“Life is the beauty of the rose and the prick of the thorn.” B. E. S.

Besh laid the device on the window sill. Opening his backpack, he withdrew his vest and engaged in the lengthy ritual of removing his multicolored shoulder bag and folding it into the secret pocket inside the back of the vest. Raul and Beasley watched silently. As Besh pulled on the vest, Beasley called for his attention.

“Sir,” said Beasley.

“Yes,” replied Besh.

“Why do you carry an empty bag?” asked the young man.

Besh answered with an earnest smile. “It’s not always empty. It was a gift.”

Raul tossed the empty flask aside and asked, “Why do you stow away? I mean, you must have been around the block. You see a lot of planets?”

“Quite a few,” answered Besh as he refastened his backpack.

Beasley asked, “Have you ever seen an alien?”

Besh rubbed his chin in recollection. “I once visited a planet populated with beavers.”

Raul laughed and nudged Beasley. “Beavers,” he parroted.

Beasley looked to Besh with raised eyebrows, hoping for more information. Besh waved a hand through the air dismissively and said, “Little furry people with big teeth. It gets really crazy the further up the arm you travel.”

Beasley asked, “Do you think we’ll find Albert soon?”

Besh answered, “We’ve come close. Each of our mishaps puts us further behind.”

“He’s in Grail,” said Raul.

Beasley added, “While we languish in this God-forsaken desert.”

Besh walked to the front door and leaned into the frame. He scanned the bright prairie for sight of the Captain. For a prairie, it was not as flat as Besh expected it to be. He saw bluffs and small hills. He saw rocks and stunted trees. He imagined tight ravines and rain gullies. Sam was nowhere to be seen. He turned his attention to the barn, which seemed ready to fall. The doors stood open, the overhead sun made the interior black and mysterious. He turned back into the house and blinked his eyes.

He said, “It’s like the Captain said. They had to drive out here to set their ambush. Once we find their vehicle, we can be on our way.”

Raul asked, “How much further to Grail?”

“Not sure,” Besh replied.

Beasley turned to Raul and asked, “Are you feeling any better?”

Raul replied with heavy eyes, “Mas o menos. Maybe a little. I feel a siesta coming on.”

Besh felt something in his vest pocket. He took a seat against the door frame and pulled out a small Bible, opening it to a random page. He read quietly with a smile on his face. 

Impatient, Beasley asked, “What’s that?”

“It’s a Bible,” answered Besh. “Well, more like the four gospels and Psalms.”

Raul opened his eyes and said, “That’s really old.”

Besh closed the small book, smiled, and said, “And still a best-seller. You know what’s also old? The expression, cool. It goes all the way back to Earth.”

“Cool,” said Raul.

“Are you religious?” Asked Beasley.

Besh looked at the book in his hand. He answered, “I like to read it now and then. Not too keen on the doom and gloom, but I like the good parts.”

Besh returned the Bible to his pocket and turned the sleeves of his shirt up past his elbows. Raul nodded while Beasley rolled to his knees to peer through the window. He scanned the bright terrain and saw no sign of the Captain.

“I’m not saying,” said Beasley, “that I don’t absolutely love being in the middle of nowhere with you wonderful people, baked like an apple, drenched with sweat, running for my very life. I do. I’m absolutely thrilled.”

“What are you saying?” asked Besh.

Without looking up, Raul added, “Spit it out, man.”

Beasley stood and dusted his knees. “I’m saying I want to go home. I could have done all this much better from my room in the castle.”

“Whiner,” said Raul, eyes closed.

“Don’t you want to find the Prince?” asked Besh. “I thought you were friends.”

“I thought so, too,” Replied Beasley. “I was more like his pet dog.”

“Here, Spot,” Raul Mumbled.

Ignoring Raul, Beasley continued, “He only took me along for show. Anytime a girl walked by, he tied me to a post and left me stranded.”

“Sorry to hear it,” said Besh, rising awkwardly from the sandy floor. “We’ll get you home as soon as humanly possible. That is of course if the castle is not besieged. Even so, I’ll go with you through the enemy lines. I’ll dodge bullets and bombs to make sure you reach your room.” Beasley gaped in disbelief. Besh continued, “Meanwhile, I think I’ll stretch my legs a bit. Care to join me?”

“I’ll wait for the ride,” answered Beasley.

Raul mumbled,  “He’ll come driving up any minute.”

With Besh gone, and Raul nodding, Beasley sat beneath the window and leaned back with a sigh. “Some quest,” he complained to himself. “If we don’t die first, we’ll be old men before it’s done.”

Raul mumbled, “It’s only been five days.”

“An eternity,” answered Beasley.

“Crispin,” said Raul.

Beasley turned to Raul and saw a broken man half asleep. “Yes,” he replied.

Raul mumbled, “Take a nap.”

Besh stood behind the ramshackle farmhouse. Raised sand alerted him to something beneath. Kicking aside sand and weeds, he uncovered a portion of wood. He immediately imagined a storm shelter. If he dug with his hands, it would take him a good two minutes to give up and walk away. Still, there might be something of use inside, and Besh was a collector of useful items. He removed his vest.

With his colorful bag of tricks in hand, he massaged a combination of colors and reached inside. As he fished around with his hand, Besh recalled the sickly Nashtatra that gave him his handy dimensional larder. Besh held the lanky alien in his lap and held his canteen to the alien lips. Its skin was cold to the touch, and a large red welt was prominent on its gray-brown oblong head. Swollen watery eyes like thunderclouds looked into his own with evident thanks. Besh still found it hard to believe that Cosmo had hit him.

With shovel in hand and the bag on his shoulder, Besh set to work clearing sand from the double doors of the shelter. The sun was hot, the work was hard, but he was soon done. He returned the shovel to the bag, produced a light, and lifted the doors open. The creaking steps called for caution. At the bottom, Besh panned his light. It was a large concrete room with shelves, a dusty cot, and a blanket-covered pile in the corner. 

Beasley started from his sleep, looking up to see the Captain standing in the door. He blinked hard and looked to his side. Raul lay curled in the sand lightly snoring. The Captain walked to the empty bag and kicked it with a dusty boot. He turned and noticed the communicator in the window, then he focused his eyes on Beasley, who sat straight, uncomfortable in the Captain’s narrow gaze.

“Where’s the old man?” he asked Beasley.

“He went for a walk,” answered the youth.

Suddenly, Raul sat up and wiped sand from his face. “Captain hombre,” he said sleepily.

The Captain took a moment out of his usual persona to ask Raul, “Can you walk?”

Raul answered, “I can, but I don’t want to.”

“Does that mean,” asked Beasley, “That your search was unsuccessful?”

Sam frowned, stared through the window, and said, “I looked everywhere.”

“Bet you didn’t look in the barn,” said Besh from the door.

“You found it?” asked Raul.

“I found a buckboard and a tired mule,” answered Besh.

“Damn,” Raul complained. “Here we go again.”

“Relax,” said Besh with a smile. “I’m joking. I actually found a large military-style rover.”

“Then, what are we waiting for? Let’s go,” said the Captain, helping Beasley and Raul to their feet.

The afternoon sun cast extended shadows as Sam led the way to the barn, and winds whistled from the south, kicking sand into the air. A black rover sat hidden in the dark interior of the barn. Sam immediately took his place in the driver’s seat. Besh sat beside him, while Beasley and Raul slid into the back seat with the baggage.

Sam backed the vehicle through the barn door and circled to stop with a northwestern direction in his view. He took a moment to calibrate the navigation control. Outside the vehicle, the sky was gunmetal gray. Dark clouds barreled northeast, with smaller brighter clouds flying beneath like remora on the belly of a deadly shark. As the rover swayed in the dust-laden wind, Beasley searched for a seatbelt and secured himself.

Raul asked, “You think we’ll find the Prince this time?”

Sam replied, “We damned well better. I got a boot reserved for his sorry royal ass, all shined up and ready to fly.”

Besh said to the Captain, “We found a communicator in the effects of the late assailants.”

“I saw it,” replied Sam.

“I was just thinking,” continued Besh. “There may be others in the area. When our would-be abductors fail to call in, someone will come to investigate.”

Sam put the vehicle into drive and bolted forward. He said, “We’ll just have to outrun them.”