CHAPTER 42

Happiness is a funny thing. It manifests itself in so many ways throughout the body, without the person being aware of it. It can be impossible to spot in strangers, but if you look for it within your loved ones, you won't be disappointed.

When Fred and Velma arrived back from the mountain, their expressions were grim and their shoulders were slouched; they were exhausted from the extra k's and all the challenges navigating the bush at night brought.

Yet Scooby perked up when he saw them coming.

'Red and Relma are rack!' he whispered to Shaggy and Daphne who were already in their sleeping bags.

Daphne shuffled out of her sleeping bag and ran into Fred's arms.

'Hey penguin,' she grinned.

Fred said nothing, merely smiling as he pressed his nose against her eucalyptus scented hair.

Daphne pulled back suddenly and stared at him front on. 'What is it?' she asked suspiciously.

He held up his hands in defence. 'What?'

Her confused expression broke out into a wide grin again. 'You've found a way out, haven't you!'

'Gee Daph, how did you pick up on that?' Fred asked.

'I don't know,' she replied honestly. 'Just a feeling.'

'We're less than a day away from the exit,' Velma confirmed.

'Rippee!' Scooby cheered.

He and Shaggy started chanting some happy little camp song while they bounded around the others in excitement.

'Thank goodness for that. I think I'm going to go mad if I stay in here any longer,' Daphne said.

'Like, we're saved!' Shaggy laughed. 'Any longer and like, I thought we were going to have to cook up some real bush tucker, man!'

Everyone laughed at first, but it died down as they began to consider the implications of what Shaggy had just said.

'Would we actually have to do it?' Fred asked.

'Like, I think the real question is could we do it,' Velma said.

'How so?'

'Well, for starters, you'd have to trap a wild animal.'

Fred rubbed his hands together gleefully at the mention of traps.

'Then you'd have to kill it…'

'Great, we've got plenty of experience in that type of thing now,' Daphne added sarcastically.

'Like, no offence Daph, but like, shut up,' Shaggy said calmly.

'Yep, sorry,' she mumbled, embarrassed by the lowness of her own jibe.

'You'd have to trap the animal, kill it, gut it, choose the bits to eat that aren't poisonous, then you'd have to cook it,' Velma said. 'And none of us have any experience in that type of thing. It's not like we all grew up on a farm or anything.'

'If worst comes to worst, I would do it,' Fred said.

'Zoinks, like really?'

'Better than starving to death, right?'

'Aren't wild native animals, like protected? You can't kill them.'

'Isn't killing other human beings illegal? As we've discussed many, many times before, Shaggy, normal rules don't apply in a war.'

'Oh, so it's okay for Velma to make the death jokes, but when I do…'

'Bed time!' Fred announced loudly, cutting Daphne off mid sentence. He swept her off the ground and hauled her over his shoulder, causing her to giggle uncontrollably.

'Raggy and I found rout something rerrible.'

Velma perked up at Scooby's serious tone.

'The rast of the food has rone rad.'

'Yeah, like I wasn't completely kidding around when I said any longer and we'd need some bush tucker.'

'Rhe ramper has rone mouldy. There's only rarrots left!'

'With breakfast, there's like, going to be a rather large dilemma. Like, how's everyone feeling about a thirty k hike on an empty stomach?'

'Rarrots! And water!'

'Right. How's everyone, like feeling about a hike on nothing but carrots and water?'

Daphne swore loudly and strongly, and in response, Fred feigned dropping her on the ground.

'Ugh Fred!' she shrieked.

'We have tea bags,' Velma said sombrely. She was beginning to strongly regret not forcing everyone up the mountain before they stopped for the night. She and Fred would have to do the trip for a third time.

'Like, also, Daph, Scoob and I talked and well, we like, left you this,' Shaggy reached over in his pack and pulled out a protein bar wrapped in a serviette. He split it in half and handed one to Fred and the other to Velma.

'Rit's not ruch, but rou need it more than we do,' Scooby said generously.

Velma stared at the boys in shock. It was a sign of how much Shaggy and Scooby had matured over the past couple of months. Before the war, all the food would have been gone in two hours. It was a miracle it lasted over two weeks.

'Thank you,' Velma replied. 'That's very kind.'

'It's the least we can do,' Daphne replied while still hanging upside down. 'You two literally saved all our butts by going up that mountain.'

Velma smiled; it was nice to be appreciated. 'Happy to help. Fred, maybe you should put her the right way up before she gets blood pooling.'

'Nah, I'm enjoying myself,' Daphne replied.

Laughing, Fred gently put her the right way up and started to carry her back to her sleeping bag. 'Goodnight guys.'

'Who's on sentry?' Daphne called back.

'Like, I am,' Shaggy said.

'Thanks, Shaggy! Night!'

As soon as Fred plonked her down on her sleeping bag, she shuffled inside and pulled the material around her. Fred sat down beside her and pulled the half protein bar from his pocket.

'You want some?' Fred whispered to her, motioning to his protein bar. 'I really don't mind.'

'No, Freddie, that's yours. But I'd save that for the morning if I were you. We're going to need our strength.'

'Good idea.'

'God, it's freezing. Get into your sleeping bag!'

'I know it's cold, but I'm actually not too bad at the moment. I did just hike up and down a mountain!'

'You can still get sick. Get in your sleeping bag!' Daphne instructed.

'Yes ma'am!'

Daphne laughed as he frantically tried to get inside his sleeping bag, before rolling over until he was right beside her.

'You know, Fred, I've been thinking…'

She smiled at him, watching the shadow of the dying flames dance across his face. His blue eyes widened as she continued to gaze into them, lost inside their beautiful ocean-like eddies…

Daphne shook herself out of her reverie. Fred was nodding at her, prompting her to continue.

'I have an idea, but I don't know if it will work.'

'Well, if it's anything other than traps, I'm afraid I can't help you with that.'

'I mean, the concept's kinda similar I guess. So here's the deal. Each of our sleeping bags has a zipper with the thing on and a zipper without the thing on it. What if we put them together to make a double sleeping bag?'

Fred gazed at her in deep confusion before his face broke out into a grin. 'You explained that terribly. But I know exactly what you mean and I don't see why it wouldn't work!'

Fred and Daphne emerged from their sleeping bags and leant back against the cold rocks of the cave while they fiddled with the zippers. Fred got his undone first and connected one side of it to Daphne's, creating one gigantic blanket. They did up the other end, and it was exactly as Daphne had envisaged, minus a small gap down the bottom where the zippers didn't exactly line up.

'Cold feet,' Fred joked.

It looked spacious, but it was a tight fit for both of them to get in, so Fred slipped in first.

Daphne's heart was hammering with excitement. She knew they were doing nothing more than sleeping together, (certainly not the connotations attached to the phrase anyway), but she could not wait to simply be in Fred's warm embrace, for more reasons other than the chilly wind. As she wriggled inside, she immediately wrapped her arms around his torso and nuzzled into his neck.

'This is the warmest I've been for a long time,' Fred whispered against her lips.

'I forgot what it felt like to not be cold!'

Fred reached out and pulled the zipper tighter around them, enclosing them both in the jacket's cosy warmth.

~oO*Oo~

Scooby's growling stomach woke everybody up at the crack of dawn. Scooby opened one eye and quickly glanced around at the others. Ever since Velma had told him about Daphne's horrible dream, he was slightly worried that the others would leave him stranded in the middle of nowhere. Of course, Scooby logically knew that would never happen, but worry has a funny way of amplifying itself at the worst of times.

He could already see Velma sitting up in her sleeping bag, making some sketches in her notebook. Shaggy was sitting on a rock at the entrance to the cave, his sleeping bag folded around him, making him look like a caterpillar. Fred and Daphne were cuddled up – in the same sleeping bag? Scooby shook his head. He didn't realise you could make a double sized sleeping bag.

'Raggy?'

Shaggy turned around and smiled at him. 'Like, borning, Scoob,' he replied nasally.

Scooby was shocked by Shaggy's rugged appearance. He had dark circles – no, they were more like bags under his eyes, his hair was rumpled and Scooby could tell he was developing a cold just by the three words he had spoken.

'Rou rokay?'

'Like yeah. You?'

'Rungry. Really rungry.'

'The sooner we get going, the better, so we don't get delirious from lack of food,' Velma interjected.

'I still have half a protein bar,' Fred piped up. 'And I will share it.'

'No you won't,' Daphne said.

Velma reflected in that brief moment: she was impressed that the gang had all adapted to waking up as the sun came up. It had been a real pain to get everyone up and moving in the early days of the war.

'Like, I was thinkig, Vel,' Shaggy began. 'Do we like, have to head for the Subie? Can we go to like, a house or sobthig? I like, feel like dothig bore than an actual bed.'

'Shaggy, you sound terrible!' Daphne said.

'Sorry.'

'I've got some Panadol I can give you,' Velma said.

'Shaggy, it's hard to tell what the right thing to do at the moment is,' Fred answered. 'It really depends on the circumstances. Who knows – maybe we'll get out there and the whole thing would be turned on its head?'

'Unlikely,' Velma muttered.

'You never know! We saw those Kiwi planes, remember?'

'Yes, a whole four of them,' she rolled her eyes.

'Rut there rould've been rome in rother places,' Scooby added helpfully.

'There could've been. But I don't see how it could make a big difference,' she said. 'Come on, I really think we should get going.'

She used the final flames of the fire to boil some water, then handed everyone a thermos of tea. They packed up what little belongings they had with them and began to follow the river.

~oO*Oo~

The last leg of their journey was dead easy, especially in comparison to what they had just done. Thirteen hours of following the river later, the endless expanse of bush gave way to a familiar building. Even know the hike had been physically easy, everyone was tired, crabby and hungry. The icy night air had closed around them once again, and every muscle ached with cold and exhaustion.

'Runnings, Runnings, Runnings!' Scooby said, suddenly gaining enough energy to bound around again.

'Scooby, stop!' Fred whispered. 'We need to be on high alert!'

'It's this part of the Janna River,' Daphne said quietly.

She didn't need to elaborate. They had mixed feeling with this stretch of river: it had allowed them to escape from the massacre inside the warehouse, but at a terrible price. The good thing was, there didn't seem to be any soldiers at all around. It seemed they had long realised they missed their chance.

Velma suddenly stretched her arm out to the side, blocking the others from coming further.

'Like, what do you see, Velb?'

'The loading dock. Gang, this is probably where we're going to get a vehicle from.'

A loud, echoing growl suddenly resounded out of the depths of the trees. Everyone jumped into an outwards facing circle and froze; the only thing moving were their eyes scanning the darkened bush.

'Rhat… rhat is that?' Scooby whispered.

The sound came again, and this time, Shaggy chuckled to himself. The others looked at him in sheer alarm.

'Guys, it's Scooby Doo's stobach. He's hudgry.'

'Rit is?' Scooby's stomach growled for a third time. 'Rit is! Roh! Reeheehee!'

'This situation is more desperate than we ever thought,' Daphne clipped.

'Okay, now that we've got that out of the way… wait. Scooby?' Velma took off her glasses, quickly cleaned them and peered closer at the loading dock. 'Scooby, is that the same Land Rover you saw from the farmhouse?'

'Reah, it is!'

'Curious. I wonder what it's doing over here.'

It was only one of two cars in the huge carpark. When they had been there earlier, there had been trucks and civilian cars, but it seemed they had all been moved. Maybe the soldiers needed more vehicles? Or perhaps this Bunnings had become important to the enemy's operations, but it was hard to know for sure.

It was almost as if Landie had been waiting for them…

Daphne turned to the others and shrugged. 'What do we think?'

'What are you thinking?' Fred asked.

'Take it.'

'That's far too risky, Daphne!' Velma whispered.

'Fuck it. I just want to get out of here.'

'No, not "fuck it"! We're back in occupied enemy territory and we have to be very careful with what we do!'

'Everything's a risk! Right now, we're at risk of starvation. If we can get the Landie, drive it to Koda Crescent and stash it like what we did with the Subaru…'

'But like, how do you, like propose we get it?' Shaggy groaned.

'We'll find a way. But Shag, listen…'

'What do you mean, "we'll find a way"?' Velma said indignantly. 'The owner's probably got the keys, and we can't actually start an engine without the key!'

Daphne rolled her eyes at Velma's sarcasm.

'I can hotwire the car,' Fred suggested.

'No. There must be an easier way.'

'Like, okay, adyway, say theoretically we like, do get the Laddie. Thed what?' Shaggy said.

'The Subie's loaded with food, remember?' Daphne answered. 'Once we get there…'

'That'll take ages. Like, isn't there food closer?'

'For who? Tell me if you see a sign saying, "Free food for Australian citizens on the run!"' Velma said acidly.

'Ri wish,' Scooby sighed.

'Scooby, even you would be able to recognise that you'd be walking right into a trap,' Fred said.

'Robably.'

'The Subie is our best option food-wise.'

'Can't we like, go to a house?' Shaggy whined.

'This trip to Koda Crescent is going to be incredibly dangerous,' Velma said. 'We need to make it in one trip. We'd be putting ourselves at risk if we stopped at any of the properties along the way.'

'Rait, shh, romeone's coming!'

They slinked into the trees and watched the scene unfolding in front of their eyes.

Two men were walking out of the Bunnings loading dock, holding clipboards and talking loudly. They looked important. One headed towards the car parked closest to the loading dock while the other started walking in the direction of the Landie. As the first man sped off, the sound of the second soldier's keys jangling around on his fingers filled the desolate carpark. It was like music to their ears.

'I have an idea,' Velma whispered, not taking her eyes off the man. 'It's unlikely that it will work. But it's worth a shot and we'll have to act quickly.'

Fred marvelled at Velma being able to come up with a plan in such a short space of time.

The man was only a couple of steps away from his car now.

'Well then, quickly, tell us!' Fred hissed.

Velma gushed, 'Say theoretically he puts his keys in the engine, he gets distracted by some noise and wanders into the bush to investigate and while he does that, we drive off in the Land Rover.'

Fred nodded. 'Okay. Okay great. What's our distraction?'

Shaggy suddenly realised that success in this plan would mean being closer to food – and safety. 'Like, Scoob and I are od it,' he volunteered.

The man unlocked the car just as Shaggy and Scooby scuttled closer to the Bunnings loading dock, keeping in the bush the whole time.

Velma didn't like this plan one bit. For starters, it was completely spontaneous, and Velma didn't like spontaneous things. She preferred to think things through properly, weighing up all the possibilities before going through with something. She reckoned the rest of the gang agreed with her on that one. Even at the beginning of the war, their attacks were so carefully thought out. This impromptu plan was a startling wake-up call to the kind of warfare style they had so well adapted to. Velma was terrified.

'Fred, you drive,' she said.

'Yep.'

The man slid into the driver's seat and put the keys in the ignition.

'Shag and Scooby need to start whatever they've got planned now! Right now! He won't hear them if the engine…'

The engine cackled into life.

Velma sighed in defeat. But then from the darkness came –

'COOOO-EEEE!'

'ROOOO-EEEEEEEEE!'

Fred yanked Daphne and Velma down to the ground in case the soldier glanced in their direction instead.

The plan worked; the soldier uncertainly opened the car door and grabbed his rifle. Amazingly, he kept the engine going. He kept his back against the car for a few moments, listening for the noise.

'COO-EEE!'

He fired several quick rounds in that direction.

'No, no. No, no no no,' Velma whispered.

'Jeepers.'

'They'll be okay.'

Unsatisfied, the soldier stalked towards the direction of the noise. Sure enough, there was a scuffle as two pairs (or three rather) of feet ran deeper into the bush.

Velma let go of the breath she hadn't even realised she'd been holding. 'We need to go to the Landie now.'

'What about Shaggy and Scooby?' Daphne asked.

'We'll pick them up,' Fred reassured her.

'That's not a good plan…'

'Wait, where's my bag?' Velma whispered.

'Chill, I've got it. Look, I'll wait here for them. You two go!' Daphne said.

'Daph…'

'Go, Fred!'

After a longing look back at her, he followed Velma towards the vehicle and wriggled into the driver's seat. Looking back at the other scene, Daphne watched in horror as the soldier started up a quick jog in pursuit of Shaggy and Scooby. Almost as if she was possessed, she started to follow the soldier. She had no idea why, but she had a gut feeling that Shaggy and Scooby were toast if this soldier chose to follow them.

The soldier slowed down as he reached the river. He cocked his rifle and scanned the length of the river, but appeared not to be able to spot them. Daphne wasn't surprised; Shaggy and Scooby were the best hiders she'd ever seen. Even now she had no idea where they went.

The soldier took out a torch and started to walk the length of the river. He shone it around aimlessly in the darkness, before striding quickly to a patch of trees close to riverbank. Less than twenty metres behind, Daphne ducked behind a large tree in case he looked in her direction. She was wondering what had drawn him to that spot along the bank until she saw a flash of metal in the trees on her side of the river. She held a hand to her mouth: the torch had picked up one of Shaggy's buttons. Her heart raced as the soldier strode with confidence towards the scrub with his rifle poised in just one hand.

The next couple of events happened very quickly. As quietly as she could, Daphne ripped Velma's backpack off her shoulders and felt for the gun. Without even a second of hesitation, she shot him square in the back, then watched as he slumped forward, creating an almighty splash in the river.

Her breathing was heavy and she lowered the gun and put it back in the bag. After a couple of moments, Shaggy and Scooby emerged from the scrub, before looking around for their saviour.

'Raphne! Rou raved us!'

'Like, ban, Daph, I thought we were goders!'

'Reah! Goners!'

'Bloody hell. I thought you were too.'

Shaggy pulled Daphne into a tight hug, absolutely relishing the feeling of being alive.

'Rhank rou,' Scooby said, licking her on the face.

'You okay?' Shaggy asked in concern, releasing his grip on her slightly.

'Hell no.'

'Like, fair edough.'

'Come on, let's get to the Landie.'

As the three of them ran out of the bush together, Fred and Velma almost collapsed in relief.

'We heard a shot! I'm so happy you're all okay,' Fred exclaimed.

'What happened?' Velma asked.

As soon as Daphne closer passenger door, Fred zoomed off away from the Bunnings carpark.

'Daphde, like saved us!' Shaggy sniffled. 'The soldier, like saw where we were hidig whed he tured od his torch.'

'You shot the soldier,' Velma directed at Daphne, piecing the incoherent story together.

She nodded.

Fred took one hand off the steering wheel and put it around Daphne, pulling her closer to him. 'Imagine what would've happened if you didn't do that.'

'I know,' Daphne said. 'I'd feel so guilty knowing I could've prevented that…'

'Are you alright?' Velma asked kindly.

'Surprisingly, I am. I'm not in as much shock as I thought. I'm sure all that will come later. It's just – we've done so much like this recently. I don't want to say we're getting used to it, but honestly, it really feels like we are.'

'I'm sorry everyone. It was a terrible plan. So much could've gone wrong. I didn't even think of this at the time – but what if there were more soldiers inside the building? What if they came out to investigate?' Velma admitted. 'Perhaps it was a good thing I didn't think of that at the time,' she added as an afterthought.

'At least now we've gone through with it and we pulled it off successfully,' Fred said. 'So, what happened in the bush?'

'Ri think the roldier saw rus hiding by the banks recause of ris rorch.'

'Mm, that bloody torch. But they were well hidden – they would've been okay if he didn't turn on his torch. Here's the thing: Shaggy's metal buttons. If we're going to do more stuff like this, we need to consider these things. Metal zippers, buttons and cords on our parkas are forbidden. We need to either paint over them or chop them off,' Daphne said.

Velma nodded thoughtfully. 'Great observation, Daphne. I'll keep that in mind.'

'Also, they get caught in the bush.'

'That's right. We can't afford to leave scraps of our clothing around. That's a tell-tale sign of where we've been.'

They travelled in a comfortable silence until Scooby piped up, 'Rhy are we riving without readlights? It's night.'

No one was bothered to answer Scooby's stupid question. At least he answered himself –

'Roh. Right. That was rtupid. I'm getting rungry.'

'I agree, Scooby. I'm beginning to feel delirious with hunger,' Fred said. 'Sorry Daph,' he took his arms away from her shoulder and put both back on the steering wheel. 'The last thing we want to do is crash.'

'No worries,' Daphne replied. She curled her legs up on the seat, then wrapped her arms around his arm that was closest to her and rested her head on his shoulder.

'Like, rebebber there are those carrots,' Shaggy added.

'Sure, why not,' Velma got out the carrot sticks.

'Carrots are supposed to help you see in the dark,' Daphne said sleepily.

'Is that true or just an old wives' tale?'

'You don't know?'

'No,' Velma admitted. 'Well, anyway, we'll give them to Fred. He needs them to see.'

Velma passed them over to Daphne, who handed them to Fred.

'What am I supposed to do – put them in my eyes?'

Daphne and Velma stared at him before breaking out into a fit of laughter as they realised he was being serious.

'Fred, the fact is they have proteins that get absorbed into your bloodstream…' Velma began. 'Actually, you know what? Yes Fred, stick them in your eyes like toothpicks to keep you awake.'

'That's the plan.'