CH 106

The ride on Catherine's boat across the ocean was interesting at first. After a whole week of nothing but water around them, Delilah was running out of things to do, as was Nana and Mayu. Cameron had gone into standby - wake me if something happens. John wasn't here, and Delilah was aching for some personal attention, like a good night of sex. Or two, or three.

Even perpetually happy Nana was showing signs of not being so happy.

Catherine Weaver was good at planning and when they had problems, she was right there to do everything she could, but when it came to amusement, Catherine really sucked. There were no games or even fishing poles on board to help pass the time. Nana and Mayu became semi-permanent residents of the pool, it was the only thing they had for amusement.

Leaning on the rail, Delilah watched the water going by, wishing she had her mermaid tail. She noticed something odd. A light colored rock floated by.

Huh? A rock floating on the water? What was this?

She then saw another one. Bored, she shot the rock with a plasma bolt. The rock and the water exploded. Delilah grinned. That was fun. She looked for another floating rock to shoot.

The plasma shot on the otherwise quiet boat except for the thrum of the engines cause a flurry of activity. Nana and Mayu got out of the pool to come see what the noise was. Catherine down in the cabin knew what the noise was, and ran up topside, thinking there was trouble. Kouta and Kaede, came out of their room, also thinking there was trouble, and noise and activity brought Cameron out of standby to also run out, thinking someone was attacking them.

Watching for another floating rock, Delilah was surprised when she was surrounded by everyone else, Cameron having her plasma canons out, and looking for trouble.

"What happened?" Cameron asked, scanning for a threat.

Delilah giggled at the. "Nothing, I just shot a rock we were passing."

Cameron stared at her. She looked over the side. "We passed an island?" she asked.

"No, it was a floating rock."

Nana giggled at her. "Delilah! Rocks don't float!"

"These do," Delilah insisted.

Cameron cocked her head slightly. "Delilah, are you functioning all right? Rocks are heavier than water. They don't float."

"These do!" Delilah insisted, "They are light gray or brown." Looking over the water, she saw another one. Pointing, she said, "Over there, about 43.6 feet away."

Everyone looked. The gray thing was just ahead of them. as they got closer, the rock became even with them and it jumped up out of the water and landed in Kaede's hand. She hefted the fist sized rock. "This is very light," she said. She passed it to Delilah who felt it and handed it to Cameron.

"It's pumice, not rock. It came from an underwater volcano," Cameron said.

"It looks like a rock," Mayu noted.

"Let's see if we can find more!" Nana cheered. She grabbed Mayu's hand. "Come on Mayu! Let's find more ocean rocks!"

Nana and Mayu ran over to the other side of the boat. Nana called over in a happy voice, "Nana can find more rock than Kaede can!"

"No," Kaede said then began looking over the water for more rocks.

It was a silly, pointless game, but it was something to do.

Delilah and Kouta stayed on Kaede's side, Cameron went over to help Nana find 'ocean rocks'. Catherine went back into the cabin.

For the next few hours, Kaede and Nana searched for and picked pumice stones out of the water. One that was too far out for Nana to reach, Cameron shot it.

"Don't shoot them!" Nana cried.

"It was too far out for you, Nana," Cameron told her. "Look one's coming, right beside the boat."

Nana grabbed it and brought it on to add to her pile.

The sun was getting low on the sky behind them, and no more pumice was to be found.

At dinner, they talked about these weird floating rocks. They'd keep a few for souvenirs, Others were to be throw high in the air for target practice tomorrow.

.

Allison liked how their house was coming along. The outside walls were red brick above a stone base. The main entrance sat inset from the porch with arched columns. The second floor above also had a porch with arched columns, dual glass doors led onto that. The safety railing on the upper porch that went between the columns was painted white.

Inside, terminators were working on putting walls up and electrical and piping in. The outside of the house looked great though. The flat area that was to be the yard was still cluttered with the tractor trailer, a couple trucks and a sawmill. The driveway from the road to the house was done in gravel for the time being, paving it would come later. Allison took pictures for Joan and Bob. This was going to be their six bedroom house when it was finished.

Claire, who came with her, asked "So who's paying for this house. It's huge."

"Joan and I agreed to pay half each. Don't worry, Mom, We're making enough to pay for it," Allison told her.

"How many bedrooms?"

"Six, and four bathrooms. A bath in the master bedroom, two other baths upstairs and another downstairs on the first floor," Allison explained.

Claire eyed her with a smirk. "Planing on lots of children?"

Allison grinned. "Making sire we have enough room, just in case."

Claire looked at the house and said, Well, it's good you're doing this now. I have a feeling things will get expensive soon."

.

Sonya arrived at the furniture factory ready to start the day. There were a few pieces finished , waiting for the final gloss coat to be put on so they could be polished and delivered. At the moment though, with this manufactured gas crisis, she was hoping to get a truck to deliver them. Going into the finishing room, she scanned the couch, chairs and a table that was about to go out, and stopped short.

There were small bites taken out of all of them. Like rats had knawed on them. On the couch, several bites had been taken out of it. Looking at it, there was one bite on every stick of wood. The same on all the chairs. The table only had bites out of the legs.

"What the hell?" she asked. She went into the unfinished room, and the same thing there. Every piece of furniture had knaw marks on every stick of wood.

Sonya felt like crying Everything they made was ruined. Looking closely, she saw they were indeed teeth marks. At first, she thought someone got in here to purposely destroy all the furniture to shut her business down. Searching she did find hairs and here and there were claw marks. Animals did this, but how and why ?

Hearing a soft chittering noise, Sonya looked over to see a brown rat with bulging red eyes sniffing at a chair leg. Angry, she vaulted over and ran at it. The rat cried out on loud chitters and ran. Sonya was faster. She stomped on it. The head flew away and bounced off a wall as the body exploded under her foot.

"Little bastard!" she grumbled.

More chittering noise came from somewhere. Lots of them. From a small hole in the wall Sonya knew wasn't there yesterday, more red-eyed rats poured forth. The noises they made got louder as they ran out. There were hundreds of them. Seeing Sonya, they ran at her, chittering loudly.

Sonya grabbed a plank and slammed it down flat on the floor. It killed many, splattering their blood out from under it. More from behind ran over the plank. Sonya began a rapid dance, stomping on the critters. They jumped at her, gabbing onto her lower legs. Most were thrown off from her rapid stomping. A few held on and bit her. She grabbed these and crushed them in her hands to throw them hard onto the floor, onto others.

The floor, red with gore was becoming slippery. Sonya stomped her way to a clear area of floor and kept squashing the little bastards with her piston like fast stomps. All of them still alive were making screeching sounds as they attacked. Sonya bloodied the floor thick with gore, then had to move again to keep her footing.

Finally down to a dozen of so, Sonya finally stomped the rest of them into little exploded bags of blood.

Where in the hell did they come from? she wondered. If that many were here, they could be all through town! Sonya found one that still had a head, snapped it up and ran to the sheriff's office.

Running down the street, she saw the sheriff's car wasn't there. she did see it at the automobile sales lot. Running closer, she saw the sheriff in the lot, squatted down, looking at a car with flat tires. In fact every car on the lot had flat tires.

Hearing her run up, the sheriff got up and frowned, He glanced at her then told Tony, "This wasn't vandalism. It looks like rats chewed holes on all these tires."

"They got my place too!" Sonya announced and held up the bloody body. "I killed a couple hundred of them that chewed on every friggin piece of furniture we've made! These little ... demon rats destroyed everything they could sink their teeth into, then they attacked me!"

The sheriff eye the bloody corpse. "Looks like we got a problem. If they attacked you, they're most likely rabid. Tony, I need your help, we have to get word out about these things, fast. Sonya take that to the hospital, we need to know if it's rabid."

.

Joan was making coffee in their small kitchen in Dallas. Listening to the radio she head about a new strain of rat that was discovered. There were very few of them so they were put on the endanger species list. To kill one was a $5000 fine. The rats had medium brown fur, and red eyes.

Joan frowned at the radio. A big fine for killing rats? Was the government going crazy? Thinking about it, she realized that was probably the case.

"Morning, hon," Bob said and hugged her from behind.

"Morning sweetie," she replied. She turned her head and kissed him. "What do you want for breakfast?"

He peeked over her shoulder to look down at her and grinned. "Anything I want?" he asked.

"Food wise. We have to go see if we're going to be allowed to play. Football, that is."

"Darn. What can I get out for you?"

"Pan, spatula, I'll get the fridge stuff," she said. Going to the refrigerator, she opened the door and noted the light didn't come on. It was rather warm inside also. "Shit!, the refrigerator died," she grumbled.

"I'll call the manager," Bob said.

Well, if it was going to get ruined anyway, Joan pulled out all the eggs and the leftover pan sausage. "Sausage and eggs this morning, before they go bad," she announced. She turned the stove on. The light for that burner didn't work. A hand onto the element showed it wasn't hearing up. Joan tried them all. Not one heated up. "Stove's dead too," she told him.

Damn, what a morning! She tried the microwave. At least that worked.

"Ghaa!" Bob cried from the other room. "Smoke's coming out of the breaker box!" Instead of a dead appliance, he called in a fire. He was waiting for 911 to pick up and the building fire alarm went off.

Having only her thin nightgown on, Joan raced to the bedroom and quickly got dressed. Bob threw on a shirt and pants. They ran out to see the stairway filled with people leaving the building.

"Window," Joan said. They were only on the second floor. She opened the window and climbed out to jump down on the sidewalk. Bob followed. The main door to the building were open, people were streaming out.

Bob let out a sigh. "Breakfast out this morning?" he asked.

"Looks like it," Joan agreed.

They walked out to the parking lot where people were complaining and waving their arms. as sirens were heard up and down the street. Several cars, their Bronco too, were tipped to the side. Going over to their car, Joan began complaining too. "What the hell is this? Some asshole flattened our right side tires!"

Bob inspected the back tire, looking for a slash mark from a knife. What he found was a rough hole. "Joan, something ate a hole in our tires."

"What would do that?" Joan asked.

Bob shrugged. "Beats me. There's one spare, I'll get one of these tire off and see if the garage down the street can fix it."

Joan grumbled. "Can anything else go wrong this morning?"

A police car came and the police looked at the building, then went in. Bob got the Bronco jacked up and got a chewed through tire off to roll it along with him. Joan watched the building. She noticed the entrance lights go out.

A short while later, the police came out with the building manager. The police left, the manager called and waved his arms. "Everyone, come closer!"

The crowd did. May of them in house robes. He announced, "We've had several electrical fires. None got out of control, but for safety, the police shut off all electrical to the building. Until an electrical inspector comes to isolate the damaged wiring, the electric has to stay off."

"What caused it?" Joan yelled to him.

"Two rats were found fried in breaker boxes. They had ripped them open to get in and chew on the wires. We suspect more have gotten in. All the boxes and wiring has been approved to be rodent proof, but they got in anyway. Until we fix this problem, the electric has to stay off. If you noticed something in your apartment not working, please hang a note on your door so the Inspector and his crew know where to look."

"Wonderful," Joan grumbled.

.

Bob got to the garage to find crowd there, all with flat tires. He waited patiently for an hour then a mechanic came out. The man looked at the line and said, "If your tire has been chewed through, we can't fix that, the holes are too rough and large to patch. You'll have to get new tires."

Under the complaints, Bob just grumbled. "Just great." He spend another three hours in line to order two new tires. The estimated wait was 10 days. They told him to bring his old tires in when the new ones came in, and they would mount them then. Calling in to the team office, he explained what happened. The team meeting today was cancelled due to many others having the same problems.

He rolled his tire back to the apartment and put it back on the Bronco. He thought about using the spare, but if he did, they would still have a flat on the front. He put the tools away and locked the Bronco, then went inside to see Joan had a window open and had now lunch on a hotplate with a sterno can underneath it.

Well, at least Joan was prepared. Bob wished they had some news, but they didn't have a battery powered radio. Aft they ate, they went looking to buy one. The stores that were still open were sold out, that was if they did have any.

.

The red-eyed rats got into the sheriff's office. Aliana saw them chewing on things and grabbed one to crush it in her hand. It let out a loud cry jut before it died, and all the others came chittering loudly and attacked her. She let go with an electrical charge to kill the ones massed on her. More came she she let them climb up on her and shocked that bunch to death. Still more came and she killed them.

The sheriff walked in to see her sitting on the floor, her clothing had hundreds of tiny holes in it and around her, dead rats were piled.

"I take it we had an infestation?" he asked.

Aliana got up and a couple dead rats fell to the floor. "Yes, and when I killed one, they massed on me. So I killed them too. Connor, these are not normal rats. Rats do not attack people, they run and hide. They also do not just start chewing on things for no reason. They didn't even touch the doughnuts, but went after the counter legs."

He nodded. "Sonya said that too, she called them Demon Rats."

"I think she's pretty close to the truth."

"You killed one, and they all attacked you?" he asked thoughtfully.

"They did, when the first one died, they all came running."

"At lest now we know how to get rid of them. Can you duplicate that cry?"

"I can."

"Then I got a job for you. After you get some good clothes on."

.

The hospital confirmed, the dead rat Sonya brought wasn't rabid. They did have her go down to the town vet to verify it. The vet did an autopsy on what was left of the rat. Taking a blood sample, he did a DNA test on it. Looking at the results, he said, "This isn't a rat. At least, one that comes from nature."

"Someone is altering their DNA?" Sonya asked.

"Very extensively," he said and sat back. "From what I see, and what you told me, these rats were genetically engineered. That takes a well equipped lab and much time. I'm going to report this finding. These animals are dangerous. They were also put on the endangered species list. They shouldn't be there for a couple reasons. They aren't natural and they are hazard to everyone."

.

John thought the sheriff was nuts. Still he had to agree this might be the best way to get rid of this strange rat infestation. He put a tape player on the bulldozer tank and hooked a speaker low on the front. The sheriff's secretary came by to make this chittering squeal on the recording that was very irritating to listen to. John's job was to draw in, then run over rats. They used the bulldozer tank because it had steel tracks. The EV-2 had rubber tracks and was prone to being chewed on by rats.

John got the set up on the tank and filed the fuel tank, Not having used the diesel much, they still had plenty in the 500 gallon supply tank. Filled up, John left to go draw rats out starting with the places the sheriff indicted. His wives were still away, the kids were in school and Barnabas was off with his business dealings, so John went to find Allison to keep watch for him around from the top hatch.

Picking up Allison at her house, they drove into town and went to the gun shop. On the way he saw many dead rats on the street. Down a side street, he head that irritating call. Yup, the sheriff's secretary was playing pied piper for the killer rats. At the gun shop, John got Allison a .22 pistol and a box of ammunition Just in case rats got up on the tank.

Heading off towards the school, John ran the tank slow and turned the rat call on. He didn't get much father when red-eyed rats came racing out from both sides of the road, coming at him.

"John! They're everywhere!" Allison cried.

"Let me know if they start getting onto the tank" John called back. Some were in front of him. The rats ran right at the tank, and many got crushed under the steel tracks. Many jumped and bounced off the lower angled plate, or onto the road wheels to get crushed. A few even made it onto the side hull to slide back down to the tracks to get throw off the front of the tracks, then crushed underneath. The popping noises came from the small exploding bodies.

"There's a huge pack of them following us!" Allison cried.

John wished he had earplugs, the noise these things were making made his skin crawl. "As long as they keep following us, that's good," he told her.

Passing the grocery store, a flood of little brown red-eyes rodents joined the chase at the tank. All screaming their cry. "How far back are they?" John asked.

"Not far, the lead pack is only about ten, fifteen feet behind us."

"Hang on!" John yelled. He locked the right track and spun the tank around on the left and drove into the pack as he gunned it. Behind them, the road was covered in rats. Many jumped up and slid off, the sound of little pops as they were crushed sounded like popcorn popping. He drove though the mass until the road was clear except for the bloody track marks on the road, then locked the right track again to spin around and charge into the mass of rats.

Crunching though the mass, John slowed. "They still following?" he asked.

"They are, can't you hear them?"

"How many we get?"

"Maybe a few hundred out of thousands. Where did they come from?"

John's tactic worked, but didn't kill enough of them. He had to think of something else. There were far too many to shoot, and coming to the school, another brown carpet of rodents was coming towards them from the parking lot.

"John, we have to do something else!" Allison cried. "They are following us but we aren't killing very many."

"At least we're leading them out of town," he said.

"Then what?"

John suddenly had an idea. "Allison, can you drive this thing?"

Allison got down inside and shut the upper hatch. She appeared by his shoulder. "What's the plan?" she asked.

John showed her the controls. He then said, "With no levers pushed, it will just run straight ahead. I climb out, you climb into the seat here and keep going down the road. I'll go to the back and open the fuel drain. After I let out enough fuel, I shut the drain and light it That should kill a bunch of those little bastards."

"No John, I'll go do that, You keep driving."

"Allison, it's dangerous! You might fall of the back! Those things will eat you."

"You might get eaten also. I'm not going to face Cameron to tell her I let you die, John!" she said in a hard tone. She pulled back and opened the top hatch back up. "Allison, No!" John yelled. He looked, she was climbing out on top. "SHIT!" he snapped.

Allison got back in. "John we have nothing to light the fuel with. Got a lighter?"

"No." Damn it, unless the lit the fuel, it wasn't going to do much.

.

Allison got back up to look out the top hatch. The brown mass of rats was still following them but losing ground. They were out of town, but still had no way to kill all those rats. Behind the mass of rats, a leather clad figure wearing sunglasses was riding up behind them on a motorcycle. He had a long, thin weapon in one hand. He pointed it at the mass. Flame erupted from it. He slowed and burned rats with the flamethrower, panning side to side to incinerate them. The rats where being burned up en-mass.

"Yes! It's Mr, Nader! He's got a flame thrower!" Alison cried happily. She watch him light up the whole mass. The few rats that ran to the sides, he stopped and lit the brush to the sides up where they had gone.

Allison called, down the hatch, "John! Mr. Nader got them. We can stop now, and turn off that awful noise!"

John turned the recording off and stopped. He opened his hatch to look around. Mr. Nader rode up beside him, holding his flamethrower to point at the sky.

"Thank you for your cooperation," Mr. Nader stated in his flat tone.

"Thank you for coming to finish them off," John replied.

"The sheriff's plan worked. I must return to school now," Mr. Nader stated, then rode around the front of the tank and back down the road filled with smoldering bodies.

.

Sonya spend the rest of the day with her and her workers cleaning the mess off the floor, then trying to figure out how to save at lest some of the furniture that got ruined.

Danny, her final finishing guy shook his head and waved a hand in frustration. "Sonya, with the unfinished stuff, colored putty in the damaged spots will work. Even using the same can of stain and polyurethane, it is very hard to match any damaged area on finished pieces and not have it stand out. I can, but you'll have to sell it at a discount, scratch and dent type stuff."

Sonya nodded with a huff. "At least we'll get something for it. All that work won't completely go to waste."

"This is a crying shame, I'll do my best with it." Danny replied.

"Thanks Danny. The guys are getting to work making new ones for our customers."

Sonya went back to her office to change the figures. There would be no profits for at lest two weeks, this sucked. At least she'd be able to make payroll.

"In here, sir," a voice said.

Two men in Government issue suits came in. Sonya looked up at them. "Can I help you?"

They produced badges. "Wildlife control Officers, Ma'am. We heard you killed one of those red eyed rats."

Sonya let out a snort. "More like a couple hundred of them. They got in here and ruined most of the furniture we've got for sale. Then they attacked me."

"Did you know they are on the endanger species list?" The one on the left asked in a hard tone.

Sonya eyed him. "Now, they are more endangered, they destroyed our whole factory of product."

The one on the right pulled out handcuffs. "It's a $5000 fine if you kill one, by your admission to killing many, we have to take you in."

"Where are all the rat bodies?" the one on the left asked.

"Buried."

"Show us where."

"No."

The man on the right said, "Get up and come with us peacefully. We don't want to harm a woman."

"They get in here and wreck the place in one night and attack me, and you plan to take me in for getting rid of them?" she asked in a hard tone.

"You broke the law." the man said ad came around to her side of the desk. "up!"

Sonya stood and glared down on him. "Stop, before you get hurt." she warned.

The other man pulled a gun. "Freeze, hands behind your back!" he snapped.

Sonya grabbed the one in front of her and threw him over the desk. The other one shot, hitting her ribs. Right after his shot, his flying partner slammed into him. He was bowled over, his gun went flying.

Sonya vaulted the desk and grabbed their heads to bang them into the floor, knocking them out. She collected their weapons and the radio the one had.

Damn, this was going to be a problem. Sonya called the sheriff. "It's Sonya, I have a problem down here in my office."

.

The sheriff looked tired when he came into Sonya's office. Seeing Sonya leaning against the desk, two men now siting against the wall, and a pair of pistols and a radio on her desk by her, he sighed and asked, "What happened?"

"She is resisting arrest," one of the sad looking men stated.

"For?"

"Sheriff, they want to arrest me for killing those rats that got in here and were destroying all the furniture we made!" Sonya said angrily. "When those rats attacked me, what was I suppose to do? Let them chew me up too?"

The sheriff nodded. The men went to get up, the sheriff waved them down. "Stay there" he said. "That notice of this endangered rat only came out mid day today. Sonya was attacked by them this morning. And she was attacked in her own place. That's self defense. Too bad the perpetrators were your endangered rats. Defense of oneself and their property is legal, against who or whatever. So I have two questions. Why are you here so fast, and which of you shot Sonya?"

"He did," Sonya stayed pointing to the man.

"Your vet in town called us, he has the remains of the rat she killed. The endangered listing was put into law last night. She's guilty!"

"Nope, she was defending herself and her property," the sheriff stated. He looked at the hole in Sonya's shirt over her ribs. "You OK Sonya?"

"Yes, his popgun only damaged my skin."

"Are you men coming along quietly?" the sheriff asked.

"We are Federal law enforcers, you can't arrest us!"

"Wrong. You are both charged with illegal arrest, and you for attempted murder," the sheriff stated. "Up and against the wall."

The men stood up. So did Sonya.

"I insist we call out supervisor!" one yelled.

"I'll do that, after you are both in jail cells. Hands on the wall and spread'em."

They reluctantly did so. In patting them down, he found their cuffs, cuffed them with them and took the keys. He then read them their rights.

"Deputy Sonya, help me get them in the car. I'm going to need your statement also."

"Yes, Sheriff."

.

Once the sheriff got statements from the men and Sonya and had them tucked away in cells, he called the county commissioner's office and explained the situation. Not long after that, he was called by the State Police Captain in Johnson city. They were sending a car to pick those men up.

Before the police could arrive, he got a call from the Governor's office, The Police Commander informed him of many attacks and damage, as well as many injuries and seven deaths they knew of so far from these 'protected' rats. Those rats had no protection status in the State of Texas. In fact, the order was kill as many as you possibly can. The sheriff told him the method he'd used to get rid or the rats in Driftwood.

.

"Over rats?" Cameron asked in disbelief as she talked to John from the small lounge on the boat.

"Yeah, I guess several other states are infested with them too. Yet despite what Washington calls 'rumors' of these rats ruining things and attacking people, they insisted they are a protected species. The name Demon Rat that Sonya first used to describe them is all over the place now. Even the news used that term."

"They are that bad?"

"Horrible. The mass onto the one they are attacking. Sonya said the way they attacked her, she's glad no one else was there yet. Those rats might have killed them. The have killed other people they massed on. I guess the President tried to activate the Texas Guard here, that used to be the National guard. They were already deployed, trying to get this rat problem in check. He then wanted the army to come in and as he put it 'restore order'. They refused, no one's invading except for these rats. Quite a few states have also joined with Texas to ignore the endangered status. Main stream media is calling those states 'rebellious'. Local stations are following the real news and saying the Federal Government is blind to the truth, and showing clips and stories of the things destroyed and the mauled and dead people caused by these rats. It's a real mess."

"We really need to get home," Cameron grumbled. "How are thing there?"

"The sheriff came up with an idea and it worked perfectly. Those rats respond to a cry from other rats. We played pipe piper and led the mass of them in Driftwood out of town and down the road. Mr. Nader came behind us and barbecued them with a flamethrower. Other places are doing that now also. The town vet made the news too, he says those rats were genetically engineered to do what they did. Tonight, the University of Texas confirmed it."

"Someone did that on purpose."

"Yup, but so far, no one has a clue who did it. Odd thing though, the states involved with these rat infestations are mainly Republican. Makes you wonder who the real Demon Rats are."

"Anything me or John Henry can help with?" Cameron asked.

"John Henry is already searching for some connection to who did it. So far, nothing."

"I'll talk to Catherine about it. John, the higher up this comes from, the harder it will be to find out the source."

John chuckled. "Aint that the truth!"

In the background, Allison said, "Is that Cameron? Can I talk to her?"

"Ahh Cam? Allison wants to talk to you for a bit."

"OK."

In the background, Allison said, "John this is girl talk."

"Let me know when you're done," he said.

The line was silent for a moment, then Allison quietly asked, "Cam, I have a ... personal question for you."

"Allright," Cameron replied.

"Well, you're on that boat in the pacific and won't be home for weeks, and I'm stuck here in Driftwood because of this stupid fuel thing..."

When Allison stopped speaking, Cameron said, "and?"

"And well, you kinda are me, and I'm you ..."

"Spit it out," Cameron replied.

"I ... this is hard, and I don't want you mad at me..."

It suddenly clicked what Allison wanted. "Are you asking if you can sleep with my husband" Cameron asked loudly.

Everyone in the lounge turned to look at Cameron, Including Delilah.

"Who is that?" Delilah asked in a hard tone.

"I ... well, yeah..."

"Not only no but FUCK NO! Put John back on!"

"That don't sound good" Kaede noted. She poked Kouta. "What did she say?"

"Ahh someone wants to sleep with Cameron's husband," he told her quietly.

Kaede grinned. "When they meet, I want to watch."

A moment later, John was back on. "Cam, what just happened? Allison just ran out of here."

"Allison wants to sleep with you. Apparently, she's not getting enough."

"Ugh, I hope you told her no. I will."

"I did. In no uncertain terms. I should hang up now before I crush the phone."

"Yeah. Talk to you later. Tell Delilah I said hi, and I hope you both get home soon. Love you."

I love you an you love me," Cameron replied, then disconnected and put the phone to one side. "We need to get home," she grumbled.