A Desert Rose

Chapter 1 - The Rescue

Chapter 1

The sun was blazing down mercilessly in the middle of the Mediterranean summer as Aimee gazed over the heated sand at Marc who was gesturing wildly for her to came and look at what they had unearthed.  They only had another hour of good light left and she was contemplating the schedule for the night.  Soon they should start finishing and clean-up for supper.  She thought to herself as she walked the small distance from the main tent camp to the dig site.  

This was Madain Saleh, an ancient city carved into the rocky cliffs in the North-West of Saudi Arabia.  While they weren’t working on the main site, which has been extensively excavated in the past and now serves mainly as a tourist attraction; they were licensed to work at an oasis a few miles into the desert.

“What is it?  We should be finishing up, the sun will set soon,” Aimee said as she approached the cords that marked the borders of the site they were working on. 

“Pieces,” Marc said as he glanced at her and then at the setting sun.

“Pieces of what?” Aimee climbed over the cord to watch as Marc slowly dusted away the sand with his brush. 

“That is exactly why you are the gorgeous and fearless leader of this expedition.  It’s your prerogative to figure that out.  Grab a brush and help me, will you?”  Marc shifted his weight to crouch to the side.

She dropped to her knees and careful of the grid-wires she inched forward to the block Marc was dusting.  Slowly they cleaned out the square and found that it ran into another one.  Half an hour later Aimee noticed the fading light. 

“We should go, the rest can wait till tomorrow,” Marc said as he followed her gaze over the desert towards the setting sun.  He carefully lifted the stone fragments and handed them to Aimee.  “Take those back to camp.  I will cover up the site; I heard we are having Al-Kabsa tonight.” 

Aimee wrinkled her nose, Marc loved the traditional meat and rice stew but she was growing tired of it.  While walking back to the tents, she picked out the largest of the pieces examined the markings on it in the fading sunlight.  But some movement behind her hand in the distance caught her attention; an entourage of vehicles were speeding over the dunes. 

“For goodness sake, what now?” She said out loud to no one in particular as she set the container down on the table. 

Aimee’s group was the only licensed archaeological researchers allowed on this side of the very large area.  Sometimes when word gets out of interesting excavations, local treasure hunters try and sneak in to steal the valuable finds.  

If they think they can speed in here and ruin my site, they can think again.  She walked over to her tent to retrieve her whip and 9 mm.  The whip is handy for desert-snakes and the Glock handy for human-snakes.  The types of people she has had to deal with here in the desert are not very cordial and a weapon speeds negotiations quite a bit. 

"I'll be back in a few minutes!"  She shouted over to the approaching Marc as she got into the dune buggy they used for the site and headed into the direction of the vehicles she just saw.   Here in the desert no one cared if a woman drove, back in the city it was another story though.

The ride barely took five minutes since the truck and two jeeps had skidded to a stop not far from the outcropping secluding them from her view.  Leaving the buggy behind it she kept low and crawled through the warm sand up the side of a dune.  A lizard scampered away from her as she inched to the top.  

She watched from the rim as several men jumped down from the back of the truck and with them they dragged something, or rather, someone.  She almost gasped when the man they had just pulled down were kicked to fall to his knees.