Jio was jolted awake by the connection of Ruby's foot kicking his side, disgruntled he pulled himself up from where he'd been sleeping and brushed off the sand that was now covering him. He then turned to look at Ruby; angry.

"What was that for?" he asked, grabbing a handful of sand off the ground and throwing it at her in agitation.

"Hey! I was doing you a favour by waking you up!" she replied as she shook out a cover causing all the sand to go in Jio's eyes.

"That doesn't mean you had to kick me!" he said, ripping the map she was now holding out of her grasp and throwing it on the ground to try and get one up on her. Unfortunately though, doing this was not the best of ideas as it was windy in the desert, which of course resulted in the map being blown away almost instantaneously. Jio did attempt to go after it but unfortunately it was too late.

Jio turned around reluctantly already feeling Ruby's angry gaze upon him.

"Come on its not that bad, we still have the compass so we should be able to vaguely follow the same direction" he said, not hearing the crunching sound as he stepped on something.

"Jio" she said, her voice now shaking with anger "Do you know what your stupid foot is now standing on?" she asked as she watched him take a step backwards; he'd been standing on their now broken compass 'crap' was all he could think as he saw the scattered pieces slowly sink into the sand.

"Hey come on you can't seriously blame me for that, can you, after all you are the one who left it on the ground"

"So you're now blaming me?" she asked incredulously "Well at least I didn't lose the map!"

"You know that was an accident!"

"And then you stand on the compass straight after? Come on Jio as if I'd believe in such convenient co-incidences!"

"How is that convenient? I'm just as lost as you are!" he exclaimed irritably "It's not like I have some magic skill that lets me know which direction to go in!"

"Fine then, I guess it doesn't matter that much…"

"Really you know a way to do that?"

"Well how do you remember which way north is?" she asked smiling.

"Its never eat shredded wheat or something right? Oh I get it! So that means that forward is north, right s left and-"

"Forget it" she said cutting him off "You're obviously a complete idiot, what I actually meant was that the sun rises in the west and it sets in the east, so that means that from that we can work out north"

"I see…" he said, not really sure if this theory was correct since he'd thought the sun rose in the east and set in the west, however he didn't say anything; not wanting to upset Ruby any further and maybe trying to avoid something else.

Anyway what resulted was that they continued moving in a direction Ruby was certain had to be south.

"Hey Ruby, didn't you say that we should be approaching a town by now?" asked Jio as they slowly traipsed through the sand, sweating under the hot sun after having now been walking for several hours "the waters running out too and I don't really think you'll be able to take much more of this" he added, noticing how Ruby's breath as now coming out in short and heavy gasps.

"I'm fine Jio" she said stubbornly "And today we haven't been walking for nearly as long as we did yesterday" he'd agree with that, though he difficulty today was probably the result of having over exerted herself the day before.

"Whatever" he said as he put up a hand to his forehead to scan the horizon "but there are some people heading this way"

"Really?" she asked "I can't see anyone, what do they look like?" she asked sounding painfully hopeful as she waited for their description.

Alas all Jio could do was disappoint as he quickly informed her that there was a shorty in a red coat and a freak wearing a suit of amour. He could only wonder how the big guy could survive the heat in such a thing.

It was a few minutes later that the two parties joined up; it was the big guy who decided to speak first.

"Um, you two don't happen to know where we could find the city of Reol?" the shorter one leaned across to his companion and though he probably meant it to be just a whisper all of them could hear him very clearly.

"I already told you Al, there's no need for us to ask directions!"

"Stop being so stubborn brother, we've been heading south the whole day! We should have reached it by now" at this statement Ruby and Jio felt a sudden feeling of nervousness over come them.

"Excuse me you too but did you happen to say you were travelling south? Are you completely sure about that?" asked Ruby. The blonde looked at them quizzically.

"Of course , it's easy to work out, even without a map all you need to know is that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west" he took in their downfallen expressions for a moment then let out a smug smile "Come on Al" said the shorty still grinning "these guys won't be able to help us, they don't even know which way is north!" the two strangers then left, leaving Jio and Ruby completely lost for words.

Fed up, they decided they deserved a rest.

"So what are we going to do?" he asked solemnly "We can't really keep going now can we? Since you made that stupid mistake" he added, unable to stop himself.

"Well maybe if someone hadn't stepped on the compass and lost our map we wouldn't be in this mess at all!" she huffed, laying back onto the sand, not thinking about how she'd get covered in sand "And yes I think we'll have to keep going forward, if we keep heading straight the way we've been going then we'll eventually have to hit a town"

"I guess that's better than nothing but we probably won't be able to go much further than this anyway, right Ruby?" he said smiling deviously, causing Ruby to frown.

"And what do you mean by that?" she asked crossly, folding her arms across her chest as she picked herself up to sit cross legged on the sand.

"Nothing" he said feigning innocence "But do we really have to keep moving today?" he added a mischievous smile now working it's way across his face.

"Yes, we need to cover as much ground as possible so we can start heading along the right course, once we find a village we can get a map and then start heading south again"

"So we should get moving now?" he asked, his grin widening sill further.

"Pretty much" they both stood up and picked up their bags "Hey Jio! What are you doing!?" she asked frantically, blushing when she felt his arms wrap around her waist.

"Picking you up" he said, before pulling her off the ground and swinging her onto his shoulder into a firemen's lift.

"Put me down now!" she screamed irritably.

"No" he said, clearly enjoying himself as he began to move forward again across the desert, though they were now moving more slowly since he was carrying Ruby.

"Seriously just let me go Jio, there's no point in this; I can walk fine on my own!" If wouldn't have killed his neck he would have probably raised a sceptical eyebrow but instead he laughed.

"What's so funny?" she asked with annoyance.

"You are" he replied, laughter still clear in his voice.

"Honest to God Jio if you don't let me down right now I'm going to activate my O.P.T!"

While these two friends squabbled there was an entirely different argument going on not that far away. It seemed that Cross had found himself a stalker.

"How many times have I told you to stop following me?" he asked, irritated as Anna followed him from behind.

"Well I'd walk besides you if I could keep up, honestly this desert is too much for me!" she complained, fanning herself with her hand.

"Then you should stay home where its safe, I don't want to be responsible if you get hurt" Anna seemed to ignore his comment though, having noticed someone approaching.

"Hey I see someone over there! It looks like they're carrying someone!" Cross looked in the direction she was pointing and saw the figure.

"I can't tell who they are though; I wonder what kind of crazy person would travel alone in the desert"

"Yeah" said Anna bitterly "I wonder"

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Lots of thanks to neospice and the reviewers for encouraging me! I've finally released a chapter after so many months. I hope you all have a happy new year!

And YES! I was so happy that I was able to use the word alas! I wonder if anyone noticed anything particularly interesting in this chapter? :]