Please Wake Me Up

[Carthrat]

"Um. Anyway," continues Tom. "If there's a shrine to be built, there's a shrine to be built, and whilst if it built itself, I wouldn't be so surprised, I don't think it will, and thus we need to be startin' the building! To the mines!"

[Halbarad]

"He said mine. Not quarry. You don't get rocks for building things out of a mine.

"That said, can we get some more conventional building materials around here somewhere? If our esteemed companion wants to make it pretty that's fine, but I'd rather get functional out of the way first."

[Bjorn]

"A function shrine," Bjorn repeats slowly, tasting the words.  "I'm not actually sure what a functional shrine is."  He sighs.  "Well, let's go for direct.  We'll need a chest of drawers or something like that, a waterproof tarp, and a can of beans."

[Brian]

Lazarus looks up from his musings with Price, and relays, There are building materials behind building number one.  Stone and mine-tailings can be found to the side of the mine entrance.

[Bjorn]

Thanks, Lazarus, Bjorn replies.  Eyeing Tom and Tim, he suggests, "Why don't I go pick up the rocks?"  Handing over the clothes, he continues, "You can get started on a altar-closet deal."

[Halbarad]

Tim passes the clothes off to Tom. "You get to be the beast of burden, young Rat."

He does a double take. "And who said that about the building materials?"

[Bjorn]

Starting to instinctively reply within the Dream, Bjorn checks himself.  Sighing, he reaches out to touch both Tom and Tim, and adds their anchors to his Dream.

That was Lazarus, he informs them, the mists gusting in amusement, and this is Bjorn.  Get used to telepathic conversations, I'd suggest.

[Halbarad]

I'd say this is weird, but that's becoming a state of being, Tim sighs. Might as well get started. Where do you want it, anyway?

[Bjorn]

Bjorn scratches his head.  Let's put it behind one of the houses, he suggets, sort of hidden.  That way his modesty won't be infringed when he reappears naked.

[Brian]

Behind the houses is a lot of cleared and level territory....  a handful of plots have trenches dug up in them, which lead to exposed plumbing.  But it's not hard to locate a relatively level spot which doesn't appear to be marked off in any way.  And, oddly, from the street, it doesn't look like there's any room at all; in reality, another thirty or forty houses could fit comfortably, with room for a yard on all sides of each.

[Halbarad]

Works for me, Tim replies.

With that, he leads Tom over to the building supplies and collects materials to begin construction.

[Bjorn]

Bjorn heads off in the direction of the mine to find rocks suitable for some sort of shrine-like arrangement.

[Brian]

The supplies are pretty thorough.  Drywall, spackle, wooden beams, nails, various other construction components.  Shovels, hammers, planes, and several dozen bags of pre-mixed concrete (add water and stir) also lay about.

By the time Tim has finished his inventory, Bjorn has returned with a wooden sledge filled with promising potential shrine-stone.  As it turns out, looking for the rocks with the most mist around them was kind of easy.

[Halbarad]

The careful application of power saw, plywood, and two-by-fours soon sees the creation of a small form (with a doorstep) on the ground, which is filled with the quick-drying concrete. The cement is troweled flat, and left to cure.

While waiting on the foundation to cure, Tim assists Bjorn and Tom in arranging the shrine rocks around the foundation, in what's hopefully a pleasing arrangement to wind gods.

Once the foundation has set enough to start working on, the construction begins. Wooden boards are nailed to the concrete, with the walls constructed atop them. The roof takes a bit of doing, but once that's in place the outer walls are covered with cedar boards clapboard style, and roofed with cedar shakes. Tim attaches a few shelves inside with a closet rod around head height for the actual purpose of the shed/closet/shrine.

The process is finished off with the installation of a simple door. By this time, the sky is settling into night.

[Brian]

Tom places the clothes on the shelves in the temple.  Mikey and Bridget offer an array of tiny (glass) windmills that Mikey reaches up to set on the roof, clear of the gutters.  Lazarus volunteers a windchime from somewhere (it looks quite old, and is made of tin).  After the addition of a few more extraneous stones to provide a path through what the jeep-driving guy maintains will be a garden some day, Anita calls everyone in to dinner.