Changing the Prophecy Chapter 22

 

Chapter 22 The Legacy of Shrub

Cardamom instinctively raised his hand to throw an enchantment at Sissrath, but the Corportons reacted swiftly. A series of shots rang out and Cardamom froze as if made from ice. Sissrath pointed to Buttercup and commanded, “Her too.” Another shot caught Buttercup and she also froze into a statue. Crumpet howled in fury and raised his hand to cast an enchantment as he screeched, “What have you done to my wife? Restore her this instant!”

Sissrath threw his head back and laughed. The Corportons trained their weapons on Crumpet, but Sissrath instructed them, “Don’t bother with him. He’ll take care of himself. No point wasting a valuable freeze blast on him. Watch.”

Crumpet’s eyes locked with Sonjay’s for a brief moment and he nodded his head almost imperceptibly. Then his golden-brown face turned several shades darker while visible electric sparks crackled up and down his arms and then, with a pop, he transformed into a little black comb with tiny teeth set close together. Such a comb was a useful object for people with the kind of hair for it, but quite useless in a land inhabited entirely by people with African-type hair. Crumpet, or rather the comb, flew into the air. Elena leaned way out from her seat on her tiger and managed to catch the comb as it dropped toward the ground. She held it in the palm of her hand and gazed down at it with a dazed expression.

Sonjay had the distinct impression that something was different about this transformation of Crumpet’s. He didn’t have time to dwell on it, though. Guhblorin snatched up the comb and ran it through the sparse hairs on the top of his head while the Corportons looked to Sissrath for guidance about what to do next. However, Sissrath, to his own horror, had begun to dance uncontrollably. His legs had taken over, dragging him into a wild cha-cha that he did not wish to be doing.

Denzel was the first to figure out why Sissrath had started dancing because Princess Honeydew had recently used that same enchantment on Denzel. He studiously avoided looking at Honeydew because he didn’t want to give her away. Her face the very definition of concentration, she kept her hand (from which the enchantment had sprung) partially hidden in the folds of her dress. Sissrath had incapacitated the experienced enchanters from jump street, but he had underestimated Honeydew, who had already begun her studies and had a few enchantments stashed away in her toolbox.

Sissrath appeared so comical jigging and jouncing around in a jerky dance, his robe flapping awkwardly, that Doshmisi and Maia laughed out loud. Unable to resist a good bout of laughter, Guhblorin joined in, his geebaching laughter exploding in the air and setting everyone off so that no one could keep a straight face. Even Honeydew cracked a smile. But Sissrath quickly ascertained the source of his affliction and pointed a bony finger with its scraggly jagged fingernail in Honeydew’s direction.

“No,” Hyacinth yelled, “not my daughter.” But the Corportons took aim and blasted Honeydew with their weapons. She froze with the expression of extreme concentration and a hint of a smile locked on her face. Saffron burst into tears. Everyone stopped laughing abruptly.

No longer dancing, Sissrath doubled over, inhaling sharply, winded by his episode of exercise. When he caught his breath he said, “Your friends are still alive for now, you fools. I can’t have enchanters romping around though, can I? It would have given me great pleasure to finish off Cardamom. However, I must obey orders. So you will come with me. The tigers remain here.” He gestured in the direction of Dagobaz, “That beast remains here too. Dismount. And no sudden moves.”

The travelers reluctantly climbed down. Dagobaz whinnied with displeasure. While the tigers watched with large, woeful eyes, the Corportons surrounded the travelers, pointing their weapons at them. Guhblorin still held the little comb (Crumpet) in his hand. The Corportons removed Cardamom, Buttercup, and Honeydew from their tigers and stretched them out on the ground side-by-side.

The travelers had just barely emerged from the Canyon of Imaginary Reality when they had encountered Sissrath. In fact, Maia and Elena, who rode at the back of the group, remained partially within the canyon. Corportons as well as a couple of Sissrath’s Special Forces stood on either side of them, however, no one stood behind them. For that reason, it surprised Elena when she noticed movement behind her out of the corner of her eye. Without drawing attention to herself, she half-turned to observe more closely. In the canyon, tacos scooted among the trees, bumping into the rocks behind her. She thought they must have come from her own imagination, for who else would have thought about tacos but her? So she purposely thought more about tacos and the more she thought about tacos, the more of them she saw and the faster they whizzed back and forth. She scrutinized the hillside behind her. If only she could imagine the tacos in full force, she thought, she could use them to shield her while she scrambled to cover behind a large boulder not far from her on that hillside.

“Maia,” Elena said quietly in Spanish, “Do you see that boulder up the slope to my left that looks like Mr. Pinter the P.E. teacher’s nose?”

Maia glanced up the wall of the canyon and sure enough she saw a boulder shaped just like Mr. Pinter’s bulbous nose. “Sí,” she answered in Spanish automatically.

“When I say ‘ahora’, we’re going to run for it and hide behind it,” Elena instructed, in Spanish.

“I think they’ll shoot us before we make it to safety,” Maia replied, worriedly, still in Spanish.

“Hey!” Sissrath shouted when he realized that Maia and Elena were conversing. “What are those two talking about back there?”

One of the Special Forces called to Sissrath, “They’re speaking gibberish. Nonsense language.”

“Trust me,” Elena reassured her, continuing in Spanish. “I see something. Flying tacos will protect us.” Guhblorin, who stood a few steps in front of Elena, glanced back at her quizzically. Elena wished she could explain the plan to Guhblorin, but he didn’t speak Spanish. She would have to leave him behind in order for her plan to work. Elena imagined flying tacos with all her might and the air filled with soaring tacos, which attacked not only the rear guard of Corportons and Special Forces that stood beside Elena and Maia, but all the guards surrounding the prisoners. The guards ducked and attempted to protect their heads by covering them with their arms. A super-sized taco flew toward Sissrath, who bent in half trying to avoid it. Meanwhile, the two girls scampered up the hill, dodging tacos as they fled. They leapt behind the boulder that looked like Mr. Pinter’s nose. In the excitement, and with the air thick with flying tacos, their enemies failed to notice where the girls had gone. It seemed as though they had simply vanished.

Sissrath’s Special Forces fled from the canyon, herding the travelers before them so that the entire group shifted outside the walls of the canyon where no tacos could reach them. Sissrath sent a few reluctant Corportons back in to drag out the inert bodies of Cardamom, Buttercup, and Honeydew.

“Don’t bother with those strays,” Sissrath instructed the Corportons and Special Forces. “A couple of worthless little girls on their own in the wilderness can’t do any damage.” He sneered in disdain.

Denzel, Doshmisi, and Sonjay glanced furtively at one another. They shared the same thought:  Maia and Elena had escaped and would find a way to get into mischief. Denzel smiled smugly with the knowledge that Sissrath’s assessment of Maia and Elena as a couple of harmless little girls flew vastly wide of the mark. He hoped the girls would do some significant damage soon.

Sissrath marched the travelers down the hill toward the compound. The area surrounding the compound still smelled like smoke from the fire that had swept through only days earlier when Doshmisi and Jasper made their escape. Few structures remained intact. At the compound, Sissrath and his Special Forces disappeared and the Corportons kept their weapons trained on the prisoners.

“I’m having a déjà vu,” Denzel said.

“What’s that?” Mole asked.

“When you feel like you’ve already experienced something before,” Denzel replied.

“OK, mon. I be havin’ one of them too,” Mole said. “Except I did experience this before.”

“Where are the sprites or the butterflies when we need them to help us escape?” Doshmisi complained dejectedly. (The sprites had rescued them from an impossible situation the previous year, and taken them to safety in Spriteland.)

“Good question,” Jasper responded. “If help is out there, this would be a good time for it to reveal itself.”

“Remember that two harmless little girls lurk in those hills,” Denzel reminded the others with a chuckle. “Give them a minute and they’ll think of something harmless to do.”

The Corportons locked everyone except the Goodacres into an open cage in the compound. Then they led Reggie, Doshmisi, Denzel, and Sonjay into a trailer. The many Corporton guards surrounding them kept their weapons trained on the captives. Denzel wondered if the guns shot slime, death rays, or something unimaginably horrible; something other than bullets or freeze-rays. The door of the trailer opened and Sissrath entered, flanked by more of the mysterious Corportons in their white jumpsuits with their gray face masks that hid their features completely. Sonjay studied Sissrath, who wore a grimy robe. He noticed that Sissrath’s fingernails, usually long and spiky, were broken and blunted. Sissrath’s eyes darted around nervously. The once-powerful and formerly self-confident enchanter appeared anxious, and not as smooth or authoritative as he had acted at the Canyon of Imaginary Reality. Sonjay figured that Sissrath did not have control of the situation at the compound, where a Corporton leader probably called the shots.

“The delusional Four,” Sissrath said in a snake-like voice that slithered from his lips with the faint touch of a hiss.

“Minus one who got away from you,” Sonjay taunted.

Sissrath ignored the comment and continued. “When will you learn to refrain from meddling in the lives of the natives here in lovely Faracadar?”

“We could ask the same question of you,” Sonjay snapped back.

Sissrath’s lips curled in a creepy excuse for a smile. “Don’t fret. You’ll be rid of me once and for all soon enough,” Sissrath assured Sonjay, “when I leave this exquisite paradise of stupid, backward-thinking, unimaginative people, which will sink rapidly into oblivion as predicted in the Book of the Khoum.”

“I disagree with your assessment,” Sonjay shot back at Sissrath.

Trapped in such close quarters with Sissrath, Doshmisi found his presence so frightening that her mind went blank. The mere sight of Sissrath made Denzel furious because Sissrath had caused the death of their mother. If those Corportons had not had weapons aimed at him, Denzel would have charged at the enchanter and smashed him to pieces. Sonjay, however, remained calm, self-possessed, and fully capable of countering whatever Sissrath said with a rational response calculated to get under his skin.

Sissrath laughed with a laugh that sounded like metal scraping on gravel. “Do you think you have arrived just in time to save this land? Faracadar will die and you can do nothing to save it. You should have stayed in the Farland.”

“You have it so wrong,” Sonjay countered. “The people are smart and resourceful. Too bad you can’t see the beauty standing right in front of you. I see a land full of creative, magnificent people. You don’t see it, do you, you unobservant dimwit? The land will not die. It will transform into a place you lack the ability to imagine. It will outlive you.”

“How dare you?” Sissrath spoke a brief enchantment that shot a sharp electric charge at Sonjay’s chest. It lifted Sonjay off his feet and slammed him against the wall. Sonjay slid down the wall and landed in a sitting position on the floor, gasping for breath. Reggie and Denzel lunged at Sissrath, but the Corportons restrained them. With a snap of his fingers, Sissrath commanded Reggie, “Tell him, Prophet! Read him the words of the prophecy as set forth in the Book.”

“He has heard the words already, Sissy,” Reggie informed him through clenched teeth, to the welcome amusement of his children when they heard that nickname.

“Watch your step, Prophet. I don’t care how many times he has heard the words,” Sissrath replied angrily. “I wish for you to say the words again and so you shall. And I have told you in no uncertain terms not to call me that.” Sissrath pointed a bony finger at Reggie, said an enchantment, and tossed an electric charge at Reggie just as he had done to Sonjay. The charge hit Reggie full-on and he was similarly lifted into the air for a moment as electricity crackled and then dropped in a heap. He moaned and clutched his chest. Doshmisi was terrified that Sissrath had given him a heart attack.

“Daddy! Daddy, are you OK?” Doshmisi called out.

“Yes, yes, baby girl, I’m alright,” Reggie gasped. “I’m used to it.”

“Enough family chit-chat. Tell your son the words,” Sissrath commanded.

Reggie took his knapsack off his back, opened it, and removed the Book of the Khoum. He turned to a worn page and began to read out loud quietly. “The time will come in the…”

Sissrath interrupted, “Louder. Read it loud and clear so we can all hear every word.”

The Corportons picked Sonjay up off the floor and stood him next to his father. They held his arms pinned behind his back.

Reggie reluctantly started reading again in a voice that carried to the edges of the room. “The time will come in the four-thousand fifty-second year when an underground energy will rise to the surface and will turn the land inside out, leaving it uninhabitable. This energy is capable of destroying all life and ending the flow of one generation to the next. It will unbalance the balance, fill the ocean with death, exile the algae, and suck the breath from all living creatures. It will bring an end to what has gone before.”

Sissrath poked his finger into Sonjay’s chest while Sonjay could do nothing to stop him. With each poke, Sissrath repeated a word of the prophecy, “It will bring an end.” Poke, poke, poke, poke, poke. Sissrath stepped back, satisfied with his performance. “All life will be destroyed, except for me. I’m leaving all of this behind and going on an adventure. I’m going someplace where I will be appreciated, unlike in this provincial small-minded backwater of a sorry ignorant little land.”

“Go then,” Sonjay said, with fire in his eyes. “And good riddance. You go with these aliens who have come with nothing more than exploitation and destruction in their minds. Please go. I’ll stay here and change the prophecy.” Sonjay’s eyes flashed with defiance as he added maliciously, “Sissy.”

Sissrath pointed his finger at Sonjay and Reggie spoke sharply, “Don’t. Enough.”

The enchanter lowered his finger and glared at Sonjay. “Good luck with that change-y miracle-y thing,” he said. Then he turned to the Corportons and ordered them to place the captives in the compound before he whisked out through the door.

The silent Corportons did as told, marching the captives to the compound where the battery makers and other prisoners were being held. From the compound, Doshmisi could see the launch site for the boats that traveled back and forth to the damaged and leaking oil rig. She looked at the entrance gate and remembered how she and Jasper had escaped the compound with Dagobaz during the aftermath of the explosion on their previous visit. That had happened only a few days ago, but it seemed like years ago because so much had happened since.

Sissrath confined the captives in an outdoor cage with a corrugated tin roof and an electrified fence around the perimeter. The fence left the cage open to the outdoors, but the roof offered protection from rain. Doshmisi wished it would rain. The sun beat down on the tin roof, which absorbed the heat, making the inside of the cage radiate like an oven. Fortunately, a breeze blew off the nearby ocean and through the open cage; and when the long day came to a close and evening approached, the air turned cool. The frozen enchanters, Cardamom, Buttercup, and Honeydew, lay stretched out inert on the ground inside the cage, as limp as rag dolls. Doshmisi attempted to rouse them with no luck. They continued breathing so they still lived.

Hyacinth sat on the ground with his frozen daughter’s head cradled in his lap. Hardly speaking, he stroked her forehead and her hair.

The Corportons provided the prisoners with essentials, such as blankets and sleeping pads, firewood and food, as well as cooking pots. Their captors apparently expected them to cook something for themselves to eat. Saffron and Iris sorted through the provisions they had received, handing things off to Guhblorin, who announced the appearance of each food item, naming it out loud and defining its condition. “One bag of garnet yams, a bit muddy, good with butter and cinnamon but no cinnamon on hand,” Guhblorin stated. “Six onions, a bunch of celery, twenty-two potatoes, and fourteen carrots,” Guhblorin recited. “Would taste delicious with a goose-chicken but none on hand,” Guhblorin added woefully. Iris then produced a goose-chicken from the depths of a wooden box and Guhblorin shouted with glee, “One uncooked goose-chicken. Perfect.” Iris, Saffron, and their eager helper went to work over an open fire. For the meat-eaters, they roasted the goose-chicken until it was tender and juicy. The vegetarians ate the roasted yams and a vegetable stew. While they ate, they watched the ancient green-tinged Faracadaran sun dissolve into the ocean.

After eating dinner and before they could clean their plates and prepare to bed down for the night, Sissrath and a contingent of Corporton guards appeared at the locked gate of the cage. “Much as I have advised against it, I must take you to speak with someone,” Sissrath stated sullenly, as he pointed at Sonjay, Doshmisi, and Denzel. Disapproval and rage smoldered in his voice. Sissrath’s behavior left no question in Sonjay’s mind that the enchanter, who had once ruled Faracadar with an iron fist, had been forced into subservience by another individual. But who, he wondered. “You three come with me,” Sissrath ordered. Sonjay hoped the Corportons would take him to meet this individual who had subjugated Sissrath.

“Take me too,” Reggie insisted.

“I’m pleased to inform you that you will not be coming with us,” Sissrath told Reggie. “You are not invited.”

“It’s OK, Daddy,” Doshmisi said softly to Reggie. “Don’t worry. We can manage.”

“No, no!” Reggie shouted desperately as the Corporton guards separated his children from the other captives and led them from the cage. “If you touch a hair on their heads, you’ll have the Prophet of the Khoum to reckon with!” Reggie called after them. Sissrath smirked as he locked the gate and led his three prize captives across the yard and into a portable building.

They entered the building flanked by the armed Corporton guards and walked down a short hallway before their guards ushered them through a door and into a room that contained only a desk, a chair, and a file cabinet. A shade drawn over the window concealed the dying light of the day and a dim lamp barely brightened the room enough for them to see. The Corporton guards prevented Sissrath from entering. He growled at them as they closed the door in his face, leaving him out in the corridor. Ten armed Corporton guards crowded along the back wall of the room, blocking the door. The Goodacres glanced nervously at each other, wondering what would happen next.

A Corporton entered the room from a door behind the desk. He stood for a long moment facing them. They had the feeling that he or she or it, whatever hid behind that white jumpsuit and that gray face mask, was sizing them up. Even though they could not see the Corporton’s eyes (whatever type of eyes it had), they could tell that the Corporton could see them. Then, abruptly, the Corporton removed its helmet, mask and all. To their surprise, the Goodacres found themselves looking at a quite ordinary man. He had straight sandy-brown hair, green eyes, and a thin mustache. He was a white man, not brown-skinned like the inhabitants of Faracadar. Doshmisi thought he looked familiar, but she couldn’t place him. He gestured with his hand and the Corporton guards at the back of the room also removed their helmets. Eight of them were men and two were women. The women were Asian and three of the men were brown-skinned but not as dark as people of African descent. They could have been Native or Latino. Two of the men looked like Africans and the remaining three were white. They looked to the Goodacres like regular people from their life at Manzanita Ranch in the Farland.

“Who are you and what are you doing here?” Sonjay demanded of the man behind the desk.

“I could ask you the same thing,” the man replied.

“I asked you first,” Sonjay insisted.

The man laughed. “OK then. I’m Aldus Shrub,” the man said. “Now your turn.”

“I’m Sonjay Goodacre,” Sonjay introduced himself.

Doshmisi turned the name Aldus Shrub over in her mind. She knew that name, but how?

“Why are you drilling for oil in Faracadar?” Sonjay continued.

“I am doing the interrogating here,” Aldus Shrub said. “I am the one entitled to ask the questions, not you.”

“Yes, well, that’s because you don’t know my brother,” Denzel informed the man quietly. Aldus Shrub glared in his direction.

“Speak up,” Aldus Shrub commanded Denzel. “Who are you?

“Denzel,” Denzel replied. “Denzel Goodacre.”

“And where did you come from?” Aldus Shrub asked.

“Same place as my brother Sonjay.”

“And where is that?”

“Manzanita Ranch,” Doshmisi stated matter-of-factly, with a faint smile playing across her lips because she felt quite sure that Aldus Shrub had no clue where Manzanita Ranch was located.

She was correct. Aldus Shrub pursued his investigation. “And where is Manzanita Ranch?”

“About a hundred miles north of Oakland,” Doshmisi told him, wondering if Oakland would mean anything to him. Suddenly she remembered what she knew about his name, and she had an idea about why he appeared so familiar. He looked a lot like the President of the United States, Spartacus “Spud” Shrub; and she felt sure that this man who stood before them had to be related to President Shrub.

Shrub’s eyebrows shot up at the mention of Oakland. “Oakland, California? How did you get here?” he demanded.

“We walked,” Sonjay replied belligerently.

“You could use a lesson in manners,” Shrub said threateningly. “When did you come here? Did you use a Polydestinographer?”

“Never heard of him,” Doshmisi answered quickly, worried that Sonjay would continue to speak rudely to Shrub and that Shrub would lose his temper and hurt Sonjay.

“Poly-huh?” Denzel asked.

Shrub laughed. “You know something? I believe you. I think you really don’t know about it. And it’s not a who. It’s a what.”

“What does the what do?” Doshmisi asked, before her brothers could say something that would dig them deeper into trouble.

Shrub scrutinized the Goodacres before replying. “You really don’t know, do you?” He seemed pleased.

They stared at him blankly. Doshmisi stole a glance at Denzel, who shrugged.

“How long have you been in Faracadar?” Shrub asked.

“Not long,” Sonjay answered evasively.

“A lot longer than you probably think, I’d wager,” Shrub told them. “Everyone knows about the Polydestinographer. If you really have no clue what it is, then you’ve been here for at least six years because it was invented six years ago and widely publicized. It was our only hope of survival. Everyone on the planet knows about it; including the people in Oakland.”

“What is it? What does it do?” Denzel asked, keenly interested to hear more about a new gadget or device.

Shrub seemed torn between leaving his captives in the dark about the Polydestinographer and explaining it to them so he could boast about it. His desire to show off won out and he continued. “It locates oil across time and space and takes you to it. It’s about the most important invention of all time. A team of researchers in Oklahoma devised and created it. My grandfather Spud Shrub put together that team and funded the research when he was President of the United States.”

A small gasp escaped Doshmisi’s lips.

“When we came to Faracadar just a few weeks ago, Spud Shrub was still the President,” Sonjay said evenly. “And he didn’t have any grandchildren.”

“I told you,” Shrub replied with a malicious curl to his lip, “the Polydestinographer locates oil across time as well as space. So I amend my assessment. I think you haven’t been here long at all. Instead, I believe, in fact, that I come from your future. Interesting. This means that you don’t know what lies ahead back in our home world. The oil shortages, the pandemics, the collapse of governments, the militarized zones. You would therefore have no idea of the urgency of our mission to collect this oil and return with it as soon as possible; no idea how much rests on our success here. Nothing short of the survival of human civilization. And we must embark on this type of mission again and again and again, throughout space and time, to gather as much oil as we need.”

Doshmisi found it difficult to believe what she had just heard.

“How does this contraption work?” Denzel asked, his eyes glittering. His curiosity about the construction of a time-travel mechanism trumped his desire to hold Shrub at arm’s length. “Did you climb into it, like a plane that travels with you inside? Or is it a device that can send you where you wish to go? Who invented it?”

Shrub laughed. “Wouldn’t you like to know?!” he taunted Denzel.

“So what is the plan?” Sonjay had no interest in the physics of time travel. He wanted more information about Shrub’s next move.

“The plan?” Shrub replied, as he raised one eyebrow and studied Sonjay.

“What do you plan to do next?” Sonjay demanded as he met Shrub’s penetrating gaze with one of his own.

“The plan, my friends, is to extract as much oil as possible from this ridiculously primitive land and then to leave. We have almost reached our quota for this expedition. And I refuse to allow you do-gooders to interfere with our extraction before we complete it.”

“What about the leak from the oil rig?” Doshmisi demanded. “Your oil spill is killing the blue-green algae, has driven the whales away, and will soon destroy the land and all the living creatures in it. We have to stop that oil spill.”

“Not my problem,” Shrub replied, with an unconcerned frown. “You sound like one of those environmentalists,” he suggested with disgust. “I, and my people, which, may I remind you, are your people from your future, are not concerned about this land or its people. Whatever happens to it once we have left is not our concern. Survival of the fittest. We came to find oil and take it. We have met with success. The oil spill is unfortunate. We could have used that oil we lost and skedaddled out of here sooner. But I have almost filled my containers, so I consider our mission accomplished.”

“You don’t care about destroying Faracadar? That the death of the blue-green algae will make the air unfit to breathe? That the people of this land will die?” Doshmisi demanded angrily.

“Why should I care about any of that?” Shrub asked, dismissing the question with a wave of his hand.

“What happened to solar energy? And wind energy? What about geothermal?” Denzel asked Shrub. “What happened in the future to all the other ways to make energy? Why did people try to stick to oil? Couldn’t you guys change things?”

“Not fast enough. Besides, we like oil,” Shrub answered. He grinned. “We know how to use it and it’s very profitable for those of us who control it.”

“Scientists say we have enough wind power in South Dakota to provide energy for the whole country of America,” Denzel said. “We just need to build the windmills to harness it.”

“Windmills are not all they’re cracked up to be,” Shrub responded casually. “They have their down side. Dead birds. Noise pollution. Besides, they’re boring and they don’t make me any money.”

“I can’t believe humans didn’t find a way to transform our energy systems into something sustainable in the Farland. Something in tune with the planet,” Doshmisi said wistfully. She thought about the words in the herbal and suddenly they began to make sense to her.

Shrub readjusted his white jumpsuit and prepared to go. “Helmets,” he ordered the others in the room. The Corportons placed their helmets back on their heads, once again obscuring their faces. Aldus Shrub lifted his helmet off the table where he had placed it when he entered the room. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have oil to collect. My faithful followers will escort you back to your cage. It has been a pleasure. I would appreciate it if you would stay out from under foot so I can complete my critical mission. Then I will leave you in peace. You and all the others in this land. May you all rest in peace.” He placed his helmet back on his head and hurried out of the room.