Redsand Canyon Heartbeat

The sound of her own heartbeat was almost deafening. She hated it.

She wandered the canyon in search of something to take her mind off the horrid sound, the way it pumped and soundly kept her awake for the night. She wanted nothing more but sleep right now, but the veteran was too occupied with the sound of her own heart. Pump, pump, pump. The more she heard it the faster it went. She growled out loud and began running in the sand. No other goal but to find water for her to drink. She needed it to slow down her now racing heartbeat. The sound irritated her ears, and she pinned her ears back toward her skull.

When she finally found water, she collapsed at the edge of it. She panted and gasped not realizing how fast and hard she had run already in deep sand. She panted and her heart felt like it was going to burst out of her chest any minute now, like it would pop out of place and stop beating.

”STOP!” She growled again and kept panting before crawling toward the water and drinking. She couldn’t lift herself from the waters, so her chest and forelegs became wet and drenched in water. She was shaking. Not sure why, she began dragging herself into the water to cool off. When she came back to the surface and crawled onto land again, she stayed on her side. The panting had subsided, everything seemed to go back to normal. For now.