their faces. Their sobs echoed through the near empty streets. Doc exited from the boiler room and saw the four.

“Balto.. I’m really sorry to say, and I truly am, but you’re time is up. They can walk with you to the edge of town, but you must leave. I… I wish you the best of luck… Good night.”

Doc walked away from them, shaking his head sadly. The walk to the outskirts of town seemed so long, yet somehow, not long enough. The setting moon looked down upon them, before covering itself with a cloud. The two nuzzled each other. Balto looked into Jenna’s glassy eyes.

“Please Balto. I could hide you at home. That way we wouldn’t have to be apart.”

Balto shook his head from side to side. “You know that wouldn’t work Jen. They’d find me, and you would get in some series trouble. I couldn’t live with myself if I did that to you.”

He turned away from Jenna and his two children. He began to walk away before stealing one last look at them. 

“Just, be careful you guys. And don’t forget, I love each and every one of you dearly, and I’ll be thinking of you every day.”

Kodi and Saba ran up and held Jenna up as Balto ran off. They watched him disappear into the darkness.

“Don’t… Don’t worry Ma. We-We’ll think of something,” Saba stammered as she and her brother tried to hold themselves together.

Their mother looked up at each of them, pain and despair in her eyes. Her children began to lead her back home, their paws shattering the snowflakes below them. Crushing them into nothingness…

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

Star moaned as he tossed and turned until finally awakening. His head pounded dully over and over again, just like it had been all of yesterday and last night. He had barely gotten a wink of sleep because of this pain. It had never let up, and it hurt just to even think about how much pain he was in. He kept his eyes closed shut tightly even as he felt the presence of another figure move up to him. At first, the words that were spoken to him were drowned out by the thumping of his own mind, but eventually he could make sense of them.

“How about now? Can you hear me now?” Star nodded his head slowly. “Good… We’re going on a little trip. All four of us. Here, let me help you up.” Hal began to lift the small dog up before ‘accidentally’ knocking him back to the ground. “Silly Pup. You simply must learn to use your legs,” he chuckled quietly.

Star grunted as he opened his eyes weakly. His vision was speckled with different colors and blurred together in one grand mess. Star’s legs trembled along with the rest of his body as he managed to stand and right himself. He could hear Hal walk over to another dog.

“Arise Nikki.” Star’s vision finally came into focus and he saw Hal lift a paw over Nikki’s head. “I said get up!”

Nikki rolled over and growled. “Don’ chu dare think ‘a hittin’ me.”

“And if I do?” Hal asked teasingly.

“I’ll break yer ankles and snap yer neck.”

Hal laughed and patted Nikki on the head. “Excellent! I thought that you, the brute, would be the first under my control.”

“Who says you have any control over me?”

“No one Pup. But you seem to be the more violent one, which makes it much, much easier to drive you over the edge,” he snickered.

And with that, he left the chow, and headed over to Kaltag. Without warning, he gave a sudden bang to the top of Kaltag’s skull. He awoke with a howl of pain and he grabbed his head instantly.

“That’s for trying to betray me my dear Pup. Next time we won’t try and pull the wool over Hal’s eyes, will we?”

Kaltag shook his head furiously as he began to roll around, gnashing his teeth together. Hal watched on with a silly grin on his muzzle.

“Ooh, Nikki, it looks like you may have a little competition.” Hal chortled. “But now that all of you are awake, it’s time to give you the agenda for today. After I give you a little nourishment, you three are heading into town. I overheard that the mail run will start today, so as to seem normal, you three will be pulling that sled. Of course, I will be with you the whole trip to White Mountain, you just won’t see me. If a single one of you mentions me, then I will surely be in earshot to hear it, and I will make you hurt so much that this will seem like a picnic.” Hal sneered at them.  “And that’s pretty much it.”

He walked over to a small pile of meat he had swiped from the butcher’s meat locker and began to toss pieces to the other dogs. He, himself, began to hungrily rip through his tender steak. Hal looked up for a second and saw the other three just staring at their food.

“Eat up my pups, because you don’t know when you’ll be eating again,” he laughed before he returned to his own meal.

~-~-

The trio walked down the now busy street, each showing concern and discomfort. Star was the first to see the sled, and he jogged to it clumsily, nearly tripping a few times. The other dogs had already been strapped in, and Mr. Simpson had been tapping his foot impatiently. When the musher finally saw his last three dogs come to the sled, he quickly strapped them in. While he walked back to his place, he lifted the mail sack, surprised by how heavy it seemed, and dropped it onto the sled. As soon as he was ready to go, he called out the special command, and the dogs immediately began to run. When the reached the outskirts of town, Saba, who was still being used as a replacement, noticed something. Nikki, Kaltag, and Star weren’t looking the best, almost as if they could collapse at any moment.

“Hey! You three doing alright!?” she called.

Kaltag looked back at her and his eyes fluttered. “Maybe… We’ll be okay though.”

Somehow, she didn’t seem so sure about that.

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

Lilith exited her home a few hours after taking her medication, and she walked down the street. A pleasant wind ruffled her fur gently as she disappeared into another building. Immediately after she did so, she was being jumped on by the three pups. She laid down on the cool floor and sighed happily as they began to chew on her tail that whisked about. Having these pups in her life was the best thing to ever happen to her. For once, she didn’t feel the fear of constantly being watched, or the need to always look over her shoulder. They were able to make her feel at home. The new medicine that she was taking probably had nothing to do with it. After all, it was a lovely day outside, and nothing could go wrong.

“Hey! Auntie Lilith! Look what I can do!” Stevan called.

She looked up just in time to see Stevan climb onto the old armchair. He stood up on the armrest of jumped off, landing cleanly on his paws. She smiled at Stevan and patted him on the head.

“Wow, that was so good.”

“O-Oh yeah! I can do better than that!” she heard Seth yell.

He too climbed onto the chair, but instead of stopping there, he made a leap and hopped onto the back. Seth looked down at the lamp besides the chair and saw the chain hanging from it.

“Careful now,” Lilith warned, “I don’t want you getting hurt now.”

Seth ignored her and hunched down. His tail wiggled back and forth as he leapt from the chair, grabbing the lamp chain with his teeth, rocking back and forth, and then flipping down to the ground. He stumbled slightly as he landed, but he smiled nonetheless.

“How was that Aunt?” he asked excitedly, bouncing around on his little paws.

She gave him the same smile that she gave Stevan. “That was amazing. Where’d you learn to do something like that?”

“I-I’ve been practicing!”

“Well, if you keep it up, you’ll only improve.”

Seth beamed at her and nuzzled her. He had never had anyone actually notice him like this, and he didn’t know what else to really do. Lilith smiled softly down at each of the pups and then she saw Becca. Becca hadn’t let up on her attack, and now she had reached Lilith’s paw. She saw the small, red ribbon and took one end in her mouth and began to tug. Lilith gasped in shock and horror. She stood up instantly and tried to cast away Becca, accidentally kicking her.

“Let go of that!” she commanded with a harsh tone.

Lilith frantically bent down and tugged at each end of the bow, until finally fixing it after much tedious work. She gave a sigh of relief and her body relaxed. She looked over and saw Becca lying on the floor, crying. Lilith’s ears lowered as she realized the mistake she had made. She walked over to Becca and crossed her front paws.

“I’m… I’m sorry if I hurt you Becca.. I didn’t mean to do that.. Can you ever forgive me?”

Becca looked up at Lilith, little teardrops in her eyes. She nodded and gave a weak smile. Lilith wiped the tears from her eyes and smiled back.

“Hey, hey, chin up… I have an idea! Let’s go outside!”

All three of the pups eyes lit up with bright sparkles as they heard this last word. Becca began to whirl around, giggling excitedly.

“You really mean it?” 

Lilith nodded her head. “Of course. But we still have to stay on our guard. I still feel a little uncomfortable going outside.”

“Oh, we will Auntie!”

The pups were out the door in an