Calm and Calamity

Chapter 27

"Will you require anything, my dear?" Ivette asked. "Any building materials or tools?"

"Thank you, but I think I've already got everything I need."

"Are you really planning on building a house all by yourself?" Sumit raised an eyebrow, both of doubt and admiration.

"Yes!" Corinna said, putting her hands on her hips.

"Have you made one before?"

"I've helped build parts of a house before," Corinna hesitated. "Haven't made a full one by myself, but I've got plenty of time to learn, fourteen years in fact." She forced a laugh. "At least I won't have to worry about any electrical wiring, maybe a bit of plumbing..."

"Plumbing?"

"Well, I say plumbing, but really it'll just be a basic toilet or rather a glorified hole in the ground."

"A bog-standard toilet!" Sumit grinned.

Everyone glared at him in silence.

"Anyway," continued Corinna. "I'm gonna start working on it in a couple of days after I've finished the improvements on the irrigation system."

Harmony's hand shot up. "I want to help build the house!"

"As do I," added Calixte.

"You do?" asked Corinna. "Well, there will be lots of bricks to be made. I've found the perfect building spot too."

"I bet you've already made the whole floor plan too," chuckled Harmony.

Corinna showed the diagram in her red notebook and beamed. "Yep!"

Day: 430

Harmony woke up earlier than usual on the anticipated day, excited to be helping Corinna with her new project. Though Harmony enjoyed dancing and hanging out with Calixte as he played the piano at the Land of the Lost, doing the same thing every day was starting to become boring.

As she got out of bed, Harmony noticed that the other side was empty.

Corinna was gone.

Sighing, Harming got washed and dressed, then headed outside, knowing exactly where Corinna would be.

Eventually, she arrived at the spot which Corinna had chosen for the building site. It was situated near the edge of the desert where the ground was solid and strong enough for construction as well as being a good walking distance from the Land of the Lost, Ivette's Trading Post, and the Food Drop-Off area.

Crouched down, a young woman with golden blonde hair and numerous freckles was digging a hole. Drawn in the sand was an outline of a house floor plan, and beside it was a wheelbarrow full of tools and materials.

"Morning!" Harmony called out.

Startled, Corinna gasped and almost dropped the shovel. "Harmony!" She turned around then looked down at the ground in guilt. "Good morning..."

Harmony crossed her arms. "I thought we were going to work on this together?"

Corinna bit her bottom lip. "I... I couldn't sleep last night. I had to begin right away!"

Chuckling, Harmony took the shovel from Corinna. "We making bricks?"

"Yes!" Corinna nodded. "But I don't think I brought enough water. We'll have to make several trips. I'm gonna make a rain catcher too which should help; hopefully, it'll rain soon. But in the meantime, we'll have to travel back and forth from our place."

Harmony transformed into her chimaera form, donning her black jackal mask, allowing her to dig with far more strength and endurance than when she was human. The hole was filled with a bucket of water and Corinna and Harmony stomped it in to create mud. As they moulded the mud into bricks, Sumit arrived.