Weigh Out Way-In

CHAPTER 69

1 JANUARY

The night passes by, the parents and the other members of the cavalcade tossing about in their sleeping bags, not being able to sleep forty winks. The worry over the missing child is wearing them out.

Morning comes together with a subdued storm and with an arrival of the rescue team. The rescue team has more sophisticated equipment to look for the missing child but due to the heavy winter storm the trace has gone cold, really cold. They don't reveal the hopelessness of the search for the parents but send the cavalcade back to Santa's Hideaway and assure them that they have the best possible gear to find missing people.

After circling around in all directions in their immediate surroundings, they make up their minds to direct their search further down on the south side of the hill. They see scratches made by long claws on some trees and a couple of carcasses torn open a bit further down.

'There has been a strong beast here just recently. Killed a raccoon dog.'

'I think we know what beast it has been.'

'I think so too. This doesn't bode well for the kid or for her parents.'

'We've now been looking for six hours without any success. Let's take a short break, have lunch and keep on looking after that.'

The rescue team keeps looking but cannot find any trace of the missing kid. It's getting dark so they take their second break and refuel their stomachs to have more energy to a further search.

Back in Santa's Hideaway the front door opens and closes. The feet of the guide is struck with a blast of cold air attacking across the floor.

'Somebody just opened and closed the front door. I'll go have a look.'

When the guide is trying to push open the door to the vestibule, something or someone is trying to push it closed. However this cannot outpower the guide's effort and falls on her back in the vestibule, sobbing.

'Qi! Qi!'

He takes her into his bear hug and barges into the hallway, shouting,

'Qi is here! Qi is here!'

Qi's parents run like the wind to the hallway and wrap their arms around their precious daughter. After hugging her quite some time, they ask her, 'How did you end up here? Where have you been?'

'A funny dog brought me here. It kept me in a cave in the dark and then brought me here.'

'Dog?'

'Yes. dark brown and white.'

'Two dogs?'

'No. One. It's white and dark brown. And another dog, orange dog.'

'Oh, there were two dogs after all.'

'Yes. And a horse, a bird and a big cat. And a bigger horse.'

'???'

The guide walks out the front door and sees the footprints in the snow and says, 'This is no dog. These are Wolverine's prints.'

'Do you mean a beast called Wolverine?'

'The kind of beast we met in Shenzhen?! The one who came to Shenzhen from here and caused a lot of trouble to us there and that's why we have this holiday here now?!'

'Yes. These definitely are his footprints. No other wolverine dares come anywhere close to Santa's Hideaway. This is one of Santa's nine fine animals.'

'So thanks to Wolverine we not only have had this amazing holiday here but also have got our dear little daughter back from the deep forest.

Where is he now? I mean Wolverine. We need to thank him for rescuing our daughter.'

'Hang on a minute.'

The guide jumps on his snowmobile and darts off following Wolverine's tracks and quite soon catches up with Wolverine.

Wolverine turns around and exposes his canine teeth but then realises he knows this rider and calms down.

'Jump on the sleigh. We'll go back to Santa's log house. They want to thank you for saving their daughter.'

'I have caused enough trouble so it's enough I managed to make it up to them by bringing their daughter back to them. Give my regards.'

And lumbers away to the top of the hill nearby and disappears behind it. He joins some of his friends, the LongTail, the Rednosed, the AllLegs, the TuftEar and the FlyingPanda. They jog across a lake nearby. Their friend Aquatic comes out of his hole in the ice and throws several fish to them. However the HoneyEater doesn't join them; he is deep asleep under the snow until spring. Besides, the WhiteFeather is long gone to the south, spending the coldest season away from Lapland.

One fine adventure is now over. It started from the disappearance of one of their dear friends, advanced to his search in a distant country, at first by the StubbornHeart, who caused a lot of commotion there, followed by the rest of them to bail him out and rescue back home. Then it was time for the pay-back; the guests from the distant country arrived at Santa's Hideaway.

All the nine fine animal friends are back in cold, snow-covered, mesmerizingly beautiful Lapland. However, the guests' adventure is not quite yet over in Santa's Wonderland. They are quickly being shuttled back to Rovaniemi Airport. Their flight is due in two hours. Suddenly their bus stops mid-way and the guide asks them to get off the bus an unknown number of kilometres away from the airport into the dark, frigid air. They step out and look at the guide puzzled and remind him they are running out of time; their flight is due very soon.

The guide heralds,

'May I introduce our colourful celestial friend, Aurora.'

Jaws dropped, the guests are over the moon with excitement, seeing green, spotting purple, skipping here, capering there, all over, right above them.

Pointing his hand from target to target, and firing imaginary ack-ack into the air, Mr Li (military man) shakes them back to the present from their awe and commands, 'Don't miss it, don't miss it. Shoot it, shoot it. Take photos, take photos. Capture this, capture that, on your phones and on your cameras.'

He looks like he may combust from excitement, so eager is he to get it all recorded.

So do the others. There is a battery of flashes, and collisions of long objectives swiftly turning from one target to the next, trying to capture everything about the majestic Northern Lights crescendoing right in front of their very eyes.

All the nine fine animals are to meet next spring again. Whether their paths will cross with those of the Chinese guests, next time in China in the future, remains to be seen. However the guests feel they couldn't have had any better compensation and any better communication than they have experienced during their stay in Lapland. As the ultimate icing on their Christmas holiday cake, they now have the long-hoped-for Northern Lights.

'Jolly good, jolly good',

say the guests in unison and get on the bus and drive off to their flight still lit by the glory of the Aurora.

N.B. the guide didn't forget the rescue team; he called them back telling them about the happy reunion with Qi in Santa's log house. So they will be back to greet the guide when he arrives at Santa's Hideaway from the airport.

THE END