The pressure from her mother and her grief over Kobus finally gets to Mercia, and when the protesters disrupt a performance, she simply walks off stage and packs her bags to go find Kobus in Israel. At the airport she meets Steve and they become friends. Wessel leaves the army and Andries and Marietjie arrive separately to take him home. Wessel realises that they've split up and walks off. Leana takes her mother some money, but Stienie refuses to take the cash and locks her out of the house. After Leana and Andries have sealed the deal on the new manufacturing process, she reveals that Steve owns the copyright to the plans and that he will have to be managing director of the new consortium. Marietjie is worried that Wessel hasn't returned home yet. Wessel goes to stay with an old army friend, Leana's brother, Jack.