A young man emerges from the sands like any other culled from the protective holds beneath the sands. I notice him with an upruptly thumping heart accompanied by the two stooges who keep watch on the north side of the isle.

"Hey, Softskin, this one from your tribe," the tall one says, pushing the young man's shoulder without much effect. I would respond with something witty, I'm sure, if I could take my mind and eyes off the young man long enough to think a coherent thought.

"Do I know you?" I wonder.

"Yes." I'm shocked to perceive a connection between us that implies communication, even though no words have exchanged between us.

"Hey, new Softskin, what tribe are you from?" the short one asks while carefully offering a rebreather and moist air flask to the new arrival. Who is this man, and why do I know him? How do I know him? He takes the life-preserving treasures awkwardly, like he has never used them before.

The tall stooge moving towards Graves kicks me into action. "I'll take him."

"What? All new arrivals go see Graves first, you know the rules."

"Except I went to Gloria on arrival."

"Which we haven't heard the end of from Graves, for wasting you amongst the sun-mad. Come on, Dust, if this Softskin wants the newbie, then we better not give him to him," the short bastard says, curling what’s left of his lip in challenge.

"I don't know how to use these," the thought is his, yet it's in my mind.

I move before thinking too much about it, pushing past the tall stooge who stumbles on his missing toes. I duck under the pipe swung at me, catching the short stooge, who, in disbelief, goes flying as I trip and toss him into the sand.

"I know him. Tell Graves I'll take full responsibility for him. See you!" I bolt out of sight, pulling the new arrival with me around the bend and up the rockface where no one hardly ever comes.

Once at the peak, I turn to face him. I know him. Do I know him?

"Who are you?" I ask, my mouth dry while my fingers are clammy with moisture. I’ve had an abundance of moisture lately, to the extent that it just oozes off me whenever it wants.

He gazes at me, into my eyes, and I know—I’ve been chasing his reflection into the desert. This, this is the mirage I’ve been chasing!

Graves is easy enough to deal with because he is upfront and frank about what he wants.

“Softskin,” his one good eye shakes before settling on me as I crawl through the cool sand of his domicile, “you have taken responsibility for a new arrival. You understand his life is in your hands.”

I understand nothing. “I understand he is my responsibility,” I say, feigning surety. My heart is still pounding loudly in my chest as I almost hear him in my mind—distinct but almost the same as me. What are you? Who are you? I ask the question in my mind, knowing I'm not talking to myself. I'm thinking to Origin/First. I understand I'm talking to him. A designation? A title? A name? All of that is good enough to be a simile of a name.

“Softskin, you do not seem your usual self. Is this new arrival someone you know from your old hold? Up here, we are all strangers, and we are all family. You owe this new one nothing you do not wish to give.”

“No... ah... I understand we owe each other nothing but common decency. We are all dead here anyway, what use—”

“You will not attempt to cross the desert then?” Graves interrupts my usual spiel with a question I now need to take seriously. Before this First came, I was waiting out the SandWall season, then heading straight north towards my mirage. Now, though, my mirage has come to me, and I don't know what that means. What do I do now?

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I will teach you to breathe properly, you will teach others.

My tight, strong muscles quiver in sympathetic pain and pleasure as we share an experience I can't quantify.

“Why?” I realize I am afraid—afraid of this person and what they may want from me, and what I may be willing to do for the power to sustain myself just from breathing as the imagery comes vividly. If everyone could sustain themselves through breathing, there wouldn’t be so much suffering in the world; the holds wouldn’t need to cull numbers by sending their own families to certain death.

“I will decide later what to do,” I nod and turn to leave, distracted by my 'thoughts.' Graves grunts as another of his grunts whispers in the hole were his ear used to be.

*

The tools these people are myriad and ingenious to the extent that I can't always immediately figure out how exactly they work or how they are made. The craftmanship of these goggles is impeccable yet they are mass produce by everyone clearly having one to start before their eventual malfunctioning. Everything I don't understand fascinates and scares me with its backwardness and mystery, the tool is the way humans here have managed to claim this world. Rebreathers are fascinating as well, a snout crafted to clean the air before its breathed into the body protecting from toxins and dust, ingenious really but I've learned the more complicated something is crafted the quicker it malfunctions in the desert where only basic tools last.

The fennec lizard is a sand snake-lizard with a scaly underbelly and a furry back, whose skin is used by native sand dwellers to make thermodynamic leather wrappings. The fennec snake-lizard is prized because these wrappings are the only type of natural clothing that can survive the desert elements while retaining their protective qualities. All the sandmen wrap themselves in dried, leathered fennec wrappings from head to toe, shielding their skin from the harsh sun and relentless sands. I am similarly wrapped, watching the desert. The wraps around me, inherited from someone recently dead, are aged and beaten by sand and generations of wearers, serving as necessary gear.

I observe Tito, equally wrapped, teaching a group of twelve the breathing technique I have imparted to him. These are the ones with the most limbs and the best chances to survive until the end of Sand Season. Sand Season is what they call it when the storms come, creating cyclones that form the SandWall and scatter sharp grains at speeds that can strip human soft tissue away. Most who end up here without a skinsuit or fennec wrappings lose their eyes to the sand, their ears and noses are eroded from their faces, and some are left without genitalia. Yet, not one dies of infection. They perish in droves from shock, strokes, starvation, dehydration, and hypothermia, but never from infection.

Witnessing the interactions between these people and nature reveals incongruities. It’s as though they are not native to this place, yet they possess specific mutations suited for survival here. It can't not be by design. I witness these lost people as part of them, a perspective I have acquired through Tito and by immersing myself here, playing at being a member of their society.

The Sand Season seems to be ending twelve months earlier than expected, and I experience both the hope and despair these people feel as the news spreads. Sand Season usually lasts four years, cutting off the desert from any and all forms of civilization. During this time, the desert tribes scatter into underground caverns and tunnels, managing their limited resources by controlling the population of the unsteady, the weak, and the unproductive. Those condemned to remain outside during Sand Season rarely survive the ordeal. With the season ending early, many will make it through the desert alive.

Tito, Cande, Irba, Losa, Telmi, and many others I’ve met here, who were once resigned to die, now have a new lease on life. They don't yet know what to do with this unexpected extension. The early end to Sand Season brings both opportunity and uncertainty, reshaping the dynamics of survival and community within the desert tribes.

“You shouldn’t be out here, Aetio,” Val says, her voice tinged with a mix of scolding and worry as she approaches him. “The sun can steal your mind if you let it.”

Our eyes connect and I know everything she means and is trying to say but hasn't outright said yet, strange how humans communicate. Val, a sturdy, motherly figure with sun-weathered skin and a fierce, protective nature, watches me with a mix of concern and frustration. She’s convinced that the desert has driven me sunmad and the thought eats at her. How could someone so young have been culled from a hold? It seems so unjust, so unnecessary to her.

''I have mastered the breathing technique, I am impervious to the elements now,'' I say to re-assure her but immediately know I have achieved the opposite and convinced her I'm mad. I see the anger, pity, the frustration and fear in her as she watches me play with the goggles and rebreather without actually donning them.

''Well I could use some pointers with my breathing,'' she says softly, ''how about you get out of the sun and show me how its done?'' She gives me her hand and i consider her before taking it and following to the shade. Understanding these humans is not a simple thing but I am learning quickly.

The trouble is that when I connect to them there is a chance they will connect to me, when i look into them there is a possibility they might look into me. Not that they know how to understand anything the possibility still frightens me. Strange these human emotions...