**Beroj 'Aza' D'Lshad sets down the axe briefly, reaching behind his helmet to pull off his gasmask, sliding it up and over his head, gasmask-hair coming loose. He unclips his chestrig, setting it down on the ground as well to free his movement, lying the gasmask on top of it. Bends over, hefting up the large woodcutters axe and holding it in both hands.

**Beroj 'Aza' D'Lshad rests the axe against his shoulder, using his suit-mounted flashlight to examine the downed tree, sizing it up and hypothesizing the best method of dealing with the issue. Aza walks up and down its length several times on both sides, formulating his plan of action. He cracks his neck, moving to about 3/4 of the way to the base of the tree, setting the axe on the ground. He methodically snaps off any branches that were protruding that were weak enough, and after doing several passes of this along a roughly meter wide area, he picks up the axe, using only slight leverage to hack off any branches that were too sturdy to be removed with his arms. Setting down the axe once more, Aza gathers the remanants of the branches and twigs, setting them several meters to the side, away from his work area. Returning to the now bare portion of log, Aza picks up the axe, getting a good solid swing against the bark of the tree, leaving a deep mark.

**Beroj 'Aza' D'Lshad readies the axe against himself for a series of cuts, following close to, or exactly on the inital mark that he left. His body worked in a cyclical motion, one leg slightly raised into a kicked-up patch of dirt for leverage, his entire body pushing against it every time the axe was reared into the air, a loud crack following immediately after. The entire rythm of the work was set almost as if by metronome, Aza sweating silently between the thundering whacks of the metal. After several minutes of intense swinging, grunting, and clashing, he was roughly 25% through the log, chips accumulating on the ground around the work. Aza rests the axe against the log, stretching his arms and back briefly, as well as catching his breath.

**Beroj 'Aza' D'Lshad uses the cloth from his stalkersuit to wipe away sweat accumulating on his brow, dampening the fabric. He leans over, gripping the wood of the axehandle firmly (ironic?) and letting the blade rest in the large gash already made in the pine. Using his foot, he re-crafts his slight mound for leverage, planting his boot firmly against the sloped surface. Again, as if a machine had restarted, the ex-soldier began a tracing circular motion, every muscle in his body working- against the dirt, against the axe handle, against the entire axe as it shatters into the pine, and all over again as the weight of Aza's body is utilized to push away and so quickly fly towards the obstacle. The cut deepens, and deepens. Aza focuses- or rather, through focus, loses focus. The mind of a soldier, the ideal soldier at least, has no distraction but the task at hand. Anything else in the way is a hindrance, something to be avoided. Slipping out of the mortal worries of the zone, the food insecurity, the bandits, the war, slipping out of the memories from Syria, and entering only into the world of the task at hand, was Aza. The minutes flied by, not because time had sped up, but rather because time ceased to be perceived, only the task itself relevant.

**Beroj 'Aza' D'Lshad jumps back into reality, sweating, huffing, after hearing the final crack of the axe being driven into the last thin sliver of wood, the tree seperating from itself. Aza stepped back, catching his breath once more, his job however incomplete. In a mirror image of what he had accomplished earlier, he passed up and down the tree, removing by hand what could be removed by hand, and by means of axe, lobbing off what could not. Gathering neatly into a pile several meters distant the scraps of his labor, Aza returned to the now uncharacteristically barren tree, preparing the final stretch of his task. Moving to the longer and more leverageble and of the split, he hefts the log over his shoulder, using all of his might to push up, his arms, lumbar, core, and legs all functioning as one. At a full stance, using the leverage of the tree itself, he walks in a large arc to the side of the road, the pine opening as if an automated gate. Setting the cleared log down, he returns to the shorter and more stout quarter of the tree, attempting to repeat the process. However, with the irregularity of the roots, combined with the weight of the log being supported by them, there was no way he was going to be able to move the stump without yet more chopping. Sighing, and again readying himself for the mindset of labor, he spends uncounted minutes hacking the roots off of the stump, until like a can it is able to roll with some coaxing off of the path, no longer blocking the shipment route.