Day 118: Hi ho, hi ho, it's off to work we go...

     We arrived back at the base shortly after midnight; we were exhausted, and just wanted to rest. We had done a lot today, and without a single casualty, which was a massive bonus! We had liberated five workers, including Joe, and had shown Gray and two other guards the error of their ways. We now knew that it was an entirely plausible possibility to attempt to recruit other guards we would come across, and reduce HoN Co.'s effectiveness. If they didn't consider us a major threat, they were in for a rude awakening after what we just accomplished! And with many more plans to destroy HoN Co. from the outside, it would be best for them to acknowledge us. We just had to be concerned about any plans they might throw our way now. Even if they did see us a major threat, they weren't going to sit back and take it, especially if we're able to convince their own employees to either leave them or work for us! We would have to be careful in the next few days, weeks, months to come... Climbing down the ladder from the hatch, we made our way to the lab, where we knew OROTHO and COLUS would be. When they saw us, COLUS seemed relieved and OROTHO barely seemed to acknowledge us coming in.

"Good news?"

"HoN Co. now no longer have the capability to mass produce portals! We followed the plan more or less to the letter, and, aside from the delays, everything went according to that plan. What once was their obsidian farm is now a smoking crater..."

"Excellent news! We've taken the first massive step towards toppling HoN Co. now! Although it also acts as a giant alarm bell to them. We're a serious threat! We're going to have to be careful from now on... Do you have any photos of the remnants?"

"Indeed we do. Syeonyx was most insistent we capture the first few moments of a great victory!"

I passed the image bundle I had stashed away to COLUS, who flicked through them excitedly. Meanwhile, OROTHO came over to congratulate as well, although I couldn't help feel it was done a little begrudgingly... I couldn't think why; a defeat on HoN Co.'s part was a success for us all, regardless of who was actually involved.

"Don't worry OROTHO. Just be happy in the knowledge that it was your plan that allowed this all to happen..."

"Well... I can't take all the credit..."

"So modest, OROTHO(!)"

"How did it go then? Tell us what you did!"

COLUS looked up from the images, and then behind us, as though he had lost something...

"What about the other guards... The workers... Where are they? Did you manage to get them out safely?"

"Better than that! We managed to convince the guards working their to give up working for HoN Co., and them and the workers went off to start a small hidden community..."

"I'm glad to see you resolved that issue without violence or complication..."

"Joe is the star of the whole thing! He went in on his own, and managed to convince a guard and all of the workers from the warehouse to work with us. Once we got inside, we were met with no resistance, and immediately found Joe and the others on the top floor of the warehouse. From there, we directed the remainder of the plan, and with a bit of a effort, showed the other two guards what they were really doing, and why it was wrong. They were playing them against each other; the guards didn't attack the workers because they had been told that they had volunteered, and the workers didn't speak out against them because they were informed the guards were authorised to use excessive force, where necessary..."

"It's a wonder how they kept the whole operation going to be honest. You can only keep two groups of people working together in the dark for so long before someone starts making connections..."

"After that, we rigged the main reservoir water feed with explosives left over from the initial hollowing out of the chamber, and blew the support. There's a photo of that actually..."

UOPETA showed COLUS the image I had taken before being rushed from the chamber. It showed the ceiling support totally absent, and gallons and gallons of water pouring down onto the lava below.

"Well, judging from the images of the large crater, it would be stupid to ask what happened next..."

OROTHO took the images from COLUS and flicked through them, one by one, and stopped on the image taken from the top looking down into the crater itself, and the remains of the chamber below.

"Odd... I wouldn't have thought there would be such a violent explosion from such a relatively small pocket of lava..."

"When the chamber blew, it ruptured the ground all around it and above it, causing massive damage to the surrounding landmass. That's why there's thousands of gallons of water pouring into the crater; a huge section of the landmass close to the sea was destroyed, allowing it access. Not to mention who knows how many underwater springs and other water sources..."

"Well, go and have some rest. We can debrief properly afterwards..."

Sweet music to my ears!

----

     Once we had rested, we went to the discussion room where everyone else was already waiting. We debriefed on the entire operation; how it went, problems we encountered, and any data or additional information we retrieved... We had passed the images around the table by this point, and it was rewarding to see the reaction on everyone's face when they saw the crater that we had caused...

"We are going to have to be so careful when moving around now. I wouldn't be surprised if HoN Co. are throwing high end security everywhere to protect the remainder of the their assets, especially the conducting tower..."

"Well, it's funny yo should say that, as myself, Amie and OROTHO have been talking about a solution to that... We know that moving around on the surface was dangerous enough before we destroyed their obsidian farm. It's only going to get worse. We are trying to work on an idea of tunnels. It seems a little simplistic, but think about it; we were all trained to be miners. And what do all miners do best? Dig? HoN Co. have essentially sealed their own fate by equipping us with the one skill that could defeat them! By constructing tunnels to all of the major areas we need to move between, we drastically increase the security of operations. However, we would need to have a secure series of tunnels, which is where OROTHO and Joe's area of expertise come in. OROTHO?"

"We have planned on a simple tunnel layout: two metres tall, and two metres wide, enough to fit two people side by side comfortably. The tunnels would run at least ten metres beneath the surface, and be reinforced with iron struts and supports and key areas. What we have in terms of security are doors. Well, iron shutters to be exact, which if implemented correctly, would look very similar to the surrounding iron supports, thus concealing it. It would be a delicate operation, and would cost us mass amounts of time and resources. Resources we don't yet have, but then again, like COLUS says; we're miners, it's what we do best!"

"As we have just halted a huge portion of progress that will take weeks for HoN Co. to compensate for, we can begin planning and constructing these tunnels. It's best if we only have one point of entry; the lab entrance that we had already built to connect to the portal we may need to make use of. But we could also connect it to the conducting tower, HoN Co. tower, Syeonyx's house and at a stretch, maybe even SERVERE's old house. We can't just think of useful and often visited destinations, we have to think of escape routes in case we become compromised. If this is successful, we could remove the front entrance entirely! It would make us a lot more secure, and provide only a single point of entry."

"So what's the first move then?"

"As odd as it sounds, resource collection! We need you to act like miners now, and harvest as much iron as you can! OROTHO and I will plan the layout of the tunnel system, including the dimensions, etc. whilst the rest of you work towards resource collection."

"Where should we start?"

"Well OROTHO has only guessed this, but he reckons the cliffs around us are rich in iron and coal. Start there. It's close by so it won't draw any attention. Let's get to work people!"

The work never stops!

Syeonyx signing off