Trulla

Eugo woke afresh to a familiar scent of coal, almost ecstatic at the new day he danced his way around his home far too happily. It got to the point that Eugo’s mind even started warping at the thought of spinning in circles, even more than he was... 

Slightly disturbed at seeing rings on his ceiling right after he had woken up, Eugo decided to get to work.

With inspiration from much of Fiz’s work, he gathered all the scrap he’d collected in the past few days, first of all, he felt that he needed a new shovel. 

He wanted to try making it himself, so he decided to get his coal quota done as quickly as possible

Opening the door to find his local coal he couldn’t help but wonder how efficient he would be if he had more than one steam engine. Maybe if he had five of them like Fiz did he could optimise his workload to maximum work of minimum effort.

Although thinking on it Eugo still enjoyed working with coal, so he still wanted the daily job to last as long as possible; just not today.

Wielding his shovel Eugo heaved lumps of coal faster than ever before, leftover ash blew in his face and he felt the fresh flames flicker on his face. 

Replenishing the coal just as it began to extinguish, the coarse steam floated up the chimney, over the smokestacks over the city.

§

After some truly draining work Eugo felt ready to practice shovel smithing, he took a flat square of metal. Laying out a small section in his home he laid out a mini-workshop for him to begin his shovel smithing business.

The first step was to shave off all sharp edges of his currently weaponised metal shard, his best idea included some vigorous sanding. By sanding, Eugo meant rubbing all of the edges of his square metal chunk back and forth for several hours until he acquired a reasonably shovel-shaped shape.

Proud of his creation Eugo was almost tempted to hang it on his wall, never touch it again and instead pray to it every morning. Instead, this practice was reserved for Betty and he continued work on the shovelhead, he now had to bash the shit out of it. 

For a shovel, it was currently very flat and would work probably better as an oversized spearhead than an actual scooping shovel.

Eugo’s initial idea included the repetitive bashing of George’s head until it eventually took its nice shape, and in the process maybe even eliminating George from his life. The thought of Arianne brutally massacring him after this though, was far from appealing.

Instead, Eugo decided to consult a friend on how one shapes shovels, as Helena’s mother was a very famous shovelsmith in his sector of the dome. So Eugo assumed she would hopefully be willing to provide him with some materials on shovelsmithing, or at the very least tell him how to make them.

§

Eugo found Helena in the announcement centre practicing her usual routine of wandering around aimlessly, thankfully he didn’t see George around.

“Hey, Helena.”

“Hi Eugo, it’s not often you come out here willingly, normally I’m the one visiting you.”

“I wanted some advice on shovelsmithing, I’ve been planning to improve my crafting skills.”

“Oh? And what made you want to do that?” Inquired the girl, now slightly suspicious of his motives.

“Nothing, in particular, I just… had some stuff happen recently.”

“So, the plain, sarcastic boy with nothing but a love for coal and his steam engine is suddenly branching out, like hell I’ll believe that!”

“Well, you’re gonna have to as you won’t be getting another explanation.”

“Fiiiiine, I’ll take you to my Mum. Pretty sure she’s in the middle of an order now so you can watch if you like.”

Eugo proceeded to be dragged to Helena’s house by the lady herself, she was never one for relaxing when it came to work. After doing the usual house greetings and saying hi to both Helena’s parents Eugo announced his reason for arrival.

“Miss Helena I’ve come to ask if I’d be able to watch how you shovelsmith, I’ve been wanting to try it recently.”

“Sure Eugo, especially since Helena seems to think you’re finally doing something about your coal addiction. If you come over here, I’ll show you my workstation, firstly to cut out the shovel shape we have these metal shears.”

“Ummm, where exactly could I get these metals shears.”

“You can usually get them for one bread supply in the town centre.”

“Ah…” Eugo’s faced sulked into a very regretful tone.

“Otherwise, here we have my large steel ball, its nothing special but enough whacks by Helena here and you get a nice shovel shape. I don’t really like doing it myself as I get back pains…”

“I see… and over there?” Asked the boy.

“That’d be the finishing touches area, but before I explain that I recommend heating the tip of your shovel when slamming it over your steel ball, pick it up with the shears or something obviously as it’ll otherwise be too hot for even you.”

“Ok, will do.”

“Finally, the finishing touches here include adding a handle with any… special additions if necessary, and it also allows customers to make any final requests which may include sharpening the head or shortening/lengthening the handle and such.”

“Special additions?”

“Nothing you have to worry your head about Eugo, just think of it as a trade secret.”

“Ok… sure, thanks for your help!”

“Anytime Eugo, I have to agree with Helena that this is the most excited I’ve ever seen you for something other than coal, I’m impressed.”

Having acquired all the information, he needed to make his shovel Eugo headed back home.

§

First of all, he had to fashion himself a steel ball and a pair of shears, the ball should be fairly easy but the shears perhaps less so. From what Helena’s Mum had told him the basic concept of the shears is to thin sheets of metal with sharp edges to slide past each other. 

The main issue was that they had to be joined together tight enough to cut but not so tight that it wouldn’t move.

To overcome this issue Eugo decided to just step past it entirely, why make shears when you can make a giant sharp metal sabre; that’s exactly what Eugo did. 

He then spent a few hours stabbing some chunks of metal with his new sabre and heating them in the coal fire. After a few very painful burns and one that caused his skin to turn white, he used the sabre to bash the heated metal into a ball. 

Considering the process took triple the length that Helena’s Mum had said it would, he was certain that his method was probably suboptimal.

Still, he managed to mash together his steel conglomerate, creating a magnificent iron clump ball in the corner of his house. He decided to put it straight to use and started absolutely beat the living fuck out of this poor shovelhead. 

After another few hours and some noise complaints from next door, Eugo had a finished shovelhead.

A bit more work required Eugo to roll his thinnest sheet of metal into a roll, and then Eugo realised something; he had to attach the head and handle. Unwilling to ask for more assistance he took the initiative to heat both of them and once again resort to smashing. 

Using the blunt end of his shovel he thwacked the two ends together with enough force to echo throughout the entire dome. 

It was done.

Eugo marvelled at his first shovel creation, a bent, slightly oblong, very blunt and short incompetent shovel. 

For definitely no reason other than it being his first creation he decided to hang it on his wall instead of using it; sticking to his current shovel for the meantime.

Having finished his shovel quest Eugo, for the first time in a while he felt content. Realising there were so many other things he could do other than burn coal he wanted to explore the dome and utilise it as much as his body would allow. 

The time limit of life no longer mattered to the boy, his only goal was to live a life worth living.