without eating or drinking.

Kendra sat down at the top of the dune. Her abdomen itched like her clothes were full of sand and dust. She lifted the bottom hem of her shirt and saw skin that cracked like parched earth. Deep gouges extended from her hip to her ribcage, the skin more like clay than flesh. As she brushed her hand across it, a piece of clay-like skin flaked off and fell to the ground.

Revulsion washed over her.

The skin farther from the gouges appeared normal, though that provided little relief. The cracked tissue moved as she twisted her waist back and forth; it was still somewhat malleable. It wasn't stone, but something was clearly wrong, and more tiny chips fell away as she moved.

From nowhere, a memory entered her mind. Bria was crying. Kendra couldn't see her; she only remembered pain and darkness. She clenched her fists in a vain effort to contain her panic. Her skin split, and blue light glowed from the cracks in her palms like the circuitry in the ruins.

The machines had done something to her. What, she didn't know.

The vision of Antony's arm falling to the ground was seared into her mind. There had been nothing they could do. If her whole body was affected ... she couldn't think about that.

The machines did this; maybe they had answers. The alternative was to head for the research station and hope she could contact someone or put herself into stasis. That was a lot to hope for if her body was falling apart.

She stood at the top of the dune, searching the horizon for the research station she knew was too far to see. Then she began the slow walk back to the ruins.