“Exactly. That’s the spirit!” Helena replied while placing an arm along Alice’s shoulder and giving her brief squeeze of extra encouragement. “Where should we start our searching?” Helena queried while looking around and noticing that the apartment was in some disarray.

“First. I’m not feeling that crash hot at the moment and I left my medication in the kitchen.” Alice indicated the way standing behind Helena and giving her a gentle nudge in the right direction.

Helena noted that even though Alice said she was fine with finding Snappy, she dogged her footsteps down the hall to the kitchen. In fact, it even felt like Alice was slightly clinging to the back of her shirt while doing so. “Was that her breath I could feel warming the back of my neck?” Helena pondered.

When Helena stopped abruptly just inside the kitchen, Alice being so close behind ran into the back of her. “What the fuck? Uh … sorry. Oh shit, what’s that damn smell!?” Alice exclaimed as she adroitly moved to grab her meds from the kitchen counter and tossed a couple down before moving quickly and closely back to Helena’s side.

It was the smell that had stopped Helena in her tracks. Being as polite as possible, Helena asked: “Did you say your power went off? Maybe something has gone off in the fridge?”

“Could be … it does sort of smell off, um mouldy/rotten cabbagy.” Alice replied.

“Well then. Let us deal with that first before we start tracking your miscreant pet.” Helena, while moving towards the refrigerator with an Alice clinging to her side like a Siamese twin, opened the door and bent down to view the contents of the refrigerator. Alice bent down to look over her shoulder.

“A bottle of vodka, some juice and what looks a container of vegetables plus a container of … eeeewww YUCK! Liver Alice?” Helena exclaimed when she opened the container.

“It’s Snappy’s food.” Alice replied defensively.

“Well, nothing seems to be actually rancid or off … ?” Looking back over her shoulder at Alice who had stood up straight with wide eyes.

Helena placed the container of liver back into the fridge with a slight grimace. “My mother delighted in our cook making lambs fry for me as a little girl when my anaemia played up. Thank goodness for iron tables as I totally abhor liver now.” Helena screwed up her nose. “Not having to eat it again after she shipped me off to boarding school was one positive.”