The Meeting
By: Greykitty

CHAPTER 1

It was early morning on a bitterly cold day that Boris happened to be flying south for the winter. “Why couldn’t I’ve taken off earlier?” he chided himself. “Yesterday’s weather was lovely, especially for this time of year. But no it’s Boris here…he’s not smart enough to leave early, oh no. Just wait till next year…”

His thoughts were interrupted by howls and rattling of metal. He swooped lower to see what was making the ruckus. As he dived lower through the clouds he could see, on the outer rim of a clearing in the forest, a metal cage. As he got closer he saw a wolf gnawing at the bars and taking a break every now and then to let out a mournful howl. Boris made a not so graceful landing into a snow bank. He got up quickly, looked around real fast hoping that no one else had seen his landing, and then ambled over to the cage while brushing the loose snow from his feathers. As he got closer he noticed that not only was it a wolf, but it was a wolf cub. He was a brownish grey and had lighter markings around his eyes, chest, and feet, and his ears were a dark brown. The small cub looked up at Boris with tears in its eyes and began to whimper. Boris looked at the pitiful little animal and decided to try and let him out. The big light grey goose waddled over to the latch and began to pull at it as hard as he could. With much effort and grunting Boris was successful. There was a loud snap as the latch broke and sent Boris reeling backwards. The wolf cub burst out of the cage and ran over to his rescuer. The cub began to lick Boris, who was still trying to get up from his tumble.

Boris yelled,” Ok! Ok! Enough with the licking already!”

The pup, being surprised at the sudden yell, sank low to the ground and tucked his tail. Boris saw this and patted the pup on the head.

“I’m sorry, old Boris didn’t mean to yell. But you should warn someone when you’re gonna lick him to death.” laughed Boris jokingly.

The kind voice of the goose was reassuring and the pup smiled up at him.

“So young cub, what is being your name, hmmm?” Boris asked.

The cub sat down for a moment and then answered in his hesitant puppy speech,” My name is…Balto.”

“Balto, huh? Well Balto, where is your family?”

Balto looked at the ground and sniffed back tears. “I was separated from them when the hunters came. They caught me and stuck me in that cage and then they shot my mother. I don’t know if she’s still alive…or not.”

Boris sighed and then said,” Well then what about your pop?”

“I never knew my father. He was a sled dog.”

“Oh…”replied Boris. He thought for a moment, not only was this cub lost and didn’t have any family; he was also part dog which meant that normal wolves besides his own pack would never accept him. Then an idea came to him.

“Hey, Balto, I’ve got an idea.”

Balto perked up.

“How ‘bout you follow me home, we’ll see about some food, and then I’ll see what I can do to find your pack.”

“Really? Oh, thank you Mr. Boris sir!” Balto ran over and hugged Boris.

Boris wriggled loose from the pup’s grip and then patted him on the head again.

“Ah, drop the Mr. Just call me Boris.”

“Ok…Boris.”

Boris started to waddle towards the woods and he looked over his shoulder and called to Balto,” Come on pup.”

Balto ran over to Boris and together they began the trek to Boris’ summer home. Balto followed closely for a while, but being a pup he soon got distracted by all the new sights and smells. He stopped by a tree to check out what it smelled like, only to have Boris holler,” come on pup this isn’t a field trip.”

Balto ran to catch up with the goose, all the while Boris scolding him to keep up. Balto lost interest in the one way conversation quickly and began to look around again. He spotted a small cave near an old fallen tree. He wandered off again leaving Boris to talk to himself. Balto climbed over the rotting log and began to sniff around the cave. He was only going to look around outside of the cave, but curiosity got the best of him and he trotted over to the cave and poked his nose inside. He was just about to enter it when he heard a low rumble.

Startled by the sudden noise he backed up a little. He waited a moment. Nothing happened so he started to move forward again. One he was in the cave he began to get an uneasy feeling that he was being watched. He was just about to go back when two glowing eyes appeared in the darkness. Balto froze where he was, hypnotized by the eyes. He heard the low rumble again, and the eyes started to get closer and closer. Balto began to back away slowly. Suddenly the eyes were gone. He sat down, shaking for a moment and then breathed a sigh of relief. He turned around and began to run towards the opening as fast as he could, only to find the eyes hadn’t disappeared, but that the they were waiting for him near the opening.

Balto stopped for a moment and then with an incredible burst energy charged past the eyes and out of the cave. The creature to which the eyes belonged sat for a moment since it hadn’t expected such a small, young creature to move so fast, and then started to follow Balto. Once it had emerged from its den Balto saw that it was a rather large lynx. Its enormous paws were churning up the powdery snow as it ran. Balto knew that it would soon out run him so he let out a loud yelp while he continued to run through the thickly forested woods.

Boris had just noticed that he was no longer being followed by the pup and turned around at the sound of yelp and started to walk the other way. He heard another yelp closer than before and then a screech from the lynx. Boris began to run towards the noise.

Balto was running as fast as his short legs could carry him. The lynx was hot on his tail. He worriedly looked over his shoulder and saw the lynx was closer than he had thought, and then turned around in enough time to see Boris in his path. He did not have enough time to stop, he collided into Boris, and they landed in a heap.

Before Boris could comment on the clumsy pup’s actions he caught sight of the lynx. He grabbed Balto by the scruff of his neck and started to run pulling Balto along as he went. Balto finally got his feet back under himself and ran alongside Boris. Boris was thinking fast about how they could lose the lynx. Balto was looking around too and a small cliff with an old rotting log in front of it had caught his attention. He grabbed Boris by his wing and cried, “Follow me!”

Boris not being in the mood to argue with the pup followed quickly.

“Where are we going?”

“Just follow me, I’ve got a plan!”

Boris saw the log and then the cliff, and figured out what the pup was trying to do. Balto and Boris leaped behind the log. The lynx was to far away to clearly see the cliff and was paying too close attention to his prey. He leaped over the log only to find himself not on solid ground but in the air.

There was a resounding thud as the lynx hit the ground. The big cat slowly got up and shook himself, then looked up at where the duo was and curled his lip, but figured that no meal was worth this much trouble. He could always snag a careless hare later. He started to walk away grumbling to himself.

Balto and Boris watched as there pursuer slowly left the scene. Then they both collapsed onto the snowy ground thankful to be alive.

CHAPTER 2

The two friends lay in the snow for a while watching storm clouds gather overhead. Boris commented, ”Storm’s brewing, we better get up so we can make it to my place before it gets bad.”

Both slowly got up, since they were both weary from the chase. They walked in silence, both too tired to think of anything. Balto began to teeter and stumbled a few times. Boris called back to encourage the pup to keep going. Balto dragged his tired body along. He began to feel very weak and sat down for a moment. As he sat he noticed that it was beginning to snow. The small white ice crystal drifted slowly to the ground and then melted the moment they hit. Boris noticed that the pup wasn’t following him again so he yelled, “Come on pup! The snow has started and once it has begun it won’t stop for a while and will just get heavier.”

Balto grudgingly followed the goose knowing that he was probably right. As they trudged on the pup began to notice the trees were beginning to become more spread out and there was a warm yellow glow coming from a valley. This perked Balto up and he began to walk a little quicker. He stopped and admired the glowing light. He wondered what kind of thing would make it. Then Boris said, “We’re almost to my place. It’s near the outskirts of town.” Balto turned away from the glowing town and followed Boris down a hill to his place.

An old wrecked fishing ship, turned up onto its side, stood at the edge of the water. Ice and snow had surrounded it, and to Balto it looked cold and desolate. Suddenly the goose said, “Well here it is.”

“Here what is?” asked the pup.

“My home.”

“That is you’re home?”

“Yup, what do you think?”

“Umm, it’s very…old looking.”

“Yeah, but it serves its purpose. Keeps the snow out and the heat in.”

“Really? It doesn’t look very warm to me.”

“That’s because you haven’t seen the inside.”

“Oh…”

Together they both walked up the board that served as a ramp to get to the main deck of the boat. Balto looked around at the boat, but was still puzzled as to how such a run-down old thing could keep heat. Then Balto noticed that Boris had disappeared. Startled he began to sniff around for the sent of him, but since the boat was full of goose smell he had no luck in finding which way he had gone. Boris popped out from behind somewhere and motioned for the pup to follow. Balto followed him down a small set of stairs which took them down into the lower parts of the boat. Down here it reeked of fish and goose. It was also warmer as they went lower and lower. Boris stopped by a door and gave it a shove; it flew open and revealed a well lit room with a few blankets scattered about and in the corner, hanging on a peg, a lantern was lit. Balto stopped at the door, his mouth open, as he looked around the room.

The room was not extremely large, but was big enough for two or three grown dogs to live in comfortably. The walls of the room still had pictures of the previous owner’s family and friends. There was an old worn mattress in the corner where the lantern was and a window on the opposite side from the lantern. The same yellow glow he had seen coming from the town was also emanating from the lantern, and for some strange reason the room was warm. Balto’s eyelids began to droop lower and lower until they were almost closed. Boris notice the pup begin to sway so he drug the pup over to the mattress and Balto climbed up on to it and fell asleep.

Boris looked at the pup and smiled, then grabbed one of the ragged blankets and placed it on Balto. Then Boris waddled over to the other side of the mattress, lay down as geese do, and drifted off to sleep.

Three seasons flew by and Balto was growing into his awkward large feet. The suns last rays streamed over the calm water and gave it silky appearance. Balto sat staring at the sunset and once the sun had disappeared over the horizon he turned to the town. The town was a glow with lanterns and Balto watched it wistfully. Boris waddled up to where Balto sat and turned toward where he was looking.

“Boris when are we going to into town?”

“Uh…once, you’re a year old. Remember? We agreed on that didn’t we? The town is a rough place, especially for uhh…”

“For what?”

“Um…for an outsider dog, ah… such as yourself.”

“Uh-huh.” Said Balto skeptically, “So then we’ll be able to go into town in about a week then, Right?”

Boris replied,” I suppose, but only if you promise to listen to me when we go.”

“All right.” Replied Balto as he longingly looked at the town.

“Come on pup, it’s time to punch the sack.”

“You mean hit, right Boris? And don’t call me pup anymore. I’m not a puppy.”

“Right, well come on.”

Together they went downstairs and went to bed.

It was near midnight, and a full moon shone through the cracks in the old boat. Balto woke up and sat blinking in the moonlight. He thought it strange that he had woken up, so he looked around the room. Seeing nothing out of place he laid down again, but just as he did he heard something walking outside the room somewhere on the upper deck of the boat.

His eyes snapped wide open and his ears strained to hear what was making the noise. He slowly began to get up, making sure not to wake Boris as he opened the squeaky hinged door. As he crept out of the room he heard another noise, like someone scraping at something hard. He walked up the stairs toward the main deck but paused when he saw the intruder.

The intruder paused for a moment from what he was doing, looked around, and then went back to it. He was pawing at something intently when Balto crept over to him. Balto raised the fur on his back and began to curl his lips to expose bright white needle sharp fangs. The stranger looked up again from what he was doing and gave Balto a glare, then ignored him. Balto growled, “What are you doing here?”

The stranger, without looking at Balto, answered coolly,” Nothing.”

“Nothing? You have to be doing something to be making all that noise!”

“Not necessarily.”

“How’s that?”

“Some can be making noise by doing nothing. Take you for instance, when you are sleeping you are doing nothing, at least your mind isn’t, but your body is. You breath when you sleep don’t you? And that makes noise. So you are doing nothing while you sleep, but your body is. But…on the other paw your mind is controlling your body so technically you are doing something when you are doing nothing.”

Balto stared at the strange dog for a minute and was thoroughly confused, and then answered, “Oh…uh…that still doesn’t explain what you aren’t doing up here.”

The intruder made a little chuckle at Balto’s last remark and commented,” Staying out of the wind and looking for a wee bit of dinner.”

The intruder walked a little ways into the moonlight and Balto followed. What Balto saw was a scruffy dog, or so he guessed was a dog. He was skinnier than Balto could have imagined a dog could get. The strange dog gave a crooked half smile at Balto, who couldn’t help but let his jaw drop a little at the sight of him. Balto turned quickly around because he heard Boris’ abnormally loud flat feet coming up the stairs.

Once Boris was up on deck he looked at Balto and started to scold him.

“You should know better than to go gallivanting around in the dark alone…”

“He wasn’t in the dark or alone.” commented the stranger.

“As you can see the moon is full and quite bright and I’m here so he wasn’t alone.”

Boris stopped mid-sentence and turned to look at where the voice had come from. Then wide-eyed he asked,” Who are you?”

“The name’s Nicodemus or just Nick for short. And you are?”

“I’m Boris and this is Balto, and this is our boat.”

“So I gather.”

“Since you know so much then why don’t you bugger off? This is private property. You know you just can’t go barging into other’s homes like this. It’s not proper nor is it nice. It’s what makes this world unsafe for a goose and dog to live in with prowlers such as you roaming around.”

“Well, I guess I’ll be on my way then and leave you two to your boat so that this poor hungry mutt can wander about alone in this bitterly cold wind some more. Ta Ta.”

Nicodemus started to meander over to the edge of the boat when Balto cried, “Wait!” Then he turned to Boris and asked, “Boris can’t we let him stay for one night?”

“What?”

“It is awfully cold out and he is pretty skinny…couldn’t we let him stay just one night?”

“Oh…NO!”

“Besides he isn’t doing us any harm.”

“But he could! Just look at him… he’s a mongrel! A…a…tramp! A…a…”

“An outcast.”

“Yes! Hey… wait…”

“Come on Boris.” With this last comment Balto looked at Boris with the saddest eyes he could make and gave a small whimper.

Boris couldn’t resist the look any longer and finally gave in.

“Oh all right.” Boris said in a defeated tone. “But one night only!” he snapped back.

Balto bounded over to Nick. Nick looked at Balto more closely and then commented, “It looks like your sweet talking and puppy eyes got the better of that goose, eh? Well…anyways, uh…thanks.”

Balto stood next to Nick for a moment then blurted out, “I’m Balto and that was Boris.”

“Yeah kid, I already gleaned that from that one sided conversation I just had with the goose.”

“Oh…right. Well, you can sleep in room next to ours. It’s down the little hallway there. It’s the door that has a crack in it and doesn’t shut all the way, but none of the doors shut all the way. The room is just a little bit smaller than ours and it doesn’t have a whole lot of blankets or anything, but then I guess you’re kind of used to roughing it huh? I’ll make sure that Boris saves a little food for you in the morning and that he doesn’t wake you up. Of course you’ll probably be up at the crack of dawn ready to eat or already have eaten. I’ll bet you have lots of interesting adventures where you come from. Why I bet you even have been to that town down there and…”

Nick interrupted Balto in mid-sentence, “Do you always talk this much? Or is it just a new hobby you’ve picked up tonight?”

“Huh…oh umm…I guess I have been talking a little bit huh?”

“Rambling incessantly.”

“Sorry. Well I’ll let you go to bed now. Do you want me to walk you to your room?”

“Night kid”

“Oh…ok…Good night.”

With that the two dogs parted and went to bed. As the winds outside began to howl Nick was glad that he had found shelter, although it was old and rickety it served its purpose. He slithered into the old shredded blanket that Boris had reluctantly parted with and drifted

CHAPTER 3

Balto was wide awake and trying to get Boris up out of bed. He started to bark at the goose, but Boris grabbed more blanket, covered his head, and ignored him. So he grabbed the goose by his leg and began to drag him out. Boris’ eyes snapped open and he yelled, “Stop it you dense pup!”

Balto immediately let go of the goose and stared at him. Boris rubbed his leg where Balto had grabbed it and gave Balto a sharp look. Balto fidgeted a little while Boris started his lecture about why one shouldn’t wake someone up and most of all pull them by their leg. From there the lecture went on to include how reckless Balto had been to leave the room in the middle of the night, let alone talk to a strange dog. Boris concluded with, “You, my pup, are not ready to go into town. You’ve shown that you still aren’t old enough.”

“But Boris…”

“No ‘buts’”

Balto looked at the ground. “May I leave now?”

The goose reluctantly let him go and yelled at him, “Make sure to stay in view of the boat at all times!”

Balto charged out of the room. He had had it. He had made up his mind that he was going to go into town without his goose guardian.

He was running up the stairs when he bumped into Nick who was on his way down.

“I’m sorry!” cried Balto.

“What’s your hurry?” asked Nick in a calm tone.

“Oh, Boris is just being a…a…”

“A what?”

“A stick in the mud!”

“Really now, how’s that?”

“He just needs to learn to have a little fun is all. He’s such a mother hen always watching me. He won’t let me go into town or even run around in the woods by myself.”

“hmmm so, where are you going in such a hurry?”

“Uhhh, no place…special.”

“Right. Well, I’ll be seein’ you later, I just was coming down to say good bye.”

“Good bye? Why?”

“I’ve taken too much advantage of both your hospitality and that goose’s.”

“Oh, well uh…hope your…uh trip or whatever you are doing goes well.”

“Ah, I hope so mate. So long kid.”

With that Nick started back up the stairs. He was about ten feet from the boat when he yelled back to Balto who was watching him leave.

“Oh yeah, one more thing, tell that goose friend of yours thanks.”

He then took off at a run off towards the town.

Balto watched as Nick disappeared into the distance. A thought suddenly occurred to Balto, if he went into town today Nick would be there so he wouldn’t be “alone”. Balto looked over his shoulder towards the stairway. He heard muffled snores coming from the hall. Boris was sleeping so now was his chance. Balto went over to the storage room and grabbed a dried fish for breakfast and then followed Nick’s trail towards town. Confident of himself, he would follow Nick’s scent and find out where he was in town.

Balto tracked him to the main street; there he caught other smells mixed in with Nick’s. He smelled dogs. Lots of dogs. He smelled meat and other delightful odors. He smelled man. He looked around fearfully. The street was abandoned as far as he could tell, so he kept on moving, making sure to keep Nick’s trail next to him at all times. He began to feel uneasy. He stopped walking and looked around. He had the eerie feeling that he was being followed. He kept moving, when suddenly a large dog barred his way from moving forward.

He looked up at the towering figure. It was a brown husky. He was white around his muzzle and feet. The tip of his tail and his belly were a darker brown. The dog brought his large muzzle down to Balto’s and in a gruff voice asked, “What’s a little puppy like you doin’ in this here part o’ town?”

Balto replied in a timid voice, “I w-was l-l-ooking ffor a friend.”

“Oh really? That’s interesting, cause I were lookin’ fer a friend too.”

“Oh ummm well then I’ll let you be on your way and…”

“Not so fast little puppy.”

The big dog draped a huge paw over Balto’s small shoulder.

“I think we can friends.”

The big dog let out an evil chuckle and then grabbed Balto by the nape of his neck and dragged him along.

Balto was hurried into a small building, which was almost a shed. There the big dog slackened his grip on his neck. Balto saw this as an opportunity and torn himself loose from the dog. The dog did not try to stop him. Balto raced over to the corner farthest from the big husky. There he hunched himself up and shivered. A thousand thoughts running through his mind, but the biggest question was, why didn’t he wait for Boris? His second thought was what did this dog want of him? He looked over at the dog and saw that he wasn’t at all concerned for Balto, but was instead looking out a small window in the side of the shed.

Suddenly the door burst open and in came two more dogs. They were both full grown, but quite a bit smaller than the big dog that had dragged Balto to the shed. One dog was black all over except for a small white patch on his chest and a sock on his right foot. His fur was in terrible condition, matted and patches of it missing here and there. His right ear was half chewed off and his tail was crooked near the end. The other dog was in far better condition. The second dogs’ fur was tan and had dark brown around the muzzle, underbelly, legs, and tip of the tail. Balto looked hard at the second dog and was surprised to find that it wasn’t a he but a she.

The strange dogs went over to the big husky and had a whispered conference then the two new ones walked over to where Balto was huddled. The female was the first to speak. Balto thought that she would have a rather harsh voice, but was pleasantly surprised to find her voice soft and comforting.

“Well now what have we here? You know that young pups, such as yourself, shouldn’t be roaming the streets like you were.”

There was a moment’s pause as Balto tried to think of something to articulate. The quite was broken by the first dog.

“Speak up mutt!” he snarled savagely.

“Patience Amos, give the pup some time. I’m sure he’s still in quite a shock from all that has happened today.”

She turned to Balto and gave him a half smile, “So, what’s your name?”

“M-m-my name is-s B-Balto, mam.”

“Ok, B-Balto, my name is Tova and as you might have already gathered, my comrade is Amos, and the big guy in the corner is Sampson. I’d like to apologize for the way my friend treated you this morning, but it was the only way to get you to come.”

“Come for what?” asked Balto in a squeaky voice.

“Some men were out this morning and they don’t take kindly towards strays, let alone wolves. So you put those together and well…”

Balto looked over at Amos you took his paw and slid across his throat.

“Oh, you mean…”

“Yup you would have put you to sleep for a long time.” Amos said without emotion.

Balto shuddered at the thought of how close he had come to dying. He looked up at Tova and asked, “Why?”

“Why? My dear child, men, or most men, hate wolves. They fear them. The myths of them turning on and killing people have grown way out of proportion. So now when any human comes into contact with one he kills it, since that was what he was taught to do.”

“But I wouldn’t do anything like that.”

“That doesn’t matter. They don’t judge on character but on breed.”

“Are all humans like that.”

“Not all, but many.”

After Tova’s last comment, the room fell silent for several minutes until it was broken by the deep barks of Sampson. He had seen a strange dog approaching.

To be continued…

I know it needs a lot of work, but hey it’s a start and it’s the first Balto fan fiction I’ve ever written. BTW to any who are curious it is far from being complete. Anyways, I would appreciate any comments on it. You can e-mail at greykitty_86@msn.com.