Uncharted

[Caira Ayryn]

(Somewhere in the distant dunes...)

"What the Hell?" Their black hatted friend had waited to see the job through, yet nothing could actually be 'seen' that far down in the darkness. The tar looked as though it had began to submerge the many interlacing cave systems and the cowboy was about to turn his horse when he heard a rumbling. It shook the ground he stood and the horse he had mounted reared him off and ran for it's life in a distempered gallop as the tidal became closer. To the highest point of the crevasse. And a shimmering silver glint caught his eye against the black fluid. Life.

"We have our chance! Are you ready?" Caira called down to Merik whom had gotten comfortable with his slung position, feet on one side and arm and head on the other. Still he was sturdy enough and ready to escape this terror.

"I sure am." He coughed and managed as he inhaled the acrid fumes of death face first.

"Okay, on three. One.. Two.."

A bullet whizzed past her head, horrified but not quite petrified, she continued her countdown, "Three, now Merik!" She commanded with a little haste and he sent a wave of force downward, flinging them upward as she synchronized her jump from the board which gave an energized start upward and conducted the tangled mess in a heinous landing on the other side of the gap. 

Caira lay sprawled in the dust as the dirt had been burnt into her wounds, she had used her arms to brace her ribs against the impact but nothing could muffle the thrashing painful blow of their crash landing. The salt in the sand stung in her wounds as the granules filled them painfully.

Merik tumbled a bit more gracefully as he clung onto the hoverboard for support and dragged it underneath him parallel to his body. His arm scathed into the shredding ground and the board bounced from the juggling impact a distance into the desert before resting on the sandy ground. He never thought he would be so thankful to see the crispy heat rimmed sand, and, had he had the strength to move, he would have kissed the hot sand dunes once again beneath him.

Another bullet swiped Caira and nicked her forearm, she was still in a crumpled mess and during the crash, the prime had hit her head. Dizzily she began to kneel against the oncoming attack but had no way to protect herself. She still didn't see the attacker as the bullets swooped around the sides of her ears, her vision rocked into two versions of spinning gravity and her eyes struggled to stay straight.

"LEAVE." Caira warned, though it was evident she was in no state to battle with the gunslinger. With a minute's pause, another bullet skimmed into her braid. "Tch, that does it." Though Caira read the proximity of his aim much better and felt as her whole body were on fire, her tangled receptors told her he had hit her several times and the lead bullets now melted with her own blood.

Without another thought she took an unbalanced aim and quickly deployed a dagger, which sailed over the ten foot crevasse - which was now a river of death. The dagger hit near his feet and bounced into an explosion that startled him and swept the dust all around him. She was unable to tell if it had it, and collapsed while relinquishing her prideful kneel into a doubled-over brace as she attempted to catch her breath. It was much too shallow. Heaves of air slowed into her lungs as she saw the pools of mirrorlike blood coat the cup of her hand.

There was something about the poisonous fumes of the tar pits, that had surely affected her as wooziness melted into every groggy, dizzy, and disoriented sensation and she fell into the ground. She no longer felt the burn of the sand as it scalded hot against her scraped cheek, and her closing eyelids sealed off the sun.