Finding himself useful right away, Zan told Winters, "My fancy headset has a built-in map. It keeps track of the inside of buildings." Zan darted his gaze to the upper-right as he saw bits of the map form already. He hadn't been thinking about territory mapping as the assistant led them to their workspace, so his map was unimpaired from the many passages they had traversed before coming to this room.

"Yes? I think I remember you saying something like that before. Will I be able to rely on you, then, to act, in part, as our cartographer?" Winters asked.

"I will try my best," Zan said. "I still don't fully know how it all works. I think it only works when I pay attention to it, because the passages leading up to here, I don't have on my map. Here on out, though, I will pay attention."

"Excellent. I will trust you to be our guide if we get lost," Winters said, turning to the men and giving everyone a review.

With the group informed of their task and how to do it, Zan did as he was told by Winters. Which was not any different from what the rest were doing. He grabbed a pickaxe, hammered away at some misermint and dumped the shards into the slot. With over a dozen people hammering away in the room the assistant gave the tutorial inside, the shards quickly filled the slow until -- suddenly -- a rumble came from the wall. The mold burned away. Then, etching itself from the wall as though a wizard had cast some spell of transmogrification, a door emerged.

No one moved a muscle while the door appeared. 'Is this normal?' someone said. Zan shared their curiosity.

"I guess this the function. Dump the ore, a door appears?" Winters said aloud though Zan thought he was only thinking to himself but aloud.

Hand on doorhandle, Zan turned the handle, and opened the plain-looking door. He crossed over into a hallway. A short hallway, the twin-doors at the end were bound by a grotesque fungal infection similar to the infection which had possessed the previous chamber's wall. Seeing misermint growths in the hallway and likely in the adjacent rooms, Zan reasoned filling the slot with enough ore would grant them passage beyond.

Conferring with Winters, a shrug meant he agreed with Zan's assessment. "Into teams! At least one warrior to a team! One team to a door!"

"Zan. Take a commanding lead. Have your friends do the same. I want all of you to gain experience in leading men. Hammer away at the ores and fill the door. Help other groups where you can. I will be doing the same," Winters said.

Nodding, Zan was nervous to lead men not his own, but he knew it was an experience he would have to learn if he wanted to be useful and help free his homeland.

This being the case, Zan saw a problem, and acted like how he thought Winters would like him to act. Standing on top of a nearby slab of stone, Zan shouted loud enough for everyone to hear him. "Can I have your attention? Please! Everyone! Listen to me! We have more people than teams than we have rooms to explore. If you are not currently in an entryway team, remain together and wait for your turn to 'tag in' for a team who needs rest. I want us to do this in rotation!"

No one opposed Zan, not even Winters, he was happy to see. Giving Zan the thumbs up, even, Zan barely contained himself to keep his smile from beaming, as he did not want to appear unprofessional.

At the head of his own team and before one of the handful of doors which lined the small hallway which culminated in the twin-doors, Zan introduced himself and asked for the names of his fellows. The soldier answered, "Pippy." A female worker from the villa said her name was "Sunny." Then there were two male labors from the villa: "Chet" and "Wheat." Five people, Zan told himself, whatever was behind this door should be easy work.

As the leader, Zan took point. He opened the door to find an empty room whose only notable feature was the many misermint ore-growths; dotting the space along its corners and up a certain stretch of its walls, Zan knew there would be no issue with hacking away at these ores.

"Spread out. Hack at 'em. When you finish picking enough to fill your bin go and dump it into the slot in the hallway. You don't need to ask my permission or anything," Zan said, letting them know he did not expect full deference.

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Heading to a nearby ore to begin his fair share of the labor, Zan thought the encounter ended. Yet a half-life lingered. As he walked to the ore, he heard one of the male laborers half-whisper to his buddy, "Good. We weren't going to ask permission anyway." Snickering, he and his fellow male worker got to work and started to pick at the ore.

Was that about me? Zan asked. Why wouldn't they ask their team-lead permission to do something? Do they think they're above me or something?

Although the interaction he overheard rubbed him the wrong way, Zan did not let it overpower his otherwise determined nature. He worked on his own ore deposit, gradually breaking the growth down, until it was but dust. Sweeping the remains into his collection bin, Zan left the room to go and dump the ore into the slot. On his way out, he saw the two male villa workers. They were huddled in close to each other whispering while pointing to someone -- on his way back, Zan saw it was a girl.

"Guys. Now isn't the time to discuss who's cute enough to meet your hog. It's work time. Get back to the room, please," Zan told the boys, who sneered at him in a way kids from his village would have never dared to look at an adult.

"We're taking a break..." one of them, possibly Chet, said.

Zan looked at their collection bins. Maybe-Chet's bin was only half full while his friend, Maybe-Wheat's bin, was only partially full. What they had done was not enough to warrant a break. Especially not while an enemy airship was doing gods-know what outside the tower. Time was of the essence, and they had no time to waste which wasn't already being wasted performing this guttersnipe labor for a foreign company.

"Fine," Zan said to the boys. "But from here on out, you fill your collection bins completely, then go and dump it. Understood?"

Taking a step to Zan, Chet didn't say anything, but he did make an obnoxious gesture where he took his hand and cupped it around his ear, as if to say, 'did you say something?' Wheat laughed hysterically.

Not taking any more of their insubordination, Zan countered simply: meeting Chet's stride by taking a few steps of his own, he glided in close to Chet and asked him, "Do I need to involve Colonel Winters? Because while you and your friend here are traveling under our protection, and as long as I am under the command of the Colonel, I am your commanding officer. If you have a problem with this just because of my age or where I come from or some other pointless fecking reason, how about we sort this out like adults?"

Bravery drained from Chet's face in an instant. He muttered a sorry and looked away. Zan thought for a moment he would push for a better apology but thought against it. He didn't want to exacerbate the situation any when he already won. "Thank you," then, was all Zan said.

Receiving no more problems from Chet and Wheat, for the time being, and with Pippy and Sunny hard at work, together, they cleaned out the chamber in hardly half-an-hour. Back and forth they went from the room to the twin-doors. Over again they lifted their bin's cover with their foot, then leaned their bin close to the slot, where they emptied their buckets. Passing other teams from other doors, and while taking quick looks into the other chambers, Zan saw similar sights. Every door they had entered led to a simple, empty room filled only with crystals meant for mining.

With his chamber all cleaned out and a line forming to use the twin-door slot, Zan told his team they could go on break.

Zan wandered into the other rooms to see if those teams needed any help. No one did. With Jiehong, Whiskey, and Winters, plus the ever-capable Scouts who traveled with Whiskey, not to mention Winters's regular subordinates, and what this all resulted in was one well-directed group. No delinquency. Everyone worked toward the common good. Zan liked this as he thought people needed purpose. He sure-as-feck knew before the war he did not have a purpose.

Asking around for spare food, Zan felt his stomach rumble, and he knew he needed sustenance. A lot of people said they had nothing to spare. Several of the elderly, however, who eat little due to their age, offered his rations of died and salted meats. Plus, some warm berries to wash it down. Was it tasty? Not really. Plain, nearly flavorless, if it hadn't been for the salt. Thanking the villa workers who gave him food, Zan eat his offerings and returned to the twin-doors at the far-end of the hallway.

Seeing the door light up and burn away the gunk which seemed to eat away at the stone-like substance of the tower, several people cheered.

"Before we head in do you want me to go around the rooms and activate them using the Spark?" Zan asked.

"The spark?" Winters replied, confused. Thinking, he seemed to remember at the last second before Zan was about to explain. "Oh!" Winters yelped. "The Spark. Yes! My attention is better spent helping direct people. I will entrust this strange artifact to your care. Go and quickly light the rooms."

Taking to his new orders, Zan popped into every room and used the Spark device in the same way the assistant had used it. He brought it over his head, spun the tri-pointed wheel, and boom, done. Energy became redirected... or whatever happened in this place when the artifact was used... and the chambers all lit up until such light spilled from them one would misbelieve a bonfire was raging within. Shielding his eyes as he ran back through the hallway, Zan returned to Winters with a huff and said, "'Kay! I think I got them!"

"And so, you do!" Winters said. "Onwards."