It was at least the third tremor Charlie had felt- none of them very significant, but enough to be noticed. The first time he had passed it off as a figment of his imagination or the result of taxed nerves, the second time he acknowledged that maybe there was more to it than that. Now this third time, Charlie's mouth quirked into a frown and he quickly shone the flashlight around the tunnel to check for any signs of an impending cave-in. Did Nate already set off the explosives? the Englishman wondered. Am I too late, and now I'll get trapped down here too?
He shook his head, determinedly pushing the thoughts from his mind as he quickened his pace down the hall. Surely if that was a volcano erupting, he'd be feeling more than just a few slight quakes he thought to himself. Still, he broke into a run, reminding himself that either way his time was running out. "Nate?" he called into the darkness. "Molly?"
Turning a corner, he ran nearly headlong into an Atlantean that was forever encased in volcanic stone, his flashlight aimed directly at the tormented expression frozen on the creature's face. Shivering involuntarily, Cutter pressed his back to the wall and squeezed by, muttering encouragement to himself as his claustrophobia flared up for a moment. Then he was off again, racing against time and the stubbornness of his teammates in an underground labyrinth that felt like something straight out of Dante's hell.
It was a couple minutes later when vague sounds in the distance caught his attention. He slowed, straining against the sound-distorting nature of the subterranean complex to hear what and where it was. "Are those... voices?" he murmured, stopping entirely for a moment and furrowing his brows. Somewhere, not too far away from the sounds of it, two people were conversing in heated tones. Also, it sounded like one of them was a woman.
Cutter bolted, racing at breakneck speeds around curves as he sprinted toward the sound of the talking. One of Atlantis' stone doors slammed shut, and he leaned even harder into his run, coaxing every drop of speed out of his body that he could. "Molly!" he shouted. "Nate!" His flashlight beam bobbed furiously and he skidded on the grit that covered the floor as he rounded a nearly ninety-degree turn.
On the other side of the bend Cutter spotted a figure slumped in the corner and he abruptly reigned himself in, his progress slowing to a trot and then a standstill as his eyes trailed over the limp posture of the figure, the pale and clammy-looking skin, and the large bloodstain visible on the person's tattered shirt. Cutter hung back reflexively, swallowing hard as the conflicting emotions of recognition and denial swirled in his mind and he stepped forward hesitantly. "Nate?" he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.
Cutter's knees hit the ground as he dropped down beside Nate and panic washed over him. "Nate?" He put a hand on his fallen friend's shoulder and shook him, but got no response. "Oh, shit- please don't be dead, mate!" Charlie murmured, eyes wide with worry. He lifted him to a sitting position, Nate's head lolling to the side as he propped him against the tunnel wall, and put two finger's on Nate's neck to check his pulse. Charlie exhaled through pursed lips and uttered a silent thanks to anyone who might be listening. There was a pulse. It was weak, but it was there.
"Don't worry mate, I'm gonna getcha out of here," Cutter said. He rose to his feet and looked at the sealed door in front of him. "Molly?" he shouted, then banged on the stone. "Molly, can you hear me?" From inside, there was a tremendous crash that shook the ground again, and Charlie gritted his teeth.
Making the call to leave someone behind- even someone he had only known for a matter of a day or two- was not something he could ever prepare for. The times he was on a team with someone, they were in it together to the end. Through all the dodgy situations he had been in (and he'd seen his share), the only times he had ever left someone behind is when they had either double-crossed him or were clearly, indisputably, dead- and only on a couple occasions had he even had to do that. But to know that an ally was on the other side of a locked door, alive and well, but out of reach and on a course to their inevitable doom, with no time to even find an alternative route to get to them? It made Charlie feel sick to think about.
"Molly, damn it, open the door!" he screamed, pounding fruitlessly against the heavy stone. "Bloody hell!" he growled in desperation, sliding his palms down the door and leaning his bald head against the cool rock. Another crash, louder than the others, interrupted his sullen musing, and Cutter clenched his jaw in indomitable determination. Swallowing painfully the lump in his throat, he gave one last look at the sealed entryway and put his chin up. "Impossible woman to thank," he noted.
The tunnel shook violently, causing Charlie to stumble into the wall. "Alright mate," he said as he pushed himself upright again, "time to get you out of here!" He crouched down, pulled Nate's right arm around his neck before lifting his bulky frame in a fireman's carry. Grunting as he adjusted the nearly 200 pounds of deadweight on his shoulders, Cutter exclaimed stoically, "Bollocks! Let me guess- 'It's all muscle', right?" He began trudging down the tunnel, muttering to himself as he went, "You definitely owe me one after this, mate... I'm gonna be calling this favor in, you can count on it!"
With steely resolve, Charlie carried his fallen comrade through the winding tunnels of Atlantis, following the trail of bullets Molly had left behind back toward the surface. The occasional trembling of the ground kept his adrenaline flowing, and Cutter made excellent time despite having to carry Nate, arriving quickly at the fork in the tunnel where the bullet trail had first begun. Shrugging his load back onto his shoulders, Charlie started down the tunnel he had come down originally when suddenly he heard the unmistakable sound of clanging metal and heavy footsteps coming his way. "Oi! lovely," Cutter breathed. "These bastards again." He looked hesitantly over his shoulder at the second, unexplored, tunnel behind him and pulled out his gun just as the first of the Atlanteans came around the corner. "'ello, boys!" he growled, then pointed his pistol and began unloading it on them. The guardians screeched and snarled viciously, the sudden attack throwing them into a momentary frenzy as they blindly reacted, but soon enough darts were flying from their crossbows and Charlie turned, running as fast as his cumbersome burden allowed down the other tunnel. "Oh no, oh no, oh nononononono-" Cutter ranted to himself as one of the bizarre Atlantean flamethrowers unleashed its fury behind him. He stumbled, and blind-fired over his shoulder in hopes to buy time, but when he did chance a look behind him he saw the savage guardians rushing towards him regardless of the flaming resin that coated the tunnel, their swords and spears flashing in the ominous light of the flames.
"We're not in Kansas anymore, Toto!" Cutter shouted to his unconscious companion as the tunnel pitched suddenly downward. Sliding down the gritty slope in a half-crouch, he used his momentum to launch back to his feet at the bottom, but was mortified to see that on the other side the tunnel sloped immediately up again at just as much of an angle. "Oh, I'm sodding well in it now!" he grumbled as he started up the hill with the Atlanteans close in pursuit. Ducking as another dart whizzed past his head, Charlie fired over his shoulder again until the slide on his gun popped back, alerting him it was empty. Breathing heavily with exertion, he jammed it back in its holster and slogged onward, having slowed nearly to a walk as he made it close to the top of the incline. "Anytime you wanted to wake up, mate... it'd be right lovely," he panted.
The otherwordly grunts and growls of the guardians seemed to be nearly on top of him as he finally reached the summit and immediately burst into an arcade of sorts; Cutter cut right and half-ran, half stumbled along the row of columns, hoping that by some stroke of luck he would find his way out. Muttering encouragement to himself, the Englishman rounded a bend in the arcade and was confronted with another group of guardians coming from the opposite direction. He immediately stopped, wide-eyed and nearly panicking. "Oh, not good. Not bloody good," he said to himself, glancing over his shoulder at the guardians coming up behind him. Trapped between two squadrons, he looked out through the arches at the edge of the balcony and saw that the arcade was positioned about twenty or so feet above the river, similar to the chamber outside the Shrine Room they had encountered on their way into Atlantis, and Charlie swallowed thickly. As the lead Atlanteans in both groups leveled their flame throwers and readied to roast him alive, Cutter squeezed his eyes shut, mentally bracing himself for whatever might happen next, and then threw himself out of the arcade with a scream.
Two walls of fire collided violently behind him, bursting out through the arches and splaying in all directions as Charlie sailed through the air and crashed into the frigid river below, the combined weight of him and Nate driving him instantly toward the bottom. Fighting the overwhelming urge to panic that his claustrophobia brought on anytime he was more than a foot or two submerged, Charlie clawed his way determinedly upward, hauling Nate along with him, and soon he broke the surface, spluttering and taking in gulps of both air and freedom. Gasping as he shook his head to clear the water from his eyes, Cutter looked upward to see both flamethrowers now pointed directly down at him, with multiple archers lined up on both sides of them.
"Oh, come on!" he exclaimed desperately. "Give a fellow a break?" As he splashed his way toward the bridge and the waiting shore just twenty feet away, there was a roar from the flamethrowers and Cutter looked back. The place on the river he had just been occupying moments before suddenly became engulfed in evil-looking Greek Fire, which danced nightmarishly on the very surface of the water. "Shit!" he hissed, and looked up to see the guardians again homed in on him, and he was pretty certain he wouldn't be able to out-swim them for long. As the horrifically-disfigured Atlanteans again unleashed their hellish attack, Charlie spoke with the calm resignation of a man who had come to terms with his fate- "Deep breath, mate," he said, ignoring the fact Nate was currently unresponsive. Then he dove under the water.
The roar of the flamethrowers was muffled as Charlie plunged downward moments before the surface became awash with flaming resin. Cutter dove deep to avoid accidentally encountering the deadly substance, and he focused all of his willpower on not dissolving into a panic as the water closed in around him. The pressure in his ears grew and his surroundings became darker and more unfamiliar as he descended, and Cutter found himself squeezing his eyes shut against the anxiety that threatened to overrun him. No time to lose your head, Charles, he thought to himself. You've got to get Nate out of here first-and do it before he drowns!
Charlie paused mid-stroke to tread water and look upward, and his heart sank at the dancing myriad of angry oranges and reds that played on the water above him as far as he could see. Terror rushed upon him, trying to overwhelm him as he suddenly knew what it felt like to be trapped under ice, only this situation seemed even deadlier somehow. He gritted his teeth and kicked out violently, propelling himself towards the bridge, his only hope in finding a patch of water that was not currently ablaze to climb out of. As he swam he repeated his go-to mantra for surviving such claustrophobic and frightening encounters- It will all be over soon, it will all be over soon. Coming on the tail end of that thought, though, was the unwelcome thought that, indeed, it would all be over soon- one way or the other.
Growling deep in his throat as he staunchly resisted such panic-inducing ideas, Charlie fought his way through the cold, inky water, dragging his unconscious friend with him. His lungs burned with the exertion of pulling so much weight, and Nate's limp form felt heavier with each passing moment. With hope born of absolute desperation, Charlie looked up again and saw that the orange and red painting the surface looked just as vibrant here, and only then realized that the amount of reflected light would make it almost impossible to tell where a safe place to surface was.
It will all be over soon, it will all be over soon...
Hoping against hope, Charlie surfaced, and astoundingly was not immediately engulfed in flames. Sputtering, gasping, coughing, and very nearly sobbing with relief, he swiped at the water draining down his face and immediately struck out for the shore, and moments later was pulling both himself and Nate out onto dry land. Teeth chattering uncontrollably, Charlie lifted Nate by his armpits and drug him through the door and out into the tunnels beyond. "C'mon mate!" he said, his voice low and hoarse as he fought to bring his shivering under control. "C'mon, breathe!" Flopping Nate down on the floor, Cutter placed his hands on his chest and pushed down hard. "Come on, come on!" the Englishman growled, watching with rising concern as he pressed over and over again without response.
Suddenly, with a gasp, Nate's head lurched off the ground, and he hacked and choked until he coughed up some water. "Oh, thank god!" Charlie breathed through gritted teeth. Nate's head lolled to the side again, eyes still closed, and Cutter smacked his cheek lightly as he moved to lift him up again. "Alright mate, it's gonna be OK!" he said reassuringly, even as another compulsive shiver went down the Englishman's spine. "We're gonna be just-"
A low, bassy rumble interrupted him, shaking the ground beneath their feet. It was no louder than the others before it, but it was somehow more thorough, the shock waves much more complete, and even as Charlie's heart sank with realization, a much, much louder explosion came right on its heels.
"Bollocks!" he exclaimed hoarsely as the tunnel began to shake violently around him.
When the reverberations of the latest explosion resonated up through the earth, Chloe knew that that was it. This was the Big One. It rolled up from deep within the ground like the harbinger of the awakening of some horrific monstrosity, and she and Sully momentarily abandoned their vigil at the top of the inferno where their battle was being waged to exchange a knowing glance. Before either of them could open their mouths to confirm their own thoughts, nature did it for them, and the already unstable geography of Atlantis came alive with a vengeance while an ear-splittingly loud explosion ripped the last vestiges of security away, bringing the crisis at hand into a glaringly sharp focus.
"That's our cue!" Sully shouted while struggling to maintain his footing as the ground heaved beneath his feet. Chloe fell on one knee, and when he pulled her up their eyes met. She was taken aback by the grim determination there. "Come on!" he roared. "There's no use staying any longer, or we'll all be dead!"
As he ran on wobbly legs towards the gates of the city, Chloe threw one last longing look behind her. Her eyes became glassy as conflicting emotions raged, ready to erupt into despair at any moment. Leaving her teammates was just too hard.
"Chloe, let's go!" Sully's voice reached her more sternly this time. Torn between the two prospects, Chloe glanced over her shoulder before taking one last look toward the tunnels below. Of course they're not going to make it out, Chloe, she scolded herself as she finally decided to let the reality sink in. No one can even make it up those stairs with a fire like that!
Setting her jaw in a hard line, Chloe turned and began making her way toward Sully. She paused to keep her balance as a nasty tremor swept through again, causing a section of ground to her right to suddenly collapse. A massive slab of granite fell down into the tunnels below, pivoting on one corner and throwing up a massive cloud of dust as it stopped, coming to rest in a downward slope. As Chloe swallowed and stared at the destruction, a silhouette suddenly appeared through the cloud, an irregular form moving with quick, determined strides in their direction.
Chloe's eyes went wide. "No f-(a well-timed crash drowned out the next sound) -g way!" she breathed.
"Chloe!" Sully barked. "What the hell are yo-" Seeing the figure emerging from the chaos he stopped and stared, looking possibly even more flabbergasted than his Australian partner, as Charlie Cutter strode up to them with Nathan Drake draped across his shoulders.
"Oi!" Cutter said curtly as he reached the two of them. "What're ya bloody well standin' there for? Let's get the hell out of here!" The he proceeded to storm past them.
Shaken out of their stupefied trance, Chloe and Sullivan turned heel and followed as the Englishman marched out of Atlantis. "Is he-" Sully asked falteringly when he caught up.
"Yeah, he's alive!" Charlie called back.
Chloe was pretty sure she saw the ten years Sully had gained earlier in the day immediately fly away on distinctly mustache-shaped wings. Then a moment later another thought seemed to flash across his face. "What about Molly?"
"She set the explosives off!" Cutter shouted as he ducked under the half-collapsed stone gate. "Hurry, these things are gonna give at any moment!" Sully hesitated, casting a doleful look behind him, but then kept moving as Charlie said.
Sure enough, no sooner had the treasure hunters made it through the entrance to the fabled city than the monolithic gates cracked in pieces from the ongoing quakes and collapsed over the opening. Beyond them, the world was in an utter uproar. Cliffs were crumbling, red-hot lava spewed high into the air, and streams of magma coursed down the sides of the mountains around them, a few rivulets even making it into the crater where they were. From somewhere water crashed over the rocks and sprayed in all directions, a mercifully cooling mist in the midst of the searing heat that surrounded them.
"Come on!" Chloe beckoned to Cutter. "I'll give you a hand getting Nate up the side of this!" Taking Nate's right arm over her shoulders, Chloe helped Charlie lift his unconscious form between them, and they made slow but steady progress up the side of the depression.
It was when they were almost at the top that a mighty roar made the treasure hunting gang stop and look up. To their right, from the direction of the sea, an enormous wave was looming, overshadowing them, and mere moments away from crashing down on top of them. "Oh, crap, here it comes!" Sully yelled.
The next instant they were all swallowed up and engulfed in the foaming, swirling waters of the north Atlantic as it rushed around them, sweeping them off their feet and washing them down the canyon. Losing all sense of orientation, Chloe flailed blindly in an attempt to find the surface, vaguely aware of the fact that at least Nate was still with her, though she couldn't tell if Charlie was. By a stroke of luck, the dynamic motion of the wave suddenly spit her out on top, and she choked on salt water as she struggled to stay afloat. "Cutter? Sully?" she cried, still blinking the water from her eyes.
"We're here!" Charlie's voice came back. A moment later she spotted them both within a hundred foot radius of her.
"Ah!" Chloe exclaimed. "That was a real doozy!"
"Not near as much as that's gonna be!"
Chloe turned to look where Sully was pointing and was horrified to see a forty-foot boat being lifted in its entirety, riding on the crest of a wave and poised to slide down the other side and crush them all within seconds. "Oh shit!" she screamed.
As the water flowed onward, the four treasure hunters slipped into the trough of the wave and the ebb revealed a rock formation between them and the barreling forty-foot behemoth. Sliding down the wall of water, the boat smashed broadside into the rocks with a terrific crash and the screech of tortured steel.
"You were right!" Chloe panted as her feet suddenly touched stone. "That was more so!"
The water dissipated, if only temporarily, and the small group found themselves sprawled on the ground below the precariously perched boat. Cutter lifted his head, then dragged himself to his feet and pointed to the vessel. "Don't know about you, mates, but I think I'd rather ride all this out on that thing then just as I am."
Sully scoffed. "Yeah, it's probably still slightly more likely to float!"
The adventurers scrambled up the jagged rocks to the rail of the boat, the little vessel creaking and groaning the whole time, threatening to come dislodged and fall at any moment. Cutter and Chloe carried Nate between them again, and Sully vaulted the railing onto the deck before turning and reaching down to take Nate. "Here! I'll lift him up!"
Another wave came crashing through the mountains and the ocean began to swirl around the base of the rocks again, rising quickly, so that by the time Sully had Nate by his arms and was dragging him onto the deck, the boat was already lifting off once more. "Go!" Cutter shouted as he pushed Chloe before him, making sure she was safely aboard before trying to get on himself.
"Charlie, hurry!" Chloe called, leaning over the rail to take his hand as the current pulled the vessel away from the rocks. Cutter leaped and grabbed her hand with both of his, and his feet scrabbled against the slick metal hull of the boat as he tried to gain a purchase. "I'll pull you up!" Chloe shouted.
"Better do it now!" Sully roared. Cutter glanced in the direction the boat was moving and gulped when he saw that it was about to crush him between the thick steel hull and the unforgiving side of a cliff.
"Chloe!" he screeched.
She swiftly jerked upward on his arms, pulling him up with remarkable strength just milliseconds before the hull made contact with the sharp rocks. Another ear-piercing squeal shrieked through the air as the boat scraped down the side of the mountain, before finally striking a log and bouncing away from it. "God, that was close!" Charlie exclaimed breathlessly.
Chloe didn't answer and only looked ahead with a stoically assessing gaze. "Sully, are you getting those engines going?" she called.
"Workin' on it!"
She continued to stare at a set of evil-looking rocks that loomed ahead of them, their jagged and pointed sides promising an merciless encounter that their battered boat surely wouldn't withstand- and they were coming closer by the second. "Might want to get cracking," she said, glancing at the enclosed pilot house. "Cause those rocks are-"
"I know, I know!" he shouted back through the window, his voice flustered. "Does this look like some sort of pleasure trip to you?!"
Chloe watched with growing dread as the vessel slipped within a dangerously close range of the rocks, then with a splutter the boat's engines rumbled to life and the props instantly churned the water behind them to a froth as Sully rammed it hard into reverse. "Yeah!" Sully yelled over the din as they slowly clawed themselves off their impending doom.
Chloe let out a cheer of her own as she stood along with Cutter and dragged Nate into the pilot house, the two of them laying him down on top of the plain wooden chart table that stood in the middle of it. "Always believed in you, Sully," Charlie said, clapping a hand to the older man's shoulder as he stepped up behind him.
"Yeah, well, we're not out of the woods yet, kids," Sully growled. His gaze was steely, his lips quirked in concentration beneath his mustache, and Chloe noticed his grip on the wheel was white-knuckled. Bucking and pitching wildly on the unpredictable waves, the little boat made its haphazard way through the treacherous canyon toward the ocean while all around them the sky was raining fire and chaos. Lava bombs fell on all sides, and some even on the deck, and every foaming breaker carried the threat of concealed ridges that could disembowel the vessel in a heartbeat.
Then Chloe spotted it. A narrow opening between two cliffs, through which Sully was doing his damndest to coax the hapless vessel as it was tossed about like a rag doll. And when she noticed the flow of lava rushing down the mountain on the left, heading straight for their path of escape, she realized exactly what Sully meant about not being out of the woods. As the stakes of their entire expedition were, in a moment, focused all the way down to a piddling fifty-foot gap between life and death, Sully leaned forward intently, the accumulative sum of whatever Navy training he had received giving him tunnel vision to shut out anything except that one passage of clear water that was about to be flushed with molten rock. White-faced and wide-eyed, Chloe and Cutter watched the lava advancing impossibly quickly, and for agonizing moments it seemed as if they might reach the passage at the exact same time as the wickedly hot magma, and all be burned to a crisp.
"This is gonna be close!" Sully roared, jamming the throttle into its furthest forward position.
Then somehow, miraculously, the boat shot through the passage and into open sea a split-second before the lava reached the bottom of the cliff and flowed into the water, creating a roiling and deadly mixture of elemental power that spouted steam and gas like an alchemist's cauldron. In sheer ecstatic relief, Chloe collapsed onto the co-pilot's chair and washed a hand over her damp brow. "Unbe-lievable!" she cried, looking back just in time to watch the pillars of Hercules collapse into the maelstrom. "I can't believe we made it out of that!"
Sully snorted and threw a troubled glance behind him. "Yeah. Almost all of us."
She frowned as the weight of his words sunk in, but was immediately brought back to the present when Sully began barking orders. "Cutter! Can you check the bilge and make sure the pumps are keeping up with whatever water this thing's taking on? Chloe, find us a first aid kit and let's see if we can keep Nate alive till we can get to civilization." Reaching into a cubby nearby, he pulled out a chart and unrolled it on top of the instrument panel. "I'm gonna try to find us a place where he can get some decent medical attention."
"Aye aye, captain," Chloe murmured humorlessly, both her and Charlie turning to leave the pilothouse as Sully mulled over the chart and adjusted their course by the big compass behind the wheel.
"So this must be the boat Floki and his crew brought, huh?"
Chloe turned to Charlie, realizing that his question was the first thing to break the silence that had been over the pilot house for almost ten minutes. "Seems that way, yeah."
Sully looked behind them and saw that the volcano was now nothing more than a dark cloud of smoke on the horizon. Satisfied that the autopilot was holding and that they could well and truly say that they were in the clear, he sagged back into the pilot's seat, wearily scrubbed both hands over his face, and heaved a heavy sigh. After abruptly pivoting the chair around, he stalked over to the chart table where Nate lay motionless on his back. Standing over his protege, Sully watched his chest rising and falling rapidly, then frowned and looked over at Charlie. "God- he looks like reheated hell."
Cutter grunted and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "Reckon he probably feels it, too."
Examining the place where Chloe had cut Nate's Henley away to apply bandages and a compress, Sully tsked and shook his head. "Took a goddamn knife to the chest... Jesus Christ..."
Chloe appeared by Sully's shoulder, concern on her face. "How long until we reach land?"
Sully glanced back at the charts he had sprawled out. "We're headed to Agadir- it's the closest city that's big enough to have a hospital that can handle this kind of trauma, but it's probably a good six hours from here." Glancing out the window, he added, "Maybe a little less if the weather stays fair like this."
Chloe met his eyes compassionately. "All we can do is hope, right?"
Sully stared at her, stone-faced, and his mustache twitched. "I guess so," he sighed.
"Ugh, no... no, get out of here... Go!" The sound made all three of them look to Nate, who was suddenly shifting fitfully on the table, his face troubled, though his eyes remained closed.
"Nate?" Sully said, leaning forward. "Nate! Hey kid, it's OK!" He put his hand on his surrogate son's shoulder.
Nate groaned but seemed to calm down for a moment, then suddenly his eyes sprung open. "Molly! Where's Molly?"
Swallowing hard, Sully looked around for support, but the look on his face was all Nate needed to see. "She's dead," Nate mumbled, leaning back again and clapping a clammy hand to his forehead. "Oh, god..."
Giving a look of fatherly compassion, Sully could only offer the simple consolation, "I'm sorry."
"Ugh, she's dead... she's dead...," Nate mumbled over and over as his eyes fluttered closed again, and soon his mutterings trailed off. Chloe and Cutter gathered around him as he drifted back out of consciousness.
"That's right, mate," Charlie said softly. "Just get some rest."
"You did all you could do," Chloe added, giving Nate's hand a gentle squeeze.
Careful what you wish for threatening to call in that favor someday, Charlie. You never know, you might, like, break your leg and have to get carried out of a castle or something...
Up next, for anyone following it, I hope to get out chapter six of the Sixth Sun, but I'll be back with the epilogue for this before too long. Thanks to everyone whose stuck with me this far!