Devils

Devils

"Look! A dust devil!"

"And your point is?" his companion replied scathingly. "It's not as is
they're rare. Get back to work."

"You hear what they said, the other day? 'Bout the storms?"

"One devil isn't a storm. We only just got here." He continued to
unpack the instruments.

"There's another over there. And there isn't any shelter for miles.
There isn't any anything for miles."

"We'll be quick," he promised. "The sooner you help me get this lot set
up and sorted, the sooner we can go. 'Sides, there's always the rover,
in a pinch. We can sit tight in there, if needs be." He was trying to
reassure the kid.

"You know what they say! The rover's no use, not in a storm."

"Look, hold this. Air pressure?"

"Low."

"Humidity?"

"Low."

"Wind factor?"

"4 and rising. This isn't good, yunno."

"Look, another hour or so, then we'll be done."

"Hour's too long. Those two devils just joined, and more are croppin'
up all the time." The boy's vooice rose another octave as dust began to
sting his face. He screwed up his eyes.

"Maybe you're right. Damned expensive it was to come out here, but it
can't be helped." The older man looked sympathetic as the boy trembled
almost imperceptibly. "Come one, let's pack up. Maybe we can sit it out
in the car. How often do these things actually blow into storms?"

The boy quoted some statistics. The man frowned. Their movements gained
a sense of urgency as the devils began to dance faster around them,
more appearing all the time. The breeze had already become a wind,
which was erring into gale territories.

"Drop the stuff!" The man yelled over the roaring wind, getting a
mouthful of dust for his trouble. The dust swirled madly around them,
the storm already approaching a mile high and rising. They dashed for
the rover, the dust and sand stripping layers of skin from their faces
and hands.

They slammed the doors of the car and the man gunned the engine. The
boy watched nervously as the billion-Euro equipment took off and was
obscured from sight by the red dust. The engine finally roared into
life and as the rover took off he realised that the wind had already
begun to strip the paint from the vehicle. The rover charged into
slightly clearer air, but it was a brief respite.

The storm finally began to gather itself, rising and widening as the
wind reached even higher factors. As the rover thundered away the boy
glanced into the rear-view mirror. The dust was like a wall, or a lava
flow, gaining on them already as the storm flowed across the plains. He
watched it get closer and closer.

The man wasn't blind to the storm's approach either. He had his foot
jammed onto the accelerator, but the engine was straining as it was.
The dust engulfed the rover, pushing it forwards. Unable to go any
faster, it flipped up and the ferocious winds slowly dragged it
upwards, away from the naked rock, and tossed it into the air. The
passengers had no idea, the flip had knocked both of them unconscious,
and all that they could have seen was dust, had they been able to
look.

Eventually, the storm blew itself out, after many months. The rover had
been discarded long before that, dropped from almost five miles up. The
mangled mess was all that remained, landing only metres from the
passenger's intended destination.