Take part in collaborative works, share your short stories, poems, original artwork and more.
The desert, a short story
one month ago
This is actually my first story I've ever finished: It wasn't my best work, but it was all right.
I had to edit it a little, because I made a few mistakes that I had to correct.
Anyways, here it goes. Hope you like it.
The Desert
It first started a few days ago: I had been walking for a few hours because my car broke down.
I was either looking for a ride, or someone who could fix my car, it didn't matter which.
At any rate, I had been walking for a few hours when I started to notice that the land around me had a scorched look, as if the sun came too close once, and set fire to the land.
The land all around me was flat, almost like a field, but it looked more like a desert to me.
The sun was very hot as if it were still a little too close to this place.
It was so hot in fact that as soon as I began to sweat, it dried almost instantly.
There were no plants, trees, or any creatures anywhere around, and I had an unimpeded view all around me, and I could see for miles.
I had no idea how long I had been walking in this particular terrain, because I had been thinking about my broken down car.
Suddenly I realized there was no road beneath my feet, it was just burnt sand.
I looked around wildly, hoping to see a road, any road.
Silly me, I must've been so focused on thoughts of my car, I thought to myself, that I forgot to stay on the road.
I decided there and then that I was going to find the road and escape from this place as soon as possible, and not just because of the desert.
This place had a feel to it I didn't like: it felt malicious, and hungry, as if it was just waiting for me to drop dead so It could eat my corpse.
"It's my imagination" I told myself, but I didn't believe it.
Maybe it was because I was alone, and I had no friend to quell my frightful imaginings, or maybe it was the place itself, I don't know for sure.
All I knew for sure was that I wanted to get out of this place immediately.
Unfortunately I couldn't, so I decided to backtrack to the road if I could.
I did so, backtracking across the footsteps I had just made , but I never found the road that day, I never found much of anything: the land was just as empty and void of any life forms, as it was before.
I eventually decided to set up a camp, because it was getting late, and I was very tired.
I was more dehydrated than I new was good for me, but there was no water I could see, there was no water anywhere.
Somehow I felt that any water that was or have ever entered this place was sucked up immediately by the hungry dirt of the desert.
You're imagining things I told myself, but I didn't believe it.
Somehow this place gave off an air of malicious hunger and it was jealous of any hydration, water, and life form that entered its depths.
I thought I could even hear whispering That was almost inaudible but definitely was, at the time not understandable, but I felt that with enough time here I could understand every word.
I felt that if I did I would go completely mad.
Already this place was draining me of life If that was possible.
As far as my camp went, it wasn't much of one, just a wall of sand protecting me from much of the wind.
"i tried to sleep for a while but that whispering was slowly driving me mad.
Eventually the sun began to set, something I thought at the time would be a good thing but ended up being worse for my sense of dread increased the more the sun sank.
The whispers were slowly becoming louder but still not completely understandable except for a few words now and then.
"Sweet blood, can taste, hunger for water, water inside you, give me blood, so Sweet, so sweet the taste, hate the sun, burning in its arrogance, will bring it down one day, so sweet that day."
Barely little beyond that was heard but that was enough.
What little sleep I got was filled with nightmares of creeping crawling things in the sand eating my corpse while I was still in it.
Each time, I woke with the shivers, and I swore that the wall of sand around me was getting smaller around me, confining me to a smaller and smaller space.
Eventually, I found myself curled up in a ball just to avoid its touch.
Eventually the sun started to rise lowering the whispers a bit, but, to my terror, not as low as they were the day before.
It seems my fear of them eventually being heard during the day was also true.
I eventually trudged out of the camp I made, the sand I trod through feeling more like a viscous liquid, which, I felt, was or would've been more than that if I would have stepped out during the night.
I somehow had the sneaking suspicion that If I were to even touch the sand at night it would be taking little bites out of me and laping up my blood.
Luckily I was wearing pants at the time, unluckily, the same pants make me even hotter during the day.
I started walking with some urgency now: I needed to get out of this hell of a desert.
It took some time but I eventually realized to my horror that any sign of footprints I had seen yesterday were gone.
In fear, I looked around.
Nope, nothing except my prints going backward to the camp I had just vacated a couple hours ago.
"Shit!" I said out loud.
At that, the whispers suddenly became louder.
"So sweet, the bitter meat, the fear he has, the blood so sweet, must taste, the sun I hate, I will kill, both before the end of days."
I ran, I didn't know where, just out of there. I hoped to escape, but I knew deep down That there was no escaping this.
I stopped on about midday or so, it was hard to tell because the sun was always overhead, even when it rose, It didn't just rise in the east, but rose until it was overhead was took only a few minutes.
"Just another reason to escape this hunk of sand," I said to myself, but at this point, I was just going through the motions of surviving.
With no hope, I watch the sun set, just as quickly as it rose this morning and set last night.
I prepared myself for another night of shivering terrors.
I slept fitfully, waking to the sound of my own screams.
I could feel the whispers that were slowly becoming louder, burrowing into my brain like a constant prick from a thorn that slowly became more and more painful.
By that point I had thought I'd gone insane. I swore the sand was moving like waves, coming closerand closer to me.
But I knew I hadn't, not at that point.
After all, hadn't I seen the sand move way to close before?
The strange thing were the nights.
When I bothered to look up, which wasn't often because I was becoming exhausted and nearing death I was sure, but in the skies was nothing. No moon, no sun, no stars, just complete darkness. Even during the evenings and early night when you'd expect these things to be seen, they weren't.
It's like the only things that existed in this hellish place were the sand, the sun, and me, plus the voices which were slowly getting louder and louder.
They weren't hushed whispers but hushed voices, the sound of which I hope none of you hear in your lifetimes, because that would spell the end of you and your sanity.
The sun eventually rose on the third day, and I knew somehow that this would be my last day of life.
At the thought of this, the whispers became even louder: "must eat, eat the flesh, so sweet, the fear so sweet, taste the blood, hear him scream, love the sound, that sound so sweet."
I walked slowly, nearing the end of my tether from lack of sleep, fear, and the damned whispers.
Somehow I knew the whispers would become shouts very soon.
I walked slowly, my gait slow, wobbly, and staggering.
I was exhausted, dehydrated to an extreme degree, and hungry.
"Soon, very soon," the whispers taunted me "Soon I will get my fill, so sweet, the taste of blood and manflesh will be miiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnne," this last was said in a snake-like hiss.
I walked aimlessly for hours, knowing that there was no use in this gesture, knowing That I Will Die Soon.
Hope is only for those to naïve to see their demise coming, I thought bleakly.
Eventually the whispering became louder, then louder, and then even louder.
Soon it became unbearable and "i shouted at the voices to stop.
"Soon enough manflesh," one of the voices said with menace and relish.
After a few minutes, I was so tired I stopped walking and fell onto my knees.
The voices became louder.
"Shuuuuuuuuuuut uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuup," I shout, trying, more than anything to shut out the voices.
They just laughed and shouted louder.
Soon I thought I'd be deaf with all the noise they were making.
To my horror, I saw the sun setting waaaaay before it should have.
"It's too early," I said with a bleak hopelessness.
Soon I saw thesand surrounding me and becoming a wall. The walls began to grow not oly higher, but closer as well. I felt it hit my back and moved forward quickly. But it was too late, it had already taken a bite out of me.
`yuummmm," the voices screamed in unison, "Come closer man flesh, smell the meat, so sweet, feel the need, feel your fear, your fear to sweet, ours soon you'll be."
THE wall was now so close I couldn't avoid touching it and started feeling the sand bite me Hungrily.
"Nooooooo," I started to scream, but the sand shot up from the ground and entered my mouth.
More and more sand started to find exposed areas and started to bite.
The sand shot up to my nose and entered my body biting hungrily. My fear was so strong at thpoint that the voices became even louder.
"Feel your fear, the taste of it so sweet, we will eat, all your meat, till nothing is left, kill you dead, find no pieces anyone will, kill kill killlllllllllllll!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
This last by shouted so loud that it sounded like a thunderclap inside my head.
The pain was getting much worse as the sand was finding my internal organs.
"Find the heart, so sweet to taste, kill him dead, him we will take."
Soon I felt the pain become unbearable and the shouting unbelievably became louder.
"So sweet, the end will come, kill you all, even the sun."
"So sweet the taste of your defeat, soon will die, and us you'll meet."
I soon felt them eating my heart, but instead of dying, I was awake for every minute of it.
My body was becoming less andless me, becoming more and more sand, I could feel it.
The voices, or the sand, I wasn't all that certain that they were different, were trying to eat me before I died, and so were keeping me alive until then, it seemed to me.
"aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh," I screamed. more sand entered and I soon died, but the worst was not over.
I soon found myself hovering over my body as it was almost eaten by sand, even the blood itself.
To my horror I could feel the hunger for human flesh begin in me.
Soon after, I could also hear myself whisper with the others things like, "so sweet the taste, must kill, not waste, the blood so strong with fear, and fog, the sweetest taste of fear I slake, kill the sun, the sun we hate."
The end.