The barren desert never sleeps. The wind stirs the sand; the heat erases sanity. Ruins of cities lie hidden beneath uncountable grains of sand, capable of cutting deep through your skin. The sun shines mercilessly, never going lower than the horizon; we never sleep.

Atyebis was in the rare shade of her cave. Her treasures all well hidden inside of it. Her pet, Orestes was flying around, trying to find unlucky mice scurrying about; but he has no luck.
She carelessly picks up the box her mother gave to her. The box is made of iron, something the government would take away if they saw it. She flung it around back and forth, from her right hand to her left. Orestes whistled, she looked up. What a rare occurrence to see a flock of birds. Orestes circled around them, and they scattered.
A day's walk and she could be gone, leave her memories behind, but she would always come back.

Orestes. Come, lets rest, we will leave when the sun is lowest

Orestes twitted, landed by her and puffed his chest proudly, and they both walked inside the cave.

after a nice sleep, Atyebis was awoken by twittering outside.
She watched as Orestes pecked at something hidden under the sand.
She heard a faint sing song. She crouched over by Orestes, and picked up a cell phone.
well how did this get here...?
she opened it, and there was a message waiting for her
travel north
to the nearest body of water
to get there, you must find the wakening of darkness
where you follow straight
with out sight
in secrecy

two minutes after she read the message she deleted it, and the phone ran out of battery.

maybe its dad...!

She sat a while, wondering what the message meant. She then saw Orestes pecking about, and she knew he knew the way.
Atyebis ran inside her cave, she desperately searched for her compass. Once she found it she grabbed her back pack. She put some dehydrated foods in there, a bit of bird feed, matches, and a few other things she would need.
She put on her heavy-duty boots, stolen from an official, hung her infra-red binoculars around her neck, and adjusted the backpack onto her back. Lastly, she fixed her almost-too-big canteen on her side. She walked to where the cell phone was, and with the hatchet she split it in half. she buried one of the halves half a mile away from her cave, and the other a fourth of a mile, in opposite directions.
She called to Orestes

Come on love, we're going to see who wants us in around the filth


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Atyebis traveled fast and efficiently. She rarely stopped, she barely slept. She traveled in the tunnel, Orestes leading the way. She could hear footsteps, smell people. So she hardly stopped. The tunnel was wider than it seemed, and somehow no one bumped into each other. This was indeed a shortcut. Due to the heat inside of the tunnel, her infra-red binoculars didn't work too well. After a few hours of walking a strange vehicle stopped by her side

Ma'am, you are Atyebis?

Yes, why?

I am directed to give you a ride. Hop in

This strange device...was an old time...car. The both sat in silence for what seemed days.

She found another phone.

Head Upwards.

It had been a long brutally hot day for Neiko. He had once again been digging for preEND history. He had decided to call it quits as night approached and made his way back to the camp site. He was alone as he began to make dinner. Not surprising seeing as how many people were being scared off by the government,and the fact that he had yet to make any real discoveries wasn't helping. As he began to cut up some meat he wondered did se7en fear people trying to learn about the past. What was there to be so afraid of. Neiko found these questions helped fuel his passion to discover the truth. After he ate he spent some time cleaning his tools a practice he had grown accustomed to. When he had finished he went back to his tent and fell asleep.

As he awoke to the morning light piercing through his tent he wished he could have slept longer. Soon enough he was up and ready to go. He began brushing his teeth after eating eating breakfast when he heard something in the distance. He stopped brushing so he could concentrate on the sound. After a few seconds had passed the sound became more distinct. It was like an animals roar except that never it took a breath. The sound was coming from the south. He looked in towards the south and made out what appeared to be a black car moving in the distance.

Neiko threw down his tooth brush and hurried to prepare himself. He had already gotten dressed earlier so he was in luck. He put on his boots and ran over to where he had put zero (a three prong/bladed boomerang he named zero cause of the whole in the center where you put your hand to throw) Neiko had seen a lot of archaeological sites destroyed by both the government and bandits looking for things to sale; even worse than those two there were people who didn't care at all about the site and just drove right through without care destroying precious artifacts. Of the three the third was the one that upset him the most. This time he was prepared to defend the site and its history. As the car approached closer he saw two women inside of the car. One was driving the other was looking at a cell phone. The fact that it was just the two made it obvious they belonged to the third group.

The driver showed no sign of stopping. Neiko pulled his arm back holding zero and threw it straight towards the car. Zero curved in the air whistling as it approached their vehicle. The blades slashed the tires, and curved back towards Neiko. He had unfortunately missed, he was only aiming to scare them and make them slow down. The car and driver lost control, and the vehicle flipped over and continued to roll. When it finally stopped Neiko rushed over. However, he stopped half way when he saw a very beautilful girl with long black hair ,climb out of the wreckage holding two grenades in her hands.

Atyebis looked at the cell phone. She was starting to get annoyed. The woman driving her would not stop chattering about how long it took her to master this contraption, and how people were amazed such a frail-looking woman could do it.

So is this vehicle stolen from the governement?

Heavens no! We would be reported immideatly. The government thinks we're using these cars for legal purposes, like shooing all new comers to the military camp. Its amazing we can work right under their noses! Hahahaha

Atyebis slighty nodded and looked back down at the cell phone. The woman yelped. Time flew by one second they were traveling, kicking up dust behind them, now they were on a tumble side-ways, to hit the blistering sand.
As soon as the car stopped skidding a bit Atyebis jumped out, clutching her two grenades. She tried erasing the fear from her face, but instead stood dumbfounded.


Atyebis was stunned. For half a second all she could do was clutch the grenades.
She heard slight whimpering and realized her driver was stuck under the car. She shoved the grenades in her large pant pockets, and crouched down. The sand was blistering hot, the heat almost penetrating the protection of her gloves.
The woman driving her was a bit bloodied, but she was alright.
She looked up to see the male who had caused this.
Her gray eyes searched for any threat.

Atyebis called for Orestes; and at once he came. He fluttered nervously.

Care to help me get this woman from under this...machine? she stated more than asked.

"Yeah sure, are u ok," he said as he watched the girl put her weapons away. He was surprised to see how she had reacted to the situation. Usually he would have expected some sort of fight, but instead she asked for his help to save the woman. The driver most have been someone important to her. He ran over towards the car. He saw the cut up tires and said,"I'm sorry I was only trying to warn you to change course's cause of the site up ahead. I didn't mean for this to happen." He was unsure of what expression to make after asking for her forgiveness. He then turned his attention to the woman who was lying under the car. "How do you think we should lift it." he asked her as he avoided making eye contact with the girl.

Yeah I'm fine, this woman here seems to be more freaked out than I am

Atyebis walked crouched down once again and spoke softly to the woman. She looked up at the male

I dont know, I have never encountered something such as this... And its fine, but youre going to find me a ride or something, I need to go to the north.

It was getting hotter by the minute, and the woman was trapped in a heat box. Her face turned red from all of the heat; she started to close her eyes, she was starting to pass out.

Well, we should hurry, she doesnt seem to be doing too well.

"Yeah, ok," Neiko replied to her as he looked down at the woman."I Think I can lift the car up if you can pull her out from under.Neiko bent down with his back to the car and dug his fingers into the sand underneath the broken windshield. He lifted up with his legs and managed to make some progress before he realized it was heavier than what he had guessed. He could hear the woman moan as the car moved. He soon realized he couldn't go any higher but this was not nearly enough space to move the woman out from underneath.He then burned up all of his remaining addrenaline as he put one last effort into raising the car. He had succeeded in lifting the car up higher but he didn't know how long he would be able to hold nor if he had left enough room. He grunted to the girl,"Hurry."

Atyebis shot under the car and quickly pulled the woman out. She was hot, pungent with the smell of burnt hair.

Do you have someplace cool i could put her at? She needs to be out of the heat.

Atyebis held the fainted woman in her arms, urgent to get moving. Orestes peeped in nervousness. Atyebis planned to leave the woman there. She had no interest in keeping that lady around. She just needed to get her stuff.

Orestes dig around for my compass

She rested her eyes on the male, waiting for him to lead the way.

Neiko let go of the car and fell forward on his knees once he saw that the woman was safely out from under. He was breathing heavily and his heart felt like it was in his throat. He looked over at the other two and realized things weren't OK yet. He stood back up in such a quick motion that his feet left the ground as soon as he vertical. He then moved over to the woman and picked her up in both arms with great care so as to not aggravate her injuries. He then nodded with his head to the girl signaling to follow him, and he headed off for the the campsite which was about 200 meters away. as the two walked towards the site he realized he hadn't told the girl his name yet. "I'm Neiko Joilet," pronouncing Joilet with a French accent making the oi into a w," I'm sorta of a vagabond archaeologist I guess. I'm excavating an some city ruins that were deserted after the end a hundred years ago. My camp site is just ahead I don't have much in the way of first aid, but I think I can still fix her up enough so she'll survive. Is this your mother, or your sister?"

Atyebis followed the male called Neiko, the soles of her feet starting to feel the heat. The air was too dry, and there was hardly any wind picking up.

Im Atyebis, my bird's name is Orestes. And that woman is nothing to me, she was just giving me a ride to the north. I need to leave as soon as possible

They walked along, Atyebis' fist were clenched white, she was losing too much time, but she didnt want to leave the woman to Neiko, that would be a little too rude. She decided she would stick around until the woman was better, and then she was leaving.

Have you found anything...interesiting? she asked Neiko

"Oh not really a few pieces of debris here and there, I've really only started to excavate recently. To be honest though I don't have nearly enough man power to cover this site by myself. Thanks to the governments threats archeology is almost a dead practice. However, I just can't stop until I know as much as I can about the past that the se7en wants to stay buried. I actually have a car you can use if you have to leave right now, but I also need to use it to get back to society so I can let you take it. However, I can drive you there or where ever it is you want to go. We can also leave this woman at a hospital along the way, but where is it that you have to go that you need to be in such a hurry."