Bones in the Sand by Julie Steimle (books to read to get smarter txt) 📕

"Jafarr...." she started, grabbing the elbow to his jacket.

Jafarr turned wearily to her. "Don't worry. It will be all right."

She clenched her teeth and shook her head.

"Besides, I know that if they tried anything, you could kick their butts and lay them flat in the desert to dry without a problem," he said without lowering his voice. Then with a smirk, he pulled out the huge zip lock bag full of boxes containing granola bars Zormna had packed for them. "Breakfast?"

He held up the first box.

"Jafarr." She growled, still not satisfied.

Dropping down cross-legged in front of the tent, opening the box. He remained unconcerned. "I figure we might be able to look at the bones today."

"Jafarr!" she snapped, resisting the urge to kick sand in his face.

"Scrapes! Fine! What is it, Zormna?" He ripped the whole top half of the box off without meaning to. The college girls across the way jumped.

He raised his hand to them in a wave and smiled. "It's all right."

"Jafarr, do you actually think the FBI is going to even let us near the bones? This whole business... How are we even going to give those bones a proper burial? That's what Arrand would have wanted."

She snatched a granola bar from the ripped box when she said this and unwrapped the plastic with her teeth.

Jafarr shrugged. "I'm not exactly sure, if you come to it."

"Jafarr!" Zormna exclaimed.

"Well? Honestly Zormna, all I knew was that it was important to get here. We might be able to get a box for the bones so we can bury them, but who's to say that the FBI will leave them alone? I think the best we can do for now is just be around when the ship is unearthed, and maybe a solution will present itself." He then took a bite out of his granola bar without another thought.

"Hmm." Peering toward at the disturbed FBI agents, Zormna sighed, as she had to agree. "Well, since we have to wait, maybe you can ask the bones what they want. You can do that, right?"

Jafarr shrugged as he thought about it. "I guess. I've never tried it before, but I can have a go at it."

She nodded. "Good. Do that. I'm going to have a look around."

He nodded and took another bite out of his granola bar.

The two camp-crashers hung around the campground a good half of the morning. The college students observed how the FBI forbade the two teens from entering the laboratory tents and the excavation site, but that didn't stop the boy or girl from trying.

It was obvious to everybody that Agent Sicamore and the rest of the FBI operatives knew the two teenagers intimately...like a sore on their foot. They called them Zormna Clendar and The Boy, on a regular basis.

Zormna was the one sneaking around the camp. She snuck into and inspected the dig site even when the FBI had blocked her way to there. One of the girls swore she saw the tiny blonde perform some kind of parkour and flipped over their heads, catch on one of the tent poles of the lab, then swoop down to slip inside the open flap. She only had a small peek inside before the FBI agent on duty caught up with her, but it seemed to be enough to satisfy her. That was the other thing...Zormna didn't seem scared of the FBI at all. The only thing she reacted to badly was the voices of Agents Palmer and Powell. She tended to press her fingers to her temples whenever they spoke to her for any length of time, as if they gave her a headache.

The Boy mostly remained in front of the tent, sitting with his eyes closed like he was meditating. The students in the camp noticed that even the FBI peered at him, whispering that this was unusual behavior for him. They wondered what was usual behavior. Jafarr's scars and vampiric paleness under his dark hair gave him that eerie, mysterious quality that had all the girls whispering. Once or twice Zormna would stroll over and check on him. Each time she did, she would ask if he 'saw anything'. With his eyes remaining closed, Jafarr would answer with simple head shake. Around noon, one of the braver students at the camp finally got the nerve up to ask Zormna what Jafarr was doing.

She regarded the man carefully before she turned her eyes back on Jafarr sitting at the tent, tossing and catching an apple from out of their packs as if it were a baseball. "Him?" Zormna shrugged, amusing herself with the apple with too much dexterity. "Oh, he's just looking for something."

She caught the apple and took a bite out of it. Walking away to look at the dig site one more time while leaving the question-asker to stand and stare at Jafarr, she passed by the tent. A faint smirk crossed Jafarr's lips. The next second he rolled onto the ground, laughing.

Zormna glanced over at him and stopped in her walk.

"Something funny?" she asked, peering over at him. Eyes fixed on them both, ears listening in.

He opened his eyes and blinked at the bright sun.

 "Yeah," Jafarr said, peeking once at a man who watched him with wary concern. "I suddenly felt hungry."

Zormna chuckled, thumbing to their packs, "There's an apple in the backpack."

Jafarr nodded, his eyes reflecting a thousand private things he undoubtedly wanted to say to her but did not venture to in public. He dug purposefully through the pack as if the spying college students across the way didn't amuse him.

Thing was, they didn't do much of anything beyond that. From their arrival to sunset, Zormna walked around, and The Boy stayed near the tent. It wasn't so much like he was guarding it, but everyone could see the duo was acting as together in a way. By dinnertime, he was up and walking, stretching out his legs and shrugging his shoulders to ease his muscles. She had joined him by six o'clock when the sun had gone down. They whispered together for about an hour, leaving only a faint indication that he hadn't exactly found what he was looking for.

"Do you want to continue to search tomorrow?" she was overheard asking.

He shook his head. "No. Searching like that gives me a headache. If it wants to come, it will come." He paused. "Maybe things will figure themselves out when we get to it."

She nodded and slipped into the tent - for what people assumed would be a change of clothes, though that never happened.

Later in the evening the two had attempted to start a fire - attempted because everyone in the camp had stopped them, citing the environmental fire law for that part of the desert - that it was a no-burn day besides. They both shrugged, exchanged glanced then settled for eating Spam out of the can along with a few more granola bars. They were out of fresh fruit.

That night, Zormna slept inside the tent with the tent door open and Jafarr lay at the door on his back, staring at the stars. Both of them talked well into the night, pointing at the sky. Their voices murmured from their place on the hill, even laughing at some inside jokes that came out in a half-English half-what-ever-that-strange-language-was dialect. The FBI hung near the camp to listen - but not unnoticed. Both Zormna and Jafarr spotted them easily, shooting the agents resentful looks, even though the duo were the invaders of the camp. Nobody could quite tell what the two teens resented about the FBI exactly. In fact, it wasn't until morning that it became entirely clear why those two kids were there in the camp.

"What do you mean they have come to take the bones and the ship? They are two kids? Mere teenagers. You said so yourself." Professor Pratte anxiously paced the silver trailer floor the next morning.

Most of their student excavators were up and having breakfast. At Prof. Pratte's request, the college students had invited Zormna and Jafarr to eat with them - mostly to keep the pair occupied while he and his cohorts talked privately with the FBI.

"Those bones are of their countryman. And that ship, technically, is theirs," Agent Sicamore admitted wearily. "Actually, they belong to the girl. The Boy is merely playing her bodyguard. However, both children are highly dangerous."

Professor Dumas blinked, shuddering in a breath. "How are they dangerous? In what way?"

The FBI agent shook his head. "I wish I could tell you the details, but I can't. We are part of a top secret operation handling the intrusion of their kind within our populace. The main reason we came here was to collect any incriminating evidence before they got to them."

Looking sharply back toward the camp, Professor Pratte drew in a breath.

"Those two are part of a clandestine organization bent on keeping the U.S. government in check. She is a soldier." Seeing both professors' looks, Agent Sicamore repeated, "Yes, a soldier. But we cannot reveal any more information about her at this juncture. But he is a fugitive, a rebel so to speak. And he has a network of spies that puts the CIA to shame."

Going pale, Professor Dumas swallowed. "What should we do?"

Professor Pratte looked at him with a stricken nod. Neither of them could conceive of what was just happening. Ancient aliens he believed in. But he never imagined them to look so human.

"I think the best course of action would be to bar them from the site and keep them from the ship - possibly giving us time to create fakes, at least of the bones." Agent Sicamore eyed each professor carefully. "To be open with you, we already have in our possession an article of their alien machinery, which they had tried to take from us earlier, but failed. And they have subverted our investigations repeatedly. And though I have no doubts they are not able to remove the buried ship from this location - not by themselves - they probably will want to look at the ship. But having said that, let's plan for the worst anyway. Just in case."

Both Professor Pratte and Dumas nodded, sharing looks.

"Pass the sausage," Jafarr said, waving over his fork hand. It was rather nice of them to offer a free breakfast - even if he knew it was meant to distract them. He had already guessed that was the purpose of the meal, but Jafarr was really getting sick of only eating granola bars, even if Zormna wasn't.

A girl with brown eyes and a pinkish complexion smiled shyly and handed the paper plate over to Jafarr. Zormna reached over and took one as well, munching silently while peeking looks at the FBI trailer.

"Don't let it bother you, Zormna," Jafarr said, helping himself to two more sausages. "I'm sure you can guess the conversation without being there - 'They're a threat, blah, blah, blah, blah...She's a soldier, blah, blah, blah, blah...He's holding the U.S. government with his secret evil friends, blah, blah, blah...' I'm sure it's nothing to worry about."

The eyes of the watching college students had gone wider as they listened to the two exchange what almost could be called banter and yet sounded a lot like bickering, especially from her. But Professor Pratte had told them to humor the two for at least that one breakfast. But even as they were invited, it grew obvious these two were one up on the entire scheme and had decided to play them for all they were worth.

"More sausages, please," Jafarr said, grinning.

Kyle glared at him, joined by the three men from the day before, but they handed over the plate anyway. It was all for science, after all.  

"You know, Jafarr, you're going to make yourself sick if you eat all those," Zormna commented, peering over at Jafarr's full plate as she ate from her