Gabi navigated down the dunes into an open stretch and floored it. The jeep roared forward, creating distance between us and the tide of sandworms. Quinn leaned close to the passenger door to look at the horde. Her eyes were wide with fear.

  She turned back like a whip. “Hurry!”

  “I told you! I. Know!” Gabi snarled, jaw clenched.

  She manoeuvred the vehicle with impressive control in the dead of night, taking us into uncharted territory confidently, but not fearlessly. The jeep bounced over hidden dips and sent sprays of sand pelting against the windshield. Her fingers whitened around the steering wheel. If she was blessed, she might have torn the thing off its mount.

  The radio crackled in my ears, and I swallowed the profanity I was about to throw at them. Calm down, Cal.

  “HQ, this is Beetle. Reading, go.”

  “Sitrep, over.”

  “Enhancer planted, we’ve got scourge in tow. Trying to shake them now.”

  “Copy. Signal’s transmitting clear. Good work, see you back at HQ, out.”

  I hung the headphones around my neck and upped the volume. They probably wouldn’t be checking in again before we got back, not unless something came up.

  “What now?!” Gabi shouted back at me.

  “Nothing, everything’s working as it should. Now you just have to shake the worms and we’ll be home free.”

  She clicked her tongue. “Don’t jinx it.”

  Despite their best efforts, the sandworms didn’t manage to catch back up to us. With Quinn guiding her through the dunes, Gabi was nigh unstoppable. She hit the last dune before reaching the streets a little too fast and made us all shout in surprise as we caught air before hitting the pavement.

  The suspension cried as we slammed back down onto the ground. But much like the rest of the car, it was sturdy beyond belief. Gabi was a wondrous mechanic, I could see why COBA recruited her despite her age.

  “How old are you, anyway?” I asked. I hadn’t outright asked yet. She spoke as she was much older than me, but she looked young. Probably even younger than me.

  She raised an eyebrow in the rearview mirror and smirked. “Wouldn’t you like to know, boy.”

  “She’s nineteen.” Quinn chipped in.

  No more than a year older than me.

  The reveal earned her a sharp glare from Gabi, but it only fuelled her laughter. “What? Why are you trying to act all mature when you almost pissed yourself seeing him get hurt a minute ago?”

  “Did not!” Gabi protested.

  The look on her face when I slammed into the backseat was still fresh in my mind. She’d been worried, that was for sure.

  I let the two bicker for a bit as we finally drove into an area with lights. The sun would rise in a minute, but until it did, the city lights helped guide us. People hadn’t stopped to care about their energy bills when they evacuated. Good for them. Doors and windows had been left ajar, bathing the streets in residual light from abandoned homes.

  Hopefully the energy grid would stay active until we made it out, but I doubted it. If the central areas of the country were hit as bad as we were, then most of the infrastructure would fail within a few days. The question was when.

  I removed my coat and armor to apply a bandage to the wound. It didn’t look too bad. I had a few small incisions where the worm’s needle-like teeth had penetrated my skin, but nothing that wouldn’t heal in a day or two.

  I applied alcohol to the wound and winced. It hurt worse than being bit. But it was for the best.

  There was no telling what diseases the worm carried, and I had no idea how much being unsung helped. I lacked a foundation of knowledge when it came down to it. My plan had been to remedy now that I was back. But just like all my plans, life had something else in mind.

  The car bounced on a hole in the road and I almost dropped the medical supplies. We passed a sign of some local restaurant. The owner wore gaudy robes and posed with an artificially whitened smile. My mind wandered to Yusuf. I wondered what he was doing now. He was a nice guy, but I knew he was probably hurting. It was his home being laid to waste by the rampaging scourge.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  I got dressed in the armor and coat again. After confirming with Quinn that there were no more threats in our immediate vicinity, I let myself relax. My eyelids were heavy and I wanted to sleep. But it wasn’t time for that, not yet. We still had a ways to go to HQ.

  To our combined relief, the rest of the journey passed smoothly. As the sun began to rise, it silhouetted the watchtowers in the distance.

  We were back. It hadn’t been more than a few hours, but so much had happened. And this was just the first enhancer of many.

  Gabi sighed in relief and leaned back against her seat for the first time since escaping the worms. “Holy shit,” she muttered.

  Quinn nodded in agreement and leaned her head against the door. “Can’t wait to catch some z’s.”

  “If they let us,” I added.

  Gabi scoffed. “Oh, they’ll let us.”

  A new pair of guards opened the gate and ushered us inside. They stared at the deep dents in the car’s side and whispered to each other. Both of them were armed civilians, not used to seeing the nitty gritty.

  Nyla and Steward stood near the central tent, ready to welcome us. Beside them, a new enhancer stood ready to be shipped away. Gabi parked alongside the other jeep and we all stepped out.

  Nyla waved. “Welcome back. How was it?”

  “Hectic,” Quinn said.

  Her voice was ragged, much more so than it had been in the car. She was acting. I hid my smirk with the collar of my coat, pretending to cough.

  Nyla wore an expression of sympathy and pulled the scout into a long hug. “I’m glad you’re okay. What happened to the scourge?”

  “They weren’t anything serious,” I said and stepped forward. My face a mask of stone. “I was bitten by one; it was whispered at most. But there was a ton of them.”

  “Do you need medical attention?”

  “Not more than I need a bed.” I smiled.

  She nodded. Steward looked a little disappointed that we wouldn’t set out immediately, but he knew we couldn’t work tirelessly. We were only human after all.

  “I’ve prepared separate sleeping quarters for you, so you’ll have someplace quiet for yourselves,” Nyla said and waved at us to follow.

  She led us to a tent separated from the others with a perimeter of sand bag walls. They went as high as the tent, probably to insulate it from sound. We stepped inside and found our meagre belongings inside. The beds were separated by thin fabrics, allowing us some sort of privacy.

  Without wasting a second, I claimed a bed as my own and fell face first into the soft pillow. I’d done nothing but rest the last few days. I suppose it had made me soft. I closed my eyes with a stupid smile on my face.

  “I think I’ll do the same,” I heard Gabi say.

  The bed next to mine creaked. Quinn and Nyla kept talking about something, but their voices grew into incoherent mumbles to me as I drifted off to sleep.

  * * *

  I woke in a sweat, heart racing and eyes darting around. The smell of soot clung to my nostrils. I felt my belt for my dagger.

  The image of my old jailor loomed in the corner of my vision. His engine burned as hot as the day I killed him.

  A nightmare, I concluded with a heaving chest.

  It had been a while since last time.

  “Uhm, you alright?” Gabi asked from an opening in the textile wall. “I heard you talking in your sleep.”

  The strap on her tank-top had slipped down her shoulder. Her bun was untied and dark strands of hair curled into her eyes.

  “I’m alright.” I muttered. “Just a dream.”

  She eyed the hand resting on my dagger. “Must have been one hell of a nightmare.”

  “What other kinds are there?” I asked and lay back down.

  She looked around quietly, then snuck inside.

  “Wha-”

  “Quiet!” she hissed and sat down on the edge of the bed, pulling her knees up to her chin. “Scoot over. I’ll fall off.”

  “What are you-”

  She rolled her eyes and shoved me to make room. “There, was that so hard?” Her hands were warm and I felt my fingers unclench from the dagger’s grip. My heartbeat calmed.

  The blanket crinkled as she lay down next to me. “I couldn’t sleep either,” she whispered. “I’ve never been so close to a monster before… How do you do it?”

  “What?”

  “How do you fight them? Isn’t it scary?”

  “I guess. But not fighting them is scarier.”

  She creased her brow in question.

  I shifted a little and scratched my neck. “If I don’t fight people die, and I get hurt. Getting hurt … it sucks. Losing people too.”

  “What about today?”

  “I’ve been through worse,” I said and subconsciously slid my hand to my chest, feeling where I’d been impaled and strung up. There was no scar, not even so much as a mark. The only lingering wound was the one in my mind. I hadn’t been so… difficult before then. Not that I’d even been easy.

  She blew a piece of dark hair from her face. “You know, I’ve been watching you for a long time… and I think this is what people dislike about you,” she said with all the tact of a hammer. I furrowed my brow, and she continued, “You don’t make it easy to approach you. Always brushing people off. If a scourge worm bit me I’d complain about it. It would be the human thing to do.”

  “What are you saying?”

  She fiddled with her hair, her face was close to mine. “That it’s fine to complain. For things to hurt. To worry and to be scared. People see you walking around all stoic, how you pretend not to care what they think of you.” She looked away from my eyes, up to the ceiling. “It’s like you make an effort to not get close.”

  “You’re talking as if you’ve known me for a long time.”

  She looked back at me with a self-satisfied smirk. “And you’re doing it again.”

  “I-“ I stopped myself. Maybe she was right. “I don’t know. I’ve never really thought about it.” But I had, more than I wanted to admit. I just never managed to make sense of it.

  Her smirk turned into a soft smile. She turned to face me. “It’s alright. Just don’t push me away. I could use… I could use a friend my age.”

  I turned to her. Her breath was warm against my face. It was uncomfortable, but her being close made me feel calm. I couldn’t remember the last time I lay so close to someone else. Much less someone I cared for. Maybe that surprised me most.

  My mind raced looking for the right thing to say, but the words never came. Instead I watched as she fell asleep by my side. Her breath was light, and her hair once more fell into her face. I reached forward to brush it away, then stopped myself when my fingers were hair’s breadth away. Instead, I closed my eyes and I followed suit. Sleep came quick in the warmth of company.

  And this time, I wasn’t interrupted by nightmares.

  TGIF, I hope you enjoy the weekend! I'll be spending it writing the upcoming fic! I'm having an absolute blast writing it. It's a nice change of pace from all the darkness in Blessed.

  See you Monday!