Message-ID: <47460asstr$1081973406@assm.asstr-mirror.org> X-Mail-Format-Warning: No previous line for continuation: Wed Aug 14 16:30:23 2002Return-Path: X-Original-To: ckought69@hotmail.com Delivered-To: ckought69@hotmail.com X-Original-Message-ID: <000901c42207$d9e9a520$6701a8c0@penguin> From: "virgosun" X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2615.200 X-ASSTR-Original-Date: Wed, 14 Apr 2004 20:04:17 +1000 Subject: {ASSM} Beryl and the Polymorph 1/9 {virgosun} (mf rom slow nosex mutant) Lines: 706 Date: Wed, 14 Apr 2004 16:10:06 -0400 Path: assm.asstr-mirror.org!not-for-mail Approved: Newsgroups: alt.sex.stories.moderated,alt.sex.stories Followup-To: alt.sex.stories.d X-Archived-At: X-Moderator-Contact: ASSTR ASSM moderation X-Story-Submission: X-Moderator-ID: RuiJorge, dennyw <1st attachment, "poly01.txt" begin> *BERYL AND THE POLYMORPH* by virgosun (c) April 2004 ******************************* Beryl Crabtree backpedalled to brake, and brought her heavily-laden bike to a halt. High wire gates loomed over her, secured by heavy iron chains and a padlock the size of a waffle iron. There seemed to be nobody about, so she jingled her bell several times emphatically. Nothing stirred but the hot breeze that sprinkled her ankles with dust. A motorised ripsaw screamed in the distance, somewhere behind the tin walls of quickly- erected workshops in the midst of the fenced-off property, a broad and barren patch of scrubland. The dirt track, rutted by the passage of heavy lorries during wet weather, went toward the workshops; this was obviously where her cargo was meant to go. The large wicker panniers that almost totally concealed the back wheel of her bike emitted a sweet, slightly nutty aroma that she ignored out of familiarity. Crabtree Delicatessen was stamped in inky black letters on the sides. Just last week, one of the strangers had come into the shop and made a lucrative contract for the Crabtree business to supply cut lunches, pies and cakes to their workforce for an indefinite period. Dad had been making the deliveries in the van, but this week the clutch had burned out - again - forcing the family to make deliveries using other means. Mum had not been keen on Beryl making the bicycle delivery, for wild rumours abounded about the strangers. Beryl insisted the bike was the perfect size for carrying the complete order in one go, and the car was needed for making longer- distance runs, so wasn't it the best idea? Of course she was curious. All the younger generation were. It was said that these workers were left over from the project that had recently built a dam across the Iomann River twenty miles upstream. The reservoir had yet to fill, but it would provide irrigation and flood control to the entire district, and it even ran a small electricity plant. Hydro-electricity, the men called it, nodding knowingly. Most of the dam workers, engineers and itenerant labour, had moved on. Some, however, had cast their lot with the strangers. These mysterious men seemed to have money to burn, and had bought up a huge lot of land on the western fringe of town. They were digging an irrigation canal from the river, had put up the workshops, and shipped in heavy machinery on groaning flatbed trucks or towed by the largest tractors they could hire. They worked most of the night as well as all day, and a dull red glow came from that part of the town in the nighttime dark. And it was all being done privately, secretly, with no visitors or cameras allowed. "Don't you stay there a minute longer than you need to!" Mum had scolded after reluctantly allowing Beryl to make the delivery. "Them people ain't from around here, they keep to 'emselves and that's good enough for me!" It was widely held they were criminals or had criminal connections, which explained their wealth. They were far too wealthy to be gypsies. They were foreigners, mixed- breed and inbred, and it was whispered some of them had hideous birth defects. The townsfolk weren't sure whether to take a closer look, or leave them alone. Now Beryl shaded her eyes and peered at the workings. Somebody had always met the delivery truck at the gate, according to her father. Then she cupped her hands around her mouth, filled her lungs, and bellowed in a most unladylike manner, "Hall-oo-oo! Lunch orders!" The distant figures of two men appeared from around the framework of a new house, one carrying a bundle of long planks over his shoulder. The other turned and shouted to someone else out of sight, and Beryl smiled relief. Somebody knew she was here. Uncappping a flask she carried strapped to the sissy-bar of her bike, she took a sip of water, then brushed her pedal-pushers straight and adjusted the scarf that kept her flyaway brown hair in check. A putt-putt engine that sounded like a motorbike became audible, and a peculiar little vehicle now came along the track toward the gate. Instead of being a motorbike with two large skinny wheels, it had four little, round wheels, and it bounced and wiggled along the road. A girl no older than herself rode the contraption, clutching the handlebars with small, skinny, weak- looking hands and arms. Beryl flashed her most welcoming grin as the little car pulled up. The other girl stared back from big, round, slightly bulging black eyes that reminded Beryl of an upset dairy cow; a look that said beware the sudden sharp kick. Her passenger got slowly off a tiny trailer that had been towed behind, little more than a padded seat on wheels. She was a midget and wore a shapeless brown dress, clutching a four-pronged walking stick in one hand and leaning heavily upon it as she shuffled forward. Although her hair was grey, her face was smooth and round, as smiling as her driver was defiant. She shuffled up close to the gate and peered through, while the other girl pulled out a packet of cigarettes and lit up while she waited. "Hi, I've brought the lunches that were ordered from Crabtree Deli," Beryl said cheerfully. The young-old lady peered myopically at her through coke-bottle glasses, breathing noisily, her whole hunched body trembling with a slow-motion shake. A shiver crept up Beryl's neck as she noticed the drool silver on the elder's chin, and the kindly docility fixed on her face. Her eyes had a slanted, slitty quality. "Hullo, pet, you's early arn'tcha?" she said slowly with a pronounced slur and lisp. Beryl could hear the gossips in the shop saying _birth defects_ again. This lady had some kind of handicap; was the kind of person Beryl had only ever heard about in tragic and maudlin stories of special schools and institutions. "Where's your chuck?" "Um, it broke down I'm afraid." "So's ours too," the woman grinned, digging in a deep pocket with a hand that swung about as if barely under control. Keys jangled, and at length she managed to engage one of a bunch in the padlock. "Smells luv fresh and make me 'ungry, I better 'urry! Sylvie help now." "Right, Gran." Sylvia swung gracelessly off the bike, which was okay given she was dressed in overalls, but Beryl suspected she'd have moved the same way if she had been wearing a skirt. Beryl helped her lift and drag one of the gates inward. "We can't get that lot on this stupid quad," Sylvia declared, glaring at the bike's panniers. "We might get one lot in your chair. I'll have to do more than one run, and you'd have to wait out here. Poppa's busy." Gran snorted, spraying spittle. "Poppa always busy, don' bother him. Din' tink of how much lunches to bring." She giggled girlishly, and Sylvia rolled her eyes in the long-suffering-teenage manner. Ever mindful of customer service, Beryl spoke up helpfully. "It'd be no trouble at all for me to deliver them right to the doorstep, if you like. I could ride in so you wouldn't have to fool about making several trips." Gran gazed at her, so that she thought she hadn't been properly understood. Sylvia puffed smoke. "You'd need a permit. We don't like people nosing around." "All I'd need to do was get to a shed or even just a table where I could offload, I wouldn't need to see anything you didn't want me to," Beryl said earnestly. "I have to get back to the shop as soon as I can anyway, so I won't be hanging around." Sylvia gave a deep, chesty cough and scuffed at the ground with a bootheel. "Tank you love, dat's real kind of you, we's a bit mixupped this morning," said Gran. "Bring bike in so lockup, it'll be okay, not going right inside. Summun else'll let you out again." Beryl walked her bike through, while Sylvia and Gran closed the gate behind her. She waited patiently while Gran clambered back into her chair, this time helped with an arm-up from Sylvia. The teen then straddled the buggy and kicked it to life. It didn't travel fast, so Beryl was able to follow in its fumey wake. She trailed them into the midst of the new houses that were springing up from the soil. There were a few old cars parked around, and caravans. New fences of fresh timber were being nailed-up, dividing the homes into even yard lots, and Beryl could see two groups of four. These people owned the land, and of course they were staying. Men and women worked alike, favouring her curious looks, and she saw quite a few children playing about the dusty street, kicking scooters and throwing balls rather than being in the town's school. She was sure she'd seen some of those faces come into the deli, without knowing where they'd come from. Behind the houses, a large wooden structure was being built, as high as the houses again. Above that loomed a crane, and she gazed up watching a man guide a large section of steel mesh as it was lowered behind the formwork. An even taller crane was being raised behind the structure, but that was all she could see. Sylvia and Gran had pulled up beside a long trestle-table that was being cleared of blueprints. Soon Beryl was offloading her tasty treats, assisted by willing and hungry hands. It was now, as faces smiled and people gathered to sample the fragrant, tasty food that Beryl enjoyed her work the most. The simple pleasure of food brought happiness to even the oddest of places. "Hi!" smiled a small whipcord of a girl whose dark brown hair stood out in a fluffy, unkempt halo. Her deep blue eyes were so intense and staring they almost popped out, showing four whites around the iris. "I'm Tempest, how are you?" Keys jangled noisily as Beryl greeted her. "Granny Stone says I'm to show you out again. Are you going to be making all the deliveries this way?" Beryl nodded. "So far as I know." Tempest looked like she should have been in Beryl's school class from last year; again, Beryl was sure she'd seen her in the shop, but never in school. At sixteen, Beryl like many of her friends had left school. Many were being courted; some were engaged. Only a few had gone to the colleges of learning in the big city. "Okay then, have you got a whistle? They reckon you should blow a whistle when you arrive so's someone can get the gate, and tomorrow we'll have a pavillion set up so the lunches can be unloaded there and everyone knows where to come for lunch. Sound okay?" "Sure, no problem." They walked, Tempest fiddling endlessly with the bunch of keys she carried, eyes darting across the cloud- spattered skies. "Storm coming this afternoon," she said quickly, as if the notion excited her no end. Beryl eyed the cumulus skeptically. It was the dry season, and such clouds seldom developed into thunderheads until later in the year. "You think so?" "Right about four, I'd say. Get your washing in by then," said Tempest confidently. "The boys here will be packing up by then. I told them not to pour any more concrete. I know stuff about the weather, you see." "Really?" Beryl had lived in Kennarthen from birth and knew the patterns of the seasons. She doubted Tempest - nobody could tell the weather exactly, not even elderly grandpas with rheumatism who had lived here seventy years. "Well," she sighed, humouring the girl rather than disagreeing, "it's so hot I wouldn't mind if it poured right now!" "You've got a long ride in the sun, back down to town, haven't you?" "Oh, I'll be all right, I've got plenty to drink." "You know Douggie, don't you?" Tempest asked curiously. "He said your name was Beryl when he saw you, and he reckons your pie shop's the best." "Douggie?" Beryl frowned quizzically. Obviously one of the workmen who called in regularly, but she knew faces far better than names, which she explained to Tempest. "He's kind of tall, slicked-back black hair, big crooked nose, moustache?" Tempest giggled. Beryl felt she should know, but still couldn't quite place him. Slick hair was fashionable for men, and there were a few moustaches around. "No...sorry." They moved aside as a truck came rattling along the track. Tempest brandished her bunch of keys; the driver slowed. "Got a set, it's okay," the driver called before crunching and grinding away. From what Beryl had glimpsed, he had seemed quite thoroughly bald for a man with such a young voice. "Hey!" Tempest yelled after the vehicle. It should have raised a choking pall of dust, but a sudden shift of breeze blew the dirt away from the young women. "_You_ can't go outside! The nerve! Pro Phillips, I'm telling on you!" She propped her hands on her hips petulantly and fumed, then resumed walking. "Can I ask what it is you folks are building out here?" Beryl resumed conversationally. Tempest shrugged. "Sure, though it should be obvious. We're building somewhere for our families to live and work, all together. We have to stick together because of, well, the way we are I suppose. People always looked at us strange, wherever we lived before, because of our Enabled skills. Enabled, not disabled, that's what Poppa Stone calls us, and he's the boss. We gotta stick together so that normal folks won't pick on us, and then we can use all our different Enabled skills together to help people. That's what old Pyrus says, and it's a neat idea." "Enabled?" Beryl asked. "What, do you mean like..." Deformities was the word that came to mind, although Gran and the odd-looking truck driver were the strangest people she'd seen. "Um," she trailed off helplessly. "Yeah, exactly, um," said Tempest, not without rancour. "Oh don't worry, we get 'um' a lot when outsiders see us, and that's just the obvious ones." She drew a deep breath, as if to beg for patience before instructing some dumb hick. "Enabled skills are special things we can do or abilities we have, that other people don't. Sometimes those Enabled skills make their owners look weird, but that doesn't make them lesser people, you know?" "Sure," said Beryl quickly, not wanting to offend. "Like blind people have fantastic hearing to make up for..." Tempest shook her head, a sneer akin to Sylvia's flashing briefly onto her mobile face. "Not exactly, but you're getting there. Here's a better example. You know how there's hundreds of different kinds of dogs, right? Like, huge muscular shaggy hounds that are bred to rescue people in the mountains, and tiny little ratty dogs that can go into rabbit holes, and dogs with extra- good hearing and others that can track smells, and fast dogs that race really quickly? Well the human race is like that too. We can be bred just the same way. That's where our Enabled skills come from. Our ancestors were slaves in the far West, and they were bred together until the Enabled traits started to appear. Our grandfathers used their Enabled abilities to escape from the slavers and came to the East a long time ago, so now they and their families are here. We just want somewhere to live, and to give back something to the lands that have treated us so kindly. That's why we're here in the middle of the country. We just want somewhere quiet to live." "Wow!" Beryl gasped. Most of the eastern world dwelled in fear of the dreaded slave traders of the far West; many nations had united and formed a defense pact to guard the western frontier from the slavers. All of that was half a world away from the idyllic life of a shopkeeper's daughter in a country town. "Was your grandma a slave?" "My grandma? Oh, you mean Granny Stone back there. No, only our grandfathers. There's four different clans of us, and only our grandpas were slaves. No, Granny Stone's just born like that. Because she was a bit funny, ordinary people didn't like her much, but she fitted right in with Enabled people." "Sure." Beryl remembered when the yellow-skinned Choktau family from the south had moved into the neighbourhood to run a horse stud. They were well-known about the place now, but at first things hadn't been easy, and the kids had been tormented at school. "It's not fair when people get picked on because they're different." "You're not wrong," Tempest agreed, "and it's really hard not to fight back either! Pop Stone's got a bad reputation because he used to kick back when others came down on him. That's where Pyrus and the other grandads come into it. They say we got to keep our cool, and that we can show outsiders we're good at stuff, and we can help. And then we can make more friends than enemies." "Good luck," said Beryl sincerely. "Proving yourself to the people around here isn't always easy. But I think we're generally fair and square. Stick to the rules and don't break the law, and pay your dues, you know." "Yeah, well, it's the closed minds that are the hardest ones to deal with," said Tempest dubiously. "That's why we're building our own school, for a start - you did ask what the buildings are for. Some of the kids are normal, they don't have Enabled skills, and they can go to the regular school here. But Enabled kids would be treated cruelly by normal kids, so they need to go to a school where they would feel safe and also be able to learn how to use their Enabled skills to best effect. Some Enabled traits are easy to deal with, and others can be hard to live with. Like, my brother's got a really weird ability...hmm..." She stuck her hands on her hips, glaring toward the gate which was now unlocked. The truck had stopped, and its driver was just finishing pushing one of the gates wide. He now had a wide-brimmed felt hat on his head, and he gave the girls a cheery wave. "I'm sorry," Tempest snorted, suggesting a temper that made her name very appropriate. "Will you excuse me? He is gonna be in SO much trouble!" She took a few running steps toward him, but he swung himself up into the cab. "He'd better not...hmm, what's he doing now?" The truck had crunched into gear and moved slowly in reverse. "He shouldn't go out because his Enabled look can really bother people who aren't used to him, and he'll forget himself one day and cause a scene, when we really should be trying to blend in so we can make friends." "Why, what's he do?" Beryl couldn't help asking. But Tempest was scowling as the truck backed toward them, and yelled out above its noise. "What are you doing? You left the gates wide open!" The driver had his elbow and head out the window, looking back and watching the girls as he backed up. When he reached them he throttled down and idled, and called his response. "There's no-one coming, it's all right, it's not like we're gonna be invaded. I should have offered you two a lift, I just thought, seeing as you were obviously headed this way with your set of keys there. Darn silly of me not to think of it - could have put the Lunch Lady's bike on the back and given her a lift, and saved you the trouble, Windy." "_Don't_ call me Windy!" Tempest blazed, rising in colour and volume. The driver flashed a grin as he opened the door and slipped in one fluid motion to the ground, facing them. "Can I offer you a lift?" he asked Beryl gallantly, sketching a bow then grabbing at his hat before it dropped off. "You most definitely can not!" Tempest retorted. "You don't look right yet! Your ears need practice!" "Ahh, but my nose is perfect!" He smiled, looking at Beryl. "Why don't we ask the Lunch Lady? I look all right, don't I?" Beryl was caught with an amazed grin on her face, frozen between laughter and amazement. He was not quite six feet tall, dressed in boots and overalls much as any other workman, and the felt hat. His skin was unevenly mottled with brownish patches, and had a thin, shiny, hairless sheen although in places it was pocked and dimpled. It seemed as though he had suffered burns, or some kind of major skin rash, and his earlobes were somehow wizened or malformed. He had an oval face with an outright impish smile, but his eyes were simply astonishing - they were turquoise blue in colour, all over, with no whites or pupils and a translucent quality. "Um," she demurred, patting her breastbone as if that would still the way her heart had jolted. It was always, always hard to look at a person with a deformity. "Well, you look fine, fine, although...those eyes, maybe they're a bit...um." He grinned and reached behind him into the cab, and perched a pair of sunglasses on his nose. Now he just looked like an eczema patient. There was something peculiar about his teeth too, but she couldn't quite see what it was. "Pardon me, but I didn't catch your name with my darling sister making such a fuss." "Beryl, Beryl Crabtree, hi." "A pleasure, Beryl. Pro Phillips at your service. Look, I was just on my way to the lumber mill, so I could spare you most of the ride back to town in this heat if you'd like a lift." Beryl didn't have to answer immediately. "You _can't_ go to town looking like that!" Tempest insisted. "Do they know you're going?" "Where would I have gotten the keys from, ma'am?" "They can't send you, surely somebody else's free? What about Reg?" "All busy. They gotta finish that concrete pour just like you said." "Or one of the regulars, like..." "Douggie?" Pro managed to grin and purr, nudging close to his sister, and her blush deepened. "Nope. He's busy too. I'm one of the few that know nothing about concrete, so it's down to me." "Get!" she demanded imperiously. "I'll drive it then!" "You don't have your licence." "I'll get Sylvia!" Pro gave a hoot of laughter. "She's younger than you! I'm sorry, Beryl, we're holding you up; frankly, Sis, you're holding up the grinding wheels of industry too." Beryl had glanced at the gate. She could have been riding out it already if she'd kept going while the siblings argued. Instead, she looked at the flat deck of the back of the truck, and Pro caught her gaze. He poked a finger at Tempest's eye-level, and started to sing a few words, all tease. "And Windy has stor-my eyes..." Her hair billowed as if caught on a storm gust. "Don't!" Pro didn't seem to have fingernails. Then he did something truly peculiar. It was a tiny gesture - he waggled his finger mockingly at his sister - but instead of bending at the proper joints, the whole digit seemed to coil and swirl like a tentacle. It was the smallest of movements, something Beryl was sure an accomplished magician could have done, an optical illusion. "_Don't_!" Tempest insisted. A puff of hot breeze slapped uncomfortably about them, bringing dust into Beryl's eyes. "Temper, temper, go and count to ten," Pro mercilessly teased his sister. "Or I'll tell Douggie you've been childish!" "You're the childish one!" she retorted, turning a hot gaze to Beryl. "He's a double-jointed freak, you asked what he could do, but his Enabled skill is annoying people! As for you, Pro, I'll fix you well and good!" She spun on her heel, storming back toward the buildings. Beryl assumed her chastising-mum look. "That was mean, stirring her up like that. She seems a nice girl." "What, Tempest?" He raised a finger. "Just hold that up in front of her and she'd get cranky. I pity the man who ends up marrying her. So, what's it to be?" he asked, looking at the bike. "Since you haven't ridden off during our silly spat, I take it you're for the lift?" "Thank you, I'd like that." Together they lifted the bike onto the trayback, then Beryl climbed up into the cab and they motored as far as the other side of the gate before Pro slipped out to lock it behind him. Whatever his physical difficulties, he had a marvellously liquid, agile way of moving that was easy to watch. "So," he said without preamble, "Windy told you about the Enabled, did she?" "Well, not a lot," Beryl replied. "I think she was more at pains to warn me not to think of your families as somehow, um, deformed or handicapped, because you've all had a pretty hard time." He nodded with a grin, eyes on the road. "You could say that. We're a pretty paranoid bunch, especially the most Enabled of us, because people being people they do make some weird faces at us. And who can blame them? If I saw me coming up the street I'd look twice to be sure my eyes didn't deceive me." "I hope I didn't do that," said Beryl in a small voice. She was still stealing glances at how his skin was pigmented and its odd texture, and trying to work out what it was about his teeth. It was as though they were fused, perhaps that was it. He smiled over at her. "Oh, you did, in your own way. Don't worry about it, like I said, I'd look twice. If you were too uncomfortable with what you saw, you wouldn't have accepted the ride," he said cheerfully. "So your Enabled ability is that you're double-jointed, is that it?" She didn't want to linger on the awkward topic of social insensitivity. He gave a deep, bubbling laugh that was irresistibly infectious. "Nope, my Dad's double jointed - I'm more like hundred- jointed. I won't do it; I know people can be really queasy about double joints." "I'm not," said Beryl keenly, for a moment being a girl in the schoolyard peering in gruesome fascination at a friend's thumb. "Can you do that thing when you put your thumb out?" "I can but I won't, it looks stupid," Pro demurred. Then, before her startled eyes, his throat pulsed and his whole head bobbed and wobbled sickeningly on his neck. He grinned again at her cry of impressed horror. "Ooh, God, yuck!" "That's the least of what I can do, but Tempest's right when she says we should be careful what we do in front of outsiders." "How did you do that?" "I'm Enabled. Some people say we should have been a circus, but there's too much family pride for that." Something else had been rolling about in the back of her mind all the while, never mind the strange families that she had just visited. She snapped her fingers suddenly. "Douggie! That wouldn't be Douglas Franklin, surely?" Pro offered her a quizzical look. "Tempest said some fellow called Douggie knew who I was, black hair, mo?" "Oh yeah, Doug Franklin, yeah. Between you and me, she's got a heck of a crush going on Mr. Franklin." "He's hardly the Douggie type," Beryl agreed. Douglas was a local who had worked on the dam project, then graduated to the strangers' workings. He was a quiet, stern-faced young man said to be highly moderate of habit, a teetotaller and miser, far from the most colourful of characters. She did know him from the shop - he came in for his cheese and lettuce sandwiches and a sweetroll every morning, and seldom said more than two words in a row, at least to Beryl. "Love works in weird and wonderful ways, I suppose," Pro shrugged. "Who knows, maybe he's patient enough to put up with her, and in that case good luck to him." "You're not trying to marry your little sister off, are you?" Beryl teased. "Ohh no, me? Of course yes." He bubbled with laughter again, then sobered. "No, seriously, I doubt he even knows she exists, while she hangs off his every word, you know, puppy love. I think he's got other interests." Beryl sniffed. "If he does, nobody else knows about it. I've never seen him with anybody." "And I'll bet if there's a centre for local area news, it's Crabtree Deli!" "No, that's not true!" Beryl managed to look affronted, although she couldn't keep the smile off her face and Pro's laughter made her want to laugh too. "Everyone knows the news that matters comes from Norrises Butchery!" This time they laughed together merrily. Pro pulled over to the side of the road. "Alas, our time together has been way too short," he said with mock sorrow. "This is as close as I go to the main street on my errand, unless I take us up the lane." "That's kind of you to suggest, but it's really tricky to get big trucks out of there. Thanks anyway, Pro." "The pleasure's been all mine, believe me," he said. "A pretty lass like you deserves a hunk like me!" "Cheeky!" Beryl frowned. "I hope you don't get in trouble. Tempest seemed really upset about you going out." "Naw, don't worry about me. I'm sick of living in that goldfish bowl out there, and I'd like to meet a few more real people. I'm only the second-ugliest guy out there, you know. You think I've got a skin condition? Should see Basil Blake!" "But you're not ugly, Pro, not really, just a bit different...ah, yeah." He had lifted his sunglasses a fraction, exposing those uncanny all-blue eyes, a knowing smirk on his lips. "All right, but people could get used to that." "I hope you do, Beryl - I hope we can keep in touch. Maybe I can wave to you from the battlements above the lunch tent, eh?" "Should do, I'll be back again tomorrow," Beryl promised cheerfully. He helped her offload her bike from the truck, then gave a friendly wave from the cab as they resumed their separate journeys. She hoped she could convince her mother to let her keep making the deliveries, for what a fascinating group of people the strangers were going to be! That afternoon, against all expectation, a storm broke over the town. It poured with rain a few minutes after four o'clock. <1st attachment end> ----- ASSM Moderation System Notice------ Notice: This post has been modified from its original format. 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