“Who taught this sheep to drive!” yelled Alise as they whipped around another corner.
        “I don’t knoooowww!” Nebraska called as he strained against his seat belt on the next corner.
        “I drive good?” The sheep’s broken English would be adorable, if they weren’t hurtling down the road at a break neck speed, narrowly missing guard rails and trees along the way.
        “Do we have to go so fast?” Alise asked at the next break in the curves.
        “Well,” said Nebraska, “if Crimson is in the capital city, she might need our help.
        “That makes no sense,” said Alise, “we have no idea where Crimson is. It’s extremely unlikely that she’s in the capital city. Unless, of course, you know something I don’t know.”
        Nebraska stared out the window into the darkness. Dawn would come soon, and he didn’t know what hope they had of finding Crimson Hen, but they had to try. Something, he thought, something was telling him that the Sheep’s haste was warranted. He couldn’t say what for sure, but he felt in his bones that Crimson Hen needed him.
        “Where should we go to find Crimson Hen if she were in the capital?” Nebraska said out loud. Always make a plan. His stomach was in knots. He missed Crimson so badly, but he knew in his heart that she was still alive. He knew, somehow he knew that she still drew breath.
        “What about the airport?” Alise said.
        They all thought a minute about that.
        “No, no good,” said Nebraska, “she wouldn’t be able to get on a plane. She’s a hen, after all.” They were silent again. “The question is, where did she go when she disappeared?” No one had a good answer, and the sheep took another hard turn and they all strained against their seatbelts. “But if she had appeared nearby, she would have made her way back to us quickly. If not . . . who knows if she’d be able to get back to Lithuania.”
        Alise said, gently, “who knows if she’d know to come here.”
        They were silent a while. Then the sheep pointed at a sign they passed. “Port!” she shouted, and hit the brakes hard while spinning the steering wheel. Alise tumbled out of her seatbelt against the window, smearing her face against the glass. Nebraska slipped down into the wheel well. Somehow the Sheep was able to stay in their seat as the car took the exit from the highway on two wheels.
        When they were back on the road, and all the car’s wheels were on the ground again, Alise said meekly, “Please, little Sheep, please don’t do that again.”
        Nebraska swallowed hard to keep from being sick. “Yes, please, don’t do that again.” After he recovered for a minute, he said, “what did you say?”
        The sheep smiled, “port! Where are boats.”
        The car was silent again as Nebraska and Alise digested this information. The sun was peaking above the horizon. “That … is a good idea,” said Nebraska. “We don’t really have a better plan. Let’s check out the port.”
        “Ok,” said Alise. “you’re right, we don’t have a better idea.”
        They drove on again in silence as the dawn broke around them. Soon, the three travelers began to see signs that they were approaching the port. Tall ships lined up along a narrow channel. The Sheep mercifully slowed the car to a reasonable speed.
        “What should we be looking for?” Alise asked?
        “I don’t know,” said Nebraska Rooster, “anything out of the ordinary?”
        They were silent for another minute or two as they crawled along the main road along the port area. Suddenly, the Sheep hit the brakes hard, throwing Nebraska Rooster into the windshield, and sent Alise tumbling forward against the back of the front seats.
        “What! Was that?” Alise said.
        “MmDrrrph Drr Drppfh,” Nebraska Rooster said from the footwell.
        “There!” Said the Sheep, pointing down the road and off to one side.
        Nebraska pulled himself up and looked where the Sheep was pointing. “My god!” he said.
        Alise pulled herself together and followed where the Sheep and Nebraska were looking. “Well, that’s got to be something, don’t you think?” she said.
        Down the road the little group could see truck after truck disgorging a huge contingent of army soldiers.
        “Yep,” said Nebraska Rooster who was letting a knowing smile cross his beak. “That looks like we’ve found Crimson.”
        The Sheep put the car into gear and inched forward. Then they parked the car behind a group of shipping containers. Carefully, they got out and inched their way around to a spot where they could see more clearly what was going on.
        Off in the distance they could see a large cargo ship coming to rest at the dockside. They could see dozens of soldiers dressed in all black with large guns stationed around the docking area, weapons at the ready. Then, they listened as a sound rose up into the morning air. It was singing. A beautiful sound of singing rose up and up and up. It was coming from the cargo ship, and it was getting louder.

        When the singing had risen to it’s loudest pitch, the crew started down the cargo ship’s gangplank, two abreast. Among them, hidden to the eyes of the soldiers, were the two small crewmen disguised as a young man and a young woman. Each and every crewman carried a black, bowling ball bag.
        A whistle blew. “Over there! One of the soldiers shouted as Moze and Jonas slipped out of the crowd and made their way hastily down the side of the docking slip. A whole group of soldiers broke away and gave chase, but the two little crewmen were quick, and knew the layout of the dockside. They quickly disappeared into the tangle of cargo and equipment that lay around everywhere.
        Another whistle blew. The remaining crew, laughing and slapping each other’s backs, completely ignored the presence of the soldiers. They ignored calls to halt. They ignored calls to put their hands up. The soldiers were completely dumbfounded. Their guns at the ready, they couldn’t seem to bring themselves to shoot happy, laughing sailors as they departed the ship. Finally, a soldier stood directly in front of one of the crewmen, and seized his bowling ball bag. Without a word, he dumped it over. Plop! Out dropped a heavy bowling ball, right on to his foot.
        He dropped his gun, howling in pain. The seaman clapped the soldier on the back with a hearty slap! which knocked him over. The sailor calmly picked up his bowling ball and kept on walking.
        Other sailors began to be stopped by the soldiers. One by one their bowling ball bags were dumped over, only to reveal simple bowling balls. As the soldiers were looking at each other with confusion and dismay a cry went up. “Over here. I’ve got them over here!” There was a rush as soldiers ran over to where the voice was calling out. A circle of guns pointed at Moze and Jonas as they were corralled, back to back.
        “Wait!” came a shout. It was the Colonel. “I want to be the one to capture the chicken!”
        There was a snort from one of the sailors, followed by a chorus of guffaws, then loud raucous laughter. The soldiers looked uncomfortably from one to another, but each held their ground. The Colonel, followed closely by Private Chuck-Bob walked through the soldiers and into the circle where Moze and Jonas were standing back-to-back. Triumphantly, the Colonel walked up to Moze and ripped the bowling ball bag out of his hand, opened it, then tipped the contents out.
        A bowling ball was the Colonel’s reward. Shaking with fury, the Colonel grabbed the bowling ball bag out of Jonas’ hands, which, when dumped out, produced nothing but a regular bowling ball. Jonas gave an exaggerated smile and shrug of the shoulder.
        “What is this!!” cried the Colonel. “WHERE’S THAT CHICKEN!!??”
        The sound of laughter from the sailors was all that could be heard. Then one, then another of the soldiers put their weapons down and backed away from the circle.
        “Wait!” cried the Colonel, “you haven’t even searched the ship!” But it was too late, the soldiers were packing their gear and preparing to leave. The Colonel ran up to the Captain and demanded an explanation.
        “I’m sorry we didn’t find your, um, chicken, Colonel. A favor is a favor, but this is one favor that is tapped out. Sorry.” Then he too began to pack his gear. Soon the dockside was empty except for the Colonel and Private Chuck-Bob. They sat on an empty crate looking stunned.
        On board the cargo ship, Crimson Hen poked her chicken head around a corner to see what was happening.

         Will and Sally stood on the beach, holding hands. If there wasn’t a group of soldiers standing in a ring around them pointing guns at them, Will would have felt a deep fluttering in his stomach. Sally felt the same way. As it was, they both felt a great deal of fear, never having had so many guns pointed at them all at once.
         There was a deep pause as the soldiers stood at a rigid attention. A soldier that seemed to be the leader barked an order, and the soldier nearest Will, walked forward and began to gesture to Will to set down his bowling ball bag. Will and Sally were frozen in place. A warm wind blew in from off shore. A bird flew overhead, and Will’s eyes followed it unconsciously. Then he slowly slowly slowly set the bag on the ground.
         The soldier very carefully and very deliberately bent down and agonizingly slowly opened the bowling ball bag. He quickly flipped it over. Out fell a bundle of the captains baggy floral underwear. The soldier twitched and then moved to Sally and her bowling ball bag. She set it down and backed up. The soldier carefully, but more swiftly opened the bag and dumped out the contents. A bundle of dirty kitchen rags fell onto the ground. The soldier looked at the lumpy pile then at Sally, then fell back into position. No one moved.
         Then a phone rang. The sound burst into the scene loudly. It was a salsa dance tune. The ring cycled once, then twice. None of the soldiers even twitched. Will noticed that the nearest soldier had a line of sweat running down his forehead. The salsa dance tune began ringing a third cycle when a soldier at the back of the ring swiftly dropped his rifle and pulled out a phone, speaking something quietly and sharply into it.
         There was a pause as the soldier listened into the receiver. Nothing stirred. The soldier said something sharp into the phone and then in one swift movement slipped the phone into a pocket of his fatigues. He shouldered his rifle and issued a sharp command. In one swift motion, every soldier stood tall, shouldered their rifles, and filed onto the boat they had come in on. Two soldiers pushed the boat away from the shore before jumping on board. The engine roared to life and a moment later Will and Sally were alone on the shore.
         They still stood holding hands. When the reality of their situation finally dawned on them, Will looked down at his hand holding Sally’s. He looked up and found she was looking at him. He met her gaze, and they held there, then he leaned in and Sally leaned in and they kissed. And then the tension of being pursued by the military and being held at gun-point released and they fell into a long and grateful hug. When the moment finally passed, Will and Sally walked further onto the shore and looked around.
         “Well, what do we do now?” Sally asked.
         “I don’t really know,” Will replied. “I haven’t really thought about what to do past our job drawing the military away from Crimson Hen,” he looked out at the sea thoughtfully. “What do you think made the soldiers leave like that?”
         “I’m sure they got a call from a superior, and got an order to go,” speculated Sally.
         “But, why?” Will said.
         A moment of silence passed between them.
         “We might never know,” Sally said finally.
         “Yeah,” said Will. “That was weird.”
         “I guess we just wait. Someone will come find us eventually, don’t you think?” Sally said.
         “Uh, yeah,” said Will. “We should wait.
         The pair sat down on an old log next to the frontage row along the shore and looked back out to sea. They sat this way for a long time. Then they could hear a car approaching. Will stood up and followed the car as it wove its way toward them. Sally stood next to Will and peered down the road as the car veered and swerved along the highway. It was lucky there wasn’t any other traffic.
         Pretty soon they could see that the face behind the wheel, which appeared to be quite white and furry.
         Will spoke what they were both thinking, “Sally, is that a . . . a . . . sheep?” “I think . . . I think it is.”
         They both stood at the side of the road in silent awe as the car pulled up next to them.
         “You come me?” The little sheep said to Will and Sally.
         Will looked at Sally and Sally looked at Will. They shrugged, and opened the rear door and slid into the car. The moment the door was closed, the little car lurched and pulled a hard U-turn, then sped down the road.