Until My Legs Give Out

"Movement felt like the only thing left I could control—which made it particularly cruel when even that was taken from me."

Before the camp's familiarity could offer any semblance of comfort, I veered northwest.

The wound on my chest continued to weep as I walked, each step sending fresh trickles of blood and fluid coursing down my abdomen. The wetness tracked through the dust coating my skin, creating rivulets that mapped my deterioration in real time. The physical discomfort was constant—a throbbing, burning presence that demanded attention I refused to give it.

But the pain in my body was nothing compared to the storm inside my head.

I clung to the hope that beyond the horizon lay answers. Or at the very least, a respite from the madness that had consumed my life. Movement felt necessary—essential, even. Standing still meant thinking. Thinking meant confronting everything I couldn't bear to face. So I walked. One foot in front of the other, following the river upstream, putting distance between myself and the campsite where Luke stood holding my accusations and Paul held my dogs and everyone held expectations I couldn't meet.

The camp faded into the distance behind me, that fragile collection of tents and supplies growing smaller with each step until it disappeared entirely. Ahead, the landscape unfolded in endless monotony—reds, browns, the occasional splash of orange where some geological quirk had painted variation into the earth. A stark, beautiful wilderness that seemed utterly indifferent to human suffering. It didn't care that I was bleeding. It didn't care that my chest felt like someone had scooped out my heart and replaced it with burning coals. It simply existed, vast and implacable and completely unconcerned with the small drama of one man walking into its emptiness.

Sweat beaded on my brow, mixing with the dust to form a gritty paste that stung my eyes. My t-shirt, already soaked with perspiration and blood, clung to my skin with uncomfortable persistence. The fabric pulled at the wound with every movement, a constant irritation layered on top of the deeper pain. My shorts chafed against my inner thighs where sweat had accumulated, each step becoming a small test of endurance.

Yet the discomfort felt like a fair price. If it meant finding a way out—if it meant escaping this nightmare, even for a moment—I would walk until my legs gave out.

Which, as it turned out, didn't take long.

The initial rush of determination began to wane as the desert stretched on, replaced by the creeping realisation of my physical limits. I hadn't eaten properly in days. I'd been labouring under the sun, swinging pickaxes and shovelling dust and pouring concrete that wouldn't set properly. The burn on my chest was almost certainly infected, probably poisoning my blood with every beat of my heart.

My legs, once driven by desperate need to escape, began to betray me. The muscles trembled with exhaustion, shaking in ways that made each step unpredictable. My knees felt loose, unreliable, threatening to buckle without warning.

"Shit," I whispered to the empty expanse, the word barely a breath in the vast silence.

And then my legs surrendered entirely.

They folded beneath me without ceremony, muscles simply refusing to carry my weight any further. The ground rose up to meet me—or I fell to meet it—and the soft, ochre dust provided cold comfort as I collapsed. My body crumpled, joints impacting earth in a series of jolts that should have hurt more than they did. Maybe I was past feeling pain properly. Maybe shock was setting in. Maybe I just didn't care anymore.

I groaned as I hit the ground, the sound swallowed by the emptiness around me. Dust billowed up from my impact, coating my face, filling my nose and mouth with the taste of Clivilius's indifferent earth.

Lying there, sprawled in the dirt, the fight to keep my eyes open became increasingly difficult. The world blurred at the edges, colours bleeding into each other, the sky and ground trading places in my swimming vision. My eyelids felt weighted, dragged down by exhaustion and blood loss and the accumulated strain of days spent surviving in a place that didn't want me alive.

My last conscious thought was of Henri. His warm weight in my arms. His tongue on my face. The simple, uncomplicated joy of a dog who loved me without conditions or complications.

And then the darkness took me.