"You did what!" Victoria felt her heart jump as Nick walked into the dining room and forced himself to confess what had happened in the study.
"It's not like I did it on purpose!" Nick snapped back, automatically on the defensive. "I tried to tell all of you I run this ranch just fine without any new fangled machine which," he placed his hands on his hips, "I told you I was bound to mess something up only you all seemed to think that thing you call a computer would make life so much easier."
"Did you try to figure out how to undo it?" Jarrod asked with his courtroom tone of voice, not that he meant to; he didn't. It just happened without his half thinking about it.
"Of course, I did!" Nick yelled as he began pacing around the room. "Do you really think I'd just walk away from our baby brother without fighting tooth and nail to get him back? I went as far as looking in that computer help book trying to figure it out!"
"You'd fight yes, but comprehend a computer technical book, no." Jarrod muttered only to receive a glare from Nick, who fortunately didn't quite hear what his oldest brother muttered. Only before either brother could say a word Audra, who had was standing in the corner of the dining room looking rather upset, wailed, "Someone needs to get the book and study it; we have to find a way to bring him back!"
Nick squirmed, not wanting to admit he'd gotten so frustrated with 'that book' that he'd thrown it into the fireplace. Fortunately for him, Heath spoke, sadness was in his voice as she talked. "I don't think that would be a good idea, sis."
"Why not?" Victoria demanded to know before Audra, whose eyes had widened in disbelief.
"Too high of a chance his file has been corrupted. He could be full of an untreatable virus' or, worse yet, he could be full of worms." Heath forced the words out of his mouth, not surprised to see his mother and sister's face go a bit green before turning to a pale color.
"Poor Eugene," Jarrod sighed, "what a way to go. He had such potential."
Victoria, who all of a sudden had a dazed, confused look come over her -as if she was trying to remember something- shook her head slightly and rubbed her eyes. When she spoke again, the three brothers were shocked beyond measure. "I think we all need to get away from the house for awhile. Let's get our things together and go on a vacation."
"A vacation?" Jarrod eyed her suspiciously, "We just lost Eugene, and you want to go on vacation?" Once again, they were shocked beyond measure to see a genuine expression of confusion appear on their mother's face as she asked, "Who's Eugene?" She then left the dining room saying she was going to pack their things, making sure Audra (who had had the same thing happen to her) followed her as 'there was no reason for her to pack everything by herself'.
"I can't believe it! Mother's forgotten Eugene already! And did you see Audra's eyes? Something's not right!" Now Nick was not only angry at himself, but his mother and sister as well. That is, until Heath spoke up again.
"It's not their fault." Heath shrugged his shoulders as he admitted he'd been on the computer earlier. "I made back up for all of our memories." He pointed to him and his two brothers, "Only I didn't have time to do mother and Audra's back-ups. Also," he told them, "I experimented a bit myself and," he looked at both his brothers who were now eying him intently, "I put their memories of Gene in Gene's file. I meant to put them back in their own files only I got busy and didn't."
Jarrod rubbed his forehead and asked, "Did you do anything else we don't know about?"
"Well, I did open Audra's file and..." Heath started to answer only to hear Audra yelling for more water, as her bath water was cold. He couldn't help but allow a lopsided grin appear on his face as his eyes began dancing in amusement. Jarrod and Nick looked at him in exasperation. What could he say? He'd told her shortly after he'd been accepted into the family that he'd find something, someday, to get even for her using that riding crop on him. Too bad he still needed to learn how to put the things in her file back in the right order.