Excerpt: A Desert Creature

Walking through the portal was an experience that Anna was sure she’d never forget. It almost felt like walking into a wall of ice water. Cold smoothing over her, creating a pins and needles sensation in her arms and legs, even though they were covered.

Her eyes had closed of there own will, and she’d held her breath, as everything around her seemed to go silent.

Then very abruptly, the cold was gone, replaced by a dry, almost oppressive heat. The sounds of people filled her ears, sounding almost too loud after the utter silence she’d just emerged from.

Forcing herself to open her eyes, Anna found herself in what she’d imagine Morocco or Cairo looked like. It was clearly a desert city, with mud brick houses, and sand the same colour covered the ground.

She was in some sort of side alley, which faced an empty street. Anna was surprised by the cleanliness of the place, knowing that usually cities were dirty, especially in the alleyways, but then again, she was in a different world now, it might be very different from the one that just left.

Slowly Anna approached the entrance of the alleyway, unsure if she wanted to attract attention quite yet. Unsure if there was any attention to attract. She was sure that she’d heard people when her eyes had been closed. People yelling, she was sure. Though now, she couldn’t see anything or anyone.

Slowly she edged out of the ally and onto the main street. It actually wasn’t much larger then the ally, and the only thing that she could really see for a difference, was that this street didn’t have a wall at one end.

Once out on the street, what she’d seen from the ally was continuously confirmed. Though she was sure she’d heard people, there was no one around. Anna sighed and moved through the streets slowly, staying against the wall and the few shadows it provided. Had anyone else ever Crossed to an abandoned town before? How was she supposed to survive if there was no one around? Sure she could scavenge, but how long would that last her? Not a year, that was for sure.

Before she could get too involved in her worries, Anna saw movement out of the corner of her eye, down another street. Quickly, as quietly as she could, she fallowed.

Coming around the corner she was surprised by what she saw. There were two men, one wearing some sort of long dark cloak with a hood that almost completely concealed him. The other in… what she could only assume was some sort of uniform, as no one with any sort of sense would wear something like it in this heat. It was thick looking, and seemed to be made of several different pieces, all in black and red.

“Papers!” The uniformed man said, pointing a large gun at the other man, his voice only slightly muffled by the full helmet with face cover that he was wearing.

Anna breathed a very soft sigh of relief that she could understand these people. That had been one of her many fears, that they would speak a language that she didn’t know. However her mind pushed that away, and forced her to focus on what was unfolding in front of her.