Desert

Just a random little play I had after some thoughts... decided not to take it anywhere in the end but thought I'd put it on here in case I change my mind one day.

Thar Desert, India 1996

There was hope in her eyes as she lay back looking at the sky above. Nothing could touch her now. She was invincible. She stared at the clear blue endless skies and smiled, although weeping on the inside, she smiled at the eternal blue of the sky. She may be untouchable, but she would never be as impenetrable as that mysterious sapphire in the distance.

She knew that she had to leave this place of peace soon. She had changed on the inside. She had taken a chance, one step at a time and was no longer scared of what was to come.

She felt atonement, freedom, yet an intense sense of loss at the same time. To have liberty placed on her shoulders, freeing her from her life of dedication to a worthless evil was a burden. Her whole life had been taken from her; she no longer knew where to go. Tears ran down her cheeks, but she still kept optimistic through her blurring vision.

She remained in that special place in the centre of the dusty desert for a long time. She did not know where she was; she had never needed to know before. This had been her home as long as she had been alive. What else was there for her out there?

Sand swirled around her. There was no evidence that anything had ever taken place out here. There was no one else left. She did not know what had happened to the others. Everything was gone. The underground vaults of knowledge were buried deep beneath her and would probably never be found in the unchanging wilderness of the desert around her.

She would leave, she would be confident. No one needed to know anything about her. She could start a new life. Where, she did not know, but she would do it. Nothing could stop her. She couldn’t die. She was immortal, blessed with the power of ancients. She may die, but would only be reborn somewhere else.

The ancients were dead and gone. They no longer existed in this lifetime. For her, this meant only that she did not have to follow rituals and rules anymore. She could prosper without them using the powers bestowed upon her to keep the knowledge safe. Should it get out it would surely destroy the fabric that keeps most of humanity going.

She stood up. Night no longer seemed to fall; there was always a constant light in her mind. She did not know where to go, only that she had to. She could not die out here in the safety of the barren land. She started to walk hearing only soft whispers in the slight breeze calling out her name “ Bhuvana… Bhuvana … Bhuvana….”




Cambridge University Archaeology Department, England 2009

Neil sat at his desk and yawned before finally deciding that it was time to get some rest. He glanced at his watch and panicked, yet again it was the early hours of the morning and he had achieved nothing more than the previous day, or the day before that and so on as long as he could remember.

He had spent the last fourteen years of his life desperately searching for an answer to the questions in his mind that had appeared ever since he was on holiday in the Indian State of Rajasthan when he was sixteen years old. He had covered nearly all 200,000 kilometres of the Thar Desert and had found nothing to satisfy his curiosity.

Neil was obsessed and he knew it. His marriage had fallen apart because of his research and his students thought he was a crazy man, damaged by some trauma from a past excavation. Even his family rarely talked to him, some thought he was crazy, others felt responsible for his ramblings of ancient civilisations, immortal women and great evil. Neil’s mind began to drift back to the day his life had changed.

It had begun in 1994 when he was out trekking through the Aravalli Mountain Range in northwestern India with his father. He had left their tent one night. He couldn’t sleep and had decided to for a walk. He walked for a small way and sat in the moonlight looking at the stars so much brighter than those in England.

He went to return to the camp and ended up stumbling and losing his sense of direction. The moon no longer seemed so bright and he staggered forwards blindly into the night, suddenly cold, unaware that he was walking into one of the most desolate, inhospitable places on earth; The Thar Desert.

He walked for miles and miles, unaware of where he was going. He didn’t even know if he was walking forwards or in circles. All he knew was that he had to keep putting one foot in front of the other if he wanted to survive.

The sun began to rise on the horizon, lighting up the shimmering sea of gold that surrounded him. He glanced around but could no longer see the mountains. The ground beneath him began to heat up with the warm rays of sunshine reflecting on him. He was exhausted. He lay down and closed his eyes. They would find him, it was light, and they would notice him missing and would search for him. He knew that his father would not forsake him in this place of death where little can grow and even less can survive. He slipped into a fitful sleep full of dreams. Dreams about phoenixes rising from fire, other languages unknown to him and the face of a girl. A beautiful girl with dark hair like silk and eyes of green.

He awoke some hours later when the sun was at its highest, burning him, making him curl up and clutch himself as his skin felt like it was being seared off. He forced himself to stand up and trudge forward with the vague hope of finding some shelter somewhere.
Everywhere Neil looked the sand was liquidising in front of him giving him the deluded idea that there was a giant sea ahead of him. He kept running forward, his mouth dry, his head throbbing from the dehydration. By now his skin was red and raw right through, his eyes were bloodshot narrow slits from the brightness of the light all around him. Yet he persevered.

After what could have been hours, minutes or even just a few seconds, as blisters formed on Neil’s skin, he took a deep breath and looked around. The endless sandy plains swirling around him as he fell into darkness. He thought he saw a figure in the far distance but knew it was just a mirage. He acknowledged that this was the end for him. Finally beaten by the elements his eyes closed as his bruised body hit the floor.

This is the point where Neil can only remember certain things about what happened next. He remembered waking up in the night, layers of skin burnt away. He tried to stand but could not, his head banging from dehydration. He looked around him and saw nothing. He blinked and there she was. A woman. She had long dark brown hair with eyes of brilliant green. She touched his forehead and his burns went away. His skin healed itself and his head stopped aching.

She vanished a moment later and although he didn’t understand what had just happened in that moment he knew he had been given a second chance to fight his way out of the desert. She had brushed her hand against his head and he had seen and felt a thousand things.

He had these images, so real and yet so distant, as if aeons had past since they could ever possibly be real.

He had no time to think about them. He heard a great roaring sound and turned to see a helicopter flying over him, it was them. They had come to find him! He started jumping, waving and shouting, however unnecessary seeing as they could already see him and were landing a little way off.

He started to run over, momentarily forgetting about the mysterious healing woman. His father had got out and was shouting, “It’s a miracle, it’s a miracle, thank the lord! He’s alive, alive and unhurt, how?”