9-181: Argyle’s Lodge, Bedroom#2

Funny how modifiers work, isn’t it?

While Oliver is looking at the boot prints in the dust he has a memory from his younger years:  The Overlord’s birthday celebrations and the Legion on Russell’s World had set up a celebratory demonstration of firepower.  It took place just outside the urban area where Oliver’s family resided on a recently harvested plantation.  Where recently there had been a towering crop there was now only dust and dirt underfoot and occasional fragments of plant.  His mother having some official role in things the family arrived early, his father parking his practice visit car on a barren stretch of dirt off the paved road a few hundred metres from where a group of Legionnaires were setting up a command post.

His mother exited the vehicle ahead of him, wearing her immaculate black uniform topped with the dress sash for the celebrations.  As her boot hit the dirt, its perfect shine was immediately marred by a small shower of grey-brown dust, and she left a perfect boot print in the dirt, like the first explorer on an alien world.

It’s not easy for Oliver to make sense of.