The story so far…

The scorching sun hung high atop the blue desert sky. Jack, Marie and Arbuck walked behind Alice single file, to cover their trail (and to, for once, humor Alice’s incessant panic attacks). Once every few steps, used as she was to her role as the responsible one everyone loved to ignore, she turned and looked whether her fellow caravaneers were still there, and in the formation she asked.

Jack was his good-natured self, checking left and right for hidden treasure and adventures to be found in the sand. Because of his carefree nature and tendency to get everyone out of trouble, everyone considered him the caravan’s captain. Only problem was he was the one who got them into trouble in the first place. Marie had changed into a beautiful but impractical bikini. Impractical was the name of the game with Marie, who a) was the group’s cook, but didn’t believe in carbs, and b) had uncontrollable binge eating attacks that her turned into a rabid monster three times her size until she had used up all the calories. Arbuck was sleeping off the hangover. He could shoot a bulls-eye on a dartboard from three miles off when sober. Only his dictionary didn’t know sobriety. And neither did his gut. Arbuck was literally allergic to water. And then there was Alice. Good, reliable, boring Alice.

Alice adjusted the heavy backpack containing the provisions and turned back towards the road ahead. What was she doing? Caravaning was a highly forbidden activity punishable by death. She knew this all too well – after all, she worked for the company that upheld this law. How then did she end up in one? She was just about to start her daily session of pinpointing the moment things had started going wrong for her when Marie shrieked.