Sonuvabitch.  They did it again.  The bastards did it again.

Well, he thought to himself, only one thing to do now.  So, he surveyed the surrounding area until he found a nice smooth, level, hard-packed patch of ground and he grabbed up a girder and he started to build.

This time he went heavy, like really heavy.  And dense too, like really, really dense.

Let’s see the bastards try to knock this one down.  Not likely.

Standard procedure called for a metal stud every 16″ on center?  Bam!  He put one every 6″ instead.  A floor joist every 4″.  All steel, no wood whatsoever – not even the micro-lam stuff.

Tensile strength?  Load bearing minimums?  Every specification doubled, even tripled or more on this build.

We’re going indestructible, goddammit, he swore to himself.

And the tower grew to massive proportions and stretched high into the air.  A huge, menacing structure.  A monolith of resolute impenetrability, he thought to himself with no small measure of self-satisfaction.  Perfection.

And then they came and they knocked it down again.  The bastards.

Well, he thought to himself, only one thing to do now.  So, he surveyed the surrounding area until he found a nice smooth, level, hard-packed patch of ground and he grabbed up a girder and he started to build.

Alright, how about this, he thought to himself, how about one that is mostly empty space instead.  Sort of the opposite of the most recent design.  All framework and gaps, high arches, pass-through areas and the like.  Harder to locate, harder to hit.  Yes.

And the tower grew, patchwork and intermittent, hesitatingly working its way heavenward.

And they came and they knocked it down again.

Well, he thought to himself, only one thing to do now.  So, he surveyed the surrounding area until he found a nice smooth, level, hard-packed patch of ground and he grabbed up a girder and he started to build.

The next tower he built on the basis of defense.  It resembled a monstrous agitated porcupine in that it featured enormous cantilevered beams jutting out from all exterior surfaces at different angles and directions.  To the end of each of these beams he welded a giant, sharpened and polished stainless-steel lance head all of which glittered and sparkled in the sunlight.  Beautiful and deadly.

And they came and they knocked it down again.

An extremely narrow tower, like a steel dowel stretching skyward.

A bendy tower that would twist and shimmy in evasive motions.

A spindly, wispy tower snaking its way up into the sky, hardly worthy of notice.

A mirrored tower, almost invisible amidst the reflections of the surroundings.

And they came and they knocked each one down in turn.  The bastards.

Well, he thought to himself, only one thing to do now.  So, he surveyed the surrounding area until he found a nice smooth, level, hard-packed patch of ground and he grabbed up a girder and he started to build.

And this time he built two towers.  A false tower and a real tower, side by side and each identical in every way to the other.  And then he waited.

And then they came and they knocked it down again.

They knocked down the false tower.

The… false… tower… Rejoice!  The false tower had fallen, but the real tower yet stood.  Take that, you bastards, he reveled and danced.  Success at last!

And then they came and they knocked it down again.

Well, he thought to himself, only one thing to do now.  So, he surveyed the surrounding area until he found a nice smooth, level, loose-packed patch of ground and he grabbed up a shovel and he started to dig.