A few weeks after twelve-year-old Arlo had visited the Em core he had decided to hike the subway in the other direction to see what he could find. Pauli didn't accompany him. In that direction, Arlo found that the subway emerged from its tunnel into the open and that was where he found the field.
The field became Arlo's new playground. He even began camping there. Slowly over time, Arlo had asked others that he knew to join him. Even though it was quite a hike the field became the center of the group's life. The feeling of being away from the constricting rules and regulations of the complex was greater than the effort it took to get there.
Now a decade later Arlo, Pauli and a few others had come out for a day in the field. They had left before daylight, and light was just breaking when they emerged onto the field.
It wasn't long until the group had company, a security drone was overhead.
One of the group, Justin, pointed it out. “How do they know when we are here?”
“I suspect the Ems are still able to track me,” said Arlo. “Even after ten years, they are my constant companion. But never mind, except for watching they've never done anything to interfere with my activities.”
“I agree,” said Pauli. “They are not going to bother us unless we do something to upset their management of the complex. I'm afraid that is why we lost a few of our number. They wanted to be too confrontational. I hope we all realize that this is not the time or place for such, we are too weak and they are too strong.”
“That's right,” said one of the girls, Rosalyn. “And I have no interest in confrontation, so if the group is into that, then I'm out.”
The others agreed.
Arlo had so far been able to organize the group through his personality and charisma. But he knew they needed something more, something to coalesce around. He had decided that self-sufficiency, as far as was possible, would be the group's goal. And self-sufficiency started with food and shelter.
The group put up some temporary shelter in the form of tents. They worked to build a cistern to capture the rain. This was easily purified for use. They even got a rudimentary waste disposal system working by using some modified technology from the government's abandoned space program.
Soon they had an area where they could go and spend a day and night, maybe longer if they brought enough food. But that was the problem, backpacking enough food for an extended stay was an effort. They were soon trying to grow food on-site. The attempt was not a complete failure, but it wasn't a success either. Growing food meant tending the fields every day and that meant a long hike there and back even if staying overnight.
Someone with experience and drive was needed to get the growing to the scale needed to provision the group. Everyone kept alert to the possibility of attracting such a person to fill the need.
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