Gyka brushed away some snow and sweat from his hair as he climbed up the mountain
with his friends. It wasn't easy for no one had built a route to go across it.
The friends met first a very steep mountain which they have to climb to the
top of the cliff. TrailMixed was imagining herself buying Levren the sweater
which she promised to buy last year but still haven't bought. Flamie_500 was
thinking about returning to his training and Sahe was thinking about his girlfriend
Areita. Yamakarasu thought about a pool of delicious grubs while Chelses turned
her thoughts to her sisters. Exlund was still thinking about Vivarosa and this
trip and Gyka was just thinking about the mountains. As their thoughts wandered,
TrailMixed grabbed the wrong rock and fell landing on Gyka, who almost fell,
but they were still saved.
"Thanks, and sorry," said TrailMixed grabbing a better rock to climb.
Gyka kissed her on the nose and said, "it's OK, just as long no one gets hurt,
but do be careful."
The day turned into night and as soon as they reached the top of the hill...
it was almost midnight. Sahe surveyed what's ahead of them. To his disappointment,
he saw nothing but mountains after mountains covered in snow. The snow on the
top of the mountains made them look likes giant cakes that made everyone's stomach
rumble. True they didn't take a rest and ate anything for the past 8 hours;
the NeoPets were very tired.
Exlund took off his backpack and dug inside for food, but he only bought weapons
and accessories for mountain climbing and hiking. Flamie_500 and Sahe all only
bought weapons and mountain accessories too along with some water, but no food.
Chelses took a 'Candy Peas' out and smiled, "Straight from the Haunted Woods."
Flamie_500 watched Chelses throwing chunks of the candy into her mouth and
pleaded, "Some of us didn't bring any food, so would you be so kind and spare
us some?"
"Boys," muttered Yamakarasu chewing on a Banana Grub, "I like all my grubs
though, but, aye, I guess you may have some of my cherries."
Chelses also spared some food to the boys. At the cliff edge, Gyka and TrailMixed
were sitting together sharing food. When everyone finished eating, it was late
into 1 am NST and the NeoPets doubled off to sleep. However, they forgot to
have someone watch for the night.
There was a small movement in the grass. Sahe stirred and the movement suddenly
stilled. There was another movement and a tiny squeak too this time. They were
heading for the backpacks.
Exlund suddenly sat up and flashed his Magic Torch yelling, "THIEVES!" which
woke everyone up.
There were two small Meercas by the backpacks and they stood frozen scared
when Exlund yelled out. Sacred out of their minds, they kneeled down on the
ground crying, "Please forgive us!"
"We are very poor and hungry!"
"I'm so sorry!"
"Enough, enough," said Chelses tiredly, "now why didn't you ask us for food
during daylight? We would have -"
"No, we wouldn't," hissed Flamie_500.
Yamakarasu banged Flamie_500's mouth shut and said, "No need to sneak around,
hehehe, just be honest and ask us during daylight, or erm, wake us up."
The blue Meerca sobbed, "Ah, I'm so sorry! My wife and I are a very old couple
and lived our lives on scraps. We beg you on our scabby knees if you could spare
some food!"
TrailMixed took out some bread and handed them to the couple of Meercas, "Eat
well an' doncha sneak us up again, Ah woulda be glad ter just give you sum food."
"Thank you, misses, thank you all," said the two Meercas gratefully and then
with that and the bread, they fled out of sight.
"Aurgh, we forgot to have someone watch," yawned Gyka, "and it's already 3
am NST, but I'm really sleepy."
"Come on, someone's gotta watch," said Exlund pulling Gyka up, "and I seem
to remember that it should be you and Yama's turn now."
"Hey, don't include me in," said Yamakarasu grumpily.
"It is your guys' turn, so just do your job," said Chelses and with this, everyone
but Gyka and Yamakarasu went back to their 'sweet dreams'.
The sun was already up shining brightly and the light annoyed Flamie_500's
eyes. He blinked and stared straight ahead. Gyka wasn't very far from him and
he was asleep. Yamakarasu was asleep too near TrailMixed. He sat up and shook
Gyka up. When Gyka opened his eyes, Flamie_500 did not look pleased. "I thought
you guys were watching!"
"We were," moaned Gyka, "it's 7 o'clock, mister smarty pants, you and Sahe's
turn since 5 am. He let you sleep on because you won't move."
Flamie_500 turned and there really was Sahe standing guard looking at the mountains
ahead. His face flamed, "Oh sorry, but anyway, everyone should wake up. We need
to move on. It's snowing again..."
When everyone was woken up, Exlund said, "We are going to be crossing much
larger mountains today, and they'll be covered with snow... we should move quickly."
"Ah can't see through dis blizzard," complained TrailMixed.
"We'll get through," said Yamakarasu firmly.
The friends got their bags and started moving again. The weather was very bad
and the snow only kept falling faster making it difficult for the pets to concentrate
on where they were going. However, they decided to head for the left of the
biggest mountain as an aim. After about an hour, the blizzard still didn't seem
to be stopping, and the friends had to rest and settle down somewhere till the
blizzard passed. They looked for a cave to hide in, but couldn't find any, and
then suddenly, Yamakarasu cried out, "Hey, a cave for us to hide in!"
Everyone followed where she was pointing and was relieved that it was really
a cave. Small, but enough to fit them all. Exlund noticed something very strange
about the cave... it went on into the darkness. He motioned everyone to follow
him, but Chelses stopped and said, "We don't know what's in there, Exlund, and
- and what if we get lost?"
"scaredy-cat cat," TrailMixed stuck her tongue out.
So without further adieu, the friends walked on with their Magic Torch on if
they have the ability. Inside, there came a dripping sound of water and it felt
very ghostly and creepy. A movement ran past them; it was a rat. Flamie_500
shivered and shook himself. Then, after walking through what had looked like
an endless tunnel, they finally reached a stop. There was a way up through the
ceiling of the cave, but it was very dark so they couldn't see what was there.
Gyka stood on top of Exlund and climbed up into the top. Lay before him was
a nice clearing and at the end was a tiny flickering of light which he supposed
was the outside. "Hey it's cool," announced Gyka and helped pulling everyone
else up.
They looked around the place and decided that it was the perfect place for
a nice little nap. After a small snack, they all went to sleep. Sahe started
dreaming. He heard a creak, first very quietly, and then louder and louder.
Finally, BOOM! Everyone woke up to the loud noise. It was a real noise. The
ceiling on the right apparently fell and the hole back into the cave was buried
up. There was a bit of a panic, but then they remembered the flicker of light,
so they quickly got their things and started moving. When they reached the light
and climbed out, they found themselves still in the mist of blizzard, but it
looked like a room, sort of. They were in the bottom of a hole that was deeply
into the snow and there didn't seem to be a way out... they had used all their
power for the Magic Torch.
"I don't want to be buried alive," whispered Yamakarasu trembling.
The army that Queen Kihalai sent out were marching across the snowy mountains
with Pozialle, Gotenks79, and Kikugoku as the leaders. They had gotten tired
of arguing about whether the Village was going to be there or not, and started
talking about the weather. "We should take a break, really," said Gotenk79,
"all our pets are suffering like crazy."
"Hm, I think they can take a bit more road," said Pozialle, "after all, we
must complete this mission as soon as possible! If we stop and rest, it won't
be easy to get them started again."
"How do you know?" said Kikugoku angrily, "I'm cold and hungry and I need a
rest."
Pozialle narrowed his eyes, "I know from experience. Everyone will go wild
if we stop."
"Well, maybe we do need a wild time," said Gotenks79 through his teeth brushing
off snow.
"Just look at everyone, they are practically starving!" cried Kikugoku.
Pozialle did look and frowned. He knew that he himself was right, but the fellow
generals also had a good point. He sighed and signaled to stop. The whole army
cheered and started running about looking for a cave. It was an absolute mayhem
and Pozialle gave Gotenks79 and Kikugoku a look that said 'I told you so'.
In the meantime of the break, they decided to look for a place to shelter themselves,
but according to army rules, everyone had to be in groups and never step more
than 3/4 of a mile from each other. Kikugoku noticed a rock and said, "We could
dig a hole by the rock and rest under it--"
"If the rock won't break our neck," continued Gotenks79.
"The rock isn't too big and it seems to be steady and stuck," said Pozialle
laughing, "we can even depend our neck on it."
They headed towards the rock and dug a hole using the ability Burrow. Then
they squeezed themselves in under comfortably. As they enjoyed hot chocolate
and watched the soldiers and knights huddling in under other rocks and so on,
they started chatting merrily too about things that didn't have anything to
do with army and battling life. "Teehee, remember the last dance we went to?"
Gotenks79 was saying, "it was hilarious... our owners showing us how to do the
electric slide..."
Kikugoku frowned and said, "I hear something... it's coming from there." He
pointed towards the left of the rock.
Pozialle frowned too and said, "The rules say that 3/4 mile apart for everyone
is the maximum, we can't go on."
"It's all right," said Kikugoku, "we can afford to go there because everyone
seemed to be around here somewhere huddled into giant groups and no one is farther
than half a mile!"
"All right," agreed Pozialle.
They headed towards the cries and then arrived at a hole. It was a very deep
hole and the three generals bent down and looked inside. There was Exlund, Gyka,
Sahe, Yamakarasu, Flamie_500, TrailMixed, and Chelses at the deep bottom.
"Well, well, look who's here," said Gotenks79, "the troublemakers from our
village."
"We still have to rescue them though," said Kikugoku, "they were the winners
actually from last time."
"All right, let's see, ropes, ropes, ropes," said Pozialle throwing one end
of them down for the pets below to catch so they could climb up.
When they reached the top, Pozialle narrowed his eyes and said, "I don't recall
you guys signing out." He blew a whistle towards a group of soldiers and they
quickly hurried towards him. "Arrest them," commanded Pozialle.
"Hey, this is a bit unfriendly after just rescuing us," said Exlund.
"Hey everyone!" cried TrailMixed aloud and everyone looked at her. She gave
a nod and then a back kick at the soldiers who held her and then the other friends
started following suit. They fought their way out successfully because they
were all stronger than the basic soldiers, and were 7 against 3 with the generals.
The seven playful friends called out with a smirk as they ran, "Thanks for
helping us!"
To be continued... | 
