Molly's Story: Part Two

     Molly’s owner put her cage down on the ground. Molly could hardly believe her eye, or her ears. The place was beautiful. It was a fancy two story house at the beach on Mystery Island. The garden was perfect and the house was decorated well. And she had to stay in the shed. What kind of a life was this?

     ‘Great. I hope I do get stolen. I might get a better life,’ thought Molly. ‘But I suppose I shouldn’t jump to conclusions. It might be okay here. Might.’

     “Right, well, I will put you in the shed now and bring you your blankets and food later,” said the Xweetok, picking up Molly’s cage again.

     He carried it over to a small shed at the back of the garden. Unlocking the shed door, he stepped inside.

     Molly looked around. The shed was dark. There were no windows, so on a hot day it was going to be disgusting. Worse than being in the box in the cupboard. There appeared to be nothing else in the shed. A bit of dust and some bare shelves.

     Molly jumped as the door was slammed shut. Once her eye had adjusted to the darkness, she looked for a place to sleep. Deciding that the corner of the shed where one of the shelves was looked like the best place, she leaped up.

     THUD!

     ‘Maybe not the best place,’ she thought, as she picked herself up.

     The shelf had collapsed under her weight. Clearly, it hadn’t been used in a while. Molly curled up on the floor in a corner instead.

     ---

     “Come on, meowclops. I am lending you to someone. Go on. Wake up.”

     Molly awoke to her owner poking her in the side. When he saw she was awake, he grabbed her by the scruff of the neck and put her in the cage again.

     Molly meowed loudly in fear.

     “Shh. Be quiet. Nothing bad is going to happen. I am only lending you to someone. It’s not like it is going to hurt you.”

     Molly continued meowing until her owner put her in the trading post. Less than a minute later, a Kyrii had made an offer on her and her owner accepted.

     ‘Perhaps if I can scare this Kyrii, he will let me go in fright,’ thought Molly hopefully. ‘Then I can go find a new owner somewhere else. But how can I scare him?’

     Molly hissed as ferociously as she could. It wasn’t very scary, though, and the Kyrii just laughed. She tried to scratch him, but he just moved the cage a little farther away. When they reached Quickref, he ran up to his owner and got the meowclops avatar.

     “Well, you silly meowclops. I suppose I better return you, eh?” He laughed as she hissed at him again.

     The Kyrii put her back in the trading post and sent a quick neomail to her owner. A moment later he turned up and offered on her trade.

     “How was she? Did she behave herself? I hope so. Thanks for returning her. She cost me a lot, you know,” her owner muttered to himself while he waited for the Kyrii to accept.

     The Kyrii wasn’t really listening to Molly’s owner, though. He accepted the offer and ran off, thinking him a bit mad.

     ---

     Molly woke the next morning when her owner came into the shed.

     “Sorry, meowclops. Wait. I called you Molly, didn’t I? Well, sorry, Molly. I forgot to bring you a blanket and food yesterday, so I have brought them now.” He dumped a blanket on top of Molly, completely covering her.

     By the time Molly had untangled herself from what turned out to actually be a sheet, her owner had left again. She could just make out the shape of two bowls on the other side of the shed.

     ‘Food and water, I suppose. Well, I better not have it all now. Who knows when I will get another meal.’ Molly sighed and walked slowly over to the bowls. The food didn’t really look like food. It looked suspiciously like mashed up omelette, but Molly couldn’t tell. She just assumed it was the Xweetok’s leftovers from last night’s tea or something. She ate a little and lapped a few drops of water with her tongue. The sound of the door being unlocked reached Molly’s ears. A plan forming quickly in her head, she ran up to the door. When it opened, she tried to slip through.

     “Hey! What do you think you are doing?” Her owner shoved her back in with his foot and slipped through, shutting the door behind him.

     He switched on a torch because he couldn’t see very well in the dark.

     “Right, I am lending you out again. I hope you are good and don’t try and run away like you just did. That was very rude of you. You should be grateful that I treat you the way I do. Speaking of grateful, that Kyrii I lent you to yesterday didn’t even say thanks. Very rude of him. But at least he returned you, I suppose. I hope this Uni I am lending you to returns you. I hope she says thank you as well.”

     By the time he had finished speaking, they had reached the trading post. He put her in a trade and almost instantly a Uni made an offer.

     ---

     “Why, aren’t you a pretty meowclops? I hope you don’t mind being lent out to random people like me. But I don’t suppose you do. Well, here we are back at the trading post. I’ll just neomail your owner and let him know I have put you back up.”

     ‘Wow, she talks almost as much as my owner. At least she is slightly more caring. But imagine thinking I don’t mind being lent out to random people. Of course, I mind!’ thought Molly.

     ---

     That night Molly curled up in her corner. She had been lent out at least five more times that day to various neopets and now she was exhausted.

     ‘I have to get out of here,’ thought Molly. ‘But how? I can’t just slip out of the door like I tried last time. Hmmm... What if I hid somewhere, so when the Xweetok comes, he won’t know where I am? If I am lucky, he will leave the door open while he looks and I can slip out then.’ With these thoughts, Molly drifted off to sleep.

     ---

     Molly woke the next morning to the sound of her owner’s footsteps coming up the path. She remembered her plan from the previous night a bit too late, though. The Xweetok was already in the shed about to pick her up when she remembered.

     “Guess what, Molly? I am going to try and sell you. I really want some more neopoints. I bet I can get fifteen million neopoints for you. I hope I can. Now come here.”

     Molly struggled with her owner as he put her in the cage. He carried her off to the trading post and created a trade, telling potential buyers how much he wanted.

     ‘Wow. Maybe I can find a new owner. A much nicer one. Perhaps if I am really nice, someone might buy me,’ thought Molly.

     Very soon a young Kougra looking for a meowclops came along.

     “Oh wow. Aren’t you pretty?” he exclaimed when he saw Molly. He looked at her price. “Fifteen million! I could get a meowclops for way less. Sorry there,” he said, patting Molly on the head before moving on to another lot.

     Similar things happened all throughout the day, and Molly started to lose hope of being bought. Her owner was asking way too much. She sighed and closed her eye.

     ---

     After two weeks, nobody had bought Molly and she was returned to the Xweetok.

     “But why would nobody buy you? Everyone wants a meowclops. I wasn’t asking much over the normal price or anything. I bet it was you! I bet you were rude to the potential buyers! I am very disappointed with you, Molly.”

     Molly ignored her owner as he rambled on. She was getting used to him and she was also trying to think of a new plan to escape. There was no use trying to escape from the shed again.

     ‘Perhaps if I struggle now, I might somehow get out of this cage...’ Molly thought as the cage was carried down the garden path towards the shed.

     She suddenly struggled wildly, jolting the cage about. With a shout, the Xweetok accidentally dropped the cage. As it landed, the door burst open and Molly rushed out. She ran about the garden for a minute with him chasing her before spotting a tree to climb, conveniently next to a fence. She ran to the tree and managed to claw her way up. She turned around to hiss once in her owner’s face before leaping over the fence to freedom.

To be continued...