Chapter Text
"Dr. Dakarai?"
Stephen Dakarai brushes the wet cloth over his patient's restless brow once more, even as the worry in the young nurse's voice causes him to look up. "What is it, Nasha?"
Nasha's entire presence seems to thrum with anxiety, and her dark eyes are round with poorly concealed fear. "A sandstorm is coming. A bad one."
Stephen straightens. "How far?"
"Close. Mustafa said it will be here in minutes. Everyone is trying to get ready."
Sure enough, a buzz of activity has overtaken the outside world. Shouts can be heard briefly before the wind tears them away; feet pound the sand with urgent steps; several babies can be heard crying, no doubt sensing the alarm of their guardians. A harsh gust of wind whips at the side of the tent, lending further credence to her report.
"Go, I will be right there."
Nasha nods, mouth tightening with determination, and darts off to join the melee of activity.
Stephen turns back to his charge, resting the cloth over his head and allowing his hand to linger there for a moment. "All will be well, Carter. I'll be back soon. Rest well, my friend."
With that, he stands, ensures the stricken doctor's cup is full of water and within easy reach, and, reluctantly, leaves the tent that serves as sleeping quarters for the medical staff.
The malaria had taken Carter hard and fast. The man had tried to work through it, of course; Stephen had found him out of bed and treating patients, dragging his IV pole behind him like that boy with his blue blanket from the American cartoons, not three hours after Stephen himself had diagnosed him and told him in no uncertain terms to get some rest. And that had been after he nearly collapsed on Debbie during rounds.
It hadn't been long, however, before even Carter could no longer deny his symptoms and he faded obediently to his cot, the grasp he allowed Stephen to maintain on his arm without even a pretense at protest sending a trickle of worry through Stephen's practiced instincts.
He's been in and out of delirium for the better part of the day, now, and those same instincts now tell Stephen that leaving the American alone is a mistake. But the wind shrieks for his attention, whipping and tearing at the corners of the tent as if to snatch it from the earth, and the voices outside now border on hysteria as they rush to ferry people and equipment into the tents most likely to withstand the storm.
"Dr. Dakarai!" Nasha's voice joins the discord, a jagged edge of desperation to it now.
Stephen casts one last look at his friend and ducks out into the storm.
John comes awake coughing. The world is a swimming haze of painfully vivid hues and dizzy shapes, and his throat is a vacuum, so devoid of moisture that it threatens to collapse on itself. He swallows, and it's harder than it should be. It does nothing to relieve his suffering. He needs water. He pushes to sit up, and it seems his arms alone weigh a hundred pounds. He is full of sand. Too heavy. Dry as bones and crumbling to pieces.
Breathless, trembling, he makes it to this feet, leaden limbs slogging a few heartbeats behind his burning brain, and makes his way to the sink. Or tries. He can't find it. His fingers keep missing the objects on which he tries to steady himself, and he can't see for the wetness in his eyes. Why can't the wetness be in his throat? Water.
A spike of adrenaline surges through him, halting his search. Work. He's late for work. Benton is gonna kill him. He messed up a patient's chart last night, and now he's late, and Benton is going to kill him.
Water forgotten, he rushes out into the Chicago morning. The sky is still dark, and snow whistles at his face like thousands of tiny missiles, stinging his cheeks and his eyes, shrieking in his ears. The wind nearly bowls him over, but he can't afford to lose the time. His odds of getting a position in surgery are bad enough as it is.
Everyone in the city seems to be running late this morning, rushing past him in every direction, several even shouting at him. Or each other. Everything is so fuzzy, and he can't understand what they're saying. Someone bumps into him and this time he does lose his footing, tumbling to the ground in a dizzy spiral.
He lies there for a time, and his tired body seems to hum in relief at being made to lie down again. Gritting his teeth against vertigo and the nearly crippling ache that at some point has begun to gnaw at his joints like some starving beast, he clambers to his feet, crosses his arms against the icy wind, and slogs toward the El platform.
In the nearly three years he's lived in Darfur, Stephen has never seen a sandstorm this severe. Often they come on suddenly, but never has such an overwhelming storm swept over them so completely and with so little warning. Within minutes of leaving the tent, his vision had been nearly completely obscured, and each breath burned his throat, sinuses, and lungs. The scarf he wrapped around his mouth and nose helped with the sand, but it did little to ease the scorching wind that made each inhale misery. And there was nothing to be done about his vision.
Distantly, he was proud of the way the camp moved as one to prepare—moving equipment inside, making sure children were accounted for, securing the tents as much as possible. By the time he and the other staff stoop back into their tent, gasping and coughing, eyes streaming from the abuse, Stephen is satisfied in the knowledge that everyone is as safe and prepared as possible.
The storm hits in full force not thirty seconds later. The wind strikes with such fervor, for a moment Stephen truly thinks their tent will be ripped from the ground, but their efforts were not in vain; the meager shelter holds firm. Still, the flapping of the canvas walls is almost deafening as Stephen scrubs at his burning eyes and makes his way over to check on Carter.
"How are you doing, my friend?" he asks, voice rough with sand, as he nears the bed.
Alarm floods Stephen's veins like ice water when he catches sight of it.
The blankets are rumpled, the mosquito net haphazardly untucked and drooping uselessly. The cup of water Stephen filled for the American is on the ground, overturned, the moisture already soaked up by the parched earth. And the bed itself sits empty.
John Carter is gone.
John is cold. So cold, he feels like his entire body might shake to pieces. It's never taken this long to walk to the El platform before. Even in the snow. Maybe he's lost. Where is he going again? His head hurts. Benton is going to kill him. He's freezing.
Abruptly, John finds himself on the ground, sat in the snow. He looks around fruitlessly—the snow bombards his eyes with such fervor that he is forced to close them. He coughs. His body is freezing, but his throat is hot and dry.
He can't seem to help it when he tips over, face coming to rest in the snow. He's going to freeze to death out here. Where is the El?
Dr. Benton is going to kill him.
"Debbie!" Stephen shouts, running back to the main area, eyes darting to and fro for any clue as to Carter's whereabouts. "Debbie!"
"What? What is it?" She catches his arm, halts his motion. "What's wrong?"
"Where's Carter? Have you seen Carter?"
Her eyes widen. "What do you mean?"
"Has anyone seen Carter?" He bellows as Debbie rushes past him to see for herself. He's met with blank stares and gaping mouths. "Nasha?"
Nasha only shakes her head, terror plain on her young face. "Could he have gone to the latrines?"
Stephen shakes his head. Carter was in no condition to go anywhere by himself—although clearly, somehow, he had. But the American hadn't been in his right mind for nearly a day. Where a delirious John Carter might go in the middle of a crisis is a mystery Stephen has no idea how to unravel.
"We have to go back out, we have to look for him," Debbie says, returning to the common area and heading straight for her scarf.
"No. You stay here; I'll go."
"Stephen—"
"Debbie, please. Don't make me fear for your life, too."
She stares up at him, an internal argument clear in her pretty blue eyes. Finally, "Be careful."
He stoops to kiss her. "Hang thick. I'll be right back."
"It's hang tight. And you better."
Stephen winds a scarf around his face and reaches for a large blanket, twisting it up and tying it tightly about his waist before moving back toward the entrance.
"Stephen, wait!" Debbie runs up to him and thrusts a pair of motorcylce goggles into his hands. "Try these. Mustafa gave them to me." She helps him tug them over his scarf and stands on her tiptoes to kiss his nose. "Bring him home, yeah?"
And then he's out in the storm, squinting in the unsettling blackness, straining to see past the whirlwind of particles clogging the air, struggling to stay upright against the wind. His shouts for his friend are snatched away almost before they leave his lips. The storm has worsened incalculably since he returned to the tent, but the goggles are a mercy indescribable. Still, it's a disorienting slog forward, fighting the very earth at every step.
With no means of guidance and no notion of where Carter might have gone, Stephen falls back on prayer—a tool that has perhaps grown rusty with disuse, but which has never failed him before. Still, nearly blind, and with half the desert whipping and stinging at his exposed skin, he finds himself terrified and doubting. The camp is enormous. There's no way he can search the whole place by himself. He should have let Debbie help. He should have recruited the others. They should all be searching in an organized grid.
If Carter dies out here, it will be in no small part because of Stephen's foolishness.
He can barely make out the massive tents on either side, though they're no more than fifteen feet apart, as he forges his way against the wind. As the pinpricks of glinting dust pelt his goggles, he's reminded of the blizzards he's seen in movies, and wonders if they're as frightening as the storm he finds himself in, now. In a way, this is preferable, he decides. There's no danger of freezing to death; all he has to do is find Carter, take shelter, and wait it out.
Simple.
Simply impossible.
It can't last long, he tells himself. Surely, the tired earth can't maintain this level of fury for long. (It's a foolish and naive thought, and he knows it even as it blossoms into consciousness.)
In the end, it can only be God that guides his feet, because all at once he finds himself sprawled in the sand, his feet still tangled up with the obstacle that undid him.
John Carter, half buried and unconscious.
"Carter," he cries—or thinks he does; he can't hear anything past the roaring in his ears—dropping to his knees, back to the wind, and crouching next to his friend.
The pale face is nearly completely buried in sand, and Stephen hooks a hand beneath his burning neck and lifts his head, brushing away as much sand as he can. In this, the furious wind actually assists him. A strong pulse throbs against Stephen's fingers as he presses them to Carter's carotid, and he sags with relief. Clumsy against the wind, he gathers the slack and unwieldy frame against him for as much shelter as his own frame might provide as he considers what to do next.
He waits for a glimmer of even partial clarity between the worst of the gusts in an attempt to determine where his blind trek had taken him. It comes. The nearest tent is at least forty yards away. Somehow, he'd wandered all the way out of camp. He swallows against the grit in his throat and scans the nearer surroundings. A small outcropping of rock juts out of the sand only a few yards to his left, standing defiantly against the wind.
Stephen doesn't bother taking any time trying to wake Carter, merely lifting him into his arms and staggering against the stunning wind until he reaches the rock. Crashing to his knees, he gently settles Carter as close to the base of the rock as he can, then he reaches for the blanket at his waist. The wind nearly snatches it from his fingers as he unfurls it, but he slams a knee onto the corner just in time. It takes a great deal of maneuvering, but he manages to roll Carter so he weighs down one side of the blanket, get under it himself, and then tuck the loose edges beneath them until they're both cocooned inside and protected from the worst of the onslaught.
Gasping, Stephen tugs the scarf from around his throat, the goggles from his eyes, and drags in deep, clean breaths. With shaking hands, he tips Carter's sweaty, filthy face toward his own.
"Carter? John." He taps the pale cheek, distantly marveling at the heat of it even as the air around them seems to sear his own skin. The American stirs faintly at his touch, and Stephen shakes him. "John. Wake up, brother."
Dusty lashes flutter against sand-chapped cheeks, slowly parting to reveal fever-sheened eyes. They wander aimlessly for a long moment before settling somewhere over Stephen's left shoulder.
Stephen shifts to intercept his gaze. "John? Hey. Are you with me?"
At last the dark eyes meet his.
An expression Stephen can't name takes over his friend's face. Carter swallows. Parched lips part.
"Doctor Benton?"