Seeing that article brought me bad luck.
In the days following the discovery that he had started dating, our trees got sick.
At first, it was simply at the edge where the Sudanese Army patrolled, but then we got a similar issue near the mountains. For the rest of the week, we worked hard to prevent the disease spreading from the point of origin to the rest of the projects.
It wasn't so easy, especially because the problem only hastened due to the wind.
The locust epidemic.
We had a hasty meeting with our members, letting the local agriculture extension officer give his feedback on what to do. We had already lost most of our food crops which we were growing near the fog nets. The ones in the greenhouse were, luckily, preserved.
I worked very hard with everyone to redirect the locusts and spray whatever we could. By the time they left, we had very little of anything left. We were just lucky they didn't topple the trees over.
Our green valley was now barren, once again. We doubled our efforts in replanting after applying insecticides to the soil. We had to ensure that there were no larvae that could ruin our efforts.
The people who loved to eat locusts happily feasted on the few that didn't get affected by the chemicals. I felt very guilty about this because I felt it was a degradation of the environment. Even then, we didn't have much time to dwell on that as my supervisor was passing by for a visit while enroute to Greece.
Dr. Li took one look at the remaining vegetation and gasped. We had roughly sixty percent trees left standing while the rest were either completely or partially damaged. We all cried foul when she was out of our ear shot. We didn't want her yelling at us about the victim mentality once again.
Before we knew it, Christmas was upon us, then a few more months passed. It was finally a year since we started the project and things were looking up.
We had established very nice grass and even had foliage and undercover brush in some areas of the forest. Some fruit trees began flowering but we took off the flowers.
The first team to come to Bir Tawil traded with the second and joined me in my little haven. Since it had been a year, I didn't exactly know what to name it, so I settled into the mind state of someone obsessed with nicknames.
The ornamental trees made the background look very beautiful. Our reports were filled with pictures of our green, little valley. We kept planting more trees, replacing the ones that died with the locust invasion, and double planting for safety purposes.
All the work we had done in one year had to be redone in under three months. It was hectic.
We worked at changing the soil's texture too. Initially, we had resorted to animal manure, then mulch. We utilized whatever we could, technology and what not, to reclaim the land successfully.
During those three months of busy work, we had some rain falling. It wasn't too expected to happen, but it did. Our gardens came alive with very many beautiful flowers. Our vegetables put on leaves and the small wheat project we had got taller and started to bear ears.
The greenhouse producing the tree saplings was surveyed further and managed carefully. we needed much stronger trees. We settled for irrigation of the trees from dusk with small amounts of water. This became very effective because they all grew by about a metre on average by the end of the month.
We got more mulch when we harvested the maize, and we set off to plant more for the same matter. The underbrush in the older parts of our forest project had started, as the trees there were now almost two metres in height.
I could only hope that it got better from there.
°•°•°•°•
My phone beeped and I sighed, turning to look at it from my laptop. I was trying to catch up on some heavy reading, and this hour of the night just wasn't the best to interrupt me.
From Namjoon
Are you awake?
From Namjoon
I checked the time so...
From Namjoon
How is work?
From Namjoon
You must be receiving my messages. This means that you're at the command centre. Can I call you?
To Namjoon
Please don't.
From Namjoon
Why shouldn't I? I missed you.
To Namjoon
Because you will distract me.
From Namjoon
This is the first time in months that we have had a conversation.
To Namjoon
How is your girlfriend?
From Namjoon
I don't have any.
To Namjoon
Stop lying.
From Namjoon
Well... It was a disagreement.
To Namjoon
I guess locking lips is a disagreement...? Whoa, you had me fooled for a second there!
From Namjoon
I'm sorry.
To Namjoon
What for?
From Namjoon
You must have been disappointed
To Namjoon
Well...
From Namjoon
But, you have to know, that I really tried to talk to you prior to this and I couldn't seem to reach you at all.
To Namjoon
Network issues.
To Namjoon
Did she make you happy?
From Namjoon
... No.
From Namjoon
She was a good girl but...
From Namjoon
We weren't compatible.
To Namjoon
Aaaah.
From Namjoon
Yeah.
To Namjoon
I am about to go sleep
To Namjoon
Maybe you'll have better luck next time
From Namjoon
Maybe
To Namjoon
Do you already have someone you like?
To Namjoon
You don't have to tell me if you don't want to
From Namjoon
... Yeah
From Namjoon
I won't tell her yet. I'm waiting to see how everything goes.
For a little while, I felt my heart clench painfully at his text. So he actually had his eyes on someone else? Whoa, he moved on too fast!
Why was I feeling pain? He wasn't someone I knew too well anyway... Right?
To Namjoon
Good luck, for that day you'll tell her
From Namjoon
Sure!
To Namjoon
I'm going to bed, so good day to you
From Namjoon
😊 good night.
YOU ARE READING
The Republic of ARMY
FanfictionI always lived for the moments my father would tell me I could not do something... then I would go ahead and do it. That had been my entire life. Maybe he was just really angry at me. Or maybe he just hated having a daughter who didn't measure up...
