Everyone Makes Mistakes

     Now, thinking of all that snow, and making footprints and snow angels. Wouldn’t you just hate it if that was taken away from you? No, that’s not the right choice of words. What I mean is, wouldn’t you be sad if all that snow was there, but you couldn’t enjoy it?

***

Terror Mountain was covered in snow for most of year. Even in summer. Muggie remembered glorious sunny springs, and summers full of songs and laughter. He sighed mournfully. It was so silent up here. The type of silence that wraps itself around you until you feel you are going to suffocate, the type of silence that fills you with dread and places a huge weight on your shoulders.

     Then Muggie used his extra-sensitive mutant Ixi ears to listen to the silence.

     He found that it wasn’t empty. Listening carefully, he could hear the far away laughter and giggling screeches of a snowball fight. He smiled at the sound, even though hearing the sound filled him with a deep, deep sadness. Though maybe ‘filled’ was the wrong word, because the sadness left a gaping hole in a corner of his heart.

     In his cabin, with the wood fire burning cheerfully, the frowning mutant aisha seemed somewhat out of place. Muggie had a right to be frowning. No owner, no friends, no sun. It was a hard life.

     Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, something caught Muggie’s attention. Though he didn’t like venturing out in broad daylight, Muggie’s curiosity got the better of his gut instinct. Cautiously he edged towards the cabins single window to peer outside. Seeing nothing, he plodded over to the door. Opening it, he stepped outside. As he stood, blinking in the doorway, the first thing that hit him was Happy Valley far below. The tiny neopets that scurried to and fro seemed tiny. A single teardrop fell from his eye. He wished more than ever before that he could be down there, without a care in the world. But he had had his chance, that was gone now.

     With a small sniffle, he turned away, after remembering what he had originally come out for. Darting to the side of the cabin, the sight he saw gave him a suck a shock his legs collapsed from under him a he crumpled in the snow. Fyora was having a snowball fight with Taelia the Snow Faerie and the Space Faerie!

     He blinked. Even the Faerie Queen had time to come out here and enjoy the snow. She had a kingdom to run, and yet here she was, giggling and throwing snowballs as though she was a child.

     This got Muggie thinking. If the Faerie queen could have fun in the snow, why couldn’t he? But he already knew the answer to that. Last time he tried most of the other neopets ignored him completely. The ones who didn’t, never, ever had any good words to say. They all told him to go away. Leave them alone. He was so ugly. Don’t look in any mirrors, they’ll crack. Eaten anybody recently? The list went on and on. Eventually, he fled. He fled, crying and stumbling to his cabin. And he hadn’t been down there since.

     He knew he deserved what he got, for being so curious. Too trustworthy. Too mouthy. Yet another list that went on and on. Despite all he had heard about him, Sloth’s sickly sweet words sounded too good to be true. And that’s what they had turned out to be. He wished now he had never been so foolish, but wishes weren’t going to get him anywhere.

     But that is where Muggie was totally, and utterly, wrong.

     The Faeries playing in the snow had failed to notice Muggie up until now, but they saw him sitting there and knew immediately that’s something was wrong.

     Fyora, despite the coldness, knelt down in the snow in front of Muggie.

     “Tell me little one,” she said gently. “What is wrong?”

     It was a while before Muggie answered, not being used to such gentle words. He told the Faerie Queen everything. He missed nothing out.

     The Faerie queen looked sympathetic at his tale of sadness. He was only young with too much life left to be so sad. She decided to help him.

     “If you could have one wish,” she said to him, “what would it be? Think carefully.”

     “I… I wish…,” Muggie stuttered, trying to find the right words, “I wish I could be anybody who is happier than me.”

     “Anybody?” asked Fyora.

     “Anybody.” Muggie replied firmly.

     So Fyora started to whisper the spell to change Muggie into a green aisha. Half way through the short chant she winced as though somebody had just pinched her. Oops! She’d said the wrong words. She kept going however, knowing that whatever happened if she stopped would be much worse. She could always change him to a green aisha with the right spell afterwards, she thought.

     When she had finished, there was a brief flash of purple light and a puff of yellow smoke, then the air cleared.

     Fyora stared at the confused looking Snowbunny that sat in the snow where Muggie had been. The little creature examined its paws. It hopped slowly and unsurely towards a small pool of water nearby. Peeping at its reflection as though the puddle held a monster, it stared at its own reflection. Then it hopped, more surely than before, to where it had originally been. The Snowbunny looked up at Fyora with its big, blue eyes. A look of realisation followed by pure delight crossed its features.

     The Snowbunny hopped into the Cabin nearby, and with some difficulty shut the door, but not before carefully wedging it open with a stone. As it disappeared inside the cabin, Fyora turned to the other two faeries, whose faces captured the phrase ‘dull surprise’ perfectly.

     “Well,” she said, not managing to keep the surprised tone out of her voice, “that was the best mistake I ever made.”

***

That evening, a small mutant Ixi, trudged blindly through the snowstorm howling around her.

     It was only chance that she saw the light from the cabin fire.

     Only chance she found a beaten path to the cabin.

     Only chance that it contained a Snowbunny, who hopped up to her as soon as she entered and snuggled next to her as they both slept by the fire.

     It was only chance that the Snowbunny seemed to understand what the Ixi was going through.

     It was only chance that the two became the best of friends.

     But are you sure it was only chance?

     Maybe...

     Maybe it was something MORE than chance...

     But what else could it be, if not pure luck?

     Destiny? Nah, Couldn’t be ;)

The End