A Very Bad Day

7 - Dumb Thugs Again

The Forest (Inside)

It has been a long time since I had been walking. I think that I took the wrong turn (like there is a right turn). I wanted to get back at the border. But me being me, a trip taking 5 mins should take 2 hours.

It was a nice place to walk through if you live in the city of noise and pollution. But you can't really enjoy a walk when you are so hungry that you could eat a hippo. Pluto on the other hand was enjoying this very much. Once, he was gone for some time and when he came back, he had a dead squirrel between his mouths. Since then I lost my appetite

I needed some kind of manual right now. How about 'training-your-dog-not-to-eat-dead-squirrels for dummies'.

But he is a loyal dog.

About sometime later, Pluto stopped dead on his tracks. He started sniffing. He has smelled something familiar. It was enough to creep me out. The only familiar scents he knew were me, this forest, some squirrels and....... his previous owners. The Lord and his little gang of thugs. Gulp.

Pluto started off to a direction. I tried calling out his name in a very soft manner or else the thugs would hear me. Not that it is going to make a difference. They might be hiding and watching in glee. Pluto didn't even turn back. He just continued sniffing and walking /running in the direction. This is bad. If the thugs were there, we are supposed to go the opposite direction and hide. I tried calming him down

"Ugh. This is booooooring."

I stopped dead on my tracks.

It was the dum thug's voice. They are not so close. But close enough. I had to think fast. Then I did something so relevant at the time. Climb a tree. When I got there, they were so close that I could see them. Even though I thought I could totally overpower their horrible sights, I couldn't help but notice that my heart was in my throat and I couldn't thinks of anything. I tried calming myself. No one would bother looking up, would they?

That's when a horrible thought occurred to me - Pluto. I climbed up not thinking about my faithful dog and left him at the mercy of his previous and ungrateful owners.

Way to go, Debbie. You've successfully lost your only companion on your journey in a hostile forest. Worse, you lost his trust. I started searching the ground for Pluto. I couldn't find him. I felt like crying.

That's when I noticed the thugs were right under my tree. There were five or six of them. All of them ugly. Suddenly one of them spoke.

"This journey is getting more and more boring."

It was the dum thug.

Some other guy, I think the leader of the group snapped.

"You're getting paid for this, remember?"

There was some mumbling on how they also remember that they thought they could have a much interesting job. I think they leader sensed this negativity. He thought of something to cheer them up.

"Do you remember what the reward for capturing the fake is?"

"What? Being able to polish the Lady's nails? Accompanying the Lord to eat ice cream? I want something like a million dollars, not a petty field day cleaning the Lord's wardrobe"

I felt pity for them.

"No. none of those rewards. I'm not supposed to tell it to you all but here goes. We will be wearing our chick swimsuits in wonder-land for a day" he told this as if it was the best thing in the world.