At one point it looked like utopia had taken over the dry sunbaked hilltops behind the city of Tongesh-Eilla. But the closing years of the last century brought new ideas to light.

Dr. Ashya as well as other colleagues had made sense of those feelings we couldn't quite figure out while commuting to work. She pitched her findings to the board of directors at the Kayralia state government.

The island state's settlements were losing money hand over first on this new utopia. She predicted within 60 years every creditor would come knocking on each others front door. Plunging world finances into the negatives for the foreseeable future.  Unbeknownst to the state directors, these discoveries where being made and presented all over the Tanchan-Helvetka-Union.

Few nations wanted to change, but the towns in Kayralia quietly listened to Dr. Ashya and her staff. In a few years Tongesh-Eilla had drastically cut back its borders. Only the ancient core, from the sandy harbor to the carved neighborhoods beside the Central Canal remained within the city's new tax base. This created a unique problem. What should be done with the old properties as their occupants moved closer to the city center?

The state funded a program presenting individuals with the opportunity to break down the old parking lots and strip malls squatting on the fringes of the city.  The end goal was to return each property to a near virgin state.

This was work for the itinerant, uneducated in good choices, and those who had nothing to lose. But one scavenger came across a surprise while rummaging through the remains of a dead retail giant.

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