Zarlum stories - episode 001 - The fall of Zarlum

part 28 awake again

Powder was still asleep.
She was walking in a forest and the leaves seemed to be glowing green on every tree it looked enchanted. As she walked she strangely started hearing an echo in her dreams getting louder and louder but wasn't ready to leave the magic land she was walking through. Powder felt herself shaking like she was in a tornado and awoke her arm darting to her sword like a homing beacon pointing it at what was shaking her. Raven raised her arms in surrender "hey whoa, it's me, it's me!" Powder lowered the sword breathing deep. Powder pushed her covers off herself dropping the sword to the ground with a clatter. They went to the wooden showers. Powder poured water into both the funnels that would feed the water through the shower. Powder laughed Raven frowned grabbing towels "what?" "You know when I first built this I had the idea of just using elephants, and they would fill their like trunks full of water and spit it at us, but we didn't have any elephants" Raven laughed "like the flint stones" Powder frowned "it's Flin" "what do you mean?" "It's the Flin... stones, not the flint stones" "no I'm telling you it's flint because they're cave people, so they would use flint" "fair enough makes sense I just remember it as Flin for some reason" "weird" she only knew what it was because when she lived with her mother she had a TV, and they were able to find some disks one of which being the flint stones.
They opened the shower's door.
They locked them behind themselves then threw their clothes over the walls into buckets and started the showers taking a 3-minute shower just to clean themselves. They then wrapped towels around themselves stepping out and grabbing the clothes on their bed. Powder turned seeing that Raven was looking at her. She tried to conceal a smile then went to her changing around pulling the curtain back. Powder pulled her curtain back stepping out seeing Raven was wearing a dark green short-sleeved shirt with black leather trousers. She had also tied her red hair back in a tight bun. They went down the ladder. They saw Magpie in the same spot as they left her staring at the door, Raven clicked in front of her which seemed to shake her out of her trance. She placed her gun on the table turning to them "sleep well?" "Yeah very well. How was your night?" "Boring, I've been awake for such a long time I don't even get tired any more but now and again I feel tired but can't do anything about it" Raven sat down grabbing her note pad "so how do you get your energy back" "I don't know, I never seem to lose my energy I just always have it, that's just how the curse works I guess... I think it's a curse I don't know what it is, I've been spending maybe hundreds of life times trying to work out what this curse is and how it works" Raven asked "how much have you learned?" "Well let me think; fuck all. It's kind of difficult when you eventually forget everything you learn" Powder sat down looking confused "do you not know how this happened to you?" "No, I have no idea, I don't really remember" Raven asked "how do you get through nights sitting there for hours?" "I daydream for hours and hours and hours until eventually you snap me out of it" Powder grabbed her cooking pan "what do you daydream about?" she shrugged "I don't know" she frowned "what do you mean?" "Well I'm in the daydream then when I come back out of it my memory just disappears it could be the memories of my past coming back, and I'm just running through them, but I can't remember" Raven asked "so when you were on my own how did you come out of it without someone snapping you out of it" Magpie sat up slightly "I didn't, I just stayed conscious all the time. I only do it with you because I just... want some peace, it's just easier you know" Powder grabbed some bacon and eggs beginning to cook them. She then got bread and started toasting it with the fire just simply placing them on the grill flipping them after a few minutes. She thought that cooking the eggs and the bacon in the same pan was a bad idea, but it didn't matter they were going into the same bodies, so it didn't matter. Powder served them up and gave Raven her plate "thank you" "you're welcome" she handed her a knife and fork wrapped in a napkin. Raven unwrapped them and began to eat while Powder put her eggs and bacon inside the toast making a sandwich. They ate and spoke about the day and what they were going to do before they leave.
When they were done.
Powder wiped her mouth with her napkin "I don't care what anyone says it's not possible to eat a bacon and egg sandwich without making at least a little mess" Raven and Powder went over to the food supply drawers. Powder opened the cupboard moving water jugs out the way grabbing out 6 large coolers which would keep their food nice and fresh. Raven opened one of the drawers her notepad ready "okay, so I am going to fill the coolers with a good deal of food, counting everything on my notebook then when it's full I will rip the page off and place it on top so when you open the box you just have to pick up the piece of paper and know what's in it without having to look through it and mess up the neatness" Powder bent down looking in the cooler "okay I think we should put the potatoes and veg on the bottom then the meat wrapped up with foil on top then the eggs on top of everything" Raven nodded and started loading the boxes while writing everything in the boxes. Once she was done with one of the boxes, she would seal it then take it outside putting it outside the truck ready to be loaded then do the whole thing again. Magpie was helping look through the stuff to make sure it was all in good condition and throwing away anything that was mouldy and horrible. Powder was planning on how to get the water they needed and get it back to the cabin.
After an hour.
4 of the 6 boxes were full and another was half full so just enough for the stuff Raven was about to Harvest. She grabbed her spade and a wheelbarrow. However, she was struggling to tie the back of her apron. Powder got up going to her seeing she was getting frustrated, she tied the apron with a cute bow. Raven thanked her then threw on her gardening gloves. She opened the door to the greenhouse moving her wheelbarrow inside the room then grabbed the coolers it would be easier to put the food inside the cooler than taking the wheelbarrow back and forth. Raven then grabbed her normal bucket however that time she filled it with water placing it next to the wheelbarrow. She grabbed her fork and spade beginning to dug up all the potatoes. When she had got all of them she threw the plants in the corner and started looking through the potatoes in the wheelbarrow feeling them if they were rotting then she would throw them in the pile with the plants. She would take the ones left over washing the dirt off them in the bucket then placing them in the cooler neatly writing how many she was doing. Once she was done with the potatoes she did the carrots, onions, cabbage, leaks and tomatoes. She threw all the plants in the corner with the others checked the condition washed them then placed them in the cooler. When she was finished. She picked up the cooler and bought it to the door looking back at the now empty room. She had just harvested all her hard work, she nodded then left the room placing the box outside with the others.
Meanwhile,
Magpie and Powder went into the chicken room and took the eggs from the coup. They then opened them, so they could walk through the chicken room freely. Powder checked they were all going out "okay, so we're just setting them free" "at least they won't be making the loudest sounds now waking up each other making louder noises" said Magpie holding the eggs "it makes no difference we're not living here" "I somehow keep forgetting that" "I have to keep telling myself that" "did we ever name these chickens?" Powder shook her head "no, no we didn't I decided not to get attached to them in case they died which of course a lot of them did so, I did get sad, but I think it would've been worse if I had named them... they also all look the same, so I would never be able to tell them apart"