>>6109599Friends, friends, just find your friends, easy, simple, they're marching in column, so watch for the dust cloud and . . .
You get turned around - somehow you get turned around - and the sun beats down and the lengths grow longer and you backtrack your own steps and find that they lead you in a circle and the Wastes have you in their grasp and you do not have Compass to guide you out and you try to nav by the sun but doesn't help this time and then, oh no, you are off the beaten path, you traverse a dune and step past a rock and quite without meaning to you step into somewhere Else.
The ground beneath your feet shifts. Crunching. Tiny crystals broken by your boot. Sharp, if you're not careful. The sand here drinks blood on slips and tumbles. Bad place to be.
You glance over your shoulder -- no -- it's behind you too. This is how it always happens. Okay, no panic, there's training for this. Orient yourself, breathe out, breathe in, mask on (you did bring a mask, right?) and then simply retrace your steps and be <span class="mu-i">very certain</span> about doing so.
Jagged pillars of warped crystalised stuff cast twin shadows from distant stars across the ground.
The light shimmers different.
A backpack lies in a small undisturbed space, cast off by -- ufh. Poor fellow. Must have been out here during a storm.
You can hear the sharp barks of distant hounds, low, in the back of your mind. A soft laugh. The rattling of a gamblers dice cup.
Mask on.
Don't panic.
Step carefully.
Retrace steps with intent.
And then .... six times out of ten you make it out okay.
Unless of course you do something <span class="mu-i">else</span> ?
