Post by Sarah "Snow Flower" Lyell-Haru on Jul 30, 2016 7:40:29 GMT -5
Lines in bright green denote the barricades surrounding San Simeon, consisting of reinforced chain-link fencing anchored with steel and wooden posts; lines in red denote entry/exit points
..picture of San Simeon going L-R from west to east...
Walking outside the main building, the enormous Hearst Castle, Sarah Lyell took in a deep breath and smiled...after several days of an unusual mid-summer coastal rainstorm, it felt good to get back outside and walk around the place she now called home. Set right on the California coast, it had once been the palatial estate of William Randolph Hearst but was now the home to a small group of survivors, of which Sarah was their leader.
As she walked down one of the long brick walkways which ran everywhere around San Simeon, Sarah thought about what needed to be done today....what do I need to do today? she thought, running through in her mind the myriad of things they needed to do now that there was sunshine for the first time in days....there were so many things they needed to do each day that it seemed the work never ended; at times, Sarah could very well imagine what Hearst probably thought as San Simeon was being built decades and decades ago, but the place still marveled her after more than two years there.
At least Hearst wouldn't have any problem with my clothes, she mused rather humorously. Dressed in a light, long-sleeved blouse, jeans and low-cut boots, she looked very much like the journalist she'd been back in Past Times...only difference, she thought, looking down for a moment, would be that I didn't have to carry a pistol with me all the time back then. It wasn't for show, either; although Sarah Lyell wasn't the handiest person around when it came to firearms, over three years of having to survive - sometimes by the skin of her teeth, sometimes by guile or just plain hard work. Anyway you cut it, she thought as she began walking around the grounds, to make it this far is a miracle in and of itself.
As she walked around, checking this thing and that item, Sarah thought about her life of old and wondered if civilization would ever return...it was also during those times that she would often think of her twin sister, Tamara, and wonder if she had made it this far as well. If I've made it this far, Sarah would sometimes tell her fellow survivors when asked, then I know Tam's made it this far as well...that thought alone kept her going on the darkest of nights.
At times, her thoughts would wander to numerously different things: she thought about her youth and growing up back in Astoria Queens, she thought about her time in college, striking out for California to study journalism, she thought of her life in San Francisco and all the fun times she had with friends and lovers....she kept her thoughts with her; they kept her sane on the darkest of nights...they kept her going, they gave her moments of happiness....
So, too, did being in the company of fellow survivors, the only difference between them and her being that they were all native Californians and she was merely a transplanted New Yorker...but as she had lived in California, the more she grew to love the state and the more she thought about herself not as a New Yorker but as a Californian...pausing to gather her thoughts, she saw that she'd made it out to the West Gate and thought, pulling out a pair of leather work gloves, time to get to work, Sarah....day's a-wastin...