As they started driving, Chuck noticed that Tess kept looking at him. “What’s the matter?” He asked. They drove in silence for a while before she finally asked “Are you going back to your world?”
“I would like to but don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere without you. I know my world doesn’t have magic so if you can’t come with me then we’ll just go back to your world. I don’t want to force you to leave your world either. I’m happy as long as I’m with you.” Chuck replied, reaching over and holding her hand.
”I don’t care where we live either as long as we are together.” Tess said, squeezing his hand and smiling. With that out of the way, she put on some music and started looking through the book.
The path wound through a scrubland of dry, brown grass and prickly plants with plenty spots of bare ground where nothing grew. The path was still made of stones and surprisingly smooth.
Chuck took it easy however, and didn’t want to push the old pickup more than he had to. They would occasionally scare up an animal on the way by but didn’t stop yet. After a few hours, Tess pointed out some bushes that seemed to have berries on them.
It was a good time for a break so he pulled over. According to the book they were edible but when he tried some they were really sour. Tess didn’t mind them and they were better than nothing so they ended up picking a bunch of them.
After another hour on the road, the scrubland was turning into a desert. Chuck figured the path must be magical somehow since the sand was staying away from it and the road stayed clear.
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The temperature had risen as well and he had to turn the air conditioner on. He was increasingly worried about the pickup as he didn’t know how well it would do in a desert setting. As he was thinking that, Tess pointed at something off to the side.
He looked over to see the sky becoming dark and what looked like a wall of sand moving toward them. “It’s a sandstorm.” Chuck said. Tess had never seen anything like it. There was no shelter anywhere he could see and he didn’t want to lose the path so they just kept following it until the storm hit.
They made it a few more miles before being engulfed by the storm. Chuck shut the engine off and they waited, listening to the winds howl around them. The wind barriers worked but some sand particles still got in since the cab wasn’t air tight.
With nothing much to do they ate a snack, talked, fooled around, then fell asleep. When they woke up, the sky was clear and the storm had passed. Sand covered the pickup but the road was still clear.
They got out and dusted things off. Chuck made sure to pop the hood and shook out the air filter. R2 also shook all the dust off himself. The storm didn’t seem to have bothered him any. Chuck had noticed that they were out of the graveyard, the sun seemed to be moving normally. He didn’t know how that was possible but just shrugged and chalked it up to magic.
They were soon on the road, following the path through the sand dunes. There were occasionally cactus like plants and he even saw some dog sized scorpions. Chuck didn’t want to get anywhere close to them as they had not one but two oversized stingers.
They did stop again by a cluster of different cactus like plants which the book said could be eaten. This time the cactus flesh was extremely bitter. Chuck grumbled, but the gatekeeper never said the food would taste good. Tess just laughed at him since she had no problem with any of the food due to her slime nature.