What's that smell?

Walking into the forest the scent of urine and faces could be smelt not too far into it, the trees further in had claw markings on them all of which were used to indicate that someone had made their home in this environment, a predator.

Cyrus still couldn't wrap his head around it, the mere thought of having to deal with a tiger the size of what he saw with Vito gave him a slight shiver the longer he thought about it.

'Is the tiger aggressive?' he asked himself.

He knew that all wild animals can be violent if they feel someone enter their territory. But if so then how was Terra able to tame 6 lions at the same time and seem unharmed while Vito who had to tame 1 tiger was obviously rag-dolled along the way?

'Perhaps this tiger truly is violent? I doubt Vito would be so stupid to antagonize it deliberately. So that makes me wonder, how should I go about ensuring my safety and taming such a beast simultaneously?' All these thoughts were filling his head.

As he continued walking down the trail into the forest he retraced back a few steps because he thought he saw something in the corner of his eye. 'A note?' he wondered.

His face was seemingly perplexed, there was a note attached to a tree right towards the entrance of the den of the tiger. A sticky note nonetheless.

It read:

"Dear Cyrus,

here is some advice on how to tame a tiger, I left it for you just in case you got nervous about dealing with one, the solution is very easy, just let loose.

Signed your instructor."

Cyrus read the note and was left with a blank stare. He shriveled it up and threw it behind him but then realized that he was littering in a forest. He didn't want to but he picked it back up and stuffed it in his pocket.

He knew he wouldn't need such useless advice but he decided he would, 'think' about it.

****

Entering back into the field where her giraffe once lay, Edith was quite displeased at the sight she saw. Three monkeys were standing in a tree together, munching down on some mangoes and throwing their seeds to the ground.

The monkeys made noises and laughed together, they would also move around the tree a lot and attempt to jump from tree to tree to get first picks on the next set of fruits they would be eating. Though they all seemed unique in certain aspects.

One monkey seemed to shy away from all the others and would place its hands around its head and sometimes cover its eyes. Another would make faces to Edith and pull on its ears as it stuck its tongue out. And the third one didn't make much sound as it was too busy stuffing its mouth away with mangoes.

Thinking about this all Edith also came to the realization that the trees that were in this place were different. It was only now that it hit her that these trees that were in this place were not mango trees.

'Did John transplant these trees here? All of them?' Looking around her there were over a hundred trees close enough together for the monkeys to jump towards. There were even more trees than when the giraffe was here.

'But when did he have the time?' She asked, 'Unless, did he already know that I would be handling the monkeys? No, that wouldn't make sense unless he rigged the lots, he couldn't have done that. Maybe he instead placed these here in preparation that someone would draw monkeys? That seems more likely.'

'But even then it is hard to swallow. Perhaps it has something to do with powers? That makes sense, I mean he does teleport technically," Edith said.

Just then she noticed a sticky note on one of the trees in the field.

It read:

"Dear Edith,

Here is some advice on how to deal with the monkeys, they are very special monkeys and are very playful as well, all you have to do is catch all 4 of them and they will listen to you very well.

Good luck, signed your instructor."

"All I have to do is just catch them? Catch monkeys in trees? Haha, trees!!?" There were some tears in her eyes but they never fell as she clenched the sticky note in her hands tightly, wrinkling the paper.

"Of course, I have to climb trees again, just my luck."

After watching the monkeys play around in the trees, there was something that stood out to her from the note she had read. It says I have to catch all four monkeys but, there are only 3 of them!

Edith looked around as much as she could but there were still only 3 monkeys. 'I guess John made a mistake.'

****

As Terra walked towards the pond that was right in front of him, he saw something peculiar that stuck out to him, it was a sticky note on a small nearby tree just a couple of meters away from the water.

It seemed to have been left behind to give him guidance on what to do. "As expected of my instructor, helping me out in a time like this, how thoughtful, but wait, where was this when I needed to tame 6 lions?" Terra asked himself out loud and this noise brought about some attention.

From the small pond of water, a small set of eyes, ears, and a bulbous snout were peeking at him and watching his every move intently. It saw him move about and swing his arms around as he spoke to himself. Terra was known to be very expressive with his reactions.

"Alright, that was in the past and now is now so there is no need to build up a fuss about this. Once I get this over with I can just ask him why he never did this for me earlier. Let's see the instructions."

It reads:

"Good luck."

And proceeded to end there with a smiley face at the bottom.

The wind had never hit Terra's face so hard until this moment as he proceeded to look up and down this note hoping that this wasn't everything that his instructor had left for him to use.

After turning his head around profusely and jumping around, he realized that there was truly nothing else, it was just this note. His mouth hung open as his arms dropped and he gave up. He then kept the sticky paper with him, "It's better than nothing I guess," he *sighed.*

After he was done making a scene, the hippo rushed out of the waters and proceeded to head straight for him. It took off at great speeds and its entire body was shaking as it ran.

Terra stood there in shock, just what did he do to get this huge of a beast chasing after him with no warning? His mouth was open and he had his legs spread out, his heart was beating fast and he placed both his hands on top of his head.

He wanted to run away but he realized quickly that it surely would be faster than him with the way it was moving. He looked around for a tree to climb but there was only the small tree that had the sticky note in this entire field. It was as if someone had uprooted all of the trees and moved them somewhere else.

Terra saw that there would be no way to escape this confrontation so he did the only thing he could do, he closed his eyes and braced himself for impact. What was the worst that could happen?

A few seconds had gone by and the only thing that he had felt was the heavy breath of the hippo breathing right in front of him, he opened his eyes to see the hippo was simply staring straight at him.

He was nervous and looked sideways but nothing else seemed to be happening so he reached his hand for its snout to somewhat pet it, just at that moment it pushed him down and rammed its nose into his belly.

Instead of pain, it was somewhat ticklish as it was being gentle and playing with him. Terra couldn't help but laugh at what was going on, "Ha ha ha ha, stop, Ha ha ha," there were tears in his eyes, he didn't expect such a warm welcome.

"Alright, alright, let me get up," he managed to say as he put his hand in between the two of them. After getting up it placed its closed mouth right in front of him and he petted it gently and then embraced it with a hug. The hippo's ears were flickering up and down excitedly as she smiled with joy.

"You are oddly friendly, after what Dawn went through I expected to have had a different type of encounter, I wonder what he is doing now?" Terra asked.

****

*cough, cough, cough*

"Is someone talking bad about me? I bet it's Edith," Dawn said as he finally reached a large tree in the field where he was.

"Where is John?" he asked himself looking around and only seeing the zebra feeding on some grass quietly.

Just then he felt a small vibration in the air behind the tree he was facing, curiosity obviously got the better of him and he decided to peek behind it and see what was happening there. But before he could fully peek behind, John walked out from it and smiled at him, "Good it looks like you are here."

Dawn looked quizzically at him and crossed his arms as his head turned slightly to the side, "Where did you go?" he asked.

"Just running some errands, I needed to leave some instructions for everyone to make sure that nothing bad happens. Especially since I will be spending the rest of the time here with you, so now let's get this started."

"You see that zebra over there, most zebras are said to be wild and untamable but even someone like Cyrus was able to tame one and that says a lot about them. They are very intelligent creatures and can bite and hurt humans, but you will be fine. You can definitely tame this zebra."

Dawn looked up at John and he couldn't quite make things out, "John you don't have to lie or encourage me. I can handle the harsh truth. You don't believe in me, do you? I couldn't even tame the hippo, why would I be able to tame the zebra when it is said to be untamable?"

John knew the look in Dawn's eyes, it was the look of someone who had given up on their self-confidence. He knew that look too well for he once used to make expressions like that himself back before he had met Alex.

But things had changed since then and he was looking forward to the day that he could do the same for Dawn as Alex did for him.

"Dawn, do you know why you were chosen in the first place? It is because you hold the same amount of potential as everyone here who is with you. Even more so than what I have. There is no doubt in my mind that you can do it this time. Take your time and no matter what happens I will be right here with you to guide you along the way. "

"Every journey starts by taking a single first step."

John had now reassured Dawn that no matter the results he would be satisfied with him and though it didn't do much confidence-wise, it did lead Dawn to tell himself, "Maybe there is a reason that I was chosen, maybe I too am worth something?"

As the two of them were about to begin working on the zebra, John's facial expressions dropped, he had smelled a sweet scent in the air, and though some people may have thought the scent to be odorless, he did not.

"What's that smell?" Dawn asked.

John looked down at Dawn to see that his shoulder was giving a slight glow, this could have been why he was able to smell the scent despite being so far away. 'Could the earth be trying to tell him to go and help?' Whether or not that was the case, John didn't want Dawn to get involved.

John grabbed both of Dawn's arms and hurriedly spoke to him, "I'm sorry Dawn, I need to go and check on something very quickly, it can't wait!" as he sprung into action.

Dawn couldn't understand what brought about the sudden change, 'Didn't John say that he wouldn't leave? Where is he going and why is he so stressed?'

But John knew that he couldn't waste any time, this sweet smell that left a metallic taste that filled the air was the scent of blood, freshly drawn blood.

And the direction that it was coming from could only lead to one person,

'Vito,' John yelled in his mind.

'What did you do!?'