PAW Patrol: Marshall Gone Missing.

Chapter 30

Aim! Fire!"

Twenty-one guns fired into the air as taps were played by the trumpeter. Police squads of over a dozen districts, including the small one in Adventure Bay, saluted as the officers slowly took the American Flag off of the closed casket. Chase wanted more than anything for them to open it again so he could look at his father one last time, even if it was the stiff image of his face that would never again open its eyes. The flag was folded as twenty-one other police dogs all howled in mourning for their fallen brother.

Everyone had told Chase over and over again, his father died a hero, protecting an innocent from a bank robber's gun. Chase didn't want a hero. He wanted his dad back.

He was still denying it, even in his heart. His dad was immortal in his eyes. He wasn't supposed to die. Heroes never die, they come back after the day is saved. Always.

Dressed in his black tux, he felt his entire body go numb as his father's human partner walked over with the flag in his hands and presented it to Chase. He stared at it for at least a minute, unable to even lift his paws or stop his eyes from crying. Ryder's dad eventually took it, and placed it next to Chase, who watched the casket sink lower and lower into the ground until there was a thud.

That was it.

His father was gone just like his mother.

He was alone.

At that moment, Chase ran as fast as he could through the cemetery. He ignored the calls of Ryder and everyone out there as they called out his name. He didn't want to listen to them, saying that things would get better. It would never get better. How could it when the last of his parents were dead? Losing his mother was hard, but she died when he was only a few weeks old. All he could remember of her was just the summer smell of her fur.

His father had been the only parent in his entire life and now he lost him. Blinded by tears and grief, Chase found himself slipping on a loose root, and fell into a pile of mud. He didn't bother getting up; he just lay there and began crying his eyes out. He wished he could sink into the earth itself and join his father in eternal sleep. If only to end this pain in his heart.

"Daddy..." Chase whispered as he closed his eyes, haunted by the peaceful face of his now deceased father.