The sound of the choppers grew louder and louder.438Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZA3bh4U6xS
Kirk didn't move. "Goddamn ostrich," he murmured, "is what I feel like."
The two choppers must have been almost directly over him, because their roaring was as loud as hell. They dangled there, a few hundred feet above him.
He was stretched out in a crevice, in a jagged ditch between two low ridges of rocky ground, and blanketed with hastily applied sand, scarcely breathing.
God, don't let them see me! he prayed.
They were staying above him, hanging in the glaring sky. Watching, waiting.
Wonder what Roddenberry told them to do? Shoot me as soon as they spot me? Or take me alive?
Could be it wasn't even Roddenberry's decision to make anymore. There were others involved, other madmen. No telling what kind of ruthless choices they were capable of.
Did the copters sound further off? Were they going away?
Kirk stayed flat out, listening. Could be a trick. Go away, and then come back.
The chuffing sound of the rotating blades was definitely getting fainter.
More minutes melted away. There was only silence in the sky.
Kirk kept waiting, not moving. After another five long, hot minutes he allowed himself to sit up, sand falling away from him.
Far off, darting toward the shimmering horizon, were two dots which must be the choppers.
"They didn't see me, I got under cover in time," he said, relieved. He stood, brushing the yellow grit from his clothes, running his dry tongue over his cracked lips. Sand had gotten into the stubble on his face, and he had to rub it out with his blistered, cut hands.
"So, I've got some more time," he said, as he stared moving westward again. "How much, though? How much?"
"This is not exactly," Cox said to himself, "what you'd expect to find in North Africa."
He parked his rented Land Rover in front of two futuristic towers comprised of a number of tall slender pipes, fastened by plastic struts to a the middle structure, a big tank. These things, out here all by their lonesome in the middle of Onk Jmel, Tunisia, were non-functioning fakes, obviously. But what were they for? Why were they here? 438Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHA5rlCJFRk
In his shirt sleeves, with the shirt sticking too him, Cox slid out of the land rover, walked past the bizarre towers and came to a halt at the rim of what appeared to be a pit, or crater. Looking down into the crater, he could see that its walls were made of hard-packed soil. At the bottom of the crater was a courtyard with more of those weird towers in the center. "Hello!" Cox called out. "Anybody home?"
But nobody answered. No one came out of the strange ovoid doorways that lined the walls of the pit. There was clearly no sign of life, none at all. Which was strange, since someone must have spent a whopping fortune to build this place, whatever it was. Why would someone build this and just leave it here?
Cox walked around the rim of the crater, noting the conduits and tanks lining it, all of them fakes, too.
Why? Why? Why?
Cox brushed his sweating chest as the answer finally came to him. "A movie set," he said to himself. "This is the set for some kind of high-budget science-fiction movie! It must have something to do with what Kirk was trying to tell his wife!"
Bang!
Tzzzzzinnnnnng!
Sand from the crater's rim flew into the air all around him.
Hit the dirt! he advised himself, doing just that. He dived and landed belly-down in the Tunisian sand.
The leftmost of the strange towers made an odd sound and splintered, sending sharp slivers of plastic flying.
Cox rolled, hugging himself in the sand, wondering if he should try to climb down into the crater and find someplace to hide in the phony courtyard, but thinking better of it. The third bullet from the high-powered rifle ate into the spot where he'd been a few seconds earlier.
Panting, perspiring like a fiend, Cox dug himself into the sand and waited. He quickly inspected the terrain around him, but saw nothing he could use as a weapon....not even a big rock. "Hand-to-hand combat isn't my strong suit," he reflected, "especially against some sonofabitch with a rifle."
Nothing happened.438Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWhivBBqpFE
Then he heard a motor grind to life. At a distance, at the other end of this bizarre dwelling, a jeep went growing away.
Very cautiously, Cox rose to his feet, the hot sand burning his feet even with shoes on.
A covered jeep, some kind of World War II-vintage green jeep, was barreling the hell out of Onk Jmel, sending spiraling clouds of murky sand into the air.438Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyc1KP8K9KW
"I think I'm going to have to apply for hazard pay, if this keeps up." Walking, still a shade gingerly, he hurried back to his rented Land Rover.438Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOs66ZW1vXb
