Part 30 Continued
Posted: Sun Oct 26, 2003 7:45 pm
PART THIRTY continued.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They drove in silence for a while, Brivari wordlessly pointing to lead David off the dark ranch. David waited until he had reached a main road before launching his offensive.
“Two strangers came to my house yesterday,” he began. He was grateful he was driving; Brivari’s stare could be awfully intimidating, and this way, David didn’t have to look at him. “They looked like our local sheriff and one of his deputies, but they weren’t. Their disguises were absolutely perfect.” David stole a quick glance at his passenger. Brivari was staring straight ahead as if not hearing any of this. “They were some of your people, weren’t they?”
Brivari was silent for so long that David thought he might never answer. He resisted the urge to press further. Brivari might be controlling the conversation by remaining silent, but David took back a measure of that control by refusing to babble in a vain attempt to fill the silence. He waited, attempting to give the impression that he had all the time in the world. In a way, he did—they were the ones who were pressed for time.
Finally, Brivari spoke. “She told you.”
Ah, good one, David thought. Start with an implied threat to my daughter. “No. She confirmed what I had already figured out for myself.”
“This doesn’t concern you.”
“Like hell it doesn’t!” David sputtered, forgetting his resolve to stay calm. “Those two threatened my neighbor and my daughter. They stood in my house and threatened me. I would say that concerns me.”
“It is not you they are after,” Brivari said shortly.
“No. It’s you. And I would guess whatever is in my trunk.”
“Exactly. This is none of your business.”
“They were willing to mow down me and mine to get what they wanted,” David said heatedly. “That makes it my business.”
“They’re gone,” Brivari said. “They did not find what they were looking for, so they moved on.”
“And you have me to thank for that,” David said deliberately.
Brivari swung his head around and stared at David for a long, uncomfortable moment. David watched only from the corner of his eye, but he still felt the heat of that stare. “Yes,” Brivari finally said, turning back to watch the road. “We do have you to thank for that.”
David relaxed a little. At least they gave credit where credit was due—sort of. “Were either of those imposters one of you four?”
Brivari turned to look at him again, surprised by this question. “No. Why?”
“Why not?”
“You think we would resort to petty threats to fulfill our needs?” Brivari asked, in a tone that clearly said he expected no more of humans.
“Aren’t you forgetting you threatened to kill me back there?”
“No, I didn’t,” Brivari answered in a silky voice. “I was merely pointing out a fact you may have overlooked.”
Oh, he’s good, David thought grimly. Slippery as an eel, a walking definition of semantics.
“The other three don’t know about these two, do they?”
“Why do you care?”
“I’m sticking my neck out to save your rear ends, while you’re doing something stupid that might get all of you caught anyway! Don’t you realize you’re putting them in danger by not telling them? They can’t protect themselves if they don’t know the danger exists.”
Brivari’s eyes flickered dangerously at these words, but he said nothing.
“Look,” David continued, gripping the steering wheel harder, “I commanded a unit in the war. I know the importance of keeping your men informed. You can’t withhold information about a known enemy without risking everyone’s life.”
“And what if the enemy is not as ‘known’ as you might think?” Brivari asked.
“What do you mean?”
“It doesn’t matter what I mean,” Brivari said irritably. “You have no idea what you’re dealing with.”
“Don’t I?” David asked, his ire rising. “Let me give it a whirl. You came here to hide your royalty, who were hurt in a war you didn’t see coming. But when you got here, it turns out some others were here before you, or maybe they followed you, others who’d love to see that royalty dead, and maybe you as well. They’re hunting you every bit as much as the Army is. You probably have more to fear from your own kind than you do from us, because we know so little about you. How am I doing?”
No answer. Up ahead a checkpoint loomed. George Wilcox was still there, briefly speaking to each car that drove through, though at this time of night there weren’t that many. David pulled up, and stuck his head out the window.
“Hello again, George,” he said. “I’m coming back through with another load of stuff for my friend.” George smiled, and bent down to peer across at the passenger seat.
David stiffened; he’d completely forgotten that the last time he’d come through here, he’d had what looked like a woman in the front seat. How was he going to explain the presence of a man? Could he say he was helping both parties through their marital spat? You’re no good at this, Proctor, he thought sourly. You really should get out of the lying business.
George looked back at him. “I see you dropped off your passenger,” he commented.
For the second time that night, David slowly turned his head sideways, wondering what he would see this time. Another woman? A different man? He was almost afraid to look. And when he did look he saw…..nothing. David quickly glanced on the floor, then in the back seat. Nothing. Brivari had virtually disappeared. Wonderful. He could add vanishing to their long list of talents.
“Yes, I did,” David said to George in the calmest voice he could muster. “But I’m still helping her move, so I’ll be back through a few more times.”
“I’ll be here,” George commented, sounding grumpy. “They want these road blocks to run all night and into tomorrow.”
“Isn’t that a little paranoid?” David asked.
“Everybody’s just a little jumpy,” George replied. “See you later, Dave.”
David drove off, watching deputies search a truck that had been pulled off the road nearby. “Jumpy, my foot,” he muttered to himself. “That’s what I call paranoid.”
“They are being vigilant,” said a voice from beside him. “As we should have been. As he should have been.”
David jerked his head sideways, expecting to see Brivari sitting there again. He didn’t; the seat was empty. But as he watched, horrified, a face pushed it’s way out of the seat back, followed by a torso. Legs mushroomed from the seat. For an instant, the ethereal body was the same pattern as the fabric of the seat, like spectacular camoflage. Then the dull beige of the seat fabric melted away, leaving Brivari sitting there, looking at him.
David realized he’d been driving with his eyes off the road. He pulled his gaze forward, jerking the steering wheel in the process, sending the car careening to the left. Breathing heavily, he righted the vehicle and continued on, eyes locked on the road ahead.
Damn him! he thought furiously. I really, really did not need to see that!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
David drove for several minutes before he found his voice again. He decided it was best to pick up where the conversation, if that was what one could call it, had left off.
“Who wasn’t vigilant?”
“We weren’t,” Brivari said, in a somewhat different tone. He sounded less angry now, more disappointed.
“You said ‘he’ should have been more vigilant. Who? The King?”
“He should have listened to me,” Brivari said, as if talking to himself. “I had lived through this before.”
“Did you keep things from him too?” David asked skeptically. He flicked his eyes sideways, catching the angry look Brivari shot his way.
“The other two are my concern, not yours,” Brivari stated flatly.
“Exactly how is threatening my family supposed to not concern me?”
“Empty threats. They harmed no one.”
“But you did,” David said. “You killed someone.”
“The human boy attacked your daughter. I would think you’d be grateful.”
“Grateful you stopped the attack, yes,” David replied. “Grateful you killed him? No. There must have been a way to stop him without killing him.” He glanced sideways. “But you didn’t want him to live, did you? He knew too much. Just like that truck driver.”
“The truck driver surprised us,” Brivari said, as if that explained everything.
Now David openly stared at his passenger in disbelief. He had expected a flat denial; instead, he got this casual admission. He wasn’t certain which was worse.
“And his surprising you is justification for killing him?”
“We are at war,” Brivari said impatiently. “You were a soldier; you should understand this. There are always casualties in war.”
“You’re not at war with the people of Earth,” David protested.
“Oh, really? Then tell me, who is it that’s camped out only miles from our ship? A delegation of diplomats sent to welcome us?”
“That’s the Army. The Government. The truck driver was just an ordinary man. There’s a difference,” David insisted.
“Is there? Did you kill anyone in your war, David Proctor?”
David fell silent, seething. He’d been a soldier; of course he’d killed. Far too often, and far too many.
“I’m willing to bet it was your governments who declared war on each other,” Brivari continued, not bothering to wait for a reply. “But did you draw a distinction when you killed? Did you stop and ask yourself if your target was civilian or military?”
“We tried to attack only military targets,” David said through his teeth.
“Ah. Yes. You tried,” Brivari said, in a tone that bordered suspiciously on condescending. “Admirable, I’m sure. But did you always succeed?”
“We did our best,” David said stiffly. “At least we didn’t deliberately attack unarmed civilians who were just minding their own business.”
“We did not ‘attack’ him—he surprised us when we were taking his truck.”
“Well, God forbid he should object to your theft!” David said sarcastically. “Whatever was he thinking?”
“We did not harm his belongings,” Brivari said.
“No, you harmed him,” David said hotly, finding it hard to believe this creature sitting next to him found it perfectly acceptable to simply torch another person. “Honestly, you are a cold-hearted bastard!”
Brivari lapsed into stony silence after this outburst. David drove on, heart racing, grateful that they were almost to the place where they had stopped the last time. He wanted to get this guy out of his car, away from his daughter, and out of his life.
“Would you kill to protect your daughter?” Brivari said suddenly.
“That’s not fair!” David objected.
“You haven’t answered my question.”
“You’re just trying to change the subject,” David said sourly.
“On the contrary, I am staying on the subject. And you still haven’t answered my question.”
“What does my daughter have to do with the truck driver?”
“Are you ever going to answer my question?” Brivari asked pointedly. “If that truck driver had threatened your daughter’s life, would you have killed him?”
David gripped the wheel furiously. Damn him! He was twisting what happened, trying to superimpose some hypothetical situation over top of the real one. “If I had to,” he grudgingly allowed. “If there was no other way.”
“So you would kill to save the life of one person,” Brivari said. He paused for effect. “We killed to save the lives of millions. If it is acceptable for you to kill to save your one child, why is it not acceptable for us to kill to save our planet?”
“How was that truck driver a threat to you?” David demanded in exasperation. “With all the things you can do, why did you have to kill him?”
“He would have exposed us.”
“You don’t know that,” David argued.
“We didn’t stop to ask,” Brivari said icily. “Perhaps you would have preferred we explain that we were a race from another world who only needed to borrow his truck to move our belongings. What kind of response do you think we would have received?” David opened his mouth, then closed it without responding. “We have a right to defend ourselves,” Brivari insisted. “And a responsibility to defend those we protect. Exposing us threatens those we guard.”
“How many others have you killed besides the truck driver and Miltnor?” David demanded.
“No one.”
“And why should I believe you?”
“So. That is how you view us,” Brivari said softly, staring ahead. “You see us as murderers, leaving piles of bodies in our wake. People with no culture of our own, no moral code. If that is the case, why didn’t we kill the second truck driver? Why are you still alive? Or your daughter, for that matter? We could have let her die. We didn’t.”
The rock formation loomed ahead. “We have arrived,” Brivari said, pointing. “Pull over here.”
David stopped the car, turned off the engine, and turned to look at the alien. This was the question that had bedeviled him ever since learning about the dead truck driver. Their willingness to save his daughter’s life did not mesh with Brivari’s almost cavalier attitude toward killing.
“Why did you save her?” David asked, hoping to high heaven he wasn’t tempting fate merely by asking. “She knew all about you. Wouldn’t it have been safer to do away with her too?”
Brivari didn’t answer. He gave David a pitying look, then climbed out of the car without a word. David heard his trunk being opened, then closed. Footsteps crunched outside his window, and he looked up to see Brivari standing there. The alien leaned his forearms on the open car window and spoke, just inches from David’s face.
“It has to do with that moral code you don’t think we possess,” he replied, as though several minutes had not passed since the initial question. “Besides, it’s bad form to harm one’s allies. Not to mention stupid.” He paused for a moment, looking out across the desert. “Your daughter was willing to help us. The aid she rendered us placed us in her debt. Whether or not you believe me, where I come from, our debts are paid. The King’s protection is accorded to those who help him or his servants, especially to those who risk their lives in his service. She was injured on behalf of our King. It was our obligation to correct the situation if we could.”
Then Brivari leaned in closer, causing David to shrink back in his seat. “But understand this, David Proctor. We show no mercy to those who would harm us, or those we guard. If we need to kill to protect them, we will. Just as you have admitted you would do if those you guard were threatened. It seems we are more alike than perhaps you thought. Or were willing to admit.”
Brivari placed his hand on the hood, and the engine roared to life.
“Tell me,” Brivari said, his eyes boring into David’s, “if our mutual willingness to protect those we guard makes me a ‘cold-hearted bastard’……then what does that make you?”
David was silent. Brivari gave him a penetrating look before walking away, toward the back of the car. Once again David turned around, but Brivari had disappeared, just as James had.
There was nothing left in the desert but the rocks, his car, and his troubled thoughts.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Next week.....
The countdown ends, as the Army arrives, and someone is there to witness it....
I'll post Part 31 next Sunday.![Smile :)](./images/smilies/icon_smile.gif)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They drove in silence for a while, Brivari wordlessly pointing to lead David off the dark ranch. David waited until he had reached a main road before launching his offensive.
“Two strangers came to my house yesterday,” he began. He was grateful he was driving; Brivari’s stare could be awfully intimidating, and this way, David didn’t have to look at him. “They looked like our local sheriff and one of his deputies, but they weren’t. Their disguises were absolutely perfect.” David stole a quick glance at his passenger. Brivari was staring straight ahead as if not hearing any of this. “They were some of your people, weren’t they?”
Brivari was silent for so long that David thought he might never answer. He resisted the urge to press further. Brivari might be controlling the conversation by remaining silent, but David took back a measure of that control by refusing to babble in a vain attempt to fill the silence. He waited, attempting to give the impression that he had all the time in the world. In a way, he did—they were the ones who were pressed for time.
Finally, Brivari spoke. “She told you.”
Ah, good one, David thought. Start with an implied threat to my daughter. “No. She confirmed what I had already figured out for myself.”
“This doesn’t concern you.”
“Like hell it doesn’t!” David sputtered, forgetting his resolve to stay calm. “Those two threatened my neighbor and my daughter. They stood in my house and threatened me. I would say that concerns me.”
“It is not you they are after,” Brivari said shortly.
“No. It’s you. And I would guess whatever is in my trunk.”
“Exactly. This is none of your business.”
“They were willing to mow down me and mine to get what they wanted,” David said heatedly. “That makes it my business.”
“They’re gone,” Brivari said. “They did not find what they were looking for, so they moved on.”
“And you have me to thank for that,” David said deliberately.
Brivari swung his head around and stared at David for a long, uncomfortable moment. David watched only from the corner of his eye, but he still felt the heat of that stare. “Yes,” Brivari finally said, turning back to watch the road. “We do have you to thank for that.”
David relaxed a little. At least they gave credit where credit was due—sort of. “Were either of those imposters one of you four?”
Brivari turned to look at him again, surprised by this question. “No. Why?”
“Why not?”
“You think we would resort to petty threats to fulfill our needs?” Brivari asked, in a tone that clearly said he expected no more of humans.
“Aren’t you forgetting you threatened to kill me back there?”
“No, I didn’t,” Brivari answered in a silky voice. “I was merely pointing out a fact you may have overlooked.”
Oh, he’s good, David thought grimly. Slippery as an eel, a walking definition of semantics.
“The other three don’t know about these two, do they?”
“Why do you care?”
“I’m sticking my neck out to save your rear ends, while you’re doing something stupid that might get all of you caught anyway! Don’t you realize you’re putting them in danger by not telling them? They can’t protect themselves if they don’t know the danger exists.”
Brivari’s eyes flickered dangerously at these words, but he said nothing.
“Look,” David continued, gripping the steering wheel harder, “I commanded a unit in the war. I know the importance of keeping your men informed. You can’t withhold information about a known enemy without risking everyone’s life.”
“And what if the enemy is not as ‘known’ as you might think?” Brivari asked.
“What do you mean?”
“It doesn’t matter what I mean,” Brivari said irritably. “You have no idea what you’re dealing with.”
“Don’t I?” David asked, his ire rising. “Let me give it a whirl. You came here to hide your royalty, who were hurt in a war you didn’t see coming. But when you got here, it turns out some others were here before you, or maybe they followed you, others who’d love to see that royalty dead, and maybe you as well. They’re hunting you every bit as much as the Army is. You probably have more to fear from your own kind than you do from us, because we know so little about you. How am I doing?”
No answer. Up ahead a checkpoint loomed. George Wilcox was still there, briefly speaking to each car that drove through, though at this time of night there weren’t that many. David pulled up, and stuck his head out the window.
“Hello again, George,” he said. “I’m coming back through with another load of stuff for my friend.” George smiled, and bent down to peer across at the passenger seat.
David stiffened; he’d completely forgotten that the last time he’d come through here, he’d had what looked like a woman in the front seat. How was he going to explain the presence of a man? Could he say he was helping both parties through their marital spat? You’re no good at this, Proctor, he thought sourly. You really should get out of the lying business.
George looked back at him. “I see you dropped off your passenger,” he commented.
For the second time that night, David slowly turned his head sideways, wondering what he would see this time. Another woman? A different man? He was almost afraid to look. And when he did look he saw…..nothing. David quickly glanced on the floor, then in the back seat. Nothing. Brivari had virtually disappeared. Wonderful. He could add vanishing to their long list of talents.
“Yes, I did,” David said to George in the calmest voice he could muster. “But I’m still helping her move, so I’ll be back through a few more times.”
“I’ll be here,” George commented, sounding grumpy. “They want these road blocks to run all night and into tomorrow.”
“Isn’t that a little paranoid?” David asked.
“Everybody’s just a little jumpy,” George replied. “See you later, Dave.”
David drove off, watching deputies search a truck that had been pulled off the road nearby. “Jumpy, my foot,” he muttered to himself. “That’s what I call paranoid.”
“They are being vigilant,” said a voice from beside him. “As we should have been. As he should have been.”
David jerked his head sideways, expecting to see Brivari sitting there again. He didn’t; the seat was empty. But as he watched, horrified, a face pushed it’s way out of the seat back, followed by a torso. Legs mushroomed from the seat. For an instant, the ethereal body was the same pattern as the fabric of the seat, like spectacular camoflage. Then the dull beige of the seat fabric melted away, leaving Brivari sitting there, looking at him.
David realized he’d been driving with his eyes off the road. He pulled his gaze forward, jerking the steering wheel in the process, sending the car careening to the left. Breathing heavily, he righted the vehicle and continued on, eyes locked on the road ahead.
Damn him! he thought furiously. I really, really did not need to see that!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
David drove for several minutes before he found his voice again. He decided it was best to pick up where the conversation, if that was what one could call it, had left off.
“Who wasn’t vigilant?”
“We weren’t,” Brivari said, in a somewhat different tone. He sounded less angry now, more disappointed.
“You said ‘he’ should have been more vigilant. Who? The King?”
“He should have listened to me,” Brivari said, as if talking to himself. “I had lived through this before.”
“Did you keep things from him too?” David asked skeptically. He flicked his eyes sideways, catching the angry look Brivari shot his way.
“The other two are my concern, not yours,” Brivari stated flatly.
“Exactly how is threatening my family supposed to not concern me?”
“Empty threats. They harmed no one.”
“But you did,” David said. “You killed someone.”
“The human boy attacked your daughter. I would think you’d be grateful.”
“Grateful you stopped the attack, yes,” David replied. “Grateful you killed him? No. There must have been a way to stop him without killing him.” He glanced sideways. “But you didn’t want him to live, did you? He knew too much. Just like that truck driver.”
“The truck driver surprised us,” Brivari said, as if that explained everything.
Now David openly stared at his passenger in disbelief. He had expected a flat denial; instead, he got this casual admission. He wasn’t certain which was worse.
“And his surprising you is justification for killing him?”
“We are at war,” Brivari said impatiently. “You were a soldier; you should understand this. There are always casualties in war.”
“You’re not at war with the people of Earth,” David protested.
“Oh, really? Then tell me, who is it that’s camped out only miles from our ship? A delegation of diplomats sent to welcome us?”
“That’s the Army. The Government. The truck driver was just an ordinary man. There’s a difference,” David insisted.
“Is there? Did you kill anyone in your war, David Proctor?”
David fell silent, seething. He’d been a soldier; of course he’d killed. Far too often, and far too many.
“I’m willing to bet it was your governments who declared war on each other,” Brivari continued, not bothering to wait for a reply. “But did you draw a distinction when you killed? Did you stop and ask yourself if your target was civilian or military?”
“We tried to attack only military targets,” David said through his teeth.
“Ah. Yes. You tried,” Brivari said, in a tone that bordered suspiciously on condescending. “Admirable, I’m sure. But did you always succeed?”
“We did our best,” David said stiffly. “At least we didn’t deliberately attack unarmed civilians who were just minding their own business.”
“We did not ‘attack’ him—he surprised us when we were taking his truck.”
“Well, God forbid he should object to your theft!” David said sarcastically. “Whatever was he thinking?”
“We did not harm his belongings,” Brivari said.
“No, you harmed him,” David said hotly, finding it hard to believe this creature sitting next to him found it perfectly acceptable to simply torch another person. “Honestly, you are a cold-hearted bastard!”
Brivari lapsed into stony silence after this outburst. David drove on, heart racing, grateful that they were almost to the place where they had stopped the last time. He wanted to get this guy out of his car, away from his daughter, and out of his life.
“Would you kill to protect your daughter?” Brivari said suddenly.
“That’s not fair!” David objected.
“You haven’t answered my question.”
“You’re just trying to change the subject,” David said sourly.
“On the contrary, I am staying on the subject. And you still haven’t answered my question.”
“What does my daughter have to do with the truck driver?”
“Are you ever going to answer my question?” Brivari asked pointedly. “If that truck driver had threatened your daughter’s life, would you have killed him?”
David gripped the wheel furiously. Damn him! He was twisting what happened, trying to superimpose some hypothetical situation over top of the real one. “If I had to,” he grudgingly allowed. “If there was no other way.”
“So you would kill to save the life of one person,” Brivari said. He paused for effect. “We killed to save the lives of millions. If it is acceptable for you to kill to save your one child, why is it not acceptable for us to kill to save our planet?”
“How was that truck driver a threat to you?” David demanded in exasperation. “With all the things you can do, why did you have to kill him?”
“He would have exposed us.”
“You don’t know that,” David argued.
“We didn’t stop to ask,” Brivari said icily. “Perhaps you would have preferred we explain that we were a race from another world who only needed to borrow his truck to move our belongings. What kind of response do you think we would have received?” David opened his mouth, then closed it without responding. “We have a right to defend ourselves,” Brivari insisted. “And a responsibility to defend those we protect. Exposing us threatens those we guard.”
“How many others have you killed besides the truck driver and Miltnor?” David demanded.
“No one.”
“And why should I believe you?”
“So. That is how you view us,” Brivari said softly, staring ahead. “You see us as murderers, leaving piles of bodies in our wake. People with no culture of our own, no moral code. If that is the case, why didn’t we kill the second truck driver? Why are you still alive? Or your daughter, for that matter? We could have let her die. We didn’t.”
The rock formation loomed ahead. “We have arrived,” Brivari said, pointing. “Pull over here.”
David stopped the car, turned off the engine, and turned to look at the alien. This was the question that had bedeviled him ever since learning about the dead truck driver. Their willingness to save his daughter’s life did not mesh with Brivari’s almost cavalier attitude toward killing.
“Why did you save her?” David asked, hoping to high heaven he wasn’t tempting fate merely by asking. “She knew all about you. Wouldn’t it have been safer to do away with her too?”
Brivari didn’t answer. He gave David a pitying look, then climbed out of the car without a word. David heard his trunk being opened, then closed. Footsteps crunched outside his window, and he looked up to see Brivari standing there. The alien leaned his forearms on the open car window and spoke, just inches from David’s face.
“It has to do with that moral code you don’t think we possess,” he replied, as though several minutes had not passed since the initial question. “Besides, it’s bad form to harm one’s allies. Not to mention stupid.” He paused for a moment, looking out across the desert. “Your daughter was willing to help us. The aid she rendered us placed us in her debt. Whether or not you believe me, where I come from, our debts are paid. The King’s protection is accorded to those who help him or his servants, especially to those who risk their lives in his service. She was injured on behalf of our King. It was our obligation to correct the situation if we could.”
Then Brivari leaned in closer, causing David to shrink back in his seat. “But understand this, David Proctor. We show no mercy to those who would harm us, or those we guard. If we need to kill to protect them, we will. Just as you have admitted you would do if those you guard were threatened. It seems we are more alike than perhaps you thought. Or were willing to admit.”
Brivari placed his hand on the hood, and the engine roared to life.
“Tell me,” Brivari said, his eyes boring into David’s, “if our mutual willingness to protect those we guard makes me a ‘cold-hearted bastard’……then what does that make you?”
David was silent. Brivari gave him a penetrating look before walking away, toward the back of the car. Once again David turned around, but Brivari had disappeared, just as James had.
There was nothing left in the desert but the rocks, his car, and his troubled thoughts.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Next week.....
The countdown ends, as the Army arrives, and someone is there to witness it....
![Wink ;)](./images/smilies/icon_wink.gif)
I'll post Part 31 next Sunday.
![Smile :)](./images/smilies/icon_smile.gif)