44

Professor Merk was cold. It was past midnight. He was working all day and all night. He finally got to a point where he could transform the tree bark into some kind of energy. But he was far from being done. He had to have more material to work on. He had to tell Jonathan to increase the work on cutting down trees. He was day-dreaming in his head: “The mighty, the glorious Professor Merk discovered a new kind of energy, which will help many poor people in the world because this kind of energy is almost infinite“. But something troubled him. This kind of energy isn't infinite. He is using the tree bark to make this energy, which is forcing him to cut down trees. He thought to himself: “Well, who cares about trees and nature“. There are people who care about nature, and they are ready to stop anybody from hurting it.

Dan was looking through the binoculars, and he didn't like what he saw. Lily (his younger sister) shouted: „C'mon, let me see!“

Dan replied: “Okay, okay, calm down a little bit”. „Just a minute“, he added.

“This isn’t good” he said.

“What’s wrong?” asked Brundo Bear with his deep, rough voice.

”I can’t see the forest, it seems it disappeared”, said Dan. “We need to do something about it.”

“I’m going to go inside and find the map.”

Dan was back in a few minutes.

“Okay, so here’s the plan. We are on this side and we need to get to the forest. That means we have to cross the railroads and go beside the mountain. But now, it’s time we dress our costumes.”

“They’re in the chest” said Lily.

“Let’s go get them.” They went to the basement and opened an old chest filled with toys, costumes and old photo albums. Dan took a dragon costume, Lily took a Native American costume, and Brundo took a pirate costume. They were ready for an adventure.

As Dan said they crossed the railroads and went beside the mountain and they saw the slope where the forest was supposed to be, but the only thing they saw was a bunch of stumps. About 1 km to the south, they saw a building of a weird shape. Little did they know, that was professor Merk’s laboratory.

Brundo said: “Somebody destroying the forest must be in that building.”

“Let’s go inside”, said Lily.

That wasn’t so easy for them. There were some guards, and they were patrolling around the building.

There were too many of them to just run inside.

An idea flashed in Lily’s mind: “We need some kind of distraction.” She was thinking out loud: “We could make some very loud noise and the guards will go in that direction so we can slip into the building”. They found some metal pots and took some sticks. They started hitting the pots, and as Lily said the guards ran in that direction. Finally Lily, Dan, and Brundo got in the building. The main corridor was empty but luck wasn’t on their side all the time. The entrance to the professor’s experiment room had a key-card lock and the only place they could get a key-card was the guard post. The problem was… the guard was still in there, and it seemed he was going to stay inside. They had to sneak in.

Lily said: “Dan is best at sneaking, he should sneak in and take the key-card.”

“Okay”, said Dan. He opened the door very quietly so the guard didn’t hear him. He was progressing very slowly, but he was making his way through. Suddenly ”CRACK”, he stepped on a soda can. Oh no, the guard was turning around…

“Well, I guess it was a mouse”, said the guard.

“Phew”, Dan sighed. When the guard turned around, he quickly hid in the cupboard. Dan grabbed the key-card and went back.

“Yes!”, said Brundo, “Now we can unlock the door!” They pulled the key-card through the lock. They went in…

Professor Merk was working. It was 1: 27 am.

But he finally did it, he created energy. That was the accomplishment of his life and… suddenly he heard something.

And that “something” was talking to him: “Are you the man who destroyed the forest!?”

“Well, I wouldn’t call it destroying, but…”

“Enough nonsense”, yelled the monster at professor Merk. ”Bring back the forest, or I will…”

“You will what?”, asked professor Merk frightened by the monster’s voice.

“I will punish you with my god powers.”

“Oh, so you’re a god”, said the professor while he was stepping back.”Well, then I will bring back the forest with my machine.”

Professor went to the machine and said to himself: “I know I will regret this.”

What actually happened, you ask?

Dan, Lily and Brundo went inside the experiment room.

Brundo said: “This must be the guy who destroyed the forest.”

“But what can we do about it, he’s some kind of a mad scientists!” said Lily.

“Brundo is good at making scary costumes, he can make a costume”, said Dan.

“I already have an idea. We could combine our costumes to create something bigger.” And they did. They made a scary costume and they scared professor Merk so much that he decided to bring back the forest.

When professor Merk pulled the lever, our heroes ran outside and shouted: “We did it!” They played hide and seek and they were having fun in the forest they saved.