Jaw dropped, Zara stared at Nolan’s gilded frame
painting in stunned disbelief, but it only became more unbelievable when she read the
engraving below: 'Nolan
~ God of Design'... For a moment her thoughts were frozen,
how was it possible? She had struggled for years in Design
School just to land a job printing plans, and Nolan, a Merchant U
grad was a god of Design?
‘…Want to be an Architectural Designer?
Great! Find yourself a merchant who’s studying Architectural Design…’
Dena’s words returned to haunt her now. She didn't know what to think. She was
unsure how she felt about this new revelation. Like a re-occurring nightmare the
images of Nolan in Dena's bed soon followed... Oh why had she been so
foolish? Look at him now!
The
construction site was a mile from the Headquarters, Zara was lucky to catch the
train today, her nerves so rattled. Normally she enjoyed the ride, the view from
the car was entertaining, but today the entertainment was replaced by the
whirlwind of thoughts in her mind.
Nolan was a god of Design? On one
hand she was happy for him having risen to the top like that, and so quickly.
But on the other hand, it really put Nolan out of her league once and for all, did it not? It hurt to admit she felt so strongly for him now, knowing that the magic
feeling could mean nothing, forever. Her
thoughts drifted to Dena and Eden, such beautiful goddesses, surely he would be marrying one of them now.
The
truth she had chosen for so long to ignore, hurt. She fought back a tear, knowing all was in fact lost now. Nolan lived their life, not hers, he would undoubtedly marry a
green eyed, ebony or golden-maned busty goddess, there was no way he would pass
one up for a grey eyed, flat chested architectural assistant with frizzy brown
hair, if one could even call it
brown.
Stressed and sorely distracted,
Nolan meandered through the Moha Lab clutching an old plan, trying to discern
how much of the lab was actually built according to the drawing.
There were so many unmarked walls, un-noted doors and storage cabinets blocking
his view that even the supposedly simple and preliminary task of marking up
the existing plans was overwhelming him.
The Moha Lab was in a
shambles and the stream of corpses and salvaged equipment arriving from Gorias
was endless. Much of the salvage had been dumped in the halls, nothing had been
thought through like Halios suggested. There wasn't much room to move, the
dormitory idea was a joke in reality, as was moving the Gora Lab in. The Moha
Lab was bursting at the seams, so much so, word was Merchant U. classrooms were now
being sacrificed for storage too.
The
situation was out of control, in some parts of the lab Nolan couldn't even see
the walls, the bodies were stacked so high. The sight and stench of death only
made things worse, the odor triggered waves of nausea, how could the aribu
handle working down here like this? He swallowed hard as the reality began to
sink in, he would need to put his best Designers on the job
to figure it all out, like Atalon ordered; yesterday.
Overwhelmed
by the headache his latest assignment was turning into, Nolan rolled up the
plan, retreated from the eye of the storm and made his way through the Hub
towards the Gourmet Chamber.
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