Hey Vic, are you with me? Youre not going into shock are you? Youve lost some blood
Marco, she said. She focused on Grahams face for the first time. He was the nearest thing she had left to a father. I loved him. Hes dead. Marcos dead.
Well, lets worry about you, then. Youve got a sarfer in the marina?
She nodded.
Ill get you there. You just need to figure out where youre going once I do.
Brock, she said. She remembered Marcos words. Remembered his voice. His face. The northern wastes. West of the grove, south of a spring. Thats where Im going.
And Vic became aware of the sun on her cheek, the grit in her mouth, the wind in her hair. She came alive as one returns from sleep. Alive but different. An empty husk capable of thought, of hearing, of processing. Of wanting men dead.
34 That Final Embrace
His black dive suit was too hot to wear in the day, so he kept it draped over his head to cast a little shade. At night, the same thin suit couldnt keep him from shivering. Whenever he stripped it off, he wept at the sight of his emaciated frame, his ribs jutting out like rolling dunes, his pelvis that of a dead mans, his legs too frail to carry him one step further. Itd been a week or more since hed had a meal, but he would thirst to death before he starved. Wouldnt be long. Wouldnt be long.
And yetknowing thishe took another step. Didnt know why. Just did. His left foot dragged and left a furrow behind. The sun was coming up, the stars fading one by one until it was only Mars up there, ready to war with him another day. Have to peel his suit off soon. Last time. Palmer wouldnt make it through this day, could no longer feel the hunger. The gnawing had become distant. He would die on the hot sand. This dayhe was sure of it. Another two or three nights to Springston at that limping rate. The crows would get him. He could see them circling. They knew.
Caw, he whispered, the word choked back by his swollen tongue. Caw.
The sun topped the hill to his left and its naked rays struck his cheek like an open palm. A lucid memory of his father. Palmer remembered the only time his father had ever struck him. It was a joke. Just a joke. Second day with a dive suit on, wanted to show what Vic had taught him, was gonna do a full submerge, thought he was getting the hang of loosening the sand, making it flow. He opened a soft patch beneath his fathers boot and closed the sand around it, thought hed be proud for the trick, thought hed laugh.
Palmer remembered the bright flash of light and the crack like wood splitting. The fire on his face. A thousand sunburns. Hed been knocked to the sand, had lain there with the taste of blood in his mouth. His father standing over him, yelling at him, telling him to remember the code, the code hed learned just the day before, what happens to any diver who makes a weapon of the sand. What the other divers would do to him.
It was the only time hed ever hit him. And it was the last time Palmer had tried to make his father laugh. Hed been ten years old. Just about Robs age. Rob. Kid was too damn curious. Mom said he got it from their father. If it led to danger, whatever it was, it came from their father. What little good they had in them came from her. Her side of the story.
Only left with her side, her version of events. Thats what Dad gets. His doing. His fault for leaving. Poor Rob. Too curious, that boy. Causing trouble. With only Conner to look after him.
And Conner who just wants to be like his older brother, who wants to starve like his older brother and stagger along, a sack of skin draped on bones, shuffling across that hot sand before he was eaten by the crows. A diver. A dream of being buried without a marker. Lost in the sand. Chasing his misfortune. No camping. His brother wasnt a diver. He was camping. Four days under the sand. Three nights marching. A week. He would die the day his father had. The note by his belly was truth. Poetry and truth.
Caw, Palmer whispered to the circling crows. He reached down and shook the canteen as if it might have filled itself. Still the chance he might come upon a spring. An oasis. He marched for hours and hours, thinking on his brothers, on his life ending, amounting to nothing, watching for an oasis. The sun cooked the sand, and this day he didnt stop. Didnt pull his dive suit off. Didnt bury himself in the sand. Wouldnt make it to evening. Wouldnt make it another step. But then he did. He doubted every step and took another. The crows cried in disbelief. Palmer tried to laugh, but his throat was closed tight, was swollen shut, lips cracked and bleeding and bonded together. When there, on the horizon, in the wavering heat of the afternoon sun, a tree. A solitary tree. A sign of water. Another mirage to stumble through, to kick up dry sand right through the middle of, but maybe this would be the one.
He veered toward the tree. Hoping. Moving with what vigor his bones had left. The tree was getting closer. Faster than his stagger ought to make it. The tree was rounding a dune. The mast of a sarfer. The crimson sail of rebels. Brock and his men.