Advanced Clockwork: Young Writers Prize 2014

Chapter 20

The desert seemed to be working against the Red Romani Caravan as they slowly fought their way through the sands and winds, the sandstorm slashing and slicing at the five to ten wagons that dug their wheels into the sand and stood against the raging elements around them. The world around them was only a unseeable wall of moving sand and the heat of the burning sun as it beat down on them with anger. The animals pulling the wagons were prepared for the impossible feat before them, the drivers only mostly as their covered faces and goggled eyes withstood only slightly against the desert's personal storm.

"Wow!" Ivin said in aw, looking out the window of the head wagon as the storm kicked and scratched at the windows. "Eve, can you believe this? It's like there really are gods!"

Eve chuckled lightly as she stood behind Ivin, her sight coming back slowly and less sharp than before. "You know, there could be fighting in the storm, Hermes and Athena maybe? Maybe even a few more but that could just be my imagination." Ivin looked at her in amazement, those black eyes shining with aw as they looked out the window.

"You're filling the kid's head with old facts, Eve." Trev said in a lazy fashion, rolling his shoulders as he tried not to look too amused by the little display before him in the comforts of the caravan wagon. "Teach him something useful, like tinkering. Maybe even a dance lesson or two, but not this old crap you keep spewing out. No one even knows what you are talking about most of the time."

"Oh, like the history of the human race should be lost because no one cares." Eve spat back, giving him a sideways glance as she smirked in his direction. "You know full well that I'm spewing better nonsense that the kind King Biou has forced down people's throats." He nodded, taking a drag from his medical blunt as he looked out the window.

His eyebrows furrowed when he saw a flash of green and bronze in the sandstorm, but it was only a quick little spurt of color that he thought he was seeing as an aftereffect of some of the drugs. That is, until Ivin shouted out in amazement and almost made Trev fall out of his seat. Not from the shout, but from something crashing into the wagon with so much force that it almost knocked the whole thing over.

"What the hell was that?!" Eve shouted, her eyes wide as she held onto Ivin protectively. The wagon was hit from the other side as the dust storm protected the identity of the attackers, making all three of the people inside almost fall over or have the furnishings fall on them. "Trev! Give me some goggles!"

"You can't be serious!" Trev shouted back, holding onto the wall as the wagon was bashed from the back end. "Hope this works!" He muttered as he threw her his goggles from off his head.

She caught them easily, snatching them out of thin air as she thrust Ivin in his direction. "Hold onto something!" She said as she went right to the window, throwing on the goggles and a sash she snatched off the floor and covered her nose and mouth. "Things might get bumpy!"

The window smashed open, making her instinctively cover her face with her arms as she stood her ground as sand and glass flew into her face. She slipped out the window as the attacker or attackers bashed against the other side and almost knocked the wagon on it's side, making Eve almost fall completely out and the sound of glass grinding against metal making an agonizing hiss that mixed with the ripping of fabric. She didn't waste any time though, gripping onto the side of the wagon as she slid the rest of the way out into the storm and flipped onto the roof with ease. She looked around, her eyes still not at their full sight but it was just enough for her to see the corroded copper and brass shining against the canvas of brown and gray.

Eve made her way to where Sparrow was fighting to control the Desert Oyinas as they started making distressed noises that she didn't know how to describe, the goggles and cloth making it almost impossible for the robot to see the frustration on the gypsy's face. The only tell was that she was swearing off the wall in anger.