CHAPTER 17

ippy! Dippy!”

Jacob Two-Two ran. He ran and ran. He ran all the way back to camp, but he was too late.

Dippy was gone.

“Oh, Dippy,” Jacob Two-Two cried, “I didn’t mean any of the things I said. I love you.”

Obviously, before he had quit the camp, Dippy had suffered a temper tantrum. Uprooted trees were strewn about the fields here, there, and everywhere. Wandering amidst the fallen trees, Jacob Two-Two stumbled on the last things left in the camp where they had once been so happy together. There were the WANTED posters he had brought back from the convenience store that time. The VICIOUS, VILE DRAGON AT LARGE poster was intact, but not the poster saying WANTED, DEAD OR ALIVE, CANADA’S MOST DANGEROUS DESPERADO. Dippy had torn Jacob Two-Two’s picture out of that poster. Obviously he had taken it with him.

Oh, my, Jacob Two-Two thought, tears of joy coming to his eyes. I’m forgiven. I’m forgiven. His heart soared. He wanted to cheer. But just then a helicopter swooped out of the sky and landed nearby. Four combat-ready soldiers leaped out of it.

“There’s the desperado!”

Even as Jacob Two-Two struggled, howling and kicking, they dumped him into the helicopter and took off again, rising over the trees strewn here, there, and everywhere.

“I don’t care,” Jacob Two-Two said. “Dippy’s safe. You’ll never catch him now. Yippee for B.C.!”

Then all at once the helicopter began to rock in the sky.

The next mountain peak trembled with explosions. Debris flew into the air. Smoke spiraled into the sky. Then the bombers flew over the peak again, unloading even more of their deadly missiles. The mountain peak shook and trembled once more.

“Well, that’s it,” a soldier said. “He’s been pulverized.”

“The dragon is no more!”