Wendy had been having a rough time these past two days.
She smoothed her silky hair and blinked in distress as the constant rumbling from next door reached her ears.
The sound was dull, as if it came from deep beneath the earth. Every thunderous boom shook up clouds of dust. Even with advanced ionized dust-removal facilities, pollution was unavoidable.
Rumble.
Beep—
The air-quality monitor was wailing, with a remarkably steady rhythm. Every time Wendy heard that sound, her eyebrow twitched, and her gaze grew dimmer. She looked utterly drained.
"How many days has it been?"
After a moment of silence, Wendy muttered to herself, helplessly resting a hand against her face. She had not rushed to file a complaint, because this was someone else's normal work.
Mudrock was a... very, very good person.
At least, that was what Wendy thought.
But when a very, very good person worked beside your laboratory every day, making nonstop noise and kicking up clouds of dust for over a dozen hours at a time, it became rather torturous.
"Has Miss Closure still not given a response?"
The day before yesterday, she had gone to see Miss Closure, one of the heads of the Originium Engineering Department and her direct superior. She had submitted a white paper titled <Manufacturing Workshops and Laboratories Should Not Be Located Together>, yet there had been no word even today.
Wendy could not wait any longer.
She decided to make another personal trip to the office.
As Wendy passed Mudrock's manufacturing workshop, its tightly shut doors suddenly opened. Mudrock, who rarely removed her helmet, took it off. Her small nose twitched lightly, and she offered Wendy a sincere smile.
"The scent of flowers. Miss Wendy, are you using a new soap today?"
"Mhm."
Wendy nodded. "Bagpipe has been stationed