[network] @user; Night 310 [voice][open]

[cosmicwords]

[There is shuffling then a low, soft voice speaks.]

Hey, everyone, it's chaos.

I found something today. It was a memory card, the data in it has been uploaded to the public record but I admit it isn't much.

[A pause.]

For those of you who cannot read Russian it says "Built a shelter. Don't know how long it'll last but it seems like it's being serviced. We need to get into that bunker."

So, the bunker is certainly important but I think we all know this already.

I'm more intrigued by the shelter, personally....

Somehow they built a shelter from the ruins of other buildings and convinced the town to accept it.

I wonder... Could we do the same? Has anyone ever attempted it?

Comments

@noone; audio

[slapthelibrarian]

I haven't been around long enough to know if it's been attempted or not, but what's the harm in trying it?

@user; voice

[cosmicwords]

Well, I've heard that the custodians of the town will move anything left outside.

That is one obstacle.

The bigger one, perhaps, is finding a group that is small enough to attempt it without drawing the attention of one of the anomalies.

[slapthelibrarian]

Even if someone is there watching it? What would happen if someone attempted to prevent things from being moved?

And I see. That is a problem, yes.

[cosmicwords]

If things are monitored, they won't move. But sometimes people find themselves falling asleep, no matter how vigilant they try to be.

[slapthelibrarian]

I see. And what if someone were to ingest a large amount of coffee, or another caffeinated beverage? Although I assume those things are in short supply around here.

[cosmicwords]

Mm. That sort of thing is rare... I think, even if you were to keep yourself caffeinated all you'd do is buy time. Somehow, this town would find a way to sedate you if it had to.

[slapthelibrarian]

Well, I suppose I knew on some level that wasn't really a viable option. So what other avenues are there?

@hexappeal, voice

[sleight_of_fate]

Well, built shelves in the clinic, and they stayed.

The firepit and racks I built outside, however, didn't, so take that as a warning. It was built out of rubble and wreckage, and it still vanished, so I'd take that as a warning. Though I know there was something in the guide about building emergency snow shelters to get through the night?

[This is interesting, and exactly the sort of thing that Rhys feels he could help with.]

Maybe taking bigger pieces of wreckage from the more destroyed buildings in town? I know there's a few houses that are almost down to ruins, and have pretty big pieces of drywall, beams, and other things that could be used.

@user; voice

[cosmicwords]

Mm.

Many of the more destroyed buildings are near the ice caves, right? I haven't been there, myself, I travel using the maintenance tunnels.

I would not recommend trying to take apart the ruins in the cave, as that might threaten the cave's integrity...but....If there are ruins elsewhere with large enough intact pieces that could be somehow transported...

[He trails off for a moment, thinking. This sort of thing really isn't his strongest suit. With his powers, shelter has never been something he's had to worry about before.]

We would need something like a sled and we would need to keep the debris indoors at night to prevent anything from simply taking it and placing it back where it was.

@beyonce | audio

[thewarningafter]

Start small, build it up from there.

[He's eavesdropped on the starts of other conversations here and the logistical problems have occurred to him, too.]

If the system can be tricked into accepting a structure as a shelter, there's some threshold at which it's considered a building. Could be all you need is an enclosed space with a door -- build that and expand it when you can get more materials to it.

But the spiders service the buildings through the vents. It'd need to be positioned somewhere they have access.

[ off screen ]

[procyon_lotor]

[ He's listening to Chaos's message when he hears Strange responding nearby. It's an interesting problem — how to build structures that actually last in this place, and what actually means permanence. ]

There's a lot of wrecked buildings around, right? What if the difference is whether you build something with built-in ventilation access?

[cosmicwords]

[chaos hmms softly then replies to both Rocket and Stephen.]

That could be the key...

This structure has vents, but they were part of whatever building was here originally.

[thewarningafter]

Aha. So if we want to build new shelters, we need to find ruins that would have received service and trick the spiders into thinking the new building was already part of the network.

[procyon_lotor]

Yeah. Huh.

If that's true, we could probably make existing structures bigger.

[thewarningafter]

So then the question is whether it's worth the time and effort. It was for them, and they've left us a few stopping points that make it easier to cover that area -- but so far I can't name many places that would be worth expanding.