Cleaning up and starting over (all welcome)

[Len Gio]

Lenny had been to Acumin as a child with his parents, but he did not really remember anything except his Uncle's house. That was a good decade ago, anyway, and between the fire and pox nothing matched his memories.

The map his Uncle had given to him was also useless, as it contained all sorts of buildings and landmarks that Lenny could no longer see or find. He could not even find his own inherited house, which was too bad as it had a very nice well in the backyard. Without a good source of fresh ground water, a Lutran would not be very happy for long in a landlocked province like Centripax. So, first priority was to find his Uncle's well, or a decent substitute.

Next was finding a place to live, as he doubted his deed meant anything in a land of ash and rubble. He'd heard that the Aedile's office had been burnt to the ground so he had as yet not found anyone to confirm or deny this fact.

But Lutrans were a happy and resourceful race, and Lenny was no exception. Finding any decent plot of land, he would attempt to start removing all the rocks and boulders from it, carting off all the timber and rubble as well.

"Start from scratch, that's the thing to do!" he said with a twinkle in his eye. "Idle hands are Jor-el's playground gymnasium jungle-jim swing set, that they are yes the are!"

Bred for the ocean depths, Lutrans had twice the strength and stamina of many land-based races, and starting early enough Lenny figured he could clear a decent-sized plot of land in under a cycle. Working steadily, he might actually have gone much faster, but then Lutrans never worked steadily. There was the hour he contemplated some ash on the ground, the time he attempted to play marbles with some small colored pebbles, and of course there was mandatory diving-into-the-ashes time set aside.

"WHeeeeeeeeeeeee!" Lenny said with a whoop, landing on a pile and undoing a good candlemark's worth of work. Then he remembered his words with the Important Guardsman Sir, blushed sheepishly and went back to work.