127 lines
7.0 KiB
HTML
127 lines
7.0 KiB
HTML
<!DOCTYPE html><html><head><title> Erosion </title><link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="html_resources/style.css"></head><body><div class="back"><a href="index.html"><</a></div>
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<h1>Erosion</h1>
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<p>
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<span class="quote speech">Morning, Michelle!</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">Ugh.</span><br />
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She feels dizzy and her body is filled with a burning sensation.
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She stumbles forward, out of her preservation chamber, and sits down
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on the floor in front of it, putting her arms over her knees to rest
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her head.
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<br />
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<span class="quote speech">I'm gonna ... need a moment.</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">Water?</span><br />
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She raises her head and Jack hands her a glass. After taking a couple
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sips, she sets it down, unsure whether it helps or makes it worse, and
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rests her head again.<br />
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<span class="quote speech">Just let me sit here for a while.</span>
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</p>
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<p>
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A few minutes later, she lifts up her head again:<br />
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<span class="quote speech">What year is it? ... and what's our
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mission?</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">Twenty-one-oh-six. There is no explicit
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mission, uplink's dead.</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">You're kidding.</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">Nope.</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">How'd you get woken up then?</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">Technical failure. My preservation chamber
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died.</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">You survived that?</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">That was the least of my challenges.</span>
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<br />
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He chuckles and briefly tells her how he found himself trapped inside,
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that one of the computer's hard drives is broken, and how he turned
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to the dome city for help.
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</p>
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<p>
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Michelle's dizziness starts to go away and the burning sensation
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in her body begins to fade. She slowly gets up, takes a few cautious
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steps forward to the table, and leans on it.<br />
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<span class="quote speech">So? What now? Any plans?</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">I guess, for now, taking a look at the uplink.
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I wanna see if we can fix it.</span><br />
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Michelle thinks for a moment.<br />
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<span class="quote speech">Sounds good – but I don't feel
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quite ready for a hike like that.</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">Take your time, you just woke up.</span><br />
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She pulls back one of the chairs and sits down. Jack picks up her glass
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and sets it down on the table.<br />
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<span class="quote speech">Thanks.</span><br />
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She takes another sip.<br />
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<span class="quote speech">The people who helped you, do you think
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they'd help us with the uplink too?</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">Don't know, but they can't.
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They're stuck inside the dome city and need our help.</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">How? Even if the tunnels have collapsed,
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I can think of quite a few other ways to break out.</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">From what I know, they aren't physically
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trapped inside, the people in charge just don't want anyone to
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leave.</span><br />
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Jack sits down as well and retells everything that happened in detail,
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starting with his preservaton chamber breaking down. It takes him about
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an hour, including answering Michelles questions.
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</p>
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<p>
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<span class="quote speech">How have you been dealing with food?
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I imagine the stockpile was already pretty low?</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">Actually not, the others seem to have mostly
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hunted and foraged for themselves.</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">I wonder what they found to still be
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edible...</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">Speaking of food, I got leftover baked
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potatoes. Want some?</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">Now that you ask, I'm slowly getting
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hungry. Did you make your usual spicy dip?</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">Yup.</span><br />
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He gets up and walks over to the kitchen area, grabs a small bowl filled
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with a dark red-ish paste, and sets it on the table.<br />
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<span class="quote speech">I had to improvise a little because of
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a distinct lack of fresh ingredients but I think it still turned out
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pretty good.</span><br />
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<span class="quote speech">Oh wow, that looks almost kinda scary.</span>
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<br />
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<span class="quote speech">The flakes they left us just aren't
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the same as fresh peppers. I had to add <i>a lot</i> to get even close
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to the usual spiciness.</span><br />
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He grabs the <span class="comment">Backblech?</span> with potatoes
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and puts it back in the oven to re-heat them.
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</p>
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<p>
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After the meal, they step outside and Michelle gets her first look
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around.<br />
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<span class="quote speech">Oddly familiar, and yet so different.</span>
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<br />
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<span class="comment">the scene where Jack opens the door should
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have a short description of the lay of the lands</span><br />
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The two decide to walk up to a <span class="comment">crest? ridge?</span>
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not far from them on the other side of the valley. Beyond it is Ivydale,
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once a large city housing just over a million people – only one of
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<span class="comment">who? whom? which?</span> remains to behold its
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overgrown ruins.
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<br />
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Michelle says: <span class="quote speech">I mean I knew it already but
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seeing it like this just hits differently.</span><br />
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</p>
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<p>
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<span class="comment">ToDo: tie this back together</span><br />
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Following what remains of an old path, the two start making their way up
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the mountain above the bunker. The path is narrow and winded, overgrown,
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and has partially disappeared. Jack walks ahead, only half following it,
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half making it up as he goes. Michelle struggles to follow, slowly
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falling behind. After a while, he stops abruptly, looking down at
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something, then up, then down again. Then, he turns to Michelle who is
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just catching up and says:
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<span class="quote speech">Well, that could be a reason why
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the uplink is down – it literally <i>is down</i>...</span>.
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Michelle reaches the edge and and sees what Jack had stopped for:
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A large <span class="comment">ravine? wash?</span> extends towards the
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top of the mountain where a landslide had left nothing but a cliff and
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a huge pile of rubble. At the top of the mountain, teetering on the
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edge, are two buildings – all that's left of the ground
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station. The rest of the buildings and the dish lay strewn around
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in pieces down below.
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</p>
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<p class="copyright">Copyright © 2023 Jan Danielzick (aka. BodgeMaster) – All rights reserved.</p><script>let spans = ["<span class=\"paper green\">", "<span>"]; let pre_texts = document.getElementsByTagName("pre"); for (let i = 0; i < pre_texts.length; i++) {if (pre_texts[i].className != "paper") continue; let lines = pre_texts[i].innerHTML.split("\n"); let result = ""; for (let j = 0; j < lines.length; j++) {result = result + spans[j%2] + lines[j] + " ".repeat(80-lines[j].length) + "</span>\n";} pre_texts[i].innerHTML = result;}</script></body></html>
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