Coarse sand. Harsh heat. No escape. Unrelenting.

Just five minutes had passed since he'd been shoved into the mass of dust from the helicopter high above. It could've been an eternity. He’d watched the small grey craft disappear on the horizon, the steel carapace dazzling, its loud buzz fading to a low drone. The low drone fading to nothing. He couldn’t see it anymore. Couldn’t even see the city, couldn’t see the icicle spires jutting high out of this burning wasteland of sand. It was gone. Melted into this desolate vastness. Just sand. Nothing but sand.

Sand.

Sand.

Under him. Over him. A gilded ocean frozen in time. A shining sea of glistering gold that stretched forever, each wave crested with the glare of ancient spindrift. He made his way half-crawling up a dune, sand cascading away beneath him as he staggered. Each step an effort, each effort harder than the last, the desert clinging to his boots and to his soul. Finally he collapsed limp on the top, and surveyed his surroundings.

Sand.

Sand, everywhere.

Everywhere, sand.

He didn’t even know where the city was any longer. Direction had been one of the first things to be consumed by this place. Devoured by the dusty dunes that had been sculpted by burning winds, each with their own fingerprint ripple of air-etched waves. Eons of eroded rock, compacted and compounded into powder. Heat shimmered around him. Delirium shimmered around him and the sand.

The sand.

Black. Of all colours, his clothes were black. It sucked the heat in, trapping him in a vortex of warmth. The dense fabric stuck tight to his body. Fabric full of sand. The invasive sand. The inescapable sand. The coarse grains prickling his skin, each a world of misery and pain and heat.

Heat.

Heat strangling his parched throat from the inside. Dry air beating at his flesh. The solar gaze boiling away his body's moisture. Heat and the sand. The sand. So many splinters and shards of an ancient mirror decaying into dust, reflecting the blinding heat until the world was an inferno.

The heat.

The sand.

His head lolled forward, and his body tumbled down the dune. He let it. Let it slide. Let it roll. Let the sand pour over it. Let the sand wash over him. Let the waves of sand flood his soul, let his body lie half-buried by this gilded tomb.

Waves of sand.

Sand.

Sand.

His eyes flashed open, and he stared straight upwards. The sky a brilliant blue — like home. Just like home. Home. He would never return. He would die here. The shimmering air. The endless dunes. The weary, relentless sun. And what of him? Carrion. A rare feast for the creatures and scavengers that haunted this place — if there could be life here. Otherwise, a cadaverous husk lost in the desolation. Just wasting away. Flesh rotting in the heat. A pile of rags and bones decaying to dust and sand. Sand. Then a wind — and gone. Sacrifice. Consumed by the hungry land. Swallowed by the desert.

Gone.

No. NO! He must return, had to return, couldn’t just die here, couldn’t die here! He had to get back. Had to get home. He heaved himself up. Sand erupted around him. Had to get home. Stumbled up the wall of sand, the wave of sand, the dune of sand, footsteps deep, pushing, forcing. Had to get home. Home. 

Couldn't get home. Footsteps heavy, dragging, stumbling, falling. Falling.

Falling.

The sand burnt against his face. A million fires, burning. A million coarse grains of glass biting his skin, heat biting his skin as he lay there. Lay there in the sand.

Sand.

Home.

Had to get home. Couldn’t get home. Lying here. Left to die here. 

Left to die.

He heard the drone of a thousand flies spinning the sand into a frenzy, and felt death’s cold shadow envelope him.