Chapter Five

I Wouldn't Have Changed a Thing...


As he turned the knob to open the door of the old Victorian home, 31-year old Ron Benson stepped quietly through the door, shutting out the bitter, biting cold of a late November Bangor evening.

Closing the door as slowly as he could so he wouldn't alarm anyone to his presence, the stress from his job in the Air Force seemed to melt away with the frost and snow on his bushy mustache and thick eyebrows that had collected during the short walk from the old country road to the house.

Hanging his heavy cloak on the rack by the door, he was overwhelmed with a mixture of the aromas and the sounds of music from the '50's that reminded him of so many traditional Thanksgiving dinners his family had enjoyed through as many years as he could remember. Finally - through the airports and layovers and the long taxi ride through the snowstorm out to the family farm - he was home.

The voices were becoming clearer and the excited conversations more understandable as he crept down the long hallway from the front door to the dining room. He wasn't supposed to be able to get away from the base with the upcoming ORI threatening his flying squadron, but at the last minute on the afternoon before the holiday, the commander released everyone for a full four-day weekend to enjoy Thanksgiving with their families if they could still make it to their respective homes. Ron didn't have to be told twice. In fact he cut out a little early so he could make the layover in Chicago that connected with LaGuardia. He wasn't expected to make it home for the holiday and he didn't call ahead to let anyone know, either.

There in the dining room were his parents and long-time family friends "Uncles" Steve Markham and Red McKinney standing around a dining room table that was completely covered in dishes full of mashed potatoes, fresh, boiled corn on the cob, green beans, gravy, a huge pan of dressing and big plate of cranberry sauce slices just to name a few dishes he glanced at and recognized.

His dad was laughing and cutting up the turkey while Steve and Red were cutting up with his mom right beside him. The four of them looked like a bunch of kids at a birthday party they were having so much fun. Ron leaned up against the doorjam and just took in the tableau and smiled. They were having so much fun they didn't even realize he was standing there until he cleared his throat.

"Ronnie!" Steve exclaimed. "You made it home after all, you little sneak thief!" Both he and his mom ran over to him with Red on their heels. The three of them practically tackled him in the doorway while each one of them were trying to get an arm around his neck to give him a hug.

"There wasn't a doubt in my military mind you'd make it home for "turkey day", son," his dad called from the table, still cutting on the turkey. Dropping the knife and fork, he wiped his hands on a pillow case-turned apron he had stuffed into the top of his pants and started walking over to the group. "Come over here and give your old man a hug."

So began the Benson's traditional Thanksgiving dinner, with Steve and Red telling tall tales about their times in the Air Force, bragging on "little" Ron following in his father's footsteps, forging his own reputation as a shop chief in a Stealth Fighter squadron jet engine repair facility, while his mom and dad quietly beamed their pride in how well their only son had turned out. "If only he could find himself a good girl and settle down." his mom thought to herself. "He's so dedicated to his work, he has no time for himself."

It was true. Ron's success in the Air Force was directly related to his obsession with the job. He was still in high school when Desert Storm broke out, and it was during the massive coverage by the news media when he got "the bug" to join the military. Specifically, the Air Force. More specifically, a flying squadron woking with the Stealth Fighter that so impressed the young man. The dream became reality when he scored higher on the mechanical portion of the aptitude test he took to get into the military than any other section of the test. He was a natural-born mechanic having been raised on a Maine potato farm and having to help his dad with the machinery whenever anything broke down. It seemed Ron had a sixth sense about machines. He could hear a tractor running across a field and tell you something was wrong with it. And the wierd thing about it, nine times out of ten, he was right. And he could fix it, too. He could break an engine down, put it back together and have it back in service before lunchtime. He enjoyed the work, too.

It wasn't that way early on though. When he was much younger, he'd spend days on end helping Uncle Red in the maintenance shop his dad had set up in the old barn next to the house they lived in trying to figure out why this motor or that one wouldn't work. On a farm, if left unattended, a makeshift machine shop usually piles up with equipment that's broken - each one being placed with a promise that it'd get fixed when 'we get around to it'. While his dad and Uncle Steve worked the fields, Red taught him everything he knew about motors and engines and had patience enough with the boy to keep his interest keen and his little butt out of trouble around the farm. It didn't take Ron long to master the craft, and soon enough, he became an invaluable asset.

But as much as his parents wanted to keep him home and safe from the evils of the outside world, they knew he was destined for greater things. Getting the old family farm back up and running was Ralph's dream. Ron had to follow his own. All Ron's parents could hope and pray for was that they gave him enough of the right kind of tools to make it on the outside, away from the farm.

As it turned out, his parents had no need to worry because he did just fine. In fact, he did so well, the Air Force kept him in the relatively new fighter squadron since he graduated from tech school for jet engine mechanics. He made rank quickly, got promoted to SSgt out-of-cycle and made TSgt the first time around. He saw action in Kosovo, Afganistan and was with the first wave into Iraq under GW Bush. He was Shop Chief now back at home station, training the younger troops for duty abroad and was well respected throughout the squadron.

Yes, he turned out just fine, but he longed to be back on the farm. The job was important, but he had seen too much too young and now, the training and sending of his troops overseas, just to hear of one of them from time to time getting wounded or killed was starting to wear down on him. He was torn between his dedication to duty and his longing to come back home. His parents weren't getting any younger and they never did hire any outside help to work around the farm except during harvest and Steve and Red were just as old as his father was. They really needed him back home, but they weren't about to say anything. Too much pride to, cut and dried. That was their way. The Benson's way. Always had, always would be. The Bensons had held that old potato farm together for generations. If a thing ain't broke why fix it?

After dinner, everyone helped clear the table and the men started filtering out to the living room while the girls loaded up the dishwasher and put up what wasn't finished into containers for leftovers. Ron lagged behind and offered to help but his mom would have nothing to do with any of that. She reached into the refrigerator and pulled out a couple of bottles of German Auslese wine they were holding back for after-dinner drinks. The Cabernet was okay to have with dinner, but Auslese is for swishing languishly as an after-dinner treat. Ron juggled the bottles while he grabbed the corkscrew and four wine glasses and headed out to the living room.

After opening the bottles and pouring the wine for everyone, Ron settled down next to Red on the black leather, brass-studded sleeper sofa. The men were engaged in their favorite conversation - the war in Iraq. "How long are they gonna draw this thing out, anyways?" Red was saying, "I mean, why don't they just pull up stakes and get the hell out of Dodge?"

"If they did that, every Islamic country surrounding Iraq would move in and there'd be a bloodbath that'd make Cambodia look like a paper cut." Steve countered.

"Yeah, but how many American lives is this war gonna cost us? I mean, let's look at this, it's 2008 now, and we've been in there since what, 2003... yeah, we've been over there five years now. Today's count is way over 8,000! For cryin' out loud, what's it gonna take?" Red argued.

"It's all about the oil. Always has, always will." Ralph said. "They tried the electric car thing. Even did it right and started out by trying to ween us off the stuff with those silly little hybrid cars, but America's demand for power and efficiency wouldn't allow it. We were back swimming in the stuff before they could completely change us over to it. It's always been about the oil."

"Yeah, don't you know it." Red answered turning to Ron, "You're too young to know about when one of the big three gas companies went bankrupt and why, but that little story tells it all."

"How's that?" Ron replied.

"Back in the '60's the big three oil companies were ESSO, Gulf and Texaco. Conoco hadn't sold out to Citgo yet and there were some Lion stations and a few other minor players still around or starting up, but those were the big three, ESSO, Gulf and Texaco. Now, Standard Oil was owned by Rockefeller before it became ESSO, a French company whose sole source of oil was from off-shore oil rigs right off the coast of guess where..."

"Where?" Ron asked.

"V-i-e-t-n-a-m." Red solemnly said with purpose. The word practically dripped off his tongue. "Charles de Gaulle couldn't secure the penninsula from the communist insurgency and when they packed up and went home, he told Kennedy it wasn't worth it - that the VC couldn't be defeated. I'll give 'em that, they tried to warn us off but Kennedy, under advisement from LBJ, whose family had been in the oil business for generations, convinced Kennedy that we could do a better job than France and could probably secure the old French colony in five to seven years. The rigs were left untouched and were still more or less in good working condition back then and now, since Clinton normalized relations back in the '90's, they're beggin' us to come back and get those rigs back up an' runnin'. I don't see that happenin' in the near future."

"Yeah," Steve interrupted, "Twelve years, 50,000 American lives later and we end up pulling out just like the French did - and for what? Oil??? We ended up empty-handed even after all that. America's addiction to the black stuff is as bad as horse is to a heroin addict. She can't live without it. Americans have to have it to get to and from work, to do our work and survive our winters. And when we pulled out in spite of that hunger for oil, Cambodians just about became an extinct race - just like what's gonna end up happening in Iraq if our politicians have their way about it. But what else is there to do?"

"Not to slight those sacrifices in the least," Ralph cut in, "but think about this - the total dead after the first day's battle at Gettysburg was just about 50,000. Granted, that was a bad time to be in a war, but it took what, twelve years for the VC to pile us up to that number? But that's not what I wanted to point out here. What I wanted to say was the numbers of the dead are always a small fraction compared to the injured and combat-wounded. That ratio could be as great as ten to one or more and a lot of those injuries can't be seen on the outside either, son." talking directly to his son, now.

"Post Traumatic Syndrome and Traumatic Brain Injuries are at the top of the list of immediate problems with returning veterans. But ever since World War I, you've got to take into account chemical weapons that reek havoc on our young men and women coming home from war that can eat you alive from the inside out. Sometimes it takes decades for it to catch up to you and it ain't pretty towards the end, either. I personally know of guys that barely hung onto life by a thread for six months to a year or more before it finally took 'em. I'd hate to linger and go out like that."

"You did know your grandpa was in the class of '41, right?" still addressing Ron, "He went AWOL for three years after he got back from Germany in '45. That was back when they still called it 'shell-shocked' or 'brain-rattled' because they didn't really understand PTSD or TBI, but that's what he had alright. He wasn't right even after he finally got back home. That's about the time the farm went to hell in a handbasket. He finally got some attention and got back half-way right after a year or two or none of us would be here today. You should have heard your Great Aunt Lucie talk it about him. He was one hell of a man before he went over there. He was one those 'gentle giants'. Us kids loved him to death, he was so much fun. He'd let us get away with so much."

"Where'd they finally find him, anyway Ralph?" Steve asked.

"Down in a mission in Houston." Ralph replied, "Actually, he was staying at the mission, but they found out who he was after they hauled him in for stealing an apple off one of those sidewalk carts and ID'd him down at the station. Poor devil couldn't even remember his own name - even after three years."

Red got up to pour himself another glass of wine and walked around the room freshening up everyone else's glass. He ended up finishing the second bottle before he got around to himself so he left the room to get another bottle.

Steve spoke up saying, "You know Ralph, I never did tell you about the time they choppered me up to a hill to refuel the generators on one of those unmanned radar sites did I?"

"No. I didn't know you ever went out on any of those. Weren't the power pro troops supposed to be taking care of that?" Ralph replied.

"Well, I kinda sorta lost really big out at the compound one night" Steve went on, "playing poker with the power pro guys, you know, and payday was still more than a week off. I swear they were cheating."

"Those guys always cheated, Steve. Hell, they used a marked deck for cryin' out loud." Ralph said.

"Yeah, well I didn't know that at the time. Anyways, after I lost that last hand, they threw me a deal that if I'd refuel this one hill till payday I'd only have to pay 'em back half of what I owed 'em. I was crazy enough to take 'em up on it and... well... anyway, here I am, up on the hill, rolling these 55 gallon drums of diesel off the chopper while it's still running and no one said anything about securing the site, I mean really, we're way south of the 'Z and all, and I jumped off the landing and turned around to get my rifle and thought I saw something over in the tall grass at the edge of the clearing off to my left way behind the chopper's tail section. I swung my M-16 around and I let loose with about a six or eight round burst in that direction about the same time I see the guy jumping out of the grass into the clearing. I practically cut him half Ralph. I cut that little bastard in half right below his chest. He had a satchel charge slinging from his hand but he didn't even get a chance to pull the plug on it. He just looked at me with his eyes all big in surprize and just fell to the ground in two pieces. I still have nightmares every once in a great while about that even after all this time. I wake up in a cold sweat - wide awake like I've been up for hours. We were Air Force communicators Ralph, we didn't sign on for any of that shit. They didn't train us for any of that."

"Damn, Steve." Ralph replied. "You never told me about that. I never even knew you were in the bush at all."

Red walked back in the room with two new bottles of Auslese. "Oh, man. The girls aren't even half-way finished and Carol gave me holy hell about us drinking all the Auslese."

"Don't worry about it, man." Ralph said, "She's just messin' with you. I bought three cases of the stuff in case we got snowed in and she knows it. Remember me telling you about us getting snowed in that one time back at Spang'? We don't get caught short-handed. I got the rest of it in the downstairs refrigerator ready for action. Besides, if I know Carol, they've got their glasses poured and hid from sight or else they'd be done in the kitchen by now. He, he. They're just havin' their own little party back in there is all."

Steve was still thinking of what he just told Ralph and Ron. The memory of Ralph's run in with Colonel Moss and Gramps back in Cambodia crossed his mind. They never spoke of it since they left Vietnam and he wasn't about to bring it up now especially with Ron in the room either. "Ralph has his own demons to deal with." Steve thought to himself.

"So, what'd I miss?" Red asked.

"Steve was telling us about his little refueling incident." Ralph said.

"Oh, about his lucky shot?" Red asked jokingly.

"You knew about it?" Ralph asked.

"Sure. There ain't no secrets between radio maintenance, man. You know that." Red replied.

"What else haven't you guys told me?" Ralph implored.

"Oh, nothing much." Red replied. "Unless you count that time I threw a grenade down the hill and took out three of 'em... single-handedly." as he said 'single-handedly', he grabbed the sides of his shirt with his thumbs up high like he was proudly grabbing the straps of a pair of overalls.

"You did what??? When did that happen?" Ralph inquired incredulously.

"Oh, We don't really know if it was 1, 3 or even 100, but I had gone up to help Steve refuel one time before he got those power pro troops paid off. Besides, after I heard what happened to him up on that hill, I figured another pair of eyes couldn't hurt to keep a lookout, so I went up with him the rest of the week. It all happened within a couple of days of each other, his incident and mine that is. It wasn't really any big deal."

"Doesn't sound like no little deal to me!" Ralph exclaimed.

"Okay, okay. Here's what happened. The chopper powered down after we landed. Something about the mechanic had to check something with the main rotor or something or other. Anyway, here's this guy up on top of the chopper way up on top of this hill, and all exposed and shit. He might as well have been waving a flag for someone to take a pot-shot at him when someone from down the hill does just that. Didn't kill him or nothing, just winged him. Bad enough we had to go up and get him down after it was all over though. Anyway, the pilot yells out to me to grab a grenade and lob it over the crest of the hill and hope like hell it hits the guy and well, we didn't hear anything after I threw it, so I guess I got my own lucky shot off, huh?"

"Christ, we might as well have been in a combat outfit the way you guys talk about it." Ralph exclaimed.

"Ralph, we WERE in a combat unit - remember? 1st Combat Communications? Emphasis on the 'Comabat'?" Steve laughingly said.

"I don't know about that." Ralph laughed back. "The way I remember it, it was more like the the 1st Mobile Communications Squadron - emphasis on the MOB." to which they all started laughing.

"Hey, don't bogart that bottle, Red." Steve interjected, "I'm getting a little dry over here."

"Okay, okay. Don't pull me by the short-hairs, I'm coming." Red said as he got up to refill Steves's glass for him.

"And what about you Ronnie? You've been awful quiet over there." Red said to Ron over his shoulder while he was pouring.

Ron looked up from his glass obviously in his own thoughts then said, "Well, I never did talk about it, but something did happen over in Kosovo."

"Oh?" Ralph asked, concerned. He knew Kosovo was not only Ron's first assignment overseas, it was his first assignment in a war zone.

"I had volunteered, well actually, I got volunteered to go out on a Med-Aid trip where you load up a couple of dueces or 5-tons with medical supplies and MRE's and go out to some of the more disaster-struck areas where people are starving and suffering because of the war and we were going through this one little bombed-out village that was on the way. We weren't scheduled for a stop-over there, but when about 20 or 30 villagers started running towards the road from one of those bombed out houses, waving their arms and yelling at us to stop, the front truck pulled over." Ron got quiet for a few seconds before continuing, gathering his thoughts.

"It was the L.T. in the front truck who made the decision to stop. He came around to the back of the second truck where I was and told us to hand out a few cases of MRE's and some water. Me and another guy were in the back with the MRE's. L.T. got his medical bag out and set up a field table on the side of the truck in the shade so he could tend to whoever needed medical attention. The villagers were crowding around the little table on the side and the tailgate in the back while me and the other guy started tossing out case after case of MRE's. I remember looking down at the L.T. and thinking now all we need is one of those big signs that read 'The Doctor is In'... Funny some of the things that come to mind in situations like that."

"There was plenty there for everyone and then some but they still kept crowding the tailgate like we were gonna run out or something. Anyway, everytime I tossed a case out, I kept seeing this one old man that was trying his best to squeeze through the crowd but he was just too feeble to push through. Finally, when everyone had gotten their case, there was the old man, standing just outside the tailgate by himself with outstretched arms and the most pitiful look on his face. I leaned over and handed his case of MRE's down to him so he wouldn't hurt himself taking the weight of it. When he got a firm grip on it and brought it down, he hugged it to his chest for dear life and smiled up at me with this rotten, toothless smile just as his head disappeared into a cloud of red mist not two feet from my face. Blood and chunks went everywhere and all over us. A sniper must have been waiting until he had a sure target and finally took his shot out on the old man. He was either too far away or had a silencer on his rifle because I never even heard the shot. L.T. threw his bag and the field table in the back of the truck and scrambled for the front truck. We tore out of there so fast the dust was still stirred up when we were well on down the road." Ron fell quiet again, slowly swirling his half glass of wine, looking down into the liquid as if he were seeing an image somewhere down deep in the glass.

The other men in the room didn't know what to say. Here was 'little' Ronnie who they had each had their hand in raising. All they ever wanted was to keep him safe from harm and here he was, fallen prey to the same damn machine they paid their own sweat and sanity to.

Steve grabbed, struggled with, and finally ended up dropping the T.V. remote off the end table next to him, muttered a "Dammit...", and turned on the T.V. TCM was playing the old Thanksgiving traditional show 'Wizard of Oz' with Judy Garland. The Tin Man was singing 'If I Only Had a Heart'.

"How ironic" Ralph thought, while pondering Ron's story, "I never really paid any attention to that old song, about how in spite of the strength a woodsman has, who's got an armor-like metallic body to protect him from any harm, could be so defenseless against something as harmless as water of all things. - And all he ever wanted in life was a heart."

Ralph was dwelling on just that thought when, during a lull in the evening at a family gathering after a Thanksgiving dinner that 'couldn't be beat', with everyone sitting around the T.V. at about nine o'clock at night, Ralph Benson felt a sharp, stabbing pain in the center of his chest that took the very breath from him. The pain quickly spread to his left shoulder just before he realized he was having a heart attack. Ralph threw himself back in the recliner and reached out into the air in front of him to grab something, anything to help him get up and out of that chair when Ron turned and saw the pain-stricken and terrified look on his father's face. He was grabbing his chest with his left hand, his right hand was extended out in front of him, and his mouth was open as if he were screaming, but there wasn't a sound coming out. Ron immediately recognized the symptoms and called out to everyone in the whole house, "Someone call 911! - Pop's having a heart attack!"

-----

In the waiting area outside the emergency room at the hospital, the cardiologist was explaining to those who were closest to Ralph in this world that Ron's quick reaction to begin CPR on his dad may have only postponed the enevitable for a few days at the most. "This is common in both men and women in his age group who haven't been watching their diet for cholesterol, fats and sodium. Tonight's episode could not have possibly caused the damage we've found to his heart, especially considering CPR was started immediately after the onset of the attack." He continued, "Tonight's episode was simply the straw that broke the camel's back. In cases like this, Ralph more than likely has been experiencing small, minor heart attacks over the past year or more that he would've probably just shrugged off as muscle spasms. The problem is, that with each passing little attack, another little piece of his heart was dying."

"So... how much damage has been done?" Red interjected.

"Over 80%." he replied. Carol screamed a wailing "Nooooooooooo... !!!" Steve went to her and hugged her close to him as she started beating her fists against his chest. "How could he be so stupid? He's so smart in everything else!" She slowly stopped hitting him and wrapped her arms around his neck, crying loudly.

"Carol, we've got him calmed down." the cardiologist continued. "He's more or less stable for the moment, but his blood pressure is still dangerously high. In his current condition, I don't know how long we can keep him stablized. He could go anytime. I'm so sorry, but if he makes it through the weekend it will be an absolute miracle. If you'd like to go in and see him, we've got him moved into ICU but you're gonna have to make it brief."

"We're all going in." Carol said.

"I don't believe that would be a good... " the cardiologist started.

"The lady said we're ALL goin' in." Red said threateningly, stepping up to within inches of the physician's face.

"Uh... like I said, if you make it brief, you can all go in."

As the small group moved slowly and cautiously through the ICU, it seemed so unnaturally quiet, with only the beeps, whirring and clicking sounds of the various life-saving equipment attached to patients clinging onto life. The nurse was guiding them to the only bed in the room where the curtains had been drawn completely around the bed. When she reached and parted the corner of the hanging material close to the aisle, she quickly passed out of sight as she held her finger up to her lips for everyone to be quiet.

The moments passed painfully slow until she finally emerged and whispered, "It's okay, you can come in now."

Still holding Carol around the waist, Steve led her through the opening in the curtain and into the close confines of the small area around Ralph's bed. There were wires attached to probes on his chest dangling over the head of the bed connected to the heart monitor that was standing beside the bed quietly beeping. An IV stand was close by on the other side with a drip through what Red recognized as a 'butterfly' sticking out of his arm and he had an oxygen tube draped over both sides of his cheeks from his upper lip. Ralph looked tired and pale, but otherwise, he looked like he was resting quietly.

Carol slowly reached over the bed's guard rail and gently touched his hand as if she were afraid her touch would break something. "Ralph?" she said, "Ralph, can you hear me?"

Ralph's eyes slowly opened and he spoke quietly saying, "Hey guys!... I would've made up somethin' special if I knew everyone was gonna come over."

"What are you talking about, Ralph?!" Carol asked, wiping her tears from one cheek with her free hand.

Red, knowing exactly what Ralph was saying, said, "That's alright man. We got the caterer waitin' out in the lobby for you to get your tired ass up outta that bed."

Ralph let a little chuckle escape and went into a fit of coughing.

"Hey, hey." Steve interjected, "It ain't that big a deal, man. We're not payin' him by the hour or nothin' - he's on contract. He ain't leavin' till you get outta here." Even Carol smiled a little at that, finally realizing they were just kidding around to lighten the situation.

"Baby, come here and give me a kiss, will you?" Ralph asked.

Carol reached way over the rails to get to him, then lingered with a kiss directly on his lips and stood back up.

"Guys, I hate to admit it, but I don't believe I'm going to pull outta this one." Ralph said.

"Don't talk like that Pop." Ron said, "You're gonna be just fine. The doc says you just need to rest."

"You've always been a horrible liar, son" Ralph said, "but I appreciate the gesture. I've already been briefed on my condition." Carol turned away and buried her face in Steve's neck as she began a new round of sobbing.

"Son, come here. I want to tell you something." Red backed away from the bed so Ron could get to his father.

"All my life, you've made me so proud in everything you've ever done. You've exceeded any fathers highest expectations. I'm so proud of the man you've become. I'm just so sorry I couldn't have been there for you when you needed me the most." Ralph said.

Suddenly feeling a deep sense of guilt that he might've been the cause of his father's attack, Ron said, "But you were, Pop. Both you and mom were always there in spirit. I should have never said anything about... "

"Let me finish, son... My time's come. There's not anything anyone said or did to bring this on. It's just my time is all. I just wanted you to know how proud I am of you and that if I had it to do all over again, I wouldn't change a thing. You remember that, son. I wouldn't have changed a thing. Now, make room for your Mom. I have to tell her something." Ron noticed his breathing was beginning to get labored.

Ron turned around to get his mom just as she was making her way to the bedside and he let her pass by him.

"Carol, everything's gonna be alright... You don't have a thing to worry about. You're the best thing that's ever happened to me and I love you dearly." Ralph said to Carol. He swallowed, took a deep breath and continued, "I've often wondered what in the world I ever did to deserve you and still to this day, I can't figure it out. I know down deep if it hadn't been for you, I'd been dead a long time ago... " Ralph's heart monitor started beeping a little faster.

"Ralph, be quiet." Carol said, noticing the machine while he spoke. "You're upsetting yourself."

"No, I've got to tell you this before you guys have to leave." Ralph said. "You remember that old trunk?"

Carol looked at him not understanding.

"My old trunk from the Air Force." Ralph said.

Understanding now, Carol said, "Now's not the time Ralph, we can tal... "

"Now is the exact time to talk about it." Ralph said, interrupting. "The trunk goes to Ron, now. He'll know what to do with it." The heart monitor was beginning to beep rapidly now.

"Ralph, you need to rest. We can talk about this later." Carol said.

"Promise me, Carol. You give that trunk to Ron, you hear me? Promise me." Ralph's expression was rapidly becoming pained.

"Okay, okay. I promise. I promise - now will you please get some rest for God's sake!" Carol's voice was beginning to crack just as the heart monitor sounded a steady tone and Ralph's eyes slowly closed.

"Ralph?... Ralph?..." Carol called to her husband desparately.

"Nurse!" Red called towards the nurse's station. There was already a crash cart being pushed down the aisle of the ICU by a technician with three nurses following closely behind.

"CODE BLUE - STAT!!!", the technician called out to no one in particular. "AND GET THESE PEOPLE OUT OF HERE!"