The smell was horrible.
I remember waking up to heat and stench. It was the kind of stench that reaches into your head and clamps down on your brain. It was dizzying and my head was pounding. It was almost bad enough to mask what the rest of my body felt like...almost. I tried to shake it off, you know the way you see people do it in the movies? Instead of just feeling sick, I was now covered in my own vomit. I sat there trying to figure out what happened and slowly realized I wasn't just waking up from a bad night of drinking and fighting, I was waking into a nightmare.
I had nasty burns and was bleeding all over, which most likely explained the dizziness; that and the concussion. I started to panic at the thought. I know I must have hit my head, because I couldn’t form a complete memory of what had happened and worse, I had no idea who or where I was. I know there had been a terrible accident from what seemed like a crash. Beyond that, I just didn’t know.
All around me were pieces of burning metal that looked like it had been ripped apart like aluminum foil. Pools of fuel-soaked sand were set ablaze and added to the already suffocating heat of the sun overhead. The air was dry and looking around me it seemed like the sand just went on forever. I tried to focus beyond the ringing in my ears for familiar sounds. No waves, no wind, and no body made a sound, there was only the crackling of the fire. As far as I knew I was alone in the desert, and bleeding to death.
My eyes started to adjust better to the light and things came into better focus. From what it looked like, those who made it out of the wreck bleed to death and those who didn't died on impact. I counted roughly four others sprawled about the wreckage, more or less intact. They must have been the ship’s crew, whoever they were, because they were all in the same uniform.
I felt the bile hit my throat again and my mind began to race into coherent and panicked thought. I was alone and stranded in the desert with nothing but the company of dead men. I tried to crawl closer, under the wreckage to find solace from the sun, but the heat was worse near the ship so I just closed my eyes. All I could do was wait. Wait for darkness and wait for help. Someone had to have seen us. They would come.
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