There was a savage sun beating down and no shade except leeward of the crumbling tomb. It was so very, very… hot. But Henry needed to get away from the tomb. He didn’t think the thing would follow him into the sunlight, but he couldn’t be sure. Besides, the sun would not stay up for ever. When night fell the creature might emerge.
Which way to go?
Henry looked around in something close to panic. The desert was featureless – a rock here, a flat slab there, a sea of spreading, shimmering sand but no landmark other than the ruin. In a landscape like this, one direction was as good as any other.
All the same, he hesitated. He was beginning to pour sweat. It stung his eyes and soaked his underarms. He would need water soon and he had no water at all. How long could you survive in a desert without water? Days? Hours? He thought maybe days, if you were lucky, but he was fairly sure it wasn’t more than a week. So if he walked the wrong way, went deeper into the desert instead of out of it, he could be walking to his death.
Which way to go?
Henry shivered. His arm and leg were burning up now and the shivering made him wonder if he was starting a fever.
There was a sound from the tomb, a rodent rustling. The creature was moving about inside. He didn’t think it would venture out into the sunlight, but the noise unnerved him so much that he moved despite his pain, stumbling away from the ruin. With no landmarks, no pointers, nothing to guide him, one direction really was as good as any other.
He made a decision. He would walk until he was out of sight of the tomb. That way, if the creature did come out, it wouldn’t find him. When he was out of sight, he would sit down and examine his wounds and try to think. Take stock of his position. That sounded like the proper thing to do.
There was a great deal of rock close to the ruin and a section, half-exposed, of what looked like man-made pavement. But all of it gave way to featureless sand, flat at first, then drifting into dunes. It was hell to walk on. It sucked at his feet and drained the little energy he had left in his legs. He had to rest even before he lost sight of the tomb. He squatted on the sand, looking back nervously. The ruin shimmered through a heat haze, as if it were under water. After a while, he climbed painfully back to his feet and started off. He felt better when he lost sight of the tomb completely.
But now there were no landmarks at all.
Henry sat down again. The wound on his arm had stopped bleeding and closed over, but it was rimmed with a greenish thread and pulsed pain in time with his heartbeat. But the pain wasn’t too bad and so far, luckily, there didn’t seem to be much swelling.
The wound on his leg was another matter. His trousers were torn and soaked with matted blood so that the material stuck to the flesh. He gritted his teeth and tried to peel it away, but the skin seemed to be coming too and the pain was almost unbelievable. Eventually, in desperation, he unbuckled his belt and eased the trousers down to get sight of the wound.
He wished he hadn’t. The wound on his arm was a claw slash. The wound on his leg seemed like the result of a bite. Even in so short a time, it had swollen dramatically, stretching and discolouring the skin while the site of the bite itself oozed a foul-smelling, yellow pus. That one was going to need medical attention, and soon. He poked the skin cautiously and was rewarded by a wave of agony so extreme that he almost threw up.
Henry pulled his trousers up again and buckled the belt. There was nothing he could do about his injuries yet, so the only thing to do was ignore them and concentrate on…
On survival.
How did you stay alive in a desert?
Henry squeezed his eyes shut and tried to remember anything he’d read or seen on TV about survival. What would the S.A.S. do in a situation like this? Strangely, information started to trickle through from foggy corners of his memory. Find shelter from the sun… preserve your energy… travel only at night… drink your own urine if you can’t find water…
He opened his eyes again. The desert stretched endlessly in all directions, barren and bare. Not a tree, not a rock, no shelter of any sort. How did you find shelter when there was no shelter to be found? But the business about travelling by night was a good idea. It would be cooler at night. He could get further with less energy and he’d sweat less so he’d need less water.
But he’d still need some. Without water he would die in days.
He began to think about drinking his own pee. The idea sounded gross, but he could probably live with that. The problem was… the problem was…
The problem was how?
He couldn’t pee in a bottle and drink from that because he didn’t have a bottle. He couldn’t pee in a hollow on a rock, because there were no rocks any more. He couldn’t pee on the ground: the hot sand would soak up the precious fluid in a second. So how…?
Henry bent forward in the sitting position and considered angles. It was a fairly batty thought, but he might just be able to do it. Although only if he managed a strong jet – a trickle wouldn’t hack it. He straightened up and decided to shelve the problem for the moment. He wasn’t that thirsty yet.
So what did he do now? Rest until nightfall, then move off again? It had to be the sensible thing, but something kept telling him not to do it. Nightfall was still hours away. The sun was hotter than anything he’d ever experienced. If he sat here without shelter he’d be a baked husk by dark. And God knew how bad the wound in his leg might be by then. Maybe it was best to move on now, while he still had some energy left, trust to luck that he was going in the right direction, trust to luck that he’d find help before it was too late.
Trust to luck he wouldn’t die.
With a massive effort, he pushed himself to his feet.