Limits

Chapter 72

Early in the morning, I ate some breakfast and got back to work. I wanted to finish that shelter today and there were still loads of things to do. I began by digging another trench. This time I dug a 3 metre long trench that was also 50 centimetres deep. After that I repeated the same step and created a rectangle that was the size of four metres by three metres. This would be big enough shelter to contain both me and Shelly.

After the digging was done, I placed couple of planks inside and noticed something was off. The problem was that the planks were not straight at the sides and therefore wouldn't connect very well. I thought about possible solution to this problem and figured out two ways to solve that. I could either straighten out all the planks by cutting the sides. If I did that then the planks would connect no problem. The other solution was that I could place one plank over the other. I would have to pattern it in such way that the 1st plank would be in the same position as the 3rd then 5th and so on. The same with the 2nd plank, the 4th, 6th and so one would follow the position of the 2nd plank.

I was keener on the latter option as I wouldn't have to cut each plank to be straight at the sides. I decided to go with the 2nd option and started to place them in such order. I then found that wind could do some damage if those planks were not properly reinforced. I decided to add two long planks at the bottom and the top while using nails in order to hold the whole wall together, then burry the bottom.

I didn't have huge amount of nails, I only had about a kilogram worth but I could easily use more than that if I wanted to make this shelter more sturdy. I would only use nails if it was really necessary. I cut 4 of the long planks to be about 4 metres long. I would use them as supports for the wall at the top and bottom. I needed 4 because the wall was not in a straight line and planks were not next to each other so if I were to nail only front side of the wall, the back side planks would be loose.

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I nailed the supporting planks at the bottom and buried the whole wall. The wall was standing without any other support needed and I could even lean on it but if I pushed it harder it would topple. It wasn't finished yet so that was understandable. I then started on the next wall that was adjacent to the one I already had.

I repeated the process for the next 3 walls and I had the basic construction done. Of course during that whole phrase of building the shelter I forgot about the doors. All the walls were already standing buried in the ground. I decided I will cut an opening in one of the wall instead of taking out a whole wall and making entrance this way.

After cutting out the entrance, I left the planks that I cut out in order to make doors. I didn't have anything I could use to hang the doors onto and therefore I could only make them in such a way that I would have to lift them up and then remove them completely in order to get in or out. I've run out of planks and it was already late in the afternoon so I decided to cut some more trees and clean them while Shelly would transport them to our camp.

'By my calculations, I should be able to finish the shelter tomorrow. It was much more time consuming than I estimated in the beginning' I thought to myself. After cutting some more logs and creating couple of planks, the sky was getting dark. As I was sawing the planks I said to Shelly "Go and hunt something for our dinner" but Shelly only pointed at the pile of animals not far away. I said "Oh, I didn't notice. Good job, let's eat and then rest for today. I will continue tomorrow". After the dinner we went to sleep.

In the morning the next day, I did my training as usual and then started to work. I saw the rest of the planks and thought about roof of our shelter. It was possible to create the conventional roof that was steep but it would be too much work. I instead decided to make the roof flat. We would live here for a month maybe two so the shelter didn't have to last for years. In order to make the roof, I would also need supporting planks that would go from one wall to the opposite wall.

'But if I were to support that whole roof on two walls would it work?' I thought to myself. I thought about it hard for a while and could only add more stuff as support in case the roof was very heavy. I would need wider planks and so I cut two long planks that had 10 centimetres in width. I then cut them in the middle and I now had support planks that could be fixed on top of the walls where the roof would be supported. I already used about ¼ of all my nails. I had no clue that I would need so many of them in order to build a shelter. I made the mental note for the future that nails are very useful.

The roof would need couple of planks as well. It was quite a large area to cover and so I returned back to making more planks. After couple of hours of sawing, I could finally start the construction of the roof. I placed the planks on top of the roof and nailed them to the supporting planks that were fixed to the walls. When I stood in the middle of the roof, the planks would bend a bit but this was under my weight. Rain or other things would not be able to bend it that easily. Besides my bag weighted a bit as well.

After placing all the planks and nailing them to the roof I could see some holes because of the irregular sides of the planks. Water would go through them so I needed something in order to seal the holes. Mud was bad for that because It would just absorb water and disperse. 'I need something that can seal the holes but at the same time it wouldn't disappear when it rained' I thought to myself.

I thought about it for a while and couldn't figure out anything. I didn't know any such material that could do it, besides I was not a builder and so I didn't have all that knowledge. Out of desperation I asked Shelly "Shelly, maybe you have some ideas? Do you know of any material that can seal the holes and make them waterproof?".

Shelly thought about it a bit and then nodded its head. I was shocked by this and thought 'Shelly knows of such substance?' I asked again "Where can we find it?" to which Shelly pointed towards the forest and motioned for me to follow it.

In the forest, Shelly was looking for something while I followed. After couple of minutes, Shelly stood in front of a tree and pointed at it. I said "No, not the tree. I need something to seal tiny holes and such. It has to be quite flexible". Shelly shook its head and pointed at the tree again. I took a more detailed look at the tree and could see some kind of golden liquid coming out of it. I asked Shelly "Are you talking about that golden thing?" to which Shelly nodded its head.

I came closer to the tree touched the liquid. It was very sticky and hard to get off from my fingers. I tried to wash it in the water and it was also very hard to come off. I said to Shelly "This is it! Well done. We will need to collect as much of this stuff as we can. I can see that one tree doesn't have a lot of it and I will need it for all the joints in the roof". I then followed Shelly around in order to find more trees that had this golden sticky liquid.