After a day's work

If all day you spend your time hunting for treasure, baking in the heat, the first thing you'll want once it's all over is something cool and relaxing. Second's definitely a, say, "paycheck" worth the week's torment. I won't mind if it's shot down with multiple deductions; anything will do, at this point. I swear, before all these darn exhibitions you could say I was pretty thin. Now that we've been working under Dyrus for some time, I feel as if I've been exercising constantly and I seem to have gained some muscle. Heh heh, wish I could just gaze at myself in the mirror the whole day -- it makes all the trouble seem worth it! Unfortunately our boss is a tough geezer to impress, so even with all that hard work, it'll take us at least a week to earn enough money to treat ourselves. Perhaps when that time comes, we could hit the big city. Eat out for some real meals -- things like steak, pizza, or ramen... Right now, all we can afford are some bland boil-in-bags and a single giant bottle of booze. However, I'll say that -- while it sounds a little pathetic compared to my hopes -- I find the simpler foods and drinks to be enough for a treat. Really! In fact, that's what's going to accompany my brothers and I this very evening.

Since our work for the day is finally over, Zig, Gorrik and I have been given the freedom to spend the evening however we please. Today we've actually managed to look past the pain of our day's labour, so I’m driving us over to the Great Desert once again. You see, that place -- or anywhere on Menahat to say the least -- is difficult for anyone to like. This doesn't come as a surprise to anybody. The days here are tedious and scorching hot. The skies are so clear it basically never rains, and when (or if) it does, it'll never be enough. Either that, or raging sandstorms that'll suffocate you in seconds. Hilariously, the nights freeze you half to death, and you'd be lucky to get even a decent amount of sleep. But despite all that, I think Menahat's vast landscapes are nothing but awe-inspiring! And when are they most marvelous? That time is only a few minutes from now, during its dusk hours, and it hits even better since the weather’s just right. 

Those landscapes... Are they full of life? Diverse? Colourful? Not at all. Suppose you could say nearly every other planet’s landscapes are better to look at, but there's just something that draws me to the ones on Menahat... something about the beauty found in a barren cosmic wasteland. Sure, it was once more than that. Sure, all it is now are dirt, dunes and mesas. But if you come to the cliff and look out across, you'll find yourself entranced by an ocean of desert stretching to the horizon. Floating islands laze about, holding so much sand that it spills off the edges. See all those cliffs, peaks, and boulders -- with the right equipment you can make out their details, enough to sketch them right. And if you're really lucky, you might even find giant ruins peeking out from the ground -- now, THAT would sure please Dyrus. But, it'd be a shame if money was the first thing that came to mind if we saw that. I suppose we should let that idea slide and just enjoy the view. We're on our off hours, after all... just sitting down with our boil-in-bags and our cheap drinks to flush it all down.