Ways of Stone, Wood, and Water

    It's a lovely day in the main camp. Well, perhaps it is best to call it early evening. The light has started to fade. It is cool, but not yet cold here. Back in the mountains, the chill must be growing, but down here things remain comfortable enough. And there is much work being done. The last surveys are being gathered and composed into one great map. Shiruba's contributions to this effort have been critical, as have others. The output is a series of maps, some that fit together, some that are focused on locations of great interest, and one that is a sprawling, enormous piece that shows the entire current holdings of Arcadia.

    Elly is musing over these maps. She is most interested, though, in the maps for the shore, where a deep water harbor sits, practically begging for someone to come along and put it to use.

    "It seems that the patience of the Olympus Alliance has been rewarded. At long last, the shipyard may be built. And with that, a fleet may come."

    With a grin, she glides her finger down the map and taps on another space, some two or three miles south. "And here, not far at all, lies the perfect place for our resort town. Sandy beaches with a natural breakwater to calm the waves slightly."

    She may be talking to herself. Or she may be talking to someone who just arrived.

Goldenblade rides into the camp on her horse, a not-particularly feisty mare. It's old and docile, and perfect for Goldenblade, who for all her skills, has zero skill at riding. Horses are famously neither as swift or as agile as the two-legged pekos. But Goldenblade has said repeatedly that she feels like an idiot on one of those things, and won't ride them, accepting the inferior characteristics with a shrug. She's supposed to be off in the east, developing reinforced concrete at Olympus's Iron Mine site, so what she is doing here is a mystery.

She hops off the horse, she's at least agile enough to land OK, and she can hand the lead over to a groom, who boggles at the unusual animal, while Goldenblade makes her way over to Wake. "Patience, my ass," she begins the conversation with that shouted greeting. "I'm burning patience and not getting any support. You want reinforced concrete or not?" she demands.

    The abrupt entry of Goldenblade may shock some. The rather rough language, too, could arch several eyebrows. But Elly just turns and laughs. "Well, what do you need for that?" she asks. "I would love reinforced concrete! It sounds like a good material to build things with. And might even help us be safe in the event of earthquakes, and I believe that's also the right thing to use for tsunami walls."

    Simply put, Elly is not ruffled by Goldenblade's apparent frustration. She just accepts it for what it is. And focuses on the solution first.

    "I know we just did some work on rebar. We just need to get a lot of it and figure out the rest. I have plenty of resources I can throw at the work, once we have the specifics."

Miho is looking a bit of a mess while she's finished up a strange mood? She's busy forging a pair of weapons for herself and is just here on a short respite to keep sanity. Also the idea of a lake is a nice one too her.

"I'm going to be so busy with that and rolling in coin." She wag he tail a bit but Wake would notice she's only ever seen Miho in three outfits, her work one, her beach and the one combat outit. The lzard girl has no real real wardrobe at all, and this has gone on for years. Wake really could get it into her head to do something about that.

"Golden blade! Wake Hey! WAit do you need help with something?! Goldenblade!? Also hello Wake!"

    Elly turns to Miho and grins. "Well, hopefully my treasury can afford to keep you funded, then," she says. A pause as she looks over Miho. "Hmm, is there something different about you, Miho? Different clothes? Change your hair a bit, maybe?"

    And there is that question! So many ask Wake that question. What help does she need. "Well, we can always use a lot more steel. Or... Goldenblade, what kind of metals do we need next? Alunimum? What does it take to make an advanced ocean vessel?"

Goldenblade is one of those people, common in the older generations, that never got used to sitting still in front of the TV being entertained. She's always working on something, training, building, or crafting, she stays quite busy when she can help it, as Elly knows from their long association. "I sent word a week and a half ago that I'd worked out how to make high-tensile steel, for rebar, for the reinforced concrete," she explains. "And now we need to set up a factory," in the older, medieval sense of a place where craftspeople gather with traders, "but I sent a request ten days ago, and I've got a sum total of silence." Goldenblade cooling her heels /for a week and a half/ certainly explains her mood.

"For an advanced ocean vessel? Not aluminum," she laughs. "You're too young to remember the Falklands conflict, I think? An aluminum ship burned to the waterline, and the remaining hull sank, burning underwater until it was on the bottom of the ocean. Aluminum burns so hot that you can't put it out, and water doesn't even slow it down. So, metal? Steel, in the formula I worked out, so we can use it to make rebar, so we can build whatever it is you want built of reinforced concrete."

Miho gets a look, but she says, "Sure, your help would be welcome. Can you get my passle of craftspeople organized into an assembly line?"

Miho looks over to Wake for a moment and pauses "huh what I'm a bit messy I was really foucsed on a spring hammer. Thinking about that gives me flashbacks to thinking about the Imperial Navy." Gien all their logistical issues in the second world war. "We'll have to think ahead a lot on that. As for clothes umm I haven't in a while is it that showing?!"

She looks to Goldenblade and she grins "Why yes i can given Grandma did that for our family."

Miho has walked right into an ambush.

    Goldenblade's question is a good one. "I fear it is my fault, honestly. I fear that the survey was the main problem. And trying to lay out the future site for the Carpenter's Union. That work is done, and I will get my people heading to the site for the construction factory now. I imagine we need the usual mix? A lot of miners and general laborers who are good at following instructions properly is what we need, yes? And likely a lot of grunties and drivers and wagons equipped to move heavy weights." A pause to think of just how much of this is desired. "You know, it comes to my attention that we should consider using Haru's hybrid engine to make a train of our own."

    Elly grins when Goldenblade corrects her about aluminum. "I was alive, but rather young at the time of the Falklands, honestly. It was studied only briefly in my training. We focused heavily on insurgencies and due to my assignments, Korea, Vietnam, China, and Russia were my main focus." She looks down, raising a finger to tap on her lip as she thinks. "We will worry about the ships after we build the... oh wow, I bet you will be able to make the most breathtaking bridges! And cities. Though I want to avoid concrete jungles like New York and Tokyo. I'd rather have cities that maintain more than just a few hints of natural spaces."

    Turning to Miho, "I see. That is it. The difference about you is that you have not changed anything." Elly grins, "Which means it falls to me, then, to help you. As you help Goldenblade with that assembly line."

Goldenblade smiles to Miho and is mollified about the delay in getting workers out to the mines. If they were busy here, there's not much that can be done. She nods about the mix of workers, and says, "Trains like Scale has in the Tower would be very useful for transporting large amounts of heavy goods crossland." She nods as Elly mentions other conflicts, and says, "It sounds like you studied them as conflicts, rather than just reading about them in the newspaper. You got the digest version with the major facts. I read it in the newspaper, event by event. In Japanese, mind, this was in, what, '81? But I remembered that detail because we stopped using aluminum in buildings after that."

As far as avoiding concrete jungles, she says, "That's what progress is about. Building buildings that last forever, so they don't collapse after a hundred or two hundred years with woodrot or some earthquake."

Miho shudders at the mention of tokyo. "For the love of all the gods let us not make a concrete hellscrpe where people are packed like corpses in a graveyard." She shudder again.

"Or the hell of aluminum for /wires/." She notes and the then looks at Wake again "Wait wait what do you mean about that!?!"

    "I feel like we want the concrete first, to help us build the railway. But when we build the road, do you think we could also lay the foundation for rail, or would that likely cause a lot of extra effort? Mind you I imagine we'll need considerable space between the road and the rail. All our animals may get spooked by a locomotive. Especially the pekos."

    Full disclosure, Elly is not sure if pekos have more issues with getting spooked, but she knows how her friend views the creature, and while Elly does ride a peko, she views the creature a bit nervously. She doesn't trust birds that do not fly.

    "From our perspective, the conflicts were a matter of gathering intelligence, creating insurgencies to avoid direct conflict, and control the flow of information. Granted, the Falklands situation is not something I necessarily blame on anyone. Colonial complications lead to these things. We treated history as both a matter of serious study and tempering. Later, when I would guest lecture, I found it especially valuable to convey what happened when we made mistakes. People died. Opportunities pursued before their time might never arise again." She sighs softly. There is something there. But she does not share it.

    "So yes, good buildings, but great city design focused on walking, not riding."

    As Miho senses her danger, Elly smiles warmly. "Nothing to worry about, Miho. I think it is important to look your best, and you have worked very hard lately. In appreciation for all your effort, you simply must allow me to provide you with a token of my appreciation." It's Elly, though, not Morri. It is going to be tasteful.

Goldenblade has zero problem with concrete jungles, it seems. She -was- a bricklayer, she built modern buildings rather than historical ones. But bridges, she can do as well. "The high-tensile steel will probably be invaluable for bridges, also," she suggests. "Is there a map of Fourland around?" she calls, and this being Wake's HQ, one is quickly brought over. Goldenblade will point to the mine. "If we build due east, we come to the Lake about 2/3 of the way to Eas. Or to the new area. There's your spot for a big bridge, if you want it." If the sea monster doesn't mind. But GB hasn't been told about that yet.

As far as city design focused on walking, she points out, "Tokyo /was/ built based on walking. All the cities that old are. It's mainly new cities that are built for cars. That's why so many streets are one-way. But we can build that, but with things arranged so that people don't have to go too far to get what they need. That's what keeps people on foot."

    Elly pauses in her answer. Finally, she speaks. "I want a bridge that is safe and makes sense from your perspective, Goldenblade. I would prefer others curb me before I get into strange vanity projects. Theaters? Art? Beautiful hotels and such? Please let me indulge there, because that is beauty that inspires others and serves a purpose. But if there should not be a big bridge there, please guide me so that I do not try to get one. I do not want to be one of those embarrassing leaders who wastes effort trying to be the biggest at something that does not matter to the people."

    "And yes, all the old cities are so much better for people. So much healthier. When people stop walking, they change. They get... odd. They stop encountering others and they start to get less healthy. The only transit I would consider adding would be something like a trolley. Efficient and not as disruptive as thousands of automobiles."

Goldenblade nods about the bridge. "A bridge that wide would be a wonder of the world, here. It'd be a vanity project, to be sure," she says, though it sounds like it would be GB's vanity here. "I mean, we could run the tracks around the lake and it'd be farther, but not too much, I think. But I can build all those other things, too. Nice Greco-Roman columns and classical buildings look very nice, I think, even if they're not the right style for an Asian city. But ... actually, a trolley is probably doable, and with the electrification from the falls, we could probably power it electrically. That sounds kind of interesting, actually....."

Morri would be tsking at Wake ove the comments to Miho. Cause Morri would want to see Miho rock what she had. This may somehow have morri involved so who knows what will happen. Miho turns a bit red. "You think so I'd be rude to say no to you with that so I'll aceept as for my new creation I'll see to indrocuing it to your smiths that's part of why I was here it should help their work go better and easier!"

She looks to Goldenblade

"Having proper steel gets me very excited more so that it should be also I wonder if we can do roman concreet and as for the city tranist system planning from the get go..."

    "If we really want to go crazy, we could go under the lake. But until we know what is there, that's all just speculation. Probably best to stick to more sensible things for now." Elly tilts her head. Goldenblade's final bit there sounds rather like something that might go somewhere. Like one of those weird moods. At least, she knows her own moods tend to start that way.

    "It would be pretty amazing, if we could make trolleys based on electricity. We use that and good city planning and our people would be so happy." Well, those things plus a whole lot more, obviously.

    Miho's reaction is normal. It seems most people get nervous over a bit of clothing. As if Elly would give them something scandalous! "It is hard to keep my excitement in check," she admits. "But I have to see to a few things to realize all these dreams. I will get my people in motion. The plumbing project in Eas is still going, as well, but I will spare as much as I can and ensure that we get things started as soon as possible."

    There will be a time later where Elly pauses to consider just what she commands. Not too long ago, she couldn't even get furniture in her castle without the help of half a dozen people. Now she commands legions of workers, supporting projects all over the world. For now, though, it does not dawn on her just how far she has come in this world. Together with her friends, nothing seems out of reach.

Goldenblade smiles to Miho, and says, "We'll do better than Roman concrete. I'm planning /modern/ concrete." She smiles, smirking about the city transit planning. "We can lay tracks in the city from the get-go. If we want to start slow, we can have grunty-pulled cars like in the old days." (Even old to her, if just barely). "My dad would talk about them."