After Earth's Fall | ✔ UNDERGOING CONSTRUCTION

~*~

As Nila strolls through Sanctuary Beach, (as she prefers to call her new home) all she can hear is silence. Though, this time it feels different. Despair and grief no longer hangs in the air but determination and teamwork. Around her, people are getting to work on building huts and tents for others to take shelter in during night-time because unfortunately, the tiny cave Nila and the rest of the trio found, isn't going to be large enough to fit a population of about three-hundred. A sense of melancholy and sorrow washes over her when she passes by two shabby crosses made from twigs and vines looming over two graves. Those graves hold the bodies of her two deceased friends. Have they already started decaying? In the afterlife, are Anna and Brice resting peacefully? Are they watching over them, rolling in their graves as Miss Chaucer's greed continues? These thoughts make Nila's stomach do loop 'd loops. However, a sweet-like-honey voice interrupts Nila's train of thought.

"Hey, Nila!" Kaitlyn yells and beckons her over with a wave of her hand, earning a smile of acknowledgment from Nila. After what seems like forever, trudging through the uneven sandy terrain of the beach up to the cave Nila catches sight of a table, made from slabs of flat rock with a humongous peace of paper scrolled over it. Actually, Nila's pretty sure it's a blue-print. Meanwhile, Naite works with his back turned on piling some sort of dusty mineral into individual cans.

"Lucas, I have no idea what we'd do without you!" Friday exclaims with a laugh.

Naite joins in as well, turns around and slides his arm around Lucas', (Sanctuary's chef) shoulders. "Mate, you are a bloody legend," he says and pokes the big guy in the chest.

"What's going on?" Nila asks.

"Lucas has lent us a hand with his arty-crafty stuff and made these smoke grenades," Riley explains and Lucas, throws Nila what seems to be a dark green and black painted soft drink can with a random piece of string drooping over one side of it. The girl almost feels the instinct to duck but quickly reminds herself to take note that it's not really a grenade.

Nila fiddles with the can in her hands, which gives her a sense of achievement. Things are finally starting to happen, giving her a sense of purpose, of meaning, of righteousness. "Cool. How'd you make it?"

"The ingredients are potassium nitrate which is this white crystallised substance you see here," Lucas takes a moment to turn behind him and pick up a small shard of a almost opaque, misty-white coloured crystal. "This could be found on some areas on the cave walls, sugar, baking soda and Janette's blue crayons out of her collection she swiped from the bunker before it fell. Friday insisted we do blue in mockery of Eden. Janette wasn't too happy about this but I offered her a job and a clipboard and that was good enough."

"What kind of job?" Riley asks, whose now relocated from the other side of the cave to lean himself against the wall besides Nila.

"She's our 'Movement Manager' and her job is basically to stroll about Sanctuary beach and boss people around. She seems pretty satisfied," Lucas explains with a shrug of his broad shoulders.

"But hold up for a second. What's the plan in all this?" Nila asks in a sceptical tone.

This time, Friday who was looming over the desk like a hunchback, studying the blue-print finally joins in the conversation. "You know how I said we wouldn't be a match against Eden? They are the only population in the world other than us and we're minuscule. But in order to stand a fighting chance, we need weapons and Eden, they have heaps and quite advanced ones at that. Which is quite ironic considering Miss Chaucer considers Eden a "peaceful society". Since the armoury is smack-bang in the middle of Eden's main sector, we're going to have to infiltrate straight into Eden unnoticed. But that's inevitable, which is why Lucas has created these smoke grenades to "hide" us from Eden's surveillance system. The armoury is usually filled with guards, so, and this is the hard part, whenever you spot a guard, let off one of these smoke grenades and take the guard out. Oh and Nila, we found that bottle of Ether you had on you yesterday, it can be used to knock out the guards as well."