Paradox Moon: The First Book of Regenesis by D. Scott Dickinson

Author:D. Scott Dickinson [Dickinson, D. Scott]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-07-01T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17. Burning Sands

Full darkness catches the band as it reaches the opposite side of the lake. There, they discover a narrow defile through the dense reeds, and the leader motions them through it to the stretch of prairie on the other side. Exhausted from their day-long trek, they curl up on the bare, open ground and fall quickly asleep.

The morning sun finds the band rested and ready to resume their journey. Surveying the landscape ahead, the man sees endless desert as they leave the maze of lakes and rivers behind. His optimism is revived, however, by the prospect of bright green oases dotting the far horizon.

It is a doleful journey this day as the furry bipeds suffer greatly from the unremitting intensity of the blazing sun. Demonstrating a behavior the man has not yet witnessed in these redoubtable travelers, the band makes frequent stops, huddling together for insulation against the harsh heat and casting dubious glances at the giant vivid exoplanet pursuing the blood-red sun overhead. For the man, too, it is like walking through a furnace.

He wonders whether they can survive the scorching sands separating them from the distant oases.

The band is gathered in a huddle as their lengthening shadows are chased by a deeper darkness spilling over the dunes and pooling in every sandy depression. Relief washes over the man in the dying rays of the setting sun.

As the band breaks its huddle, the man approaches the leader and points in the direction of the nearest, now invisible oasis. Mustering their remaining energy, they strike out at once into the inky blackness.

It is midnight when the company enters the frond-fringed oasis, and they soon find sleep and solace in its cool embrace. Only the man remains troubled, dreading the sun’s return when they must resume their enervating march through the merciless heat of the trackless desert.

He does not suspect the next step he takes on the scorching sands will bring him within sight of the desert’s end.

Suspended between sleep and wakefulness, he is lulled by the muted, melodic murmur of gushing, gurgling water cascading across his fading consciousness.

Even the sun, already high in the sky when they awaken, cannot chase away the cooling shade of the broad green fronds shielding them from its fiery rays. While the leader shakes his band from their deep sleep, the man is greeted by the sight and sound of a low, gentle waterfall at the opposite side of the small oasis.

Approaching it hopefully, he nearly stumbles into the waist-high depth of a stout stream that flows from the base of the fall only a few feet into a sucking well that carries it back into the damp earth. But in those few precious feet, its crystal-clear depth reveals a variety of fish including a smaller cousin of the finned beasts so favored by his fellow-travelers.

The leader and his huntsmen skewer several of the beasts for their band, including two other fish which they present scaled and filleted to the man. It

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