Author’s Notes: A Modern Hybrid fantasy project set in a world where the many races of fantasy coexist together with Humanity. Like the movie Bright but (hopefully) better.
“Doc?”
She didn’t answer.
“Doc?”
Her silence didn’t falter.
“DOC!”
Finally she sighed. She moved out of her squat, her pace languid, straightening her thin long legs and turned to the man who called her.
“What?” she deadpanned; less a question and more of an expression of annoyance, reminding him of his mother when she got annoyed. She raised her right eyebrow, auburn that contrasted with her dyed blonde hair. He found her very beautiful but he had spent far too much time with her for that attraction to be anything more than physical.
“The Captain said that a sandstorm’s coming from the south, just on the horizon. He’s popping up tents for shelter. He told me to get you”
“Can’t you see I’m busy” she didn’t waste a breath, searching for something in her toolkit he didn’t know the name of.
“You really wanna force his hand?”
She stopped for the briefest moment before returning back to her work.
“Don’t say I didn’t warn you”
‘Bitch’ was unspoken, though if she knew the presence of that word, she ignored it.
He wanted to tear at his hair. He didn’t know why it was her, of all people, he had to pick to shadow. He guessed it was him watching too many movies as a kid. Something about archeologists were so enticing, they seemed to attract adventure. The stories people wanted to hear and if he didn’t get a story out, a good one, he would be out of a job. His industry was a dying one and the only option for ex-journalists was to write a book. Brett could put pen to paper and end up with Hemingway but he just didn’t have much of an imagination.
So it was a bit ironic that the subject of his new story had a bigger imagination then he did; because she seemed to see excavation sites everywhere and of course he would have to drag himself to come along.
They stood at the bottom of a hole, the site of their excavation. The only thing they’ve found so far was rock and a lot of sand. Even the soldiers guarding them doing double duty wasn’t enough to speed up the process. It was maddening to stay there with nothing to do, sun burned and sweating like crazy in the forty degree heat. Supposedly they would find something of interest but she had been tightlipped on what exactly they were looking for. Whatever it was it was interesting enough for the Pentagon to be interested, dedicating to them an entire company of troops as escort.
They’d been at this for a month now, searching the Moroccan wastes for something she called a Talisman (or rather “the” talisman). He did it for his readers and she did it for her… curiosity? Brett couldn’t understand the woman’s motivation and the longest conversation he had with her lasted for about as long as it took to finish a burger and milkshake. He saved that conversation for a rainy day but in the desert rain was as likely as catching a unicorn.
He was about to walk back to camp before the sight of a figure in full battle dress standing over them at the edge of the site stopped him in his tracks. When he saw who it was, the air was sucked out of his lungs. It was the Orc. He’d seen him a couple of times at camp and every time his eyes would linger for a few seconds longer than what would be considered appropriate. As he came closer and closer to them, Brett caught a better look. His helmet shadowed over his eyes, yellow with pupils the color black. His horns were long, jutting out from his lower teeth. His clan marks weren’t like anything he had ever seen, they were blue, hardly distinguishable from his grey, scaly skin. He’d never seen blue on Orkish clan marks.
“Mr. Thompson, Ms. Ponder. The Captain requests your presence in the camp immediately, the storm is getting faster”
Evelyn froze, “How is it getting faster”
The Orc shrugged, “Wind I guess”
“There wasn’t any wind a few minutes ago, you’re telling me there’s suddenly a sandstorm coming our way”
Brett restrained the urge to facepalm, she didn’t even listened to him.
“I’m no meteorlogist-”
“Meteorologist”
He grunted, “Whatever. The point is that the Captain is ordering us to get into our tents and weather this thing out. You’ll be alone here, you might get lost.”
She stood up, this time much less lazily then she did when she addressed him. Brett was an experienced interviewer, he could read the tiniest cues and figure out what that person was thinking or feeling. Her icy demeanor was the same as ever but the tiniest hint of fear tinged her features.
“Get the Captain here now”
“Look lady, I take orders from my superiors, as far as I’m concerned, you’re just a jumped up VIP we have to protect”
“You don’t understand. You need to get him now or we are all going to die”
“What?”
“Now!”
The sun seemed to disappear barely a moment later. The sandstorm was no longer on the horizon, it was upon them. That hint of fear was no longer just a hint. Her body language, her face, screamed of fright. Now he was scared.
“Hide!”
Rafi Writes 