"I want to pry the door open on this stairwell, and each way we can let sand into this place lower than us." I begin.


"So would it help to bust lower floor windows as well?" Mia asks as soon as I finish my sentence.


"I haven't gotten a clue. It's worth every effort." I reply.


"Perhaps it's time we go back down for a while and fill down there first." She suggests.


"We can always do that. hopefully we don't lose the walls while doing this." I say.


"What would even make you think of that?!" She exclaims.


"Think about it, if we let the sands in the gravity can make the building act differently than when it is buried due to the pressure." I sigh. "With how far we fell, it's impossible to predict at this point." I add.


"So we really are taking chances with this idea." She sighs.


"That's true. However I am almost certain this site will be more easily discovered by passersby." I explain. "Even if we don't survive we can still help the cause." I add.


"I see the point. Agreed let's go with the greater good." She says in agreement.


An impulse washes over me and I only can help but hug onto her. I pull her to me and just squeeze. I can't seem to bring myself to let go. She tenses up a little as the time goes forward. I can't help myself for some reason. I find solstice and sanctuary within these few moments.


"You alright?" Mia asks me.


"I think so, just, enjoying this. For some reason you make my worry seem to vanish." I admit.


"I see." She takes a breath.


"Something up?" I ask her.


"No, we should get back on the move." She pries herself from my grip.


She goes to the stairwell in the closest corner and start to go down the stairs. I follow quietly. we wind up going down a long way, farther than where we started. We need to unbury our location. It takes a while, without a way to keep track, feeling like ages. We enter a large open floor plan and windows around every side. We look to one another.


"So, shall we start down here?" Mia asks.


"Seems like its deep down enough." I admit.


"Lets start on the far wall and work our way back into the stairwell then up. rinse. repeat." She instructs as she starts walking towards the far end.


She picks up an old metal pole that was laying against the wall. I sigh as I look for something to hit the glass windows with myself. I find a large stone and lift it. She swings at the window nearest to her. I launch the rock at a window in my corner. My window cracks with the impact. I hear another crack from the other side of the room. We each hit our windows again.


A wave of sand comes barreling in through the shattered glass. The force of the sand knocks both of us onto our asses. We stare at each other a moment and laugh. We just may end up killing ourselves in this ridiculous attempt at escaping the earths burial of us.


"Ready for the rest?" She asks me with a stupid scared grin.


"As ready as I will ever be." I say to her.


"Well, we better get to work." She says as se gets herself from the floor and pats off the sand from her clothing.


I rush back to my feet and get ready for the next window. we get faster as we learn to hit the windows. Before I even notice five floors of this hell has gone by. We both are exhausted from the work we already did. My hands ache with a tingle throughout all of them. I can only imagine hers are the same way. My legs feel like gelatin and rubbery. This day will either end or kill us. I feel like the more we do this the less hope there is.

"C'mon Etha, this is our best chance." Mia speaks up to me.


I suppose I was in my head, for her to have to get my attention from whatever had it. She grabs my hand and leads me into the sixth floor of breaking every window. The sand isn't filing the rooms totally, so this may not work the way I had in mind.


"You're right." I reply.


As we pass our way up the stairs, we notice the broken stairwell from earlier, knowing this is the point where we thought would break before we got here. Its a relief, to say the least. We may be able to make this work. I can only hope my wild idea comes to work out. I run to the far side of the floor, Mia keeps the same idea as I.


"Ready?" I ask her.


"Yep, Lets get through this floor as quickly as we can." She replies.


We both swing and knock out our windows. One by one the glass breaks and more sand leaks into the building. We go up another flight of stairs. I feel like we are never going to reach the top of this place. Why did Ark Tech have such huge building during the old days before the bombs dropped? was there that many people? I only wind up with more questions.


We work our way through bit by bit, floor by floor. It seems to me we are making this too quickly and easily. Even surface life is not this simple. I feel like something is wrong in my gut.


"Something wrong?" Mia asks as she lays her hand on the next stairwell door.


"Somethings wrong, this seems too easy, isn't it?" I ask.


"Well, I guess. It has been relatively safe in here." She admits.


"Lets just hope we are gonna make it to the surface." I say flatly.


I try not to let the feeling of hopelessness drown me out with the intensity of the pressure. This situation in too much for me to handle. I dart up the stairs and into the nest section. I wait for Mia to join me once more. Level by level we have to fill this place with sand and hope we can break the surface of the world.


We systematically clear this floor. We go up to the next level. We rinse and repeat this process for hours on end. We keep moving. After about ten more of these levels being filled we can start to feel the ground shaking around us.


"It's working." Mia says as we re-enter the stairwell.


"Yeah apparently. I wonder how much more work we have to do?" I ask.


"I dunno, good question." I say.


We keep pressing on. Level after level. The stairwell keeps filling with more dusty air. I start coughing and feeling a little dizzy. Mia starts to wheeze.


"We didn't consider about how much air we have to actually do this." She says.


"Uh, Yeah."


"We need to get to the top now." She says.


She grabs my hand and half drags me back into the stairwell. My vision starts to blur as I feel myself bump up a set of stairs before the long drag across the floor. I can feel my feet begin to bump up steps again before I lose my vision. I can feel everything.


My breathing gets more shallow as I hear dirt moving around. I hear Mia grunting as she is moving masses of dirt. I feel my heart get weaker. I can hear her muffled groans as I feel my body be moved more and more. I find my lungs fill with ease again. heat goes onto my face and then a splash of water that is as cold as ice coats me.


"Wake up!" Mia shouts.


"Huh, what happened?" I sigh.


I hold my head as it feels like its throbbing. My vision is blurry as I wake up. I feel like I got knocked out. I feel my lungs burning with every breath.


"You passed out from a lack of Oxygen." Mia says.


"What?" I try to get a look around as my vision starts to get focus.


I hear laughing in the distance. I wonder where we are. I don't know how she got me here safely. I can hear hard footsteps approach near us.


"We're in New Boston. Turned out I dug into some guys basement." Mia laughs.


"You're kidding, right?" I laugh.


"Well, on the bright side he's rich because of us finding the legendary site of Old Boston. Now we just have to excavate the area properly." Mia explains.


"Well, now I guess we prepare for traveling farther?" I ask.


"Yeah we want to head over to the mission site." Mia sighs.


"What's wrong?" I ask.


"I don't want to put you in more danger." Mia says.


"I chose to come along." I say.


"Etha, don't be like this."


"Like what? You asked if I would come and I came. Now what? You expect me to just walk away like this whole past week hasn't happened?" I exclaim. That's unreal of her.


"I just feel like I'm putting your life at risk way too much." She rubs the back of her neck.


"I want to be there to protect you the best I can." I admit.