The Wounds We Heal

Chapter three: New Thought

"Aha! Guys, I think I have an idea. Why not camping?" Snowflake suggested.

"What?" Rubble queried, clearly confused.

"Come on," Snowflake said, as she walked towards the inside of The Lookout. Specifically, the elevator.

Following after her, they began running; entering through the sliding doors to head for the elevator.

Somehow the soccer ball showed up beneath Marshall's paws and he tripped over it. Rolling forward, he caught the slippery colored material of a certain play toy they'd once had a headache of a time with and crashed right into his friends as the parachute landed upon them. Which floated down to cover the pile of pups, so that Marshall could pop up and yell..

"Goal!!!"

And this started everyone laughing, as they pulled the parachute off them in order to unstack the pile, while the elevator began it's task of taking them to the upper level of the Lookout.

XXXX

"Ok, Ryder there you go." Katie said, setting him down to rest in a roller chair. One of those old computer desk chairs, set low enough for the boy's feet to fully touch the ground.

"This should give you some mobility.." The girl went on. "With Rocky's help, we made this old office chair into your own kind of wheelchair I guess you could say.. on that can lock in place at your command, with a button press or a vocal command. And is set up so you can lay back to rest if needed.

"That's great.." Ryder smiled. "Thanks, Katie."

"At least you can sit upright, now." Jake mentioned with a big grin. "Cause anything's better than laying down flat, I think."

The three young people chuckled together and only stopped to look over to the center of the room, when hearing the elevator rise up.

The pups walked out of the elevator towards the group, with Snowflake in the lead.

"Hi Ryder. I wanted to ask you something. We've noticed Chase has been in a flat mood lately. We were thinking of ideas for how to cheer him up, and I was wondering if we could camp outside tonight?" Snowflake explained.

"Better yet.. I know the perfect spot in the woods to do it." Everest suggested. "Somewhere easy to get to, for Ryder's sake."

"Hm.. that's weird." Katie mentioned. Ryder nodding in agreement.

"Chase should be almost healed by now?" She went on, coming forward. "How come he's so down?"

"We're not sure." Marshall sighed. "That's why we're trying to cheer him up."

"We wanted him to play some soccer with us." Skye said. "But he wouldn't come out of his pup-house."

"Yeah," Ned agreed sadly.

"We were hoping something like this would cheer him up." Marshall added.

"Hm,.." Ryder mused. "You know,.. he has been a little flat lately, hasn't he.." Katie stepped forward and placed a hand on his shoulder, Jake doing the same on the other.

"You know what?,.." The boy thought for a moment longer. "Sure, why not.. I think we all could use a night out together."

"How about this weekend?" He went on, glancing up at Jake; who nodded. "We could go up there right away tomorrow morning; hang out for the day and sleep there overnight!"

"Yay!!!!" The pups howled, barking aloud, while the humans among them laughed.

xxxx

The uproar of cheers somehow reached his ears and he looked up.