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Rey turned and drew a line in the sand. A literal line in the all too literal dull orange sand, her long walking stick scraping a deep, angry furrow.
“You stay on your side of this line,” she instructed her towering travelling companion and the stick jabbed the ground. It was a warning jab. Ben knew the next one could take his eye out.
“But the shade is on your side.”
“But the shade is on your side,” Rey mimicked in a whine. “Deal with it Princess, you can pick another rock. I don’t want you near me right now,” she added angrily and walked away leaving him with arms tightly folded.
There were no other people in the middle of the Diyari Jedi country; there was only sand, sand, clumps of sharp bladed grass, rare rocky outcrops, more sand and three camels kneeling while calmly chewing their cud. Long eyelashes blinked at the bickering pair. The camels had been listening to their odd new owner fight with the female for the past few days.
Ben looked at the sand line. He dropped his arms and scowled, dark eyes glared from under a fringe of black hair. He rubbed his nose with the back of his hand, but it only made the itching worse. The red grains of dry, desert sand stuck to his sweaty skin and clung to every crevice, wrinkle and hair on his body.
“I hate sand,” he told nobody. The camels continued to chew, they didn’t mind sand. “Fine,” Ben growled in a louder voice and went to unload the water tanks off the camels. At least his animals were on his side of the line. The pig headed, pain in his ass could sit alone.
He spread out his tarp before snapping open the heavy case he kept his drone in. Checking the transmitter was off Ben moved the intricate, gleaming black flying machine to a position in the center of the tarp and straightened the blades so they all matched. It was a good luck charm to make sure each blade sat pointing towards the front. He connected the battery and carefully went through the other steps to for calibration. Finally, once everything was adjusted to his precise liking, Ben set the drone to circle the area in a wide spiral and auto pilot back to its take off point. He had just enough time to fly around their campsite before it got too dark to see.
Just as he expected Rey’s head bobbed up from behind her rock pile at the sound of the drone’s engines whirring into life. Ben waved at her, but she didn’t return the gesture, instead he heard faint yelling from her direction. Putting a finger to his earlobe Ben watched her lips move. ‘Let her scream unheard into the desert,’ he thought as he turned, hands shielding the sun from his eyes to watch his pride and joy zoom up into the late afternoon sky. As it flew away her yelling became clearer. The head camel’s ears flattened and he grunted disturbed at all the noise.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah, I hear her too mate,” Ben mumbled and he settled his back against the stump of a long dead tree to watch the drone’s recording on his laptop screen.
A pair of red coated boots appeared in his periphery vision. He could already imagine Rey standing there beside him with her little hands on her hips, eyebrows drawn together in a cranky scowl.
“This isn’t the right area. You know you’re wasting your batteries. Disturbing the… the…”
“Rocks?” He offered dryly without looking up.
“You disturb me! I told you I don’t want the drone.”
Ben finally looked up from his screen and smiled a thin, fake smile. Oh yes, Rey was really angry now. “You are not the boss of me,” he told her. “In fact, without me, you wouldn’t have gotten this far. Also, you crossed the line.”
“Fuck the line!” She stormed.
He tutted calmly, looking completely unmoved by her argument and with a few taps on his keyboard adjusted the camera angle on the drone. Rey walked to a camel and started rummaging through a bag. She pulled out a small, rattling box and then went to a second camel and unrolled her rifle. Ben turned slightly away from her as she sat down next to him and started loading the gun, fitting the bullets with a series of sharp clicks.
“If you shoot my drone, I’ll never forgive you,” he told her seriously.
She snapped the casing shut, stood up and aimed the barrel of the rifle at a passing flock of loudly rasping corellas. Hat tipped back, Rey's dark eyes slightly squinted as she wedged the stock against a shoulder. A finger lay over the trigger.
“I know where I’m going and I don’t need you or a drone. The map…”
“The map, the map, the map some kid drew,” he mocked. “How about you widen your scope a little, huh? That’s your problem Rey, always doing things the hard way. If you’d just join my project and use some technology instead of your gut we’d get where we both need to go so much quicker.”
“I’ll never join your organisation,” she replied and tensed as the drone came into sight, just a speck in the distance. “The Diyari Jedi so called ‘Temple’ will not be made into tourist trap for caravanning old people with an opal mine stuffed underneath. YOUR companies will hollow out eons of formation and force, and for what? Profits to make rich men richer.”
Ben watched the rock piles and scrub fly by on his laptop screen and shooed the clinging flies away from his face. A large grain of sand was resting on his keyboard, sitting between the letters ‘V’ and the ‘B’, he brushed it off carefully with his middle finger and then continued to move his finger upwards to gesture a giant ‘Fuck you’ at Rey’s back. The laptop screen changed from endless desert to the drone momentarily filming a girl pointing a rifle into the sky and a man flipping her off while a trio of camels knelt nearby.
He lowered his finger and tried to make his voice as cool as possible. “Why don’t you sit down and we’ll have something to eat?”
If Ben knew anything about Rey he knew that food was the one thing that could calm her. In his opinion she was far too small for trekking long distance in a bone dry environment. He had the benefit of bulk and muscle to get him through the endless walking, and even he felt almost constantly starving, but when he had offered to buy her an additional camel to ride on she had gotten all high and mighty. She didn’t want his corporation money. Well, he’d find the Temple first, and he’d find it through using the drone, and then he could shove a hundred dollar bills into Rey’s mouth. She liked to make believe it was pure coincidence their goals were the same and that they had just ‘found’ each other on the same cow-track trail. As much as Rey hated the drone and, at times, seemed to hate him she always seemed to turn up. And truthfully he, like a dog, seemed to follow, even when he had the upper hand. Even when they are both walking one of the most remote regions on Earth. It was like they had tracking beacons buried in each other’s brains, no matter how secretive they were.
Rey carefully considered the offer of food and finally unloaded the rifle, dropping the bullets one-by-one back in its box. “Got any bread left Benny?” She asked in an off-hand voice.
“I have not. I have couscous and packaged tuna or instant rice and beans. You can take some, yeah,” he looked up from his screen. “But only if you sit down and play nice.”
“I always play nice, I’m a good person,” she quipped. “Unlike some.”
Another grain of sand landed on his keyboard as she dug about his packs. How he hated sand. And flies. And piles of rocks. And burrs that stuck in his socks as he walked. And sunburn. How did the burrs get there anyway? All poked up in between his toes. Fucking sunburn.
Rey had collected dry sticks as she had walked. She was such a scavenger, he guessed it came with the line of work she was in. Like a Girl Scout she was always prepared and yet, Ben felt, never ready for serious work.
Rey made a little fire out of the sticks and prickly brush, and rigged a billy with a mixture of rice and beans above it.
The drone hummed in the distance and the camels stood and wandered as far as their ropes would let them. They chewed at the scenery and burped happily to each other.
“Cup of tea?” Ben asked hopefully.
She ignored his request and stirred the billy with a spoon tied to a stick. Usually she’d say ‘one hump or two?’ It had been their joke the past couple of nights, but today’s fight had driven her to the end of her tether. Like the camels she felt she couldn’t stretch far enough away from her unwanted trekking mate.
“I think I’ve picked up something to the West a bit,” Ben said and cleared his throat. “It's a large rock shelf. I might head that way tomorrow.” Glancing sideways he was disappointed to see Rey didn’t make the slightest reaction to the suggestion of going their separate ways. “Drone will be back in seven minutes,” he added.
“Map says towards Oodnadatta,” she finally answered.
He shrugged. They had discussed the location of the Temple before, long winding discussions full of theory and rumor, as well as secrets and lies, and now there was nothing left to say. She had her job and he had his. It was how it always was.
Instead of fighting Ben watched Rey wave away the flies and stir their dinner and rub her freckle spattered nose. She was beautiful. A beautiful, talented woman who could do anything, almost anything, he corrected himself. God her legs were unbelievable, kneeling like that her butt crack showed just an inch above her shorts as she leaned forward over the fire. Ben smirked at the view.
A long, long time ago… Well, no use thinking of that. That was the last thing she ever thought of lately. ‘Better to keep everything professional,’ he reminded himself. The drone returned and Ben saved the filming to watch again in the morning, then he packed up his equipment carefully returning everything to its proper place. He sighed as he realized Rey had scrambled his pack in her search for food. Inconsiderate girl.
“I’ll be glad to leave,” he told her as he separated his dirty clothes from his pouches of tuna. “You know we don’t work well together. Remember the time we were both diving off Elba? Trying to find where that rich bitch had dumped her jewelry box into the Archipelago?”
“I remember I found it,” she answered.
“And, after I had tried to convince you it was it was a lost cause.”
“I still think of the reward I got when I feel at a crossroad in my travels.”
“You are a crossroad.”
“Well, you are the cross I have to bear!” Rey scraped the rice and beans into a pair of tin dishes and passed a plate to Ben with an arched eyebrow. Tempting him to retort.
The sun set in a brilliant show of orange and pink. A star appeared, Mars at the horizon. It joined the white moon, which always seemed to be somewhere in the southern sky night and day. It looked chirpy and young, just a tiny slither of a crescent. Ben pulled off his shoes and socks and stretched out on his side letting his feet feel the air.
“Remember the library,” Rey said quietly.
He could never, ever forget the library. There had been many, many libraries all over the world in his career, but he knew instantly which one she was talking about. It was strange, she had never wanted to talk about that particular adventure in the past.
“Yes,” he answered and rolled onto his back with the plate resting on his broad chest. A brown ant crawled excitedly along his arm.
“Those were my books,” she said.
“You know why I had to take them.”
“But, I was perfectly fine. Then you came and messed it all up.”
Ben lay still watching the moon and the star without answering her. She had always seen the books as a win for him, but it had been a loss. One he’d never been able to admit. “I was always going to let you have the bonus for finding them, but you wouldn’t listen,” he said.
“Sure you were Benny.”
“I’m not the monster you think I am,” Ben answered and sat up to finish his dinner before the flies did it for him. “You got the internship in the end anyway, because you’re a girl. A little Mary-Sue with your smiles and black belt in back stabbing. The professors all love our little action woman.”
“So, you’ve finally swallowed the red pill have you?”
Rey scraped the last of the rice out of her plate and licked the remains off her fingers. Didn’t she see her hands were covered in dust? Her wrists were practically brilliant orange with the reddish sand.
“You eat like a pig,” he pointed out.
“HA!” She laughed and wiped her hand on her shirt. “At least I don’t act like one. At least I don’t say, ‘ooo Rey my love what did Aunty say? What does she think the Temple looks like?’ and then follow me everywhere while at the same time disrespecting every single ancestor here.” She put a palm to the ground. “With your drones and cameras and sponsorship by Trivago and Zijin, how can you sleep at night?”
“Very well,” he clipped. “On the softest sleeping bag money can buy.” And to prove a point he went to his packs and pulled out his Dune swag, setting up its little legs and extending the sides to make a neat camp bed. Rey stoically kept her back to him, poking the brightly blazing fire and feeding it little sticks and twigs. She did not care if he slept on angel wings or a bed of nails.
For what felt like the hundredth time since they’d discovered they had both been offered contracts searching for the same mythical goal, he told her, “It’s just a job. If it wasn’t me being hired by the mines, if it isn’t you being guilted by those environmentalists, it would be someone. The world isn’t going to ignore the pictures that kid brought back of million dollar opals. At least if I find the Temple it won’t be hidden. I’ll make sure the world knows about it. Let the people decide.”
A sharp clang startled the camels as Rey threw down her plate, their heads swinging to look at the two bickering humans. “That Temple doesn’t belong to the world,” Rey snapped then her voice turned softer. “It doesn’t even really belong to the Diyari Jedi, because they are the land.”
A camel hummed in the distance and another joined it. The sound of large creatures moving through the brush filled the stiff silence. More stars, thousands of them, joined the first ones. Now they twinkled in the almost total darkness more than Ben could count. The night was different in the desert without the light pollution of the cities. It felt so alive, not just empty space above his head. Ben lay feeling uncomfortably guilty. Rey would soon see, even if she got to the rumored opal veined Temple first and if the elders could apply for land rights using her information, there would be some who the lure of big money would override their long lost traditions. The last of the Diyari speakers would get money for access to their land and jobs for the young ones. All the tree hugging, hippie-dippy, pro bono city lawyers in the universe couldn’t save the Jedi Temple.
“You should get some sleep,” he advised. “Want me to help you with your swag?”
“I’m fine. I left it behind that rock,” Rey admitted motioning to the outcrop she had been sulking behind earlier. “I think I’ll just lie on your tarp next to the fire.”
He sighed. “Don’t be like that, it will get cooler soon. Get set up already.”
His temporary exploration partner lay down in the sand and sniffed. She lit a long twig on fire and tapped at a rock with it, leaving black charcoal dots across its stone surface.
“I don’t feel sorry for you. You can get a torch and easily go get your roll. It’s right there.”
Rey changed the subject. “Benny, remember in the library, when you said we were doing the right thing?” Tap, tap, tap went the stick, then a pause as she waited for his answer.
Oh, she was back to that. Ben squirmed and propped his head on his hand. “We were going to do the right thing, but,” he shrugged. “We didn’t need to.” He lowered his voice. “I couldn’t let you carry those books, they were almost as big as you are. “Don’t lie in the dirt Rey, I’ll get your swag.”
“NO, I’ll get my swag.” She stood and after some scrabbling around the campsite clicked on a torch.
Ben watched the torch light bob and move and disappear into the night before returning. Rey added the rest of her sticks to the fire, not for heat, but to keep feral dogs away, then she spread her own smaller, scruffier sleep roll next to his own. She unhooked and slid off her bra and shorts so she was only in her underwear and tank top. Ben watched as she brushed her teeth, each circle of her toothbrush making her boobs jiggle until one strap of her top fell off her shoulder in a breathtaking display of warm tanned skin by firelight.
“Remember the driftwood fire in that tiny Nordic fishing hut,” he said hopefully. “How we held hands for the first time?”
“Mmm hmm, and you took off your shirt while it was raining outside for no reason at all other than to show off. Or did you take it off before we held hands?” She suddenly grinned in the darkness then knelt on her swag and rested her elbows on the side of his elevated bed. If her shirt slipped an inch more he would get the most delicious view. He extended a finger and pushed the other strap off her shoulder, but the stubborn fabric clung to her breasts like a shroud on an altar. Rey leaned closer. “If I knew, back then, you would be a pain in my ass forever I would have thrown you off own of those rocks into the ocean,” she whispered. “I hate fighting with you. Why don’t you just join me? We could change the world.”
“I hate fighting too,” he admitted. “Why on Earth did you take this job when you knew I had my offer? I had to accept mine just to make sure you didn’t die of exposure.”
“My hero,” she told him and placed a fingertip on his lips. “Before you tell me again how much I need your babysitting, remember when I rescued you from that extortion ring in Venezuela? I didn’t give them a single bolivar.”
Ben brushed her finger away. Rey was always going on about Venezuela. He had been negotiating with his captors himself, had them thinking he was nothing more than a poor American stoner. They were going to let him go anyway. He opened his mouth to tell her so, but his eyes rested on her cleavage again. There was one adventure they had both had where he knew he was the clear victor.
“Remember when we got married?” He moved his hand to her cheek. The familiar curves felt smooth and warm.
Rey leaned softly into his calloused palm. “It was the most beautiful, most amazing, most terrifying day of my life Benny. Move over.”
Ben teetered on the edge of his swag as she snuggled into his side. “Who won that treasure?” He demanded and kissed her neck as his arm gathered her close to press bodies, sweating and hot together.
“You did,” Rey sighed. “But, I’ll win the next one. I’ll find the Temple Benny.”
Her mouth tasted like mint toothpaste and he like sand and sweat. Ben's hands stroked her back as he moved to kiss her sun chapped lips.
“No chance,” he sighed and then flinched as she ran her sharp nails down his back in reply.
Above the resting adventurers the thousands of stars that make up the Milky Way slowly spun. Wej Mor, the emu, flew in darkness and the three camels enjoyed the enveloping silence.