"A few sandwiches short for picnic"

A Fan Fiction created by Tarashima

Part 4

Thankfully, my mum had gone taking a shower, so I was all alone in the kitchen. Before someone else could interrupt my actions, I'd grabbed on to some sausages, a piece of ham and fish leftovers from yesterday's dinner.

Buck lightened up quite a bit when he saw the food I'd brought him. I let him eat at my desk as I sat down on my bed. Though I had started to accept the fact that he was real, it felt rather weird having him eating human food in my room. Hastily, like there was no time to lose, he gobbled up the food with no manners whatsoever. But what did I expect? He was, after all, a wild animal.

Soon, he'd finished eating, seeming to be enough satisfied for the moment.

"Well, that wasn't too bad" he said, licking his fingers.

"Told you" I said.

He sat down at the end of my bed and looked at me.

"Now what?"

To be perfectible honest, I wasn't sure. I was starting to get hungry myself, but I didn't want to think about me right now.

"Well, we could try to figure out a way to get you home, by reason out why you ended up here in the first place." I said.

"Perhaps, but I thought we agreed; we don't know exactly how I ended up here", he said, sounding rather arrogant.

I sighed heavily, though I know his words were true.

"Okay, just let me think about it for a second or two" I said, and started to think while I looked up at the ceiling, like it was gonna help me think better.

Buck laid himself down, letting me do the whole thinking. One irritated thought about how unfair it was that I was to come up with the solution all by myself crossed my mind for a second, but I ignored it and started to do some heavy mind-work.

The first theory that entered my mind was that of magic: Some sort of irrational magic had played a few tricks on the universes, causing a gap between worlds which Buck had accidentally found. But I didn't believe in that kind of stuff, I've read way to much science to know that everything has a reason, making magic a thing that only exist in the creativity of human brain.

Besides, if magic was involved, what or who had caused it?

Which led me down to theory two, a typical one for me and my self-esteem; Someone was playing a cruel game with me, trying to make me suffer by let me lose my mind; piece by piece. There could be magic involved, but a much darker one, caused by someone with a corrupted heart. I once read in a book about a demon from the underworld was competing with two other demons on being as cruel to mankind as possible. The first demon had tempted a priest with two beautiful girls, making him doubt in his faith. In a decennial; he was to be one of their victims.

The second demon had corrupted a politician, making him accept a small bribe without shameful thoughts; he was about to become theirs in a year.

But the third one had done something completely else, that wasn't as medieval as the other two and worked much better in our modern world; he'd overcharged the whole mobile network in London at lunchtime, causing so much irritation that you'd been able to hear how the arteries thickened. And after that, all of the affected had letting their rage affect others, letting a whole chain start where people was taking out there rage at each other.

He'd lost of course, demons wasn't supposed to develop into modern creatures.

It could be work of demons, but I wasn't sure which kind of the mentioned that could be able of such things. And besides, I'm not a religious person so why bother to corrupt my soul?

Nope, both theories weren't plausible in my head. So it left me with the third theory, a more scientific kind; there's been a rip in the fabric of space and time continuum. I wasn't sure how the string theory was working either in theory or physically, but I know that if there was some sort of truth behind it, the universe as we know it had thousands of parallel universes beside it. And between those universes, there's a thick tissue of strings, making contact between them impossible, unless some strings handle on their own will and bend in totally other ways, causing gaps and portals between universes.

That theory made me feel smart and kinda delighted, but I guess I had it all mixed up. And even if that was the right answer; how would we be able to fix it?

I decided to make a try to discuss it with Buck and turned my head towards the weasel, and saw he'd fallen asleep!

I wondered if he needed mortal peril twenty-four seven to stay alert, and if I had to come up with some sort of physical challenges for him.

I poked him with my finger trying to awoke him, but he just snored and turned so he was lying on his side instead.

Oh, c'mon, I thought and shook him a bit incautiously. He jumped up and before I could blink, he'd landed on my stomach with a crazy scary look, pointing the knife at my face!

"Easy, it's just me!" I said.

He exhaled one or two times, then realized who I was and lowered his knife.

"Sorry mate, kinda lost my orientation for a second" he said.

I guess I've learned today to never awoke a weasel in a harsh way, or else you get bitten, or stabbed in this case.

"You scared the cuss out of me!" I said, letting my hasty fear exchange to irritation.

"I said sorry, isn't that enough?" he said, started to sound rather irritated too.

I wasn't feeling satisfied, but I didn't awoke him to argue, so I shrugged.

"I have come up with some theories about how you got here" I said instead.

"I thought ya were about to think about how to get me home?" he said, looking confused.

"It will be a lot easier to get you home if we know how you ended up here in the first place" I said very slow so he would understand.

He didn't seem to do so, but nodded anyway, letting me know that I could continue.

So I started with the first theory about magic. He seemed to swallow it without a blink, maybe animals preferred the easy way of thinking and just accept things as they were. But who knows?

Then, I explained about my second theory with dark magic involved and how it could be the handwork of demons, but that didn't seem to stick with him.

"I don't believe someone would be so cruel on purpose, so ya don't have to get so paranoid" he said with a voice that said 'I don't care what you say because I'm right'. I sighed in annoyance, he could be slightly arrogant when he wanted to.

The third one about the string theory wasn't fitting him at all, he didn't even understand what I was trying to say. So I tried to illustrate what I meant with drawings, but that didn't help either.

When I tried to explain with the help of my carpet, telling him that he would imagined a world behind it that was only reachable when there's was a hole in it, he took me a bit too literal and sliced a hole through the fabric.

"But ya said there would be a world behind" he said when I'd told him to stop with an angry voice.

"I was talking in metaphoric therms! Not telling you to actually do it!"

He was about to answer when I suddenly heard sounds outside my door. Someone was coming!

"Quick, be still and don't move!" I said.

He glared at me, but quickly jumped up to my bed and remained totally still in a sitting position.

Just a second after, my mum entered the room.

"I'm going to work now with Dad and the little ones" she said.

The little ones referred to my three youngest siblings, who was going in schools in the big city two miles away. Not because there wasn't any schools nearby, we lived about one hundred yards from one, but our family wasn't exactly popular in the small town. Which made the little ones preferred to go in schools where no one know about them and the rest of us, and could get a fair picture of us all.

"Right, got that ma'am!" I said, trying to cover up the hole in the carpet so that my mum wouldn't see it.

"I want you to take care of the washing today if you're not going to work"

"Okay"

"And clean up the house will ya? This whole place is a total mess, especially your room"

"Is there anything else you want me to do, your highness?" I muttered.

I don't like it when my mum give me orders with the subtext "I don't want you to do anything unnecessary like having fun". But she thought that if you were about to be home all day, you'll do your share of taking care of all the work that had to be done, you didn't need to do fun stuff all day.

"Not that tone ma'am, or you'll get some privileges suspended."

I didn't answer her, I was about to get angry, and I didn't want to argue this early in the morning.

"Make sure that the others go to school today" she said and then closed the door.

I sighed, was I some kind of extra mother when our ordinary mum was out?

It isn't easy being the oldest one.

"I don't like her at all, she just seem to start a blue whenever she got the chance" I heard behind me.

I turned to Buck who was standing with his arms crossed over his chest.

"What, my mum? She's just pretty special, that's all"

He shrugged.

"What were we talking about before she interrupted?" he asked instead.

"Right, my theories..."

"They're totally rubbish"

His words shocked me quite a bit.

"Who where? What now?" I said perplexed.

"They just don't make any sense at all, and ya don't seem to believe in them either"

"What, you thought it was just to open the same door as you entered yesterday?"

"I didn't know what to think"

"I don't either, and I'm doing the best I can, but I don't think it'll be easy"

"Ya don't get anywhere just by thinking"

"But I can't do anything unless I know what to do, and therefore, I need to think!"

Oh god, what was I doing? I was arguing with a weasel that weren't supposed to be in my world, and a weasel I happened to like a lot.

I sighed and put my hands in my face, trying to calm myself.

"Look, I want to help you as much as I can, and I gonna send you home, but I don't think it will happen today. And if we're gonna succeed in this mission, you'll have to understand that this isn't your world, it's mine. We'll have to do things my way"

Now, it was his turn to look slightly perplexed.

And then, I couldn't hold myself.

"In other words; I got rules you'll have to follow." I said with a crooked smile.

"Rule number one, ALWAYS listen to Natalie!"

Buck didn't seem to like it when others took control, or the fact that he had to obey me. He'd been alone for too long, that was for sure.

"Rule number two, don't move when others are nearby"

He seemed to accept that rule, thank the moon.

"Rule number three..."

I was carried away a little too much, I hadn't got a clue what my third rule was, and I didn't want to come up with something as stupid as "he who has gas, travels at the back of the pack".

"...uh, always listen to me."

"Ya said that twice"

"Yes, because you got to listen to me double as much as you have to be still"

He moaned in annoyance, he didn't like this at all.

Oh, this is gonna be so fun, I thought for myself, smiling teasingly.

End of part 4