Beth was bored. If she was asked to go sweep the sand one more time she thought she would lose it for real.

She was perched on her hammock, swaying slightly as she looked between the broom and the slightly cracked, glass window of her bedroom. Like the rest of the house, it was a mess. Her parents were self-aware enough to know asking her to clean it would result in them having to help out with the other rooms.

Sweeping the sand however. That was Beth’s daily task and, in all fairness, an important one. She hated the idea that everyone was resigned to staving off the inevitable when it came to their sinking town. She didn’t want the place she grew up to become like the ruins that stuck out of the dunes not much further than a half hour walk from the town’s edge.

The sapphire caverns of the Driumstrae were the only reason anyone was mad enough to settle a town in a wasteland like Eazrik. And whoever that mad person was, Beth wanted to slap them with her sandbroom. A normal brush that had been used so much to sweep the sand off porch and doorways of their home that it was useless at brushing anything else, without showering that thing in sand. Then again, everything was sandy anyway. It’s why Beth favoured her hammock. Difficult to collect sand in something like that.

The Cogmans were the main tinkerers of the town. Beth’s parents, Charles and Tabitha Cogman, worked away at all hours of the day, trying to come up with safe and practical uses for the things that were collected from the ruins. That also meant there was a certain level of expectation when it came to Beth and her ability to tinker and invent. It came naturally to her, but she was bored. Everything was either a dull shade of brown or yellow, depending on if you looked at the wood of the house or the sand surrounding it.

She got up and picked up the broom. Better to get it over and done with, she decided. She hovered at the door to her parents’ workshop- the only well-built room in the house- and watched them both crouching and staring intently at a glowing blue rock, sharing theories on what it might be of use for. Her mum nodded in her direction, the thick goggles cutting off the eye contact.

Beth raised the broom and indicated to the front door, her mum raised a thumbs up and turned back to the rock.

Beth less walked to the front door and more climbed. There was so much clutter with items the rest of the town had figured useless for their efforts, but her parents had liked and kept. They were hoarders and she loved them for that; but sometimes it made it really darn difficult to get out of the front door-

She shifted the overturned metal barrel out of the way and squeezed out onto the porch. She groaned, her feet sinking slightly into the thick layer of sand that had already accumulated. The house was sinking faster every day it seemed. It wasn’t a wonder that everything was built out of cheap materials. Easy to erect another home once one sinks too far to salvage.

Beth shivered slightly. It was nearing the colder seasons. She didn’t fully understand everything that went on in the world, but she did manage to notice the pattern of the warm to cool cycle of the weather. What didn’t make sense about the weather was why it was as cool as it was in the heart of the desert. Everything she had been taught made it sound like desert were barren wastelands. Tick. They were also scorching hot, to create the wasteland. For as far back as Beth could remember it had never been overwhelmingly hot. They had their days, but it wasn’t anything like she had read deserts were meant to be.

She looked back out to the ruins and sighed. I bet they knew why there was a desert in the middle of nowhere, she thought. Then again, they couldn’t have been that clever considering they also planted themselves in the middle of it and sank like we’re doing now.

She shook her head. She always got distracted. She was like her parents like that. The curiosity of tinkerers seemed to be as much of a curse as it was an advantage. She gripped the broom she had forgotten she was holding and began beating back the sand as best she could. Every sweep left a good portion of sand behind, but eventually there was a noticeable patch of wooden porch that had been previously hidden.

She wiped her forehead, the sweat helping stray grains of sand to stick to where her brown hair was already clinging. Now that that was done, she figured she deserved some fun. She cracked open the front door and pushed the broom through it before closing it once more.

She was debating which house to go to, which residents would be least likely to shoo her back to her own home, when the collectors arrived.

Shallow grooves trailed in the sands behind them as they dragged sleds with some items collected in from the latest trip into the ruins. They were getting sparse in recent months. Unwilling to venture into the more dangerous, less well-mapped areas of the ruins, the closest easiest pickings were nearly all gone.

The ruins themselves were so vast under the sand that nobody really knew how far down they reached. They did know that things still lived down there. Deep down. People went down and sometimes never came back. Whether it was the cause of mysterious latent magical items or beasts deep within, there were warnings and laws keeping people out of most of the ruins.

“Heya, Beth,” Freddy called from the front of the group, pulling his sled right up to her porch, “think we got some real good ones for ya dad today.”

The others gave Beth a nod as they left their sleds in front of the house and walked into town to get some rest.

“Did they fall off on the way?” Beth said, raising an eyebrow at the small collection of trinkets. She looked back up at the aging man in front of her and the look in his eyes got her to immediately back track. “I’m joking, I’m joking. You know I love the random junk you find.”

Fred looked down at the sled and back up to Beth. He sighed.

“It’ll be you we’re delivering for soon enough. A brain that smart needs to watch its tongue from time to time.”

“Don’t you worry about me.”

“I’m worrying about everyone else, you little dolt,” Freddy laughed scratchily, “I don’t know anyone else that can put up with your quick mouth.”

“Anything good?” Beth nodded to the sleds.

“We got this cool armband looking thingy from off a corpse,” the younger man piped up. Varlo, grandson to Freddy, had stayed to keep Freddy and Beth company

“Hey, hey, hey,” Freddy said, “I’m pretty sure I told you not to tell her where that came from.” He motioned to give Varlo a slap but the younger man had already hopped back, arms raised in innocence.

“It’s a shame you can’t join us,” Varlo said, “It could be interesting to see all the cool things we aren’t able to bring back up.”

“Absolutely not,” Freddy said, this time fully connected with a swat at his grandson, “and you will not bring up such a dumb idea again. Idiot.”

“It didn’t seem like too much of a dumb idea,” Beth said in defense.

“That is why it is such an idiotic thing to say. The fake sense of security is what gets you more than anything else,” Freddy said in a lowered voice.

“Oh, cheer up,” Varlo said, patting Freddy on the shoulder. Varlo’s dad had not been one of the luckier collectors, Beth remembered, cursing her insensitivity.

“How about you both go and get a good drink in you. All that exploring must have given you sanded throats,” Beth said, changing the subject. “I’ll tell dad you left them some toys to mess around with.”

“You’re a sweet thing,” Freddy said, giving her shoulder a squeeze. Varlo said his goodbyes and the two of them walked across the sand to get back to their home.

Beth began the strenuous task of lifting the ‘new’ items into the house, one by one. There wasn’t much to lift, thankfully. Not much at all. One sled had actually been completely empty.

A thought struck Beth, so devious that she laughed it off immediately, before it stabbed her imagination a second time.

Maybe I should go and see what all the fuss is about.

Not considering the consequences, on the off-chance they shook her out of her mad idea, she grabbed one of the sleds and began the trek to the nearest ruin entrance.

The closest stone structure to the town was shaped like a bowl that had been dropped carelessly on the sands. Tilted at an angle, the entire thing had always looked funny to Beth. According to her dad, people used to entertain each other in the big bowl, through make-believe or fighting. Beth thought the whole thing sounded so silly. Up close, it was a little harder to giggle at.

Most of the entrances had collapsed as the building had sank over the years. One had been reopened as the designated safe way in and out for collectors. Beth knew this because she could read the directions scratched into the stonework everywhere. Arrows pointing out different areas of interest, or places to avoid. It was a shame that something so magnificently large had become a surface to scrawl upon.

She was in the shade reading these directions. The sun had traveled far enough in the sky that Beth became acutely aware of how little time she had to explore. She left the sled outside and headed into the solitary dark tunnel.

The scratches did not cease the further in she went. It wasn’t difficult to read them as there were everflame torches placed along all of the winding corridors. She had her small one in one of her many pockets, on the off-chance she got lost in the dark.

Trotting from room to room in nervous excitement only someone doing exactly what they knew they weren’t allowed to be doing had, Beth gazed at some of the huge contraptions the collectors had left behind, unable or unwilling to haul such large pieces of metal. She had no idea how anything worked, nor what they were even built for. Some just looked like solid blocks of various metals.

Others were as intricate as fake metal people, nearly life-like if not for the metal in place of skin and gemstones in place of eyes. Everything in between had been left strewn and forgotten in the ruins. Anything smaller had been fair game for collectors.

Beth completely lost track of time. It was only once she reached the end of the safe zone that she remembered exactly where she was, not just in her own head, ideas whirring. She considered turning back. It had been a good exploring session but she didn’t want to risk her parents’ wrath. On the other hand, she thought, one more room couldn’t hurt.

She tried to open the large wooden door barring her way. The sign on it taunting her. She was unfazed when it didn’t budge. Pulling out some little metal lock picks, she made short work of the lock on the door. Turning the handle and scraping the door open, darkness greeted her. A pitch-black corridor. Waiting.

The door, being wood, must have been put in place by the collectors to stop people from wandering too far. To Beth, other than the lack of light, it didn’t look much different.

Still, the stories gave her pause. People went missing for a reason. But everyone is slowly dying up there. The town is sinking into its own grave. Maybe I can find something to help us out. She pushed forward, pulling out a strap from another pocket and tying it around her wrist. It had gemstones embedded all the way around it, glowing like the everflame torches.

There were no scratches over the walls here. The decorations lay untouched, although all but stone and metal had given themselves away to time. The walls told tales. A group of adventurers fighting off all sorts of beasts. Fighting alongside all sorts of beasts. Leading a charge with men and dragons by their side against some terrible foe upon- weird; they looked like floating islands.

More stories followed in the same style as the first collection. A band of heroes doing incredible things. Beth was just beginning to look over one that depicted a huge war, watched over by a sad warrior when something clattered against some metal down the hall. She didn’t wait to think about not being alone, she was already running. She burst through the door of the closest room, slamming it shut behind her and hoping to wait out whatever was on the other side. This room was lit. Well lit. The door was metal, but well decorated. It looked to her that she had stumbled into a child’s bedroom, although much of it was in tatters. The everflame torches burned bright in here. The metal frame of the bed remained, smaller without the fabrics to lay over it. There were many small trinkets in here. Likely children’s toys, but that didn’t stop the mechanisms being useful. Beth spent her time whilst waiting out the beast beyond the door by picking up and pocketing anything she could see that she could carry. She was just squeezing one final item into her small shoulder bag when she saw it, lying on its side behind the bed frame. A blue gemstone bowl, possibly a bowl, at least. It was the exact same type of stone that her parents had been examining earlier. Maybe she could figure out what they hadn’t?

She hadn’t heard from the creature outside for a little while and guessed it was long since night time. Her parents would be worried enough to slap an invention on her to force her to sweep sand all the time, just so they could keep track of her. She shuddered at the thought and then froze. Something else in the room had shuddered also.

Ever so slowly, Beth took a step towards the door. Whatever was behind her took a step, too. She broke out into another sprint. She whipped the door open and ran as fast as she could, throwing some of her less valuable looking small items over her shoulder to slow whatever might be chasing her. How had it gotten into the room? She thought as she bolted back past the scratched arrows, leaving the sled where it was and racing across the sand towards home, the moon watching her the whole way back.

She flung, well she tried to fling the front door open, but there were items blocking it. She squeezed through the front door and started rapidly explaining where she had been to an empty living room. She paused.

Ting. Ting.

They’re still working, she thought, outraged.

“Hey,” Beth said, kicking open the door to her parents’ workshop. There they were, taking turns to hit something that looked like it had a series of large metal buttons on it. “You didn’t miss me at all?”

“What do you mean honey?” Charles said, not looking up.

“Yeah,” Tabitha said, “you were sweeping the sand. Didn’t you say that’s what you were doing?”

“Hours ago, Mum.”

“Oh, right, right.” Neither parent looked like they really took in what she was saying.

“Look what I found,” Beth said, pulling out random items from her pockets and shoulder bag. She was forming a small mound of sand where she stood, with how much she had picked up on her way to and from the ruins.

Finally, she presented the bowl and it caught her mum’s attention.

“Did they bring that in today?” She said, walking over to get a better look at it.

“N- yes, yes they did,” Beth nodded, “Varlo found it. Look what it does.”

Beth began to pass her eyes over it, noticing that whilst it could appear like a fancy bowl, there was a nearly imperceptible button built into the convex side. She pressed it triumphantly, hoping against hope that anything would happen. Even an underwhelming thing could get her some attention from her parents.

What she got, however, was anything but underwhelming.

The bowl started to vibrate in her hands. Not enough for her to drop it, although it was close. The blue stone began to glow slightly and then more brightly. The rock that her parents had been looking at, lying on a counter to the side of the room, began to glow and shake also. Beth, unwillingly, jerked her arms in its direction and the rock shot towards the bowl, magnetized. There was a brief moment of calm, possibly imagined, as the vibrating stopped. Maybe it was the bright flash that followed that helped to burn the image of her parents crying out in pain as the room exploded around them. Maybe it was the guilt of knowing she messed up.

She looked down at the bowl and the rock, but they were not in her hands anymore. The bowl lay at her feet, cracked in two. The rock nowhere to be seen. Her eyes tried to adjust from the bright light. It was pitch black and she was not standing on wood or sand, but something sturdier, and slightly wet; and so, darn cold.