Chapter 45: Four Bomb Craters

Around One Week Later

Narrative Continued by Paul Young

Hearing the voice emitter click on, I asked, "How long ago you think this took place?" hearing the voice emitter click off before I looked around in the heavy suit at Duncan Schmitt but feeling the eyes of everyone else turn back to me.

Nathan, Salgado, and Mr. Nelson weren't kidding, this was incredible.

I adjusted my grip on the heavy .50 caliber machine gun and looked at the dune. Nothing. Hearing the mechanics work as I moved the legs to turn myself, I took in the sight of those short concrete buildings up back the way we came in the distance. I had been in this region before, and even though the occasional memory flickered in the back of my mind from the last time I was in this area, I saw the face of that kid and was ready, I was even hoping for another attack like that.

I had to remind myself that the other men weren't wearing suits like this, and I felt that in their looks. Turning to the faces still half scanning the dunes, and half looking to me, my eyes behind the reinforced visor and thick steel of the helmet went to each dry bush gently swaying in the wind to the next before landing back on Mr. Schmitt kneeling beside the pile of burnt bodies. Mitchell stepped up to the young man, they exchanged a few words, and after a moment, the kid looked at me over his shoulder;

"If I had to guess, probably around a few days ago, maybe a week."

Doyle gestured to his men to fan out and start searching the area for any other clues about what happened here, and my eyes went almost instinctively toward the four heavily disturbed patches in the dirt, and the wrapped man kneeling at the edge of one.

It might have been a day after Nathan had his appointment with the VC doc to order his new hand when the NCR Trade Boss met with Constable Hanshaw. I wasn't there for it, but the Constable found me and my boys manning the gate near the end of shift when he stepped up to me with Doyle in the rear. He told me that he needed me to gather four men, so I selected Licus, Savitt, John, and Ramos for whatever the Constable needed.

Just as I feared, the Constable was told that Leonard received no word from the large group of mercenaries and guns he sent around the north GSL about two weeks previously. The Constable was told that they never checked in with Leonard past one of the checkpoints along the route they were to take. Before I could head home to my family, Doyle and I were shown the map and we could not believe how close the group's last check-in was. A place on the map that was only around a four-day trek for the guard had taken Leonard's guns for hire just under two weeks before they never checked back in again.

Such a thing was somewhat typical and was part of the reason that New Canaan rarely relied on mercenaries for any sort of expedition or reconnaissance mission. We could rely on them in a pinch to fill in for market patrols or help escort any of our own merchants past places like Hanksville or 89 City, but not much else. This was especially because mercenaries had a habit of being on their own time frame than their employer's if left unsupervised.

In the end, the Constable needed me and Doyle's men ready to set out and investigate what might have happened to Leonard's mercs. Me, Doyle, and the men we gathered were dismissed, and I spoke to the Constable in private by the barracks while the rest of the day shift turned in weapons. I basically asked if he could pick someone else for the job since I'd talked to him about things with my family a few times since returning from the Sevieri job. Although it was above my station as a lieutenant of the guard, I promised my wife and kids that I wouldn't be setting out for the wastes as often as I had in the past year when Michelle was pregnant. I probably could have gotten away with simply asking, since the man in charge of the guard was the man who raised me, but I made my argument from the position that I had gone on more scouts and expeditions in the past year than I had in almost the past 4 years combined. The man understood, and I could see in his drooping mustache alone that he wanted to grant me that permission to stay home, but asked me to join Doyle's group since I was the one most familiar with Leonard's situation, given how I was there for the meeting that set off the idea.

I agreed with a heavy heart, already planning out my own part in the argument with my wife and probably kids, when the man offered me something I was not expecting at all. He made a deal with me:

"Just do this one more scout for me, and I won't ask you for your part in another one for at least 6 months."

He then said that he was still working out the details with Leonard, writing up the reports he'd need for Elder approval, so it would likely be a few days before Doyle and I needed to head out. Then he gave me the unexpected part.

Returning home after that meeting with the Constable, I had a lovely night with Dani, Michelle, and even my grandson. With what the Constable offered me, I decided to hold off on telling Dani what I was asked to do again and headed to muster that next morning before handing off control of the detachment to Rhynes and John. After that, I walked with the Constable over to the scav shops on the east end to get to work.

For almost two straight days since getting asked to take part in another scout I promised my family I wouldn't, instead of working in the towers, I spent those shifts at the scav shop learning the function, systems, and how to operate the T-45D power armor suit that Nathan and the techs returned to us with over a week prior.

The afternoon before setting out, I told my wife and the kids that I would, unfortunately, have to break the promise I made to them when I got back from the Sevieri job those weeks ago. Before they could say a word, cry, or get upset, I urged them to follow me, and I led them across town to the scav shops where I had been working. Being the only person outside of the Constable and Steven Chapman of battery and power to have a key to the fusion core lockbox, I had my wife and kids stand outside the shop and wait for me while I exited the small garage clad in the giant steel suit, and carrying the .50 caliber machinegun I'd been familiarizing myself with. Removing the helmet, I stepped forward and told my wife that I was granted special permission to wear the suit out into the wasteland for this assignment.

The looks on Joseph and Hannah's faces when they saw their dad in that big suit of armor were priceless, but Dani and Michelle still had tears in their eyes. I couldn't tell if the tears were out of thankfulness to the Constable for helping keep me safe, or if it was still due to me breaking the promise I made to them. In the end, I was thankful that the Constable let me do this little display because the woman I married eventually calmed down enough to give me her own blessing, while Michelle subtly became more interested in the suit like her younger siblings.

I knew the thing wasn't impervious to all sorts of damage, but I assured the family that mechanized armor suits like this helped beat the communists before the nuclear war, and the reds certainly had more firepower than any of the spears and occasional hunting rifles the White Leg warriors had. Truly, news of my selection to this scout would have gone so much worse if it wasn't for this permission given by the Constable, so I was more than thankful to him.

That next morning, I gathered up my men and Doyle's before morning muster, entered the suit of power armor, and gathered the .50 caliber ammunition from the armory before setting out. Just outside the gates of town, I could hear the grumblings of jealousy from Doyle and the others, and even thought I heard the word "nepotism" from Mr. Schmitt, but recalled what Nathan said when he saw me training in the suit around the scav shops the other day,

"They'll understand when they've had their chance in the thing."

Along the walk north around the walls of town, I made sure to tell them that the Constable was merely having me "try the suit out" which was true in a way, and that "The scouts were going to be the ones who got to wear the armor when the techs were done with the other suits. This ended the grumblings amongst Doyle's men almost instantly, and the grumblings of my men ended when we linked up with Mr. Graham. I could see the Burned Man's eyebrows rise even behind the wrappings when I stepped up to him, and then the grumblings ended for good when I did what I did to the rad bear that crossed our path on our way through lower SLC.

We had the pair of heavy machine guns in the armory for probably a decade or two when there was talk about fixing them to mount up in the towers. The machine guns were simply too heavy for anyone to carry them, but the Guard had simply never gotten around to acting on that tower mounting idea, so the guns mostly served as show pieces behind the armory cage. We had plenty of .50 ammunition for the anti-material rifles in the towers that were sometimes taken on scouts, but not even I knew what to think when I got the opportunity to test the oil-dripping automatic cannon I was able to easily carry thanks to the power armor…

With one three-second burst and about 15 to 20 rounds that were probably able to be heard from the North Fields and North Tower crews, that mutated bear was reduced to several chunks that Mr. Schmitt gathered up on the move, and we ate well by the campfire that night.

Over the next few days, we checked each coordinate the merc group checked in at, but the stay was not more than a few minutes. There was no point in tracking from there when we already knew the last place they checked in at.

We were able to cover ground in 4 days that the Trade Boss contracted mercenaries spent over two weeks walking to. A day out from the small isolationist little community of Jude, we reached the last checkpoint Leonard received, and given that their next checkpoint was outside the walls of Jude itself, Doyle's tracking began as we approached the small settlement. Perhaps around 5 miles from the gates of Jude, Duncan and Graham had tracked the merc group to a spot on the map not too far from the ambush site that marked the end of Evan Buller and so many other men of the guard in September of 2277.

Licus again said what the group had concluded nearly at the start of this trip; "They sure took their sweet time getting here."

Doyle's man Hendry gravitated towards the crumbled asphalt road the mercs were following before they ended up as that pile there.

"How many bodies do you guys count?" I asked Schmitt and Mitchell, still beside the bodies while Graham began to inspect those disturbed patches of sand.

"No way to tell for sure. I count 16 hands, but there were definitely more before the wind carried some of the ash away," said Mitchell.

I nodded, continuing to scan the dunes. I took a step forward, watching Ramos wipe a bead of sweat from his brown before crouching down beside John. The young man appeared to just stretch his legs rather than to inspect something, as he stood to his feet after a moment.

Doyle and his guy Douglas were inspecting the cracks of the half-buried old-world road before John asked either me or Doyle;

"Did they have any pack animals?"

I stole another look at the ash pile. It was big enough to probably contain the 18 that set out on the expedition, but probably not their animals too. Before Doyle could, I answered;

"Only two brahmin from what I heard. One belonging to one of Leonard's traders, the other just to help carry rations and ammo for the mercs."

The winds whistled by, and I could almost seem to feel it even behind the thick helmet when John asked again generally, "Think the raiders might have taken the cattle for food and whatnot?..."

This time, Doyle answered from the distance, "Don't think so… but maybe… I can't see any tracks they might have made… Then again, wind could easily have carried them away days ago…"

Mr. Schmitt stood himself up from beside the pile and began to tread the path that Doyle took along the asphalt seeming to be able to give his commander a second opinion.

I wasn't sure what to make of the whole thing, and just before I could inquire about the disturbed dirt or craters, Doyle stepped up to the rest of us adding;

"You know the weirdest part?..." Savitt glanced over his shoulder to Doyle from his spot on the edge of the road. Savitt returned to acting perimeter security and Doyle added, "I haven't seen one bullet casing, spear, or tomahawk…" he paused again, and the man gestured up to the ridge we checked that would have served as the best if not only possible vantage point to execute a perfect ambush;

"… Not even up there either…" Lt. Doyle stretched his legs, "… suppose it's possible they gathered up their spent shells for reloading, or their tomahawks and spears for re-use… but not even One was missed in the clean-up?…"

John and Ramos began to study the cracks in the asphalt looking for signs of casings from the mercenaries in their defense. Before John or Ramos could, Doyle concluded, "Not even a missed casing stuck in the cracks."

Scanning the ridge and adjusting my armor suit's grip on the heavy machine gun, I asked; "You think the White Legs took out nearly 20 heavily armed mercs before they could even fire a shot?"

I thought back to the ambush in this region that led to the deaths of Evan Buller, Diego Marquez, Rowan Tomlinson, Salazar, Sutton, and the Gates brothers. I still remembered how all my men fought back, getting off shot after shot, even though none of those men would ever come back home. If myself and those seven men could put up a hell of a fight and then fall before the Constable's backup could arrive ten minutes later, what could have happened to this group?

Were they all drunk or too distracted in the opening volleys? I thought of how deadly that raid was and then thought of all those incidents I'd seen in the past 11 months where I'd seen the White Legs getting stomped by 80s, Levanoans, and even guards of protected caravans. It didn't make sense. I'd seen the bodies, starting with the 80s annihilation of those White Legs around that gas station when I was training Licus and the other newer men, then the way the White Legs were routed by the 80s again only a few weeks ago on the Sevieri escort. Was it possible that the White Legs, the whipping boys of the three most dangerous tribes in our part of the Utah wastes, had the ability to annihilate a heavily armed mercenary group before they could fire a shot? That prospect alone was terrifying to think about when Doyle suggested the best logical explanation:

"It's not impossible that the White Legs just thoroughly searched all the cracks and then sauntered off with the brahmin," said Doyle casually... That answer seemed to quell something in everyone, and then me, but then Graham reminded me of what I had neglected when he turned from the nearby little rise overlooking the Great Salt Lake;

"What explains those bomb craters then?"

Me and the men all could deny those disturbed patches of sand, those little indents in the earth beside the road no longer. John and Ramos and Hendry knelt beside a different one, occasionally glancing at one another, each seeming to say without word that they had their own conclusions about them, but wanted to hear Graham's;

"What you thinking, Graham?" asked Doyle.

I stepped towards John and Ramos, glancing at the shallow craters. I'd seen craters from mines, grenades, man-portable missiles, grenade rifles, dynamite, C4, and all sorts of other improvised or ancient army explosive weapons. The only problem was that I'd only seen the aftermath of a detonation in the minutes, hours, and perhaps even day or two after. I know the faint smell of chemicals or smoke after a recent mine detonation, I've seen that smoke, I've seen the fragments of the devices in craters like this, and the black blast marks in the dirt… Although the shallow little craters could have indicated the detonation of mines or high explosive grenades, they bore no signs of that and the reason for that echoed almost annoyingly in the audio sensors on my thick T-45 helmet. That wind and the half-scattered pile of bodies reminded me of how wind and time made the most unfortunate companions when seeking answers in the wilderness.

"You think White Legs might've gotten ahold of some old grenades or mines, Graham?"

The wrapped man merely said, "I don't know," before turning back to face the Great Salt Lake sitting out there in the distance.

The Burned Man left us all in silence, and Doyle's men gradually stepped down into the short craters, pushing some sand aside with their long rifles or hands in search of fragments of mines or grenades or missiles, the answers sat just out of reach. In the end, whether the destruction of Leonard's mercs was due to the White Leg raiders using some mines or explosives, if their raiders were so good they could kill these NCR mercs before firing a shot, or if the mercs did fire a shot but were ultimately overwhelmed by the White Leg warband with a very thorough cleanup crew, one thing we knew was true:

Based on that pile of burned dead, it was easy to understand why the mercs never checked in with Leonard or the folks of Jude.

It was too late in the day to set off back towards home. Although we could have, it was far safer to head to the settlement of Jude since it was so much closer than the outermost ruins of SLC (it took us almost a day to cross the promontory bridge itself). Although we would have preferred to nestle into a cozy ruin or basement in outer SLC, we knew that our investigation into White Leg territory was almost certainly watched. A trek back towards SLC or New Canaan that day meant setting camp in the open wastes, something that would have almost guaranteed time for any White Leg scout who might've been watching us to gather his friends. Most likely, the friends who did this to Leonard's Mercs. No, it was far safer to make the 5-mile trot towards Jude, crash there for the night, and head back in the morning… Plus, it had been a while since I last had a chance to visit Jude.

I led the men up the path and came to a stop at the head of my party maybe 20 yards from the gates to Jude. The men manning the short towers that resembled our own, but half in size, were aiming their guns at us since we could just barely make them out, and a glance in the rear showed the men all raising their weapons above their heads just like Doyle and I were talking about. Some of the men had never gone to Jude before, but that was understandable, especially since there was only a special group of traders within town that went here about once or sometimes twice a month. That, and the group assigned to protect those traders on this dangerous northern route was, I believe, Lt. Gardner of the Night Guard's detachment.

Still, Doyle and I gave the men a little rundown on how to speak to the people of Jude, and Doyle and I refreshed each other on customs the other might have forgotten in order to relay them to the men. The biggest thing to tell men like Licus, Ramos, and Mitchell was to keep the evangelizing to a bit of a minimum. Each of those men was pretty good at evangelizing to strangers and also had never gone to Jude before. Licus in particular asked why we preferred that he didn't evangelize to the people of Jude, but neither Doyle nor I were exactly sure what to say. Thankfully, John came to our rescue, asking the young man;

"How much do you know of the Old Testament?"

Licus, with memories of finishing his New Canaan citizenship studies only a little over a year ago, admitted, "I mostly remember Genesis up to about Ruth, but prefer the New Testament if I'm being honest… Leviticus through Deuteronomy was beyond rough to get through."

This made most of us smile, while I could see Mr. Schmitt solely focused on the men in the towers when John replied for the young man; "The folks of Jude worship the God of Abraham too… it's just the New Testament part where they disagree with us... best to just leave it at that."

I hadn't been standing there for more than ten seconds, my .50 HMG resting on my hip and other hand up, the guns of my men were all still above their heads when at last, the small bus began to slowly rumble along its rails to one side, and out stepped the man himself.

Not even with his personal guards, the 70-looking-year-old man stepped towards me at the head, his arms making exaggerated gestures as those guns in the towers focused on us and the words of Rabbi Lazarus came to us;

"Who could that be under all that craziness!? Look at that! Look at that! I see some New Canaanites, but look at this one, eh?..."

The man in the closed dusty black coat, tallit over his shoulders, and tiny dome-shaped cap (I believe called a "yarmulke") came to a stop in front of me and tapped on the steel; "… Look at this one, let me guess? Mr. Herbein?"

Rabbi Lazarus glanced at Doyle and gave him a finger wag as if to say, "I recognize you, Doyle, but let me guess this one." I answered through the static of the voice emitter on the helmet;

"Not Herbein, sir. Good to see you, Rabbi Lazarus."

He squinted at me, "Gardner?... or?"

"It's Lieutenant Paul Young-" said I, only to be immediately cut off by the old man as he snapped his finger and exclaimed,

"Paul! That was my next guess! How're you? I don't even recognize your voice under all that!" he gestured towards Doyle and the men, "Put those arms down! Your arms must be killing you!..." I could hear the men lower their weapons, the leader of Jude gestured towards the guards in the towers, and they too lowered their weapons as the Rabbi turned back to me;

"So, Paul, Doyle! It must have been two? Three years?... What brings you and your men up to us? Another outlaw you're tracking this way? I don't see Gardner or any traders with you, so I assume it isn't business?"

The men drew closer, some stretched their legs again, and Doyle took his place on my side as I said to the Rabbi, "We're just looking to crash with you all tonight. We'll be out first thing in the morning…"

I paused for a moment as the Rabbi started pulling slowly on his beard as if stuck in deep thought as I added, "And we can sleep outside the walls if your people would prefer? It's just a bit late for us to head back home now since we're this deep in White Leg territory."

Scarcely a moment after I was done, he'd come to his conclusion as he said in an instant, "Sleep outside the walls? There? You'll get yourselves exploded?! Do you know how many mines and tripwires are out there just off the path? No no no, come on in, you can stay the night. We have plenty of quarters for you to stay a night so long as Gardner and Albright's traders don't come in tonight."

I grinned, some of my men were chatting lowly with each other, and his words about "mines" got me thinking about what we came across only an hour and some change earlier as I said, "Thanks, Lazarus." Doyle whistled to the men, saying;

"Boys head on inside, just past the Synagogue in the center of town…" Some of the men who'd been here before already started walking towards the gate as Doyle saw the blank stares on some of the others, "… that Temple looking building in the middle of town," the others followed the more experienced close behind, and I looked back at the Rabbi, asking him;

"Do you have someplace for me to store this by the way?"

Seeing the men walking through the gates, I noticed I didn't see Graham joining them, but a brief glance showed him standing a stone's throw away on the edge of the trail, looking back towards the Great Salt Lake. I turned back to the old jew as he answered;

"You may be able to store it in the garage just past the gate there," gesturing towards the gate with his finger pointing right. I removed my helmet, taking in that late afternoon breeze, and nodded my thanks to the Rabbi as he added to Doyle, "What about you, Doyle? How're you?"

Doyle asks, "I'm doing great, and thanks again for letting us stay with you all. But how are you? I'm honestly pretty surprised you're here in town. Some of Herbein's boys were saying that you've been spending all your time up at one of your other little settlements a ways north?"

Before the Rabbi could, I said aloud, "I heard Albright's guy Liam say that he saw you around Tar Walker territory scarcely a week or two ago, how you getting around so fast, haha?"

The Rabbi grew a wide grin, still pulling on his beard as he said to Doyle and I, "I like to wander sometimes, but I'll appear and disappear where I'm needed, ha! I'll always end up with my here when I need to be, haha!..." I chuckled, and Doyle said with a smirk;

"It's almost as if you're trying to embody the name some of the others have given you,"

Rabbi Lazarus said with another small laugh, "The Wandering Jew, yes indeed. What Jesus has raised, Stays, raised…" he paused, and shrugged before adding, "You be alive for 2,000 years and you feel the urge to walk around every so often, ha."

Doyle and I shook our heads, we'd forgotten how much of a jokester Rabbi Lazarus was. He'd lead this little community of Jews as long as anyone in New Canaan could remember. Me personally, I'd seen this guy on several occasions since joining the Guard, and from all I could remember, no matter how long the gap was between visits, he never seemed to age past the appearance of a 70-year-old man. Given his agelessness, and his proclivity towards wandering, or being spotted in random places across the wastes, those who regularly associated with him had given him the name, "Lazarus" (the man Jesus raised from the dead), or, "The Wandering Jew."

Either way, the Rabbi said to us, "Still, you men never told me what brings you out here."

I watched the men disappear into the town as the people of Jude passed by going about their late afternoon duties, and Doyle answered;

"We were just trying to track down some mercs the NCR sent up this way…" he paused, the Rabbi looked at him curiously, still brushing his beard, "… You didn't see them, did you? We found what appeared to be their bodies about 5 miles south, but did you happen across any survivors a few days ago? Maybe a week?"

Lazarus looked to me, and I added, "The wind took away a lot of the ash, so there was no way to really tell how many were in the corpse pile."

Lazarus again thought for a moment, his eyes briefly going towards Graham still looking out at the GSL. The Rabbi raised his eyebrow as if about to ask about the distant man of our party, then looked back to Doyle and I saying sincerely, "Nothing really comes to mind, Doyle. I'm so sorry…"

The old timer was clearly still thinking, and I thought briefly again about those mines he mentioned earlier, and the little craters around the ambush site as I said, "Did you happen to hear the attack by chance? It wasn't too far from here. Perhaps maybe some explosions?"

At this, the Rabbi snapped a finger and said, "Now that you mention it, Abner up in the tower said he heard something like that coming from the south about a week ago…" Doyle and I glanced at one another, and the Rabbi offered, "I can send him to your quarters if you'd like to interview him about it."

Looking at each other again, Doyle and I thought, both of us seeming to come to the same conclusion as Doyle said, "That's alright. We don't have much to really ask him about if he only just heard it."

The Rabbi looked at us as if he wished he could have been more help, but then another thought hit me and I asked, "One thing though…" Doyle and Lazarus looked up at me as I heard the footsteps of Graham drawing closer in my rear, "… Do you know how many he heard?"

The old man looked at the approaching stranger, his old eyes growing a little wide before squinting to see better before he replied, "I think he said three?"

Graham halted right on the other side of Doyle, and I didn't really hear it when Graham was introduced to the Rabbi by Doyle. I didn't really hear it when Graham and the Rabbi and Doyle began an idle chat. I forgot to consider whether Graham should join us with Jude's community. I forgot to remember that Graham had an almost supernatural ability to disappear when he identified a person in the wilderness as a threat. I forgot that Graham would only show himself to people he could trust. All I could think was, "Three explosions" as I thought about those four craters in the dirt around the ambush site.

I eventually tuned in to the conversation between Lazarus, Doyle, and Joshua Graham. Lazarus was very familiar with Joshua Graham, but as predicted, the community would allow him inside by the word of Lazarus.

The three of us walked towards the community, Joshua became quiet as we approached, and none of us were really even noticed by the few people of Jude outside during the later hour. Lazarus showed me to the little "garage" that was more of an old shipping container to store carts, and I stepped out of the armor while Doyle led Graham to the scrap shack where visitors stayed. I ended up chatting with Lazarus for a little longer as the sky got darker, but it was hard to focus on his words as I couldn't stop thinking, "Three explosions." Wondering what to make of that in general.

I caught the occasional words from Lazarus, and it was clear that he was very intrigued by Graham. Apparently, he had heard the same stories as everyone in the wastes, but thanks to our traders, and the guards sent up this way over the time since Graham's return, not one of them had known of Graham's integration into our home. In the end, the man said that neither he nor any of those who may have seen him enter town would speak word of his residence in New Canaan. However, he said that he preferred that we depart with Graham as soon as possible. He reiterated how dangerous having a man like that around is, and that is something I and many others in the guard had seemed to forget as well.

Being very thankful for the Rabbi's vow to silence, I knew there was nothing to worry about from the people of Jude, and I left that man by the little garage thankful as well for his permission for us to stay with his people.

I spent most of that evening in the common housing shack with the men. Some of them were already trying to fall asleep, some of them chatting lowly on their bunks, Doyle setting out his gear for tomorrow's return trip, and Graham sitting on the bunk in the corner, very silent in the dim light of a nearby lantern.

It was a quiet night, and I couldn't stop thinking "Three explosions," having no idea what to make of that and the four craters. I would find myself subsequently thinking of the pile of ash and burnt bodies, Graham staring out at the Great Salt Lake, the complete erasure of evidence for the attack. Then, by the time I laid my head down to sleep, I found myself thinking about the little star of David that would inevitably be painted somewhere on the armor by daylight, and wondering why I was thinking about Joseph's little nightmare he had the night before I set out on this short trip.

A/N: Kind of a short chapter today I know. I'm exceptionally busy these days, so it'll be somewhat difficult to post regularly, but I'll still try to get something out here and there. :)