Yen thought books smelled good. Like old wood turned into dust. At the same time, paper was made of wood, sooo… it made sense. Yen liked reading realistic fiction, science fiction, and nonfiction, but her favorite type of book was an autobiography. She loved learning about what was going on inside the heads of so many people. Once, she read the diary of an explorer that was found after the explorer disappeared. He had been taken by the bears. The bears are what live outside of our country. They are wild, and the only thing keeping them away is the beast pigs. Yen had read that in the guide. Even when the pigs are in the caves, the bears can smell their stench and run. Bears do not eat you when they find you. They are vegetarian. We do not know exactly what they do, but we think they kill you in some way. Yen flipped to a page with a picture of a beast pig. It was big and white. This one was Evie. The eldest.

 “Mom!?!” Yen yelled, then heard the shower running and steam flowing into the room. It immediately stopped. “Mom!?!?!!”

            “Yes?!?!” her mother yelled back.

 “What does camera mean?” Camera. She knew it was a new type of machine, and she had only seen it once in a “Fun NEW Facts!” book she had gotten for her birthday. She new it needed paper, which everyone knew costed a fortune, that’s why everyone used leaves.

“It makes pictures.” Her mom stepped out of the small bathroom, even if one bathroom was more than they had back up in the tree of Pinodia, with a towel rapped tight around her waist and a second towel rapped higher up under her arm pits. “You press a button and it creates a perfect replipica of whatever is in front of it on paper. There are only four of them in all of KZ.”

 Yen was wide-eyed. “Wow. That… oh wait I think it’s pronounced replica, not replipica.”

 “That’s what I said.” Her mom went back into the bathroom and closed the wooden door behind her.

Yen sighed. She wished Tako was here. They would fight over who got what side of the bed and when it was decided, no one liked the side they got. There mom was lucky to get her own bed.

       The next morning, they got up, ready to see the beast pigs. Even without Tako, they both managed to make noise and the room became a city full of questions, exclamations, and emotions. They left their room, only to discover they were two of the few people hear that slept in. Thankfully, the quiet gave Yen a window to hear what was going on outside. When they made it to the second to top floor, she could hear the yells and screams of the crowds, but most importantly, a huge roar. It was a beast pig.