Welcome to Alien Inn

Chapter 6

Matt lunged for the door and pounded on it with both fists.

"Dotti! Dotti! Are you in there?" Gulping, he cried, "Who are you? What are you doing to my dog?"

The voices stopped. The whimpering stopped. The whole inn seemed unnaturally silent. Only the wind howled outside.

Matt tried to swallow the lump of fear that was gathering in his throat. He knew it was Dotti he had heard. He'd know her whimper anywhere.

"Dotti!" he yelled again. "Dotti, where are you?"

Still, silence hung in the air.

Suddenly the door opened a crack. Matt's eyes widened in alarm as Dotti scampered out the narrow opening and into the hall, her tail between her legs. She let out a yelp when she saw Matt.

"It's okay, girl! Are you all right?" He dropped to one knee to pet her, but she took off at a gallop.

Matt raced after her. She careened around furniture in the lobby in her madcap dash for the stairway. He bounded up the stairs behind her and reached the top in time to see her crash through the half-open door to his room.

Out of breath, he stumbled into the room and collapsed against the bed. Dotti was cowering in the corner, her nose buried between her paws and her eyes wide with fright.

"It's okay, girl. Nobody's going to hurt you," he said. "Here, Dotti. Here, girl," he coaxed.

Dotti didn't budge.

Wrapping his arms around his pet, he asked softly, "What did they do to you in there?" He rubbed the top of her head while tears filled his eyes and terrible fear filled his heart.

All of a sudden his eyes focused on a small bare spot on the side of her head, just below her ear. He leaned forward and examined it. The white fur between two black spots had been shaved off a tiny area, not more than a square inch in size.

Gasping, he turned her head to the other side. An identical square-inch patch of bare skin was there, too.

"Oh, no!" he cried. "They really did do something to you!"

Matt started to jump to his feet to get help when he sank to the floor again. Had they done anything else to Dotti? If he looked her over carefully, would he find more marks?

Slowly and carefully, he went over every square inch of her body. Finally, on her left rear paw, he found what he had been afraid he'd find, a small cut in the shape of a half-moon.

Matt stared toward the window where snow still battered the glass. Something awful was going on at Snowed Inn. But what was it? He needed to tell his parents.

Pulling the leash out of his pocket, he reached for his ski jacket and put it on along with his mittens and cap. "Come on, girl," he coaxed again. "I need to talk to Mom and Dad. Then we'll geo outside, and you can play in the snow."

This time Dotti scooted out from the corner and came to him, waiting patiently for Matt to snap the leash onto her collar.

When Matt got downstairs he spotted his parents coming out of the restaurant. But to his dismay, they were walking along and talking to Mrs. Rogers.

Rats, he thought. He didn't dare say anything in front of Mrs. Rogers until he found out more about what was going on. For all he knew, she might not be the sweet little grandmother she appeared to be. She could be in on it, too. She could even be the one who hurt Dotti!

The idea made him angry. He needed to talk to somebody. Looking around the lobby, he spotted Julee and Ashlee. But they were in a corner near the fireplace, deep in conversation with Lisa and Maggie. A glance toward the game room located Bart, busy at a video game with his back to Matt. He certainly didn't want to talk to him!

Matt decided that what he probably needed anyway was time to think before he approached his parents. And Dotti definitely needed to go outside.

A blast of icy air hit Matt as he opened the door and stepped into the snowstorm. Although it was cold, it seemed almost refreshing after the long night and scary morning inside Snowed Inn. He caught a snowflake on his tongue and let Dotti off the leash, watching her bound through the giant snowbanks.

Scrambling over the snow blocking the front stairs, Matt cut through the empty parking lot and headed toward the door. Dotti was running and barking ahead, woofing for him to hurry up. The road hadn't been plowed, and walking was hard. Puffing and panting, Matt had to struggle to keep from losing of his dog.

Poor Dotti, he thought. What did they do to her?

Unexpectedly Matt rounded a turn and was out of sight of the inn. He gasped and skidded to a stop.

He was standing in warm sunshine! And the road ahead was clear! The last of the snow was melting and trickling off into the ditches on both sides of the road, making soft little gurgling sounds.

He whirled around and looked back in the direction he had just come from. The blizzard was raging as hard as every inside a giant cloud that reached from the ground beneath his feet to high into the sky above his head.

He turned again and whistled low in disbelief as he scanned the sky in the other direction. It was clear and blue for as far as he could see.

He stood frozen to the spot, his heart beating wildly.