Page 90 of Beyond The Maples
"We don't have time to turn back. Our only option is to move quickly and hope we make it to the pods," he says, with marginally less malice in his voice.
"Yes, sir," I mumble, turning back and finding my place in front of Tarius.
Farra gives me a sympathetic smile as I pass, and I try to give her areassuring nod.
Within minutes, the dust starts to swirl and thicken, and my stomach clenches. I am in no condition to run, but we must have quite the stretch before we get to the pods, so I push my body. We all do.
I see the faint outline of the flag poles; the pods are there, and my legs start to work harder as the wind picks up. Before we left, Tane had all but shoved a mask in my face, seeing mine had beenstolen. I'd be suffocating right now without it. Even with the goggles and the mask on, it becomes more and more impossible to move, to see, to breathe.
"Stay close together! Stay in line!" Tane bellows, trying to fight the wind with his voice.
Leo falls, and Farra and Tane haul him forward. It feels like my body is being beaten by the wind and dust, weight hitting me from all angles. I turn, and Vera is helping a struggling Berkley, who was in front of me but is now somehow behind. I see the faint silhouette of a tall figure, and turn fully. How did Tarius get so far behind? Without hesitation, I track backwards toward him, faintly hearing my name being screamed.
Tarius is on his knees by the time I get to him, the wind seeming to ebb and flow around him, giving him a small reprieve where he's kneeling, defeated. I tug him off the ground as best I can, and push him forward. He wobbles, but we catch up to Farra and Berkley in rough, staggered steps.
Berkley snags Tarius by the scruff and I keel over for a second, trying to catch my breath. I look up ahead, the dust somehow getting even thicker. I know I'm not far from everyone, but somehow I can only see faint silhouettes.
I am being strangled by dust now. Strangled and punched and whipped. The throbbing in my head gets stronger, and I realize how disoriented I am. I push my feet forward with every last pitiful ounce of strength, praying to Ethra that I'm going the right way, and hoping he takes pity on me.
A hand latches onto my shirt, and I'm yanked in the opposite direction. Relief washes over me as I'm pulled again, and again, and then pushed downwards.
Tane, I realize, is shouting something at me. He's on his knees using his hands to dig out a buried hatch and, on instinct, I kneel beside him and do the same until our hands hit hard plastic.
With one impressive tug, he's got the hatch open and is pulling me inside after him.
I land with a thump, right on top of a hard wall of muscle. The door slams shut behind me, sealing us in.
Reality settles into me as I pull my mask down and my goggles off, coughing and reveling in my first few easy, dust-free breaths. I inch myself off of Tane, but the space is so tight and he's so unnaturally large, that I have to slide my body off his, a layer of dust falling beneath us.
He sucks in a breath through his teeth, and I hold back a snarl. My head hurts, my lungs hurt, and I have no patience for his moodiness.
But then I remember everyone else, and my body lurches. I move towards the handle and accidentally whack Tane in the process.
"Would you stop?" he grunts.
"What about everyone else?! We have to go back out to make sure they made it!" I'm reaching upwards again when Tane uses his arm like a seatbelt over me.
"You are not opening that door. I made sure everyone else got into a pod before I came back and hauled your stubborn ass in here."
I try to find his face to see if he's telling the truth, but it's pitch black in here.
"If I find out you're lying to me…" I'm interrupted by a sarcastic laugh.
"Don't finish that thought, for both our sakes. Oh, and usually when someone saves you, a simple thank you is the appropriate response," he mutters, removing the arm that was pinning me down.
I take a deep breath and decide to believe him. I'm still feeling too close to Tane. I inch my body as far as I can toward the curved pod wall, but there's just nowhere to go. He seems to sense what I'm doing; he moves too but again there's nowhere to go, his huge shoulders locking him in.
The relief I feel in here is short-lived. The silence in the pod feels a little deafening, and I start thinking of the sand and dust that's probably piling up ontop of the pods. Whose idea was this? We're going to be buried alive in here. My breaths become ragged, as I imagine more and more sand piling up on top of us.
"Treow..." Tane says sternly, and my attention snaps towards his voice even though I can't see anything. "Maple, hey, it’s ok."
He's never used my first name before, and why does his voice sound so different suddenly? I hate how much I like it.
"Maple," he says again, commanding, yet gentle, but I can't catch my breath. I realize idly that this is the exact wrong thing to do when we're inside a tiny coffin with limited air, which only adds to the panic I feel.
He inches closer to me, and now my attention is divided between my panic and his proximity. Which, if I'm being honest, has always been the case. Apparently, he's encouraged by whatever response or lack of response I give him, so he inches closer again, this time snaking his hand up my shoulder in the dark, until it sits gently at the base of my neck and good collarbone.
I should pull away, should bat his hand off. But I can't seem to do it. The roughness of his palm contrasts with the gentleness of his touch and it's... intoxicating. I'm painfully aware of every single spot our skin meets.
