Warm, Humid & Fake 

A loud but distant burble of a snowy egret echoed uncomfortably through the warm, humid, and unhurried artificial winds. Rustling the local fauna would dance with the singing cicadas in the dry brush surrounding the lagoon. A breeze meandered past wind chimes hung by locals on Torrey Pines and Eucalyptuses; they would complement the falling seeds shaking off peppered pepper trees adding to the rhythm of Solarium Cities song with its constant hiccups and murmurs.

The rhythm of the city came from its, shockingly intact, but in need of repair, electricity poles. The buzzing could be heard erratically arcing and popping of their own accord. Some were toppled and buried beneath rubble. It didn’t matter though, the pathway from one pole to the next somehow always kept its connection. Like a nervous system for the city, it communicated warnings when things would go awry. The children were told this was due to the eastern inland city limits echelon crew regularly maintaining it using the collections of Bahari everyone would gather. The first generation called them the Rhyches. One of the third generation's children had gossiped about this once.

“-it’s true! some guy name Echelon o-or Rhyches I think…But! He will come in and grab some of the stuff we find and use it to help keep everything safe! 

Webbers was telling Gribnau and Abresche about it when they got assigned guard duty.

Saids' the reason we had that last storm was that our parents and us couldn’t gather enough to keep them running.”

One of the children by the name of Bernard would spread this gossip like wild weeds in nutrient soil. 

Many of the children liked Bernard. Though most would admit he was a bit off from time to time, whether because he didn’t fully understand or simply wasn’t paying attention, no one seemed to know. It did seem like he was always searching for something though. As if he had lost a precious memory but he didn’t know what or where it was. Occasionally he’d disassociate while playing. This would lead to him disappearing for a few off times only to arrive when they needed him for working parties. But he was useful and when there was an anomaly breech during a job, he could handle it. And he was able to take on the harder work just fine. Though Bernard would tell you differently.

Now if the rhythm was ghost-like power systems humming throughout the city then the murmur had to be the children playing throughout it; along with them, there were the remnants of the first and second generations still alive too. 

After the original great hurricane and the previous inner cities' first then second-generation wars much of Solarium had become a baron of population these days. One could wander the city for almost a full day without finding another person. That is unless they knew where to look. The children would tie strings with knots that would be placed on known meeting spots to let others know where to meet next. The system was simple but efficient. Not to mention it was the best that they could come up with. Each child created a unique knot to represent themselves and followed it up with a special knot that represented a location. Sometimes it was tied with a piece of those locations surrounding foliage as a gift or a warning. It was up to them to take down the knots and replace them every few off times. 

The third generation was lost and without much to aid and educate them in terms of old societal roles and etiquette norms. But they did their best. Some of them would get bored and start researching old records in abandoned buildings using the basics of the first scripture that had been taught to them.  A woman by the name of Miss Legrane had taught them the basics of reading and writing. The children had all seemed to like her plenty enough and most retained her lessons. She was a kind and patient woman. Many were disheartened when the sea took her. But that was the way things worked in this city. Some made it and others did not. Even the strong can’t live forever.

Most of them had been cut off from their parents during the last great storm flooding.  Most of the remaining first generation had been swept out to sea. But they got to learn the rest of what they needed to survive. A few who didn’t get washed away souring the storm flood or murdered by the local feuds that would occur afterward would show them a trick or educate them on what could or could not be eaten. Some could still see their parents working on the other side of the inlet that divided the sea from the lagoon. They could see the smoke and occasional light show of them defending themselves from the dozen or so sea folk war tribes that inhabited the coastal deep regions bordering Solarium. 

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

They were just past the highway's reach but not close enough to swim from the old train tracks' newly created abrupt end. Eventually, they were told by a first generation named Mr. Webb that they were working hard for him to help dig a way out of the city. The bulbous and balding old man would give the children and a couple of the remaining older generations jobs every few cycles to collect supplies. Paying them in Bahari Pearls is equal to the difficulty of completing the task. A single pearl would be enough to tide a person over from hunger if they traded it for Leftie on the corner of Rios and Lomas at his market. Though you usually had to bring him more than just a pearl if you wanted anything worth a damn.

Unfortunately, the second generation seemed to be following a local legend named Eschelmens leadership. Under his influence when the city was cycled off, they would become more aggressive with poaching or blocking off certain territories they deemed useful to them. Most people tended to stay inside and wait out what they called Off-Times. As this usually came without Solarium's natural warnings and protection from the creatures that would be kept away during On Times. Not all were dangerous, but many become hostile if not properly dealt with. 

The second generation loved playing with beasts and mutations of botanical wonders. Many would disappear only to be found hung from their entrails on electrical poles or splayed open in the middle of the street once the off-times were over.  The off-times were when the second generation played the most. It was a proving ground to see who could stay with them and who had to return with the third generations.

Eschelmen's crew would chant the words he spoke from his original speech when he had led many of them in defending themselves from the last generation's war effort conclusion,

“Challenges are for the weak! We play because we are strong...We play in the Off-Times and to let the anomalies know we are always On! In the darkness and the dawn! Before the bells toll it is we of the Second Generation that will right & justify the wrongs! We are not afraid, dissuaded, or manipulated but instead, we play until the anomalies are gone. We play! We play! We play!”

They would greet each other and dismiss those they deemed useless to them with the phrase, "We play because we are strong...".  

Anytime someone needed a more dangerous task done they would go the the Anarchist Nationals led by Eschelmens. Many of the second generations felt it was an honor to call the terrors of anomaly breeches during shutdowns Playmates and wanted to constantly prove themselves worthy of being in Eschelmens' crew. A few of the children would assist them occasionally if enough threats happened at once. It was never discouraged to play with the second. If you did though you had to keep up.

The anarchists tended to stay on the northern side of town as the south was occupied by Edens Lost Apostles. A community of first, second, and third generation all living in the remnants of the ruined La Colonia complexes. They were well protected in numbers but also constantly at war with each other. Old family feuds from before the great hurricane still occurred. Most weren’t alive when the feuds started. But that’s not to say that if an outside source were to cause trouble with anyone in their neighborhood, they wouldn’t all stop the fighting and end the outside threat with extreme prejudice. Everyone knew not to mess with a child from La Colonia lest the Jackals or Esperanza or worst of all Smalls were to find out then you would be dealt with swiftly. 

Occasionally, a child of the third generation would begin to get lonely and act out in the city causing some destruction to what was left of it. Mr. Webb would send his son who they all called Webber to find the child wandering the city and let them know their parents were calling. Depending on how violent and scared being alone made them; the task was either easy or quite difficult to get them to a landline and hear their parents' voices to let them calm the child down and get back to gathering supplies to help the effort. Often Webber was accompanied by his friend Gribnau who was much taller and stronger than most of the other children. While Webber was small and sickly looking Gribnau was the opposite. He was poised, athletic, and unnaturally resilient too. He was known for going toe to toe with the second generation and with a few first-nomadic transients.

It was usually best to let them guide you to a landline and to calm you down. They weren’t mean children by any stretch of the word but rather Webber was trying to help those he considered his friends while also doing what his father told him to do. As for Gribnau he simply thought it was fun when things got out of hand. Afterward, the children would find a way to make amends and go back to gathering supplies until the next one acted up. 

This was how it was. 

Nothing ever changed for the third-generation children. At least not until the weather changed.

Disputes would come and go but despite the best efforts of certain generations trying to rise in the city, it was all in balance. Solarium would shut off and then it would be on again. Rinse and repeat. 

So long as Solarium was uncomfortably warm, unreasonably humid, and kept its artificial winds at a unique and rhythmic lull; then it was for the most part just a boring beach town. 

It wasn’t until the off time and the most recent storm that things began to change…