24. A cargo ship arrived at the beautiful Island of Sodor. When the Fat Controller was assigning tasks to the little trains, he said: “To transport this batch of goods, Thomas and Edward working together will take 8 days to complete; if Thomas works first for 13 days, then Edward works for 6 days, it can also be completed. But now Edward has other tasks, so this task will be completed by Thomas alone.”
Thomas will need $\qquad$ days to complete the task.
\begin{tabular}{l}
24 \\
\hline 28
\end{tabular}