Pre-Milliways
Cora sighed contentedly at the deserted school room. Her students were good boys, but very energetic-which was to be expected, at their age. At the end of the day, she loved the abandoned silence as she started to clean the school room. She gathered the boys’ chalkboards, wiping them clean of their remnant equations with a rag cloth and bucket of water that’d been brought in from the pump that morning.
After carefully stacking them, Cora opened the small school room pantry door and balanced the chalkboards precariously on their shelf. Closing the door, she returned to her task, picking up the various chalk pieces and putting them into their box, occasionally having to hitch up her skirt and wrestle the pieces from under chairs. As was common, a large number had broken into smaller halves (she’d have to enter that into the inventory: 1 batch new chalk pieces, Friday the 12th)
Satisfied that she had collected the last pieces, Cora stood and dusted her dress off, somewhat ineffectively, with a triumphant smile. She quickly neatened the chalk pieces in their little wooden box, and latched it (she had asked Miles to fashion a simple leather clasp after the box had been accidentally knocked over, spilling its contents, one too many times).
Exhausted from her duties and not paying much attention, Cora opened the pantry door and shoved the box in absentmindedly-the shelf was at shoulder height and impossible to miss. However, instead of the solid sliding noise of the box landing on its shelf, there was a moment of silence before a loud clatter.
Startled, Cora looked back through the door.