Missing Children (The Cat of Bubastes)

             You might have read and know the book, The Cat of Bubastes, but have you ever wondered: What happened to the characters after the ending? I sadly do not know everything that happened to them, but I do have an exciting story that I want to share with you.

             If you have read the book, you would know that in the end, Amuba marries Mysa and Chebron marries Ruth. However, what you do not know is that they had children. Amuba and Mysa had two kids, one girl (Dina, 15) and one boy (Yahya 10). Chebron and Ruth had five children, three girls (Leah, 16, Aya, 12, and Hannah, 4) and two boys (Darius, 18, and Gabriel, 12, twins with Aya).

             Now every child, of course, is not the same; they have different personalities. Darius is the oldest of all the children. He is the most responsible boy, but sometimes he likes to play around and gets into trouble sometimes too.

            Then there are Leah and Dina. They are not the same age, but they get along well. They, as well, are very responsible. However, unlike Darius, they NEVER get into trouble, but Dina does like to play too though. If Ruth (the wife of Chebron and the mother of Darius, Leah, Aya, Gabriel, and Hannah) could have a favorite child, it would be Leah. It would be the same with Mysa and Dina.

            Next are Yahya and Gabriel. Gabriel usually likes to get into mischief with Yahya, his cousin. If he is not with Yahya, he is being scolded by his father, Chebron, for getting into mischief. Yahya is almost the same as Gabriel, but younger.

             Gabriel’s twin, Aya, on the other hand, usually likes to take care of and play with Hannah. She is very kind and loves to make people happy. Hannah learns how to be kind too like her sister, Aya, but, as all four-year-olds do, she likes to do things her own way.

             The two families were close. They never got tired of going over to each other’s homes to eat dinner. The children, as you saw in the previous paragraph, also got along magnificently.

             Amuba and Mysa, as the king and queen of the Rebu, live in the castle with their kids. Because Chebron and his family are the family and great friends of the king and queen, they live in a fancy, big house, with sandstone walls, a big, beautiful garden, and nice soft beds. Of course, their house is not larger than the enormous castle of Amuba. The king and queen’s house is almost the same as Chebron’s, but everything is bigger.

             To begin the real story, it was a warm, bright Saturday morning in Rebu. Dina and Yahya, after getting ready for the day and eating a delicious breakfast, grabbed some toys and raced each other all the way to their uncle’s house. On a beautiful day like this, they would most likely be with their cousins all day.

              The second Chebron’s door was knocked on, the children were playing as if they were taught to do nothing else. Instead of playing like everybody else was, Leah was spending the time talking to her mother and father. She had been asking herself a certain question for a while, and it finally occurred to her to ask her parents:

            “Mom, what would you and Dad do if one of us went missing?”

            “Well Leah, if you and/or one of the other children went missing, even if it was one or both of my sister’s (Mysa) children, your mother and I would search everywhere for you. In every tree and house and cave nonstop until we find you.” answered her father.

            “Thanks Dad!” exclaimed Leah. She felt a lot better now that she talked to her parents about it. She always did.

             The children either played at one house or another. Sometimes, however, they would switch from one house to another. Of course, they would always ask first though, and the children would always come back before dark. Today was one of those days.

             After asking and receiving the answer of yes, all the children left to go to their Uncle Amuba’s and Aunt Mysa’s house to play until sunset. Meanwhile, Chebron and Ruth cleaned, took a walk, and talked. From the time the children left, time passed. The seconds turned into minutes, the minutes turned into hours, and before Chebron knew it, it was sunset.

             He thought it was strange because his children would usually be back at sunset, but he thought, “I shouldn’t worry about it. They are always back before dark; I am sure in a couple minutes they will all come racing down the hill and almost knock me over like they always do.” But dark came and the children had still not returned. Ruth had thought the same thing as her husband hours ago, and now they were both starting to worry.

             Finally, Chebron said to his wife, Ruth: “The children haven’t been back in a while. I am going to go to my sister’s (Mysa) and her husband’s house. If they are not coming back right now, they are going to be there. I will be back in a couple of hours.” Then he left to do what he said.

            When he arrived at the king and queen’s palace, he was greeted by King Amuba, who seemed to be coming out of his house, not to greet Chebron, but for a different reason.

            “Chebron!” said Amuba in a surprised tone, “Finally, a friendly face that I know so well. It is about time that my children came home. I was just going to fetch them, you see, before I saw you. What are you doing here anyway?”

           “I am doing the same as you, getting my children. Did they not come here; they said they would.”

            “Not that I know of,” replied the king, “but we should check the castle just in case. I will go tell my household. You can come in.”

            When Chebron walked into the glorious house of the king and queen, he saw a servant that he had never seen before standing at the door. Upon this servant’s face was a mysterious smile which seemed to say, “I know something you don’t.”

            Amuba saw Chebron look at this man, and the servant’s face, and after they passed him, he said, “That is a new servant. His name is Maat. I think he is Egyptian, but I am not quite sure. Last week, Jethro insisted on not hiring him when he was visiting from Persia, but I did anyway because Maat said he had no home and no money.”

           King Amuba ordered the soldiers to search every bit of the castle. Every nook and room until they found even a sign of the children, if not the children themselves. After four hours, at one o’clock in the morning, all the soldiers came to the king without any sign of the children. However, Amuba knew every single one of his soldiers by heart, and if one was missing, he would know.

            When all the soldiers came back, he noticed that two were missing. Their names were Caleb and Michael. Caleb was the best soldier in all Rebu, for he had started training to be a soldier over 34 years ago, and he is 46. He could literally find a needle in a haystack in about 9 seconds if you told him to. He could run a marathon with a knife through his stomach in a library and not make a single sound. If you told him to do something that he knew was the right thing to do, he would do it bravely in less than a minute. He was what his name meant, bold.

           Michael, on the other hand, was the opposite of Caleb. He only was in training for one year, but he knew enough about being a soldier to work for the king. He was 17 years old, a fast runner, and extremely handsome, not that that matters to any of the other boys and men in the castle.