by Paul Kater
This is where the houses are. You are pointing at where the screen is damaged."
"Crappedy crap."
William, Rebel and Maurizio let the two worry about the map and followed the two cats around until Hilda was convinced that Kerna was right.
Walking around was difficult, with the large cracks in the shattered concrete. Further away they saw a stretch of what looked like grey-green sand, dry and uninviting.
"We're quite a bit off track," the witch informed them when the group had assembled again. "We're here" - random stab at the screen - "and we are going there" - another stab at the screen. "We say we have to go that way." Hilda pointed somewhere behind her. She looked at Kerna for a moment, who nodded. "Yes. We're going that way."
"Good, I appreciate that," said William, "but I do think we have to patch up our rig a bit. We went quite fast, and it was originally not designed for MACH 1."
"Mach what?" Hilda and Kerna asked.
Rebel and Maurizio laughed.
"No laughing at the witch!" Hilda yelled over the outburst of joy. "You go fix whatever mach you have to, and then get us out of here."
William and Rebel then faced a slight problem. The flight rig definitely needed patching up but there was nothing around to patch up with. The grey sand in the distance was not helpful, and the crumbling concrete was faster in crumbling than in being a concrete help.
Rebel stated that there was nothing she could do, as she lacked the proper material. William tried to convert some of the concrete into metal bands, but the material was obstinate and did not keep together, not even after being changed. It was interesting to see strips of metal fall apart like crumbling concrete, but not very conducive to getting away...
28. Sad country
William, Hilda and Kerna resorted to tearing strips of fabric from their clothes. These were easily changed into strong metal bands that were perfect for reinforcing the flying rig.
"Do you have any idea why the shuttles did not follow us over here?" Hilda asked Kerna as they watched the work in progress.
"This is the forbidden land," Kerna explained. "Some of the old legends say that there are dangers here, real dangers that will come for you when you don't watch, and they will kill you."
"Sounds like a bundle of fun," the witch grinned. "So why did you come here with us, when you know about these dangers?"
"They are only legends. Many people whisper that they are brought into existence to keep everyone near the houses."
"Smart girl," Hilda nodded, "I appreciate your thinking."
Kerna looked at the witch. "That does not mean I am not afraid..."
Grimalkin and Obsidian came back from their private adventure, all grey from the dust and the sand as William and Rebel tested the last few connections they had made. Hilda picked up Obsidian and patted the dust off him. After cleaning the cat, she handed him over to Kerna and took care of Grimalkin.
The cats were not happy, but they endured the treatment in silence. Being all dirty was not the way a magical's familiar should be, and the dust refused to go away by itself.
"We'll see to it that nothing happens to you, Kerna," she tried to reassure the young woman who held Obsi against her chest. Hilda held up Grimalkin. "Now don't you look nice and clean again?" she asked the cat.
"Meowww."
By that time, William had the rig afloat and they all took their seats. Slowly the rig moved upwards. William tested that everything was fine and stable, confirmed the direction that Hilda and Kerna had pointed out, and then, together with Rebel, he made the rig turn. "Here we go, folks."
The rig started moving, picking up speed smoothly. A phweeeeep sounded over the desolate area.
As the contraption moved away, from under the rubble slowly a dark grey head appeared. Two red eyes watched the floating rig go. After a while, when the rig had gone out of sight, the head sank back into the ground, without a sound...
-=-=-
For a long time, the companions flew over the same boring grey land. The concrete was more or less the same, be it also more or less crumbled. The grey sand sometimes came near and sometimes seemed to fade away, as if some unseen sandy tidal wave was playing its game.
"Do you have any idea how long we have to watch this?" Hilda asked Kerna. She was getting more than just bored out of her mind, and the lack of magic made it worse as there was no way that she could play with the concrete and the sand. Or even just help William fly the rig, even though she had to admit that he and Rebel were doing a good job on that.
"Until we see something else," Kerna had no other option.
"Oh. It'd better be soon."
William looked back at the witch and felt sorry for her. He knew how she needed to do something and be in control and all that, but he also missed the connection to her more and more. As that was all he missed, he could not even fathom what she was going through, having no magic to wield, "We're doing what we can, Hilda," he said. "Want to ride up front for a while? I am sure Maurizio will trade places with you."
"No. Just keep going and get us some place decent," the witch grumbled, using her cat as a distraction for her hands. Grimalkin suffered in silence.
"William. I sense something." It was Rebel whose head jerked up and peered around.
"What?"
"I don't know. It's strange."
This was of course very disconcerting. A woman as strange as Rebel calling something strange was never a good thing.
"Do you at least know where?" Hilda asked.
"Yup. Right in front of us."
Everyone did their utmost to discover something strange in front of the rig, but nothing felt like showing itself. The pilots even slowed down the rig, and William made it lift up higher, with the idea that perhaps from higher up they might be able to see something. This proved to be a smart idea, and one that was done on time as well.
Below them, suddenly a small mountain of sand and concrete rose up, and not just slowly like a mole would do. The bulge seemed to jump upwards, as if it wanted to catch the rig and its occupants. Claw-like paws stretched out from the sand-mountain and reached up to the flying thing that suddenly looked very vulnerable and breakable. One claw would be enough to cover about ten rigs. With occupants. And there were two of those monstrosities
The sand thing rose up to almost one hundred feet high. William and Rebel threw the rig in a sharp turn, as they were not high enough to avoid the monster.
"Crappedy crap!" Hilda was right."What is that?!"
"Looks like one of the dangers Kerna mentioned is real after all," Maurizio said. The captain was fumbling in his pockets as if he desperately needed something from one of them. "Madonna, where is it!"
"Right in front of your nose!" Hilda yelled, as she could not see what he was doing. "Oh, right behind us now!" she corrected herself after a fascinating yet nausea-evoking manoeuvre that William had to perform. The sand-beast had grown some more and was moving in pursuit.
Kerna sat in silence, her eyes large and radiating fear.
While William handled the flying, Rebel grabbed one of the small food packages from a pocket. "Can you turn this into water?" she asked the wizard, who nodded as he made the rig avoid yet another swoop of a claw.
"We have to get over this thing and then soak it," Rebel said, "sand and water make mud."
Now that did make a lot of sense, but Hilda was not certain that the sand on this insane planet would be aware of that as well. "I hope so!"
Maurizio in that time had found what he was looking for. In his hand was a very small object, as if he had stolen a miniature pistol from a baby. This thing looked menacing though, despite its size. "Hold still!" he exclaimed as he tried to get a proper aim at the sand-thing.
Hilda suddenly realised the spooky thing that entire battle was going on in relative silence. The sand did not make any sound, the only thing they heard were their own voices and the wind rushing by.
"Forget it!" Rebel said. She made the rig jolt as Maurizio fired. A long blue flame b
ounced from the small gun and as if guided by magic it found one of the long arms of the monster, taking it clean off. The arm fell apart in just sand and small rocks. The monster did not seem to mind or notice, it kept charging.
Somehow they managed to get the rig over the mountain of violent sand. Rebel tossed the package, William flashed his wand for a moment, and then a large amount of water went down. The effect was stunning to behold. At first the greyish lump of sand only turned darker. Then, as if it took the sand a while before it understood what it was supposed to do, its movement became slower, and blots of mud flew around. Some of them reached the people on the rig. Then, as the water reached the core of the sand-monster, the mountain suddenly collapsed. All it left was a large dark smear on the light grey ground.
"Suck an elf. That was... some sand."
"Too true. And I would prefer not to run into some of that anymore," the wizard said as he steered the rig away from the smear and down to the surface. "I need a break."
Once landed, they took some time to eat and get their bearings. According to Maurizio they were still on course, and Kerna was convinced of that as well. As there was nothing the others could bring up against that, they proceeded in that direction.
After a long flight William became tired. Rebel said she was getting sleepy as well, so the rig was parked and one of the inflatable packages was transformed into a large tent. By the time they were done making camp, darkness was crawling in.
"That's so odd," said Hilda, "I've never seen darkness crawl in that way.
