The World Has Gone | Dessa
caressaharand
“We’re free.”
Even as they had landed here - in the middle of this wasteland, lost and without any certainty of what was to happen to either of them - they both felt it: the crushing weight of the Quasar’s hold was gone. The air was hot and dry, but for the first time since she left home, Ressa felt as though she could breathe.
“A'nikya'te,” Xia whispered, dropping to the ground, feeling the sand through her fingers. She was home. Ressa couldn’t help but envy her that, but they both knew that Reva was a far safer destination than Vaane. It was easy to hide out here in the nothingness. Even Xia, who knew her homeland as well as any, was lost. They had limited supplies: at this rate, they would only survive a few more days out here. If the desert did not kill them, the locals would.
It will still be better, Ressa thought, for us both to die here in the sand.
Death was a better fate than what awaited them both in Arvor. Xia was to be married to Leck and Ressa would be killed as soon as her child was born. And what hope could her child have for the future, if she could not help guide it? It would be better for him, too, to die now than to be raised a Quasar.
Neither had much hope that they’d be able to make it to the capitol where Xia could find them help, but they kept on. Xia had gotten her bearings enough to know they were, at least, headed in the right direction. But beyond that, she didn’t know. There could be a hundred miles ahead of them, or a thousand.
Either way, they would not make it on their own.
They risked a lot by approaching the a broken down ship. Ressa didn’t fear being robbed (they had little enough as it was for them to take) or killed (death was only days away, as it was), but she did fear being recognized. By now the entire empire would be looking for them and she knew that the Quasars would be offering a grand reward for their safe return.
Whatever happened, she would not let them be sent back.
The ship itself was small and battered. It did not belong to the Tomaks, but it was not a Quasar ship, either. They hoped that whoever they found would know Xia and want to help her or have been out here for so long, that they wouldn’t know who either of them were, at all.
They were greeted defensively, phaser pointed at them both. She’d expected that, what she hadn’t expected was the man they’d stumbled across.
She knew him.
It was hard not to, living in Arvor. His face was everywhere: a wanted man. The Quasars tried to keep it under wraps that they had once captured him, only to let him escape. But she knew him from before all of that. He was Vaanish.
But was he a friend or foe? She couldn’t say. He had been kind once, another lifetime ago. She was not the little girl she’d been then and she doubted very much that he was the same man then as he was now. She’d been a Quasar prisoner, living in the greatest comfort they knew how to give and she had suffered. He had been down in the depths of the prisons, left to to Leck’s mercy … what must that have done to him?
She put her hands up slowly in surrender, “Dex,” she spoke his name softly, hoping not to startle him, “Do you remember me?” She asked. “We need your help.”
Dex, she said. Dex, the word was a dream, distant and far away. He’d known someone by that name, once; he wondered if he still did. Dex had fought hard but it had all come to naught before he’d died in Leck’s prison, or perhaps even before. He’d not had the dignity of a name in those prisons, either. Dex had been a person, he’d had a life and hope and aspirations. This wanderer of the wastelands he’d become had only one aim: destroy House Quasar, and it was not an achievable goal. Only the sands spoke to him, now, only the wind whispered the names of the loved ones lost. Perhaps this was a dream, too. Perhaps, at last, he’d gone mad.
Still, he knew one thing. Dex Carrow would not point a gun at Ressa Harand.
“Mmm,” he said. Yes, yes, he remembered her.
He shifted, fingers easing and tensing in their grip. His finger strayed from the trigger, his elbow eased. Still, he held the gun, but in uncertainty. He dreamed of a past he’d once known: his mother’s smile. She dreamed, often, of the Vaanish sky when they were on Arvor; spoke constantly of the green world in its orbit, so far away. And he remembered her time of need; the middle princess kneeling by her side, offering a warm smile and aid. Dex blinked; his eyes felt weighty in a way that was not exhaustion. His arm quavered, then fell to his side.
He dropped his eyes...and saw her belly. He’d heard rumors, both that there was a child between the middle princess and Aram Quasar - and that a child had been lost...yet he saw, now, that the latter had been nothing more than rumor. Ressa Harand was clearly with child. Suspicion clouded his eye, his lips pulled back. He turned his eyes back to her face, glanced towards Xia again. His body was tense, like a coil, ready to spring into action.
We need your help. His eyes were heavy on her. Slowly, so that she could clearly see what he was doing, he eased his gun back into its holster and moved towards her. He was edgy, still, moved like it, but his mother’s grateful smile was in his eyes and they need his help. He moved closer, stood in front of the door to his vessel, looking at them. He moved his head like a shrug. What do you need? he meant to ask, but the words had forgotten the way from his brain to his lips. He dropped his glance towards the sand, thought of bending down to draw the letters there. He flicked his glance back towards them; did not trust the vulnerability of stooping.
He piled his breath in the back of his throat for a word. “How?” he asked, finally. The sound was more a grunt than a word, mangled and choked in his throat, practically inarticulate, barely managed. He wondered if she’d even understand him, or if he’d lost that power, entirely. He did not know the last time he’d spoken to another human being. His throat was sore and raw and he was thirsty, thirsty as he’d ever been. He gazed at her, waiting, hooded eyes searching.
