Ooh, rattlesnakes! There's a good idea! Maybe the hooting creatures keep them as pets, or... guardsnakes? That's a thing, right?
I've seen a couple of comments this morning along the lines of "this should have been a landslide", "I think much of America is disappointed with how close this has been", and "America is better than this." The problem is that America isn't better than this, and the election is clear proof. And, sadly, if you'd asked beforehand I'd have told you I thought it would be closer than it is and refused to say that Trump wouldn't win. Because I think the same people who voted for him the first time round are still voting for him.
Rattles "Leave it," I said with emotion in my voice. "Let's not go poking rattler nests." "Yeah," said Ben after a moment, just a touch too much hesitation for me to be happy with. "Might be best not to poke anything round these parts that rattles. You worked out where that key is for?" "I think so," I said. "There's a couple of empty places, but maybe they've looted some of them clean already. This looks like it should be over here, north-east of us, near the river still. It looks like a fairly big building, and circular." "Circular?" Jimmy leaned over my shoulder. "Odd. Most of these buildings are rectangles." We all looked at the map and saw that he was right; the buildings were mostly rectangular and the roads were largely horizontal and vertical, with more diagonal roads in the centre and some curving ones at the out edges. "Granary, maybe?" said Ben. "They tend to be round for some reason." "Could be a windmill then," I said nodding. "Wonder what could be in a windmill that would interest the good dead folk of Elizabethtown." "I wonder what you could put in there that you'd want to lock up," said Jimmy. "Seems like you'd be hiding something where no-one would expect it." "That's a good point," said Ben, cheering up. "That's definitely something Red would do." I started to protest my innocence and defend my good name, but Ben and Jimmy were already half-way out of the door and discussing everything else they thought I'd do, or at least admit to doing, so I just shook my head softly, checked that the key in the dark area of the map was still there, and followed them. We walked along the river, though I thought it might be quicker to go through the city. However, I was sure we were looking for a round building near the river, and this seemed like the best way not to miss it. We walked past several more low buildings, two stories at most, with external staircases that made me wonder why they were never internal. It suggested that it didn't rain much here, but the plant-life seemed to go in the other direction. Unless they all drew water from the river, in which case I wondered how solid the ground really was. Then Ben stopped and asked if we'd come far enough yet, and I stopped and looked around thinking that he was probably right. We looked up in all directions, but there was no windmill, no tower, nothing circular to be seen. Then Jimmy snorted with laughter and pointed, and we looked, then we looked down. The circular structure that we'd come to find was a circus of some kind: a large circular plaza with statues at the compass points, a gold-fence, partly torn-down, around it, lots and lots of plants that crept and spread over the paving stones as though trying to consume the place. We might never had known what was here if the Elizabethtown folks hadn't found it first; they'd torn a path through the densest greenery and, just peeking through a mountain of foliage like a frozen green waterfall, was a door and a window. Somewhere at the centre was a small stone building. "Looks like this was mostly built underground," said Ben, smiling.
Greg - no, it is most definitely not a thing, thank you.
I've come around to this side of the argument. Perhaps in four years the country will have changed enough under stable leadership that the next election won't be so distressing. But the continued support for the outgoing idiot is as perplexing to me as the support he's received all along.
I'm glad they've left the key to the dark part of the map, for now at least. I'm not sure I'd put it past them to investigate that eventually. But this building seems like an interesting and worthy find, and I look forward to seeing what they discovery within.
2 comments:
Ooh, rattlesnakes! There's a good idea! Maybe the hooting creatures keep them as pets, or... guardsnakes? That's a thing, right?
I've seen a couple of comments this morning along the lines of "this should have been a landslide", "I think much of America is disappointed with how close this has been", and "America is better than this." The problem is that America isn't better than this, and the election is clear proof. And, sadly, if you'd asked beforehand I'd have told you I thought it would be closer than it is and refused to say that Trump wouldn't win. Because I think the same people who voted for him the first time round are still voting for him.
Rattles
"Leave it," I said with emotion in my voice. "Let's not go poking rattler nests."
"Yeah," said Ben after a moment, just a touch too much hesitation for me to be happy with. "Might be best not to poke anything round these parts that rattles. You worked out where that key is for?"
"I think so," I said. "There's a couple of empty places, but maybe they've looted some of them clean already. This looks like it should be over here, north-east of us, near the river still. It looks like a fairly big building, and circular."
"Circular?" Jimmy leaned over my shoulder. "Odd. Most of these buildings are rectangles."
We all looked at the map and saw that he was right; the buildings were mostly rectangular and the roads were largely horizontal and vertical, with more diagonal roads in the centre and some curving ones at the out edges.
"Granary, maybe?" said Ben. "They tend to be round for some reason."
"Could be a windmill then," I said nodding. "Wonder what could be in a windmill that would interest the good dead folk of Elizabethtown."
"I wonder what you could put in there that you'd want to lock up," said Jimmy. "Seems like you'd be hiding something where no-one would expect it."
"That's a good point," said Ben, cheering up. "That's definitely something Red would do."
I started to protest my innocence and defend my good name, but Ben and Jimmy were already half-way out of the door and discussing everything else they thought I'd do, or at least admit to doing, so I just shook my head softly, checked that the key in the dark area of the map was still there, and followed them.
We walked along the river, though I thought it might be quicker to go through the city. However, I was sure we were looking for a round building near the river, and this seemed like the best way not to miss it. We walked past several more low buildings, two stories at most, with external staircases that made me wonder why they were never internal. It suggested that it didn't rain much here, but the plant-life seemed to go in the other direction. Unless they all drew water from the river, in which case I wondered how solid the ground really was. Then Ben stopped and asked if we'd come far enough yet, and I stopped and looked around thinking that he was probably right. We looked up in all directions, but there was no windmill, no tower, nothing circular to be seen. Then Jimmy snorted with laughter and pointed, and we looked, then we looked down. The circular structure that we'd come to find was a circus of some kind: a large circular plaza with statues at the compass points, a gold-fence, partly torn-down, around it, lots and lots of plants that crept and spread over the paving stones as though trying to consume the place. We might never had known what was here if the Elizabethtown folks hadn't found it first; they'd torn a path through the densest greenery and, just peeking through a mountain of foliage like a frozen green waterfall, was a door and a window. Somewhere at the centre was a small stone building.
"Looks like this was mostly built underground," said Ben, smiling.
Greg - no, it is most definitely not a thing, thank you.
I've come around to this side of the argument. Perhaps in four years the country will have changed enough under stable leadership that the next election won't be so distressing. But the continued support for the outgoing idiot is as perplexing to me as the support he's received all along.
I'm glad they've left the key to the dark part of the map, for now at least. I'm not sure I'd put it past them to investigate that eventually. But this building seems like an interesting and worthy find, and I look forward to seeing what they discovery within.
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