The Velvet Red Sand

I wanted to try something new, i always write fantasy type story's so i wanted to write something more realistic while still keeping that whimsy like atmosphere and expressive detail

Heat. Such an interesting phenomenon. When it’s not there we wish for it to show its lovely warmth, but when there’s too much, we push it away again. The desert has obviously always been hot and on that day, it was no different. Me and two other guys I was squadded with were tasked with patrolling a small sector of the desert in hopes of apprehending a rebel solider who was rumored to have taken out a who ally camp by himself.

            “Dude this is so pointless there’s no way in hell we find this guy with such little information about him or his whereabouts.” James (the guy standing to my left) said annoyedly rolling his eyes.  

About fifty feet behind us the other guy Rohan was running to catch up

            “Didn’t see much up there, I mean there were a few dead cacti but not large enough for someone to hide behind.”

            “I say we just head back to camp and pretend we left some gear back there or something cause I’m getting tired and it’s way too hot for any normal individual to be out here for this long.” James huffs out.

For some reason they both looked at me when he said it like I was the almighty final say or something.

“Well, we could if yall are willing to face serge, you know he’s been all tweaked out since the news of the psycho rebel surfaced.”

We all laughed for a bit and then with a simultaneous nod of agreement we started back to camp. It was about a two and a half hour walk back and honestly the first hour or so we had completely forgotten about our jobs, why we were even out in the desert and just talked, it felt good, but at the halfway mark we found ourselves in a possible peculiar situation. A soldier lay face down in the sand, one of our own.

“W- what happened” I shrieked in terror, “IS HE ALIVE, ROHAN CHECK HIS PULSE!”

Rohan knelt in front of the limp body, slowly rolled him over and checked for any signs of life.

“He’s alive, just unconscious. Some one hand me your canteen, he needs water.”

James tossed his to Rohan then said “What an idiot, how do you forget…”

The pause in James’ sentence went on for an unnaturally long.

“You alright James, why’d you stop?”

Rohan too looked up at James confused and shouted in horror, “RUN!”

I started sprinting with no hesitation and did not stop until I stood atop a small sand dune. As I looked back, I saw James’s body lying and the ground and Rohan slouched over leaking blood onto the coarse sand. Where, where was the enemy. There were dozens of dunes near and far so pinpointing the exact location was going to be impossible.

Cold. Something hit my eye, it was so cold, and I was now also dripping that familiar red substance. I couldn’t help but fall to the ground from the force of it. The sun was beautiful that day, it painted the sky vibrant shades of pink and orange like the ones that I read about in all those cringy romance novels. I just laid there for a while watching the clouds slowly flow past me.

As the adrenaline finally rushed through my body I sat up and saw not too far in the distance a man with a sandy colored cloak walking away. He was real, the rebel that took out the camp, he was there, right in front of me. Such skill he had, like an artist with a canvas every stroke he took would leave a beautiful red streak. My mind ponders on how he was able to catch us so off guard, he left no trail, not even a gunshot was heard, it’s like he was the sand and as the pain in my I grew I laid down once more in that velvet red sand and slept, peacefully.

Author's Note

i for sure wanted this to be a more non-formal read cause that's how i felt the characters would be, also i think the first half might be a bit weak and the second half rushed but i needed to fit a lot of content into a small format.