Chapter 6: The Mad Chocolate Moose Chase
Chocolate Milk Sea
Thirty minutes had gone by since the group left the Pudding Palace. The colorful pudding was so tempting that Maggie and Grace kept on asking for seconds, resisting Mrs. Calloway's attempt to pull them out. Rudolph had to help her out before the both of them had the chance of eating everything in the entire palace. Mrs. Calloway had enjoyed the purple pudding herself but did not get carried away with craving for more like the other two since she thought that one was enough. Now they were riding across the Chocolate Milk Sea on a boat made out of graham crackers with marshmallow sauce and chocolate bars, pulled by four large chocolate swans. The magnificent swans seemed just as realistic as any real swan in a lake. Most of them would fly above the Chocolate Milk Sea as if they were dancing. Grace gazed dreamily at the swans flying high above and floating wherever the currents took them. Down below the boat, she could see her pretty reflection in the creamy satisfying sea of chocolate milk smiling back at her. If this whole magical adventure was nothing more than a dream, than it was surely something she would never want to awaken from until it was truly over.
"Hey Rudolph, how deep is the Chocolate Milk Sea?" asked Maggie after taking a sip of the creamy foaming substance. To her, it wasn't anymore satisfying than the Lemonade Fountain, but it was still tasty.
"It only stretches up to 12 ft, but I still wouldn't intend to go for a swim in it. The swans you see here don't really like anybody other than themselves swimming in their territory. They can get pretty cranky about it." The group stared at the swans wondering how the geese react when feeling cranky, but soon decided to let it go for now. The boat sailed on through the milky currents sloshing in its silkiness.
Candy Cane Alley
"This is Candy Cane Alley," announced Rudolph as the group walked along the road to an area with giant peppermint candy canes sticking out of the fields like cornstalks surrounded by wooden fences, "In here; candy comes out of the soil and grows like regular plants you see in a garden."
"Wow, I've heard of growing vegetables on a farm, but never thought I see a candy garden. This is amazing," said Maggie gazing with awe at the splendid fields. The sound of hummingbirds sipping at nectar flowers filled with a sweet honey perked at their ears. On one side of Candy Cane Alley, another field of nectar flowers sweetly scented the air as more hummingbirds pecked at them. This was the perfect spot for growing honey and for use in creating specific types of candy recipes. Everywhere candy such as bonbons, lemon drops, cupcakes, toffee, jelly beans, peppermint drops, licorice, pastries, and lollipops sprang from the ground from small to large.
If possible, this might have been a favorite spot for tourists to come and pick at candy like they would for strawberries and vegetables, but the only thing that can ever prevent anyone from treading through lied somewhere in the midst of the gardens in which Grace would soon find out about.
"Over there is where the peppermint bushes grow candy canes and cream colored cookies," Rudolph pointed his direction to a few bushes covered in peppermint colored leaves. "And that over there is where the trees grow frosted covered donuts," on the right side of the road stood trees glimmering with gold leaves along with donuts hung from the branches just like an average apple tree. Only there were no traces of fruits or vegetables in the Land of Sweet Candy. A gentle breeze was blowing making the tree branches rustle and twinkling like a beautiful tune from a music box which rang in everyone's ears softly.
While Rudolph continued on with his description of every acre of the candy fields, Grace could feel her mouth salivate and dribble by gazing at every sweet in the gardens with her gums clapping and her tongue licking. Taking one look at the other two cows, they were too busy listening to Rudolph talk about where the candy goes after being picked once their full grown and none of them even noticed her sneaking over the fence and through the candy fields approaching the donut trees. Right now she began thinking with her stomach as she craved for more sweets that she had not yet tasted. She hopped up to grab a pink frosted sprinkled donut with her teeth. It was sweet and tempting which spread a childish smile across her frosted stained mouth. After that she went for another with custard filling on the inside and took a bite out of another made of pure chocolate that melted in her mouth and went smoothly down her throat. The pleasant donuts had attacked her taste buds craving for more.
Happily skipping like a deer away from the donut trees, she danced from field to field, tree to tree, and bush to bush plucking every tiny candy to stuff inside her mouth. In fact, she was so dream dazed that she barely recognized a sign hidden in a different field labeled KEEP OUT: candy fields guarded by MAD CHOCOLATE MOOSE! Finally, Grace stopped skipping and sat down next to a garden of cupcakes, toffees, and chocolate almond bars to have a few more bites before heading off to rejoin the group, believing that she would eventually catch up to them anytime. Plucking a chocolate bar, she shoved it into her mouth as the pure, rich, creamy flavor melted inside. She thought it felt sticky and gooey but didn't seem to care.
"This is the best chocolate I have ever tasted," she said in some kind of joyful, sweet, appetizing trance as she plucked a cupcake and another chocolate bar. The cool thick almond chocolate stuck to her mouth as she chewed and chewed with her mouth slightly open. Her eating manners were becoming as revolting and sloppy as Maggie's ever were. This was definitely a dream she certainly did not want to wake up from. In fact, it almost seemed like nothing could ever stop her from going on with chewing away the sweets in the gardens. Or so she thought!
While she was still crunching on the almond bar, a dark silhouette figure with strange enormous antlers sticking out of its head formed on the ground closer and closer near her sitting position. Because of the crunching, she was unable to hear anyone approaching her until she felt a sort of furious snort behind her head and the stomp of a foot. She had known of the presence when the snorting grew louder and heavier like a train ready to take off at a high speed. With her cheerful happiness replaced by confusion, she began to turn her head slowly as she kept hearing the heavy snorting grow hotter directly on top of her. Behind her, she found herself glaring at the angry eyes of a mighty, muscular, chocolate moose with a long muzzle, long spindly legs, white teeth resembling a bulls, and broad antlers arising as cylindrical beams large enough to tear anybody apart. But the question that rang in her mind was how a big animal like him would be doing wandering around a happy place like Candy Land when they should be in Montana or Canada. Now Grace could feel her stomach churn when the moose moved its face closer to hers whilst still snorting. But what did she do that caused him to fuel? She could only remember running amuck in the fields taking almost every last bit of half-grown candy and knocking into something hard and wooden, but was unable to get a good glimpse of it. With the moose snorting and tapping his right foot impatiently, Grace stared up at him trembling.
"Um, ugh I…ugh hello, want some?" Grace offered the moose a pink frosted cupcake hoping that it might calm his anger. But the moose did not seem to buying it as its head leaned forward till it touched her snout. "Or maybe not!" With a nervous grin, Grace gulped and made a run for it a moment after the moose began scratching the dirt roughly preparing to charge her like a mad bull. She darted through the fields shoving aside any stalk blocking her path of escape.
"What have I done to make him angry?" Grace said to herself huffing and puffing. "All I did was mind my own business with the candy and…OOF!" Grace was cut off when she hesitantly bumped her body into a hard piece of wood. From the words on the sign, it was then that she understood about the anger of the moose and what a grave mistake she made by jumping in this place. "OH NO, NO WONDER HE'S ANGRY; I'VE BEEN TRESSPASSING!" Grace slapped her hooves over her cheeks pulling them down in a surprise panic.
GGGRRRRR! It was then that the moose appeared again behind her snorting madly and digging his right foot in the dirt madder than ever. The blond heifer's eyes widened leaving the moose behind in a puff of smoke clouds forming in his face.
"Why doesn't anybody put up more signs out here instead of one?" she said hesitantly, still pushing through the stalks. "Then again, if I hadn't been thinking with my taste buds, I'd still be with the others. Now I have to find them." Grace felt a small sense of relief when she found herself out of the candy field staring at the fence within a mile away from where she was still running. Taking one last look back, the moose had been gaining up on her faster than she might have thought. Still, she kept on moving fast enough in order for her to gain altitude for a high jump over the fence. The moose kept on charging straight at Grace and then when she had least expected it, he had head-butted her from behind the moment she had slowed down halfway toward the fence. To her, his charge felt like slamming her backside against a hard canyon wall. Now the force of the charge was powerful enough to send her soaring over the fence like a small rock being kicked by a boot.
"OOF!" Grace grunted the moment she landed back on the road sliding until she was 15ft away from the fenced area. Dusting herself off, she turned back to take one last look at the moose to see if he was still steamed off. There he was behind the fence snorting madly still. "Maybe he just doesn't like Christmas cheer or me at the least," she said a moment after heading off to rejoin her friends still listening to Rudolph tell a story.
"Oh, I almost forgot to mention ladies," said Rudolph. "Don't go wandering over in the candy fields. It is guarded by Chuck, the big chocolate moose with a bad temper and will charge anybody he sees plucking those candies."
"Oh now he tells us," Grace whispered under her breath sarcastically. Of course, she still knew it was her own fault for wandering away from the group.