Chapter thirteen: Memories
Eyes heavy with sleep, and tightening from dreaming, a stiff body shifted.
"Hah!" Awake in a moment, his head lowering with the heavy weight that was placed upon it in the eye of his imagination.
"Ugh.. *yawn*" this deep yawn led into Chase lying down again, to bury his face into his paws and rubbing them tightly.
"Sleep well, Chase?" Cocking his head over, one brown eye peered up to find Ryder standing over him, with his trademark grin to match the sunshine outside.
"Uhhnn.. honestly.. I'm kinda.. wishing I wasn't awake right now." The pup groaned, leaning his head back into his paws to cover his face with another groan.
"You can always rest some more if you want." Ryder shrugged. "No one said you have to get up yet." A yawn himself and he continued. "We're all kinda tired from last night."
"Yeah.. all thanks to me." Chase sighed, his tone flattening at his gaze dropped, having looked up at hearing the yawn that wasn't his own.
"Maybe.." the boy shrugged loosely. "But.. it's ok." He finished, taking the pup up and lying back on a beanbag with his beloved police pup sprawled against his chest. "We all know you're struggling a little right now.. and.. we know that you need time to deal with it. As long as you remember that we're here for you.. there's no reason to feel ashamed for last night."
Chase sighed, lowering his head. "I know." He said, setting his head down onto his paws on Ryder's chest.
"I don't wanna be awake right now." Chase moaned after a silence fell over them.
"Then, I think, this will make it so you don't have to." Ryder said, dropping a blanket up over the pup's head only leaving his muzzle exposed. The heaviness of the blanket, while thin and light, still encouraged the heaviness of his eyes to return and suddenly his thoughts faded once again. The boy soon following unbeknownst to both of them until they would wake again..
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The blanket rose up again with a rounded shape, falling away to fully expose the German Shepherd's head.
"Huh?" Glancing around, the room was silent and no person or pup could be seen there. Looking down Ryder was still fast asleep, but glancing around once more then down at him, he found a dustier version of him beneath his very paws. Finding this to be a shock he swiftly skooched back slightly from him, when suddenly the darkness around them pulled Ryder out from under him up off of the beanbag that remained, as Chase was dropped off into a free fall away from him. The wind that rose up on him from his back ended with hitting rock bottom face up, so that he could look straight up at the only light, which shone down on him like a spotlight. Rolling onto his paws, he gazed about the thick shadows around him, hoping to find something that could be an indicator of something he wasn't sure of in the moment. Suddenly the pair of glowing red eyes opened eye-level with him, then lurched forward with only a moment's pause…
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"Ah!" Thrusting himself up off his right shoulder he realized the mistake it was to jerk up. As his body popped and cracked away the stiffness to almost make it all worth it, except for the lingering ache and sting of the two separate injuries that remained there. The soft blanket, which had fallen down to his shoulders, comforted him, and strangely enough, felt heavier than he remembered. Then finding it to be the same blanket, he noticed how it had been covered with a thicker one to keep him somewhat swaddled in the two blankets together in a make-shift sleeping bag made with the folds the blankets alone. The sun by now had disappeared; hanging so high in the sky, he couldn't see it from where he was. Then hearing the munching and smacking of dining pups, he jumped up in surprise, and tore out the door blazing from his thick nest of covers in a flash. Bursting out the door and sliding into a right-hand turn, he tripped over his own paws rushing forward and fell over a certain spotted pup in a fire red vest; crashing in a heap on the ground beside him on the other side.
"I overslept! Why didn't you wake me!" Chase cried, questioning the line pups all staring back at him from their bowls brightly.
"You needed to rest after your adventure last night." Marshall answered easily, when recovering himself. "We weren't gonna wake you up just because you are usually awake by now."
"Besides.. from the sound of it.. you didn't wanna get up earlier anyway." Skye recalled, glancing at Ryder briefly; just beyond where Chase stood.
"Well.. yeah,.. cause it was too early in the morning at that time.. but twelve o'clock in the afternoon?! Way too late,.. even for me." Chase protested while shaking his head.
"Chase relax.. you're getting a little too worked up about all this.." Marshall soothed, turning to face his friend while a couple of the pups resumed eating; Rubble obviously one among them.
"W..what'do you mean?" Chase questioned, with the arch of an eyebrow.
"Well your ears are twitching, but yet your tail's wagging.." the Dalmatian pointed out. "Are you ok?"
Chase's gaze wandered down as he mentally observed himself for a moment. Meeting Marshall's gaze then quickly dropping it as a result.
"No..I..um.. *sigh*.. I can't sleep til almost noon, ok." Chase sighed finally, finding his calm demeanor once again.
"Chase,.. you needed that rest." Marshall reiterated, coming to stand face to face with him. "You literally fell asleep while Katie was washing you off last night.. and Ryder had to hold you, in order for us to clean and dress your wound."
"What're you talking about.. I-.." Chase froze,.. finally realizing the different feeling at his collar, and rushed out around the pups to the bowl of water standing next to Rocky's pup-house; peering into it to view his own reflection. The white that he found poking out, though, stuck out to him immediately.
"No.. no, no, no, no, n-n-no! This can't be happening! No!.. what?! Ugh.. this isn't gonna work.." the pup complained, seemingly to himself.
"Chase,.. what is wrong." Marshall asked him in forwardly exasperated tones. "You got hurt last night and we needed to take care of it."
"No! Don't you get it!.." Chase whined, meeting his gaze abruptly. "I've already worried my mom and the Prescotts enough with what I did yesterday.. and now I'll have to explain how I got hurt.. all over again." Lifting a paw to it, he scratched as though an itch had suddenly developed underneath the bandage, which covered the scratch it was meant to protect. "She worries enough about me as it is." He finished, setting his paw down and lowering his head at the same time with a sigh.
"But.. shouldn't that be kind of a.. good thing." Rubble wondered slowly.
"No.." Chase replied heavily,.. hesitating a moment later. "Well.. I don't know.. maybe? *sigh* It's complicated."
"Doesn't sound like it to me." Marshall contradicted. "I mean.. usually if someone is worried about you, it means they care about you very much."
"That's right,.. and it's no secret that Mariana truly loves you." Ryder added. "Sounds like she hasn't been the same since you disappeared from your old hometown all those years ago."
"Which is why.. you should tell her honestly what happened." Rocky put it, coming closer to his friend's side. "She deserves to know what happened since she spent all night wondering if you were ok."
"But then why does she have to know? Why does anyone have to know, if they see that I'm ok?" Chase protested. "If all that matters is that I'm safe,.. what does it matter what happened at all."
"Chase, what's wrong with you?" Marshall questioned, successfully masking most of his surprise. "You know you should always tell the truth."
"*sigh*.. Yeah.." He sighed in an uncertain reluctance they'd never heard from him as his gaze wandered away from them sheepishly.
"Come on, Chase.." Rubble spoke up after a time. "I'm sure it won't be as bad as you think it will."
"Yeah, I'm sure they'll understand." Rocky agreed. But at this, Chase's frown turned away as his ears flattened about halfway.
"Shouldn't they be here by now anyway?" He wondered in a dry manner.
"Nope.. they told me this morning that they couldn't come til later this afternoon." Ryder replied. "Something came up on their farm outside of town."
"Oh,.. ok.." then Chase wandered off toward the Lookout, head lowered distraughtly as the pups exchanged glances.
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For such a small room, it can get pretty messy pretty quickly. Picking up the blanket draped over the beanbag left on the top floor of the Lookout, Ryder carefully folded it and set it neatly on top of the beanbag. Though he wore a smile on his face the whole time.. a nagging thought still clung to the back of his mind; attempting to finger its way forward all the while. It's not like him to act this way.. the boy thought. Then again.. there was at least one time that that wasn't the case…
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A small golden paw disrupted the dust that lay there. A grunt and the pup it belonged to was able to pull himself up to the higher elevation he was reaching for; only to prepare to do it again.
"Ih-.. almost.. there.." Chase comentated through the strain.
"Are you sure this is a good idea Chase?" His spotted companion wondered from the ground. "I mean,.. that doesn't look all that safe."
"Relax,.." the young German Shepherd pup replied, pulling himself up one box higher. "I got this.. and I'm being careful. See?" At this moment though, his back paw slipped and he scrambled to grab a hold of the box in front of him, catching the edge of it just right to bring it down with him. Marshall jumped back as Chase free-falled while the box fell open on top of him, a shatter following the crash.
"Chase are you ok?!" Marshall cried, racing over to the box as Chase pushed it off of him, buried in the innards of the white packing materials.
Seething with a painful squirm, he covered his right foreleg with his other paw and grimaced sharply. Marshall's eyes hit the ground from his friend's face, and the redness that soaked his golden fur clued him in on the reason.
"Oh, Chase.." the Dalmatian gasped. "-See- I told you this wasn't such a good idea. There's nothing that important to risk your neck to reach. We should've just asked Ryder for help, now I need to get him and tell him what happened."
"What?! No way! You can't tell him.." Chase protested, rising quickly, with a slight grunt, squinting with one eye at the sting. "We can fix it.. he doesn't have to know about this. We can handle it."
"Are you nuts?!" Marshall cried. "You said you could handle climbing those boxes to reach the one on the shelf behind it, and yet you fell. But something glass just broke and cut you so that now you're bleeding... And you think we can just.. clean this up and pretend it didn't happen? How do you think we can cover up something like this, before Ryder finds out about it? That wound needs to be properly cared for and it's not like Ryder's not gonna notice it."
"We can just say I got it when we were exploring.." Chase reasoned, as Marshall reluctantly came alongside him for support. "We've gotten plenty of scratches that way before."
"True,.. but this is a whole other thing." Marshall countered certainly. "You cut yourself on glass.. and who knows if pieces were left inside the wound. We can't risk that being the case and causing more damage. Plus.. it could get infected."
"Oh, come on Marshall." Chase begged, sitting down against the line of shelving away from the mess they'd created. "Ryder just started letting us go over to Katie's by ourselves.. If he finds out we tried to handle this ourselves and failed.. He'll watch us like a hawk for like.. ever, before he starts letting us go out anywhere on our own again."
"Relax Chase.." Marshall sighed, rolling his eyes dryly. "I'm sure Ryder won't be that mad, as long as we tell him what happened right away."
"Ha,.. easy for you to say.." Chase snapped just as dryly. "You're not the one it happened to."
"Hey, I'm still just as hosed as you are." Marshall countered, turning to his friend squarely. "I should've stopped you.. and then I should've gotten Ryder as soon as you started climbing those boxes to get up there."
The doors opened and they looked up at hearing:...
"What is going on here?!"
'Shoot, it's Ryder!' the two pups collectively thought. The younger aged boy stood awestruck at the mess laid before him, and his two pups sitting nearby it, with subtly crimson painted paws,.. Chase trying to casually conceal his wound.
"What happened here, pups?" Ryder asked again, looking at them quizzically.
"Uh.. well.." the two responded, their gazes wandering away from the boy's glance guiltily. Ryder's brow arched, and Marshall's gaze dropped to his paws, as he bit his lip.
"Chase fell!" the Dalmatian blurted out finally, earning both Ryder's and Chase's shocked expressions. "I tried to stop him, but-.. he wanted to show me something and.. tried to get it off the top shelf himself." Ryder's glance then settled on Chase and the pup became instantly sheepish.
"I..um..well..um.." the pup stammered, backing away slowly, to come into contact with the shelf behind him. "Uh.." he mused finding he had nowhere to go now, as Ryder advanced toward him with a stoic expression.
"Chase, why didn't you come ask me for help?" The boy asked kneeling down to him to place a hand on his head softly.
"Because I-.." Chase trailed off, sliding away from the boy's touch, then slowly freezing in choosing his words. "..I thought I could do it by myself." The pup finally admitted, turning his eyes up to Ryder in regret.
"And now?" the boy wondered suggestively.
"*sigh* Now I know I wasn't.." The pup admitted further, head lowered in shame. "And I should.. be more careful next time.. and..ask for help when I need it.. Versus trying to handle it all myself."
"I'm proud of you, Chase." Ryder smiled, scratching his pup behind the ear.
"-you are?" Chase gasped, looking up in astonishment.
"Of course.. I can tell you didn't really wanna tell me what happened," Ryder said, beginning an approach toward the mess. "And you had the opportunity to lie, but,.. I'm glad you chose not to and told the truth anyway. I know it can be hard sometimes.." The boy went on, turning back toward them. "But I'm proud of you for making the right choice anyway."
"Oh yeah.. Right!" Chase realized straightening up, then recoiling at the sting in his foreleg; picking up the paw that only hurt from the scratches left behind by the glass…
Hey what's up you guys! This chapter was pretty fun! The memory at the end was the best part for me.. And the most fun to write. Not sure when this story will end, but I know it will be a while before we get there! And with that said.. Hope you enjoy this new part and look forward to reading the next one. Thx!