pretty face,” he paused for a moment as he saw her blush slightly and then continued, “and two, I may be going out on a run with Kodi.”

Jenna sighed, “Balto, you know how worried it makes me when just Kodi goes out there… and it makes me feel much better if you’re there to keep him out of trouble.”

Balto beamed, “For a second there, I thought you were gonna shoot down the idea!”

Jenna licked him on the cheek and winked, “You should know by now that I’m full of surprises… Just, be careful for me all right? I just don’t want anything to happen to you.” She slipped her orange bandana off of her neck and wrapped it around Balto. “I know you probably thinks it’s stupid that I always do this, but, it somehow helps ease the worry when I know you’re wearing it.”

He smiled and nuzzled her once more, “Don’t worry about me Jen, I’ll be just fine.”

Balto then slowly bowed his head and walked out of the pet flap and headed towards the post office. When he arrived, he saw that all of the other dogs, including Kodi were already hooked onto the sled.

Kaltag grinned when he saw Balto approaching, “Nice to see you could show!”

Balto returned the expression, “Wouldn’t want to let you guys down!”

Mr. Simpson also noticed the wolf-dog approach, “Ahh, so I see that we’ve got ourselves a replacement.” He walked to the front of the sled and unhooked Kaltag from the lead dog position and put him at the back as a wheel dog. “I know you hate it Kal, but you and I both know that Balto deserves it.”

Kaltag cocked his head to side, acting as if he didn’t understand. Mr. Simpson patted him on the head and walked to the back of the sled. Balto looked back at Kaltag and shrugged.

“Don’t worry,” he called to Balto, “I should be used to this anyways!” he smiled.

With a loud command by the musher, the team of dogs barked and set off across the tundra. And from a vantage point atop a house, a familiar shadow watched with a smile as a bitterly cold wind lashed at his face.

“Excellent…” he sniggered.

~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~

A thin woman had been taking her two huskies out for the early morning walk when she saw something that she wouldn’t soon forget. She had been looking down one of the alleyways causally and spotted what looked to be a giant clump of fur. On closer inspection it was not one, but two dogs that were both soiled with a deep crimson color. The woman let out a shrill scream that pierced the normal silence like a knife through hot butter as she ran to the sheriff’s home. Her dogs stayed behind and looked at the horrifying scene.

“My god…” the first dog said, looking at the female and trying to resist the urge to throw up, “I know, er, knew, this dog… We… We got to be close friends… Who could have done something so,” she struggled for a word, “vile, Ritchie?”

Her mate looked at her with a solemn face. “I don’t know dear…” he walked over to the corpse of the male and shook his head, “I just don’t know.”

“Do you think we should-”

“Tell someone? After Susan’s screech, the whole town'll know with or without us telling,” Ritchie interrupted.

The female, Duchess, shook her head. “No. We have to at least tell Jenna…”

~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~

A short while after Balto had left, Jenna had decided to walk around town, just to get out of her house. She casually glanced at the wooden buildings as she continued her walk. Suddenly a husky that looked very much like herself, rushed from an alley. She came sliding towards Jenna and came within inches of hitting her.

“Saba? Saba what are you doing here?” Jenna asked her daughter, concern evident in her voice.

Saba, who normally was a cheery individual, looked quite shaken and nervous. “Grams was going to… but she ran into me and told me… I couldn’t believe my ears.”

Jenna frowned, “Told you what? Calm down, just tell me what happened.” 

Saba took a deep breath and sighed, “It was terrible. Two dogs were ruthlessly murdered, and we don’t have a clue of who it was.”

“Couldn’t someone have just gotten the scent of whatever did it?”

“I wish, but the fallen snow and all the… you know, must have covered it.”

“Where are my mom and dad going?”

“Grams said that she was going home to go over this and Gramps was on his way to tell Doc.”

“Thanks for telling me Saba…”

Saba nodded her head sadly and slowly started to walk away, but she turned around, “Be careful Mom.”

Jenna smiled faintly and watched as her daughter took off. She looked at darker clouds on the horizon with a worried face. “Balto, please stay safe and get back here as fast as you can…”

~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~

“I’m coming Ritchie, I’m coming!” barked Doc.

The brown Saint Bernard huffed behind the smaller husky as the raced down the streets. Doc nearly bowled over Ritchie as he came to an abrupt halt at the entrance of an alley. He was panting, even though it was a short run.

“Who knew you could run so fast Ritchie? I thought you were about as old as me!” he said, cheerfully, but when the red and white husky didn’t even acknowledge his comment, or even turn to face him, he coughed. “So. What was it you, er, wanted to show me?”

Ritchie only lifted up a paw and pointed down the backstreet, he didn’t know how to put what he had to show him in words. Doc nodded and strode down the alley. From farther away, he thought he saw two dogs sleeping in the very middle. He walked closer but then stood there in disbelief as he surveyed the scene. It wasn’t a pretty sight at all for him. After brief seconds he quickly closed his eyes and shook his head.

“This… is awful,” Doc muttered.

He forced himself to take  a sniff of one of the bodies to see if he could find anything. His face scrunched up and he felt a queasiness in his stomach.

“Nothing. It’s all mingled together.”

“What do we do now Doc?”

Doc bit his lower lip and sighed.

“I’ll be perfectly honest with you Ritchie. Nothing like this has happened since I’ve been in charge. I think it’d be best not to cause a panic. I don’t want everyone to start suspecting even their closest friends as a murderer. Let’s just bury this and pretend like it never happened.”

“But Doc, it isn’t right to do this. We have to let everyone else know!”

Doc looked at Ritchie very sternly. “Remember the last time I ‘let everyone else know’? I caused our hero Balto, the innocent one, to become the target of the whole town. You’re lucky that you and Duchess weren’t run out of town with Steele because you were helping him, even if you were just being tricked… Now are you going to help or not?”

He saw Doc move away from the bodies and he started to kick snow onto them. Ritchie shook his head and did the same until all that was left was a patch of snow. Right after they finished, they heard the plodding of two pairs of boots that were rushing in their direction.

“It was right over here!”

Ritchie knew that voice belonged to his owner Susan. She skidded around the corner and stopped, huffing from the run. She bent over and tried to recover as a man came into view with his own dog on a leash. He was one of the very few police officers for this town, and it showed by his blue cap and badge. He looked at where Susan had directed him and scratched his head.

“Um, are you sure you saw something here Ma’am? I don’t see anything.”

Susan looked up. “Yeah, I’m positive it was… Where’d it go?”

The police man loosened his tight grip on the leash a bit and started to wander the alleyway. The dog saw Doc, but Doc just shook his head. The other dog seemed to get the hint and continued to rove about before returning to his master, whimpering. The man looked at Susan and put a hand on her shoulder.

“Uh listen Ma’am, I think it’d be best for you to go home and get a little sleep. There‘s obviously nothin‘ here.”

“Yes, yes you’re probably right,” Susan said rubbing her head as the police man walked her down the street.

~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~

Inside of a building with the sign ‘Telegraph Office’ a dog sat idly in a pet basket underneath a table as his human sat in a chair, waiting. He had a pen in his hand, even though he hadn’t heard anything lately over the telegraph. He was slightly surprised when he started to hear beeps. He started to talk aloud and scribble down the words he could catch.

“Anchorage to Nome and other Seward Peninsula towns STOP This is a severe warning that must be heeded STOP Refrain from-,” the connection started to fizzle out and he heard the word “whether” beeped in before the line went completely dead.

He shook his head in a confused manner and walked outside. He looked above him and saw that the telegraph lines had large icicles hanging from them but they were still intact, so he went back inside.

“Sure is a funny thing isn’t it Morris?” he asked his dog who just stared at him. “Yep,