voice.

Jenna held the jerky in her mouth as she saw her parents pad towards them. Her mother glanced at her father.

“Do you always have to be such a softy?” Duchess asked.

“Well someone has to,” Ritchie replied casually.

“And unfortunately that someone is you."

Ritchie stuck his tongue out at her and laughed. Duchess rolled her eyes and placed a paw to her forehead.

“I apologize for his behavior. I promised myself I wouldn’t bring him back into the public again, and now I know why.”

Jenna giggled at her parents antics and crossed her front paws.

“Aw, c’mon, you’re both embarrassing me,” she said in the whiniest voice she could muster.

“Well Honey, it’s not that hard to do, sorry to say,” Ritchie chuckled quietly before Duchess playfully smacked his head.

Ritchie fell to the floor and covered his head with his paws. “Ow! Ow! My self-esteem! She’s abusing it!” he cried out.

“Vhat a ham,” Boris started before looking at Duchess, “ I vish you the best of luck, you vill be needing it.”

Duchess failed at hiding a smile. Ritchie stood up and dusted himself off before he eyed Boris and rose an eyebrow.

“Joining her side, Bernard? I see. This means wahr.”

Duchess hit him in the head again, but this time it wasn’t so fake. Ritchie rubbed the spot where she had struck and received the message.

“Ahem, so, what have you been up to Jenna? Anything exciting to share?” Ritchie asked, trying to start a conversation.

“Well, actually yes. The other night I heard a scratching on the door, and that’s when I met this little pup named Becca.”

“Huh, strange,” said Duchess, “the same exact thing happened to us a few nights ago too. Only his name was Seth, speaking of which, where’d the little guy go to?”

She looked around them and saw no sign of Seth. Jenna and Balto did the same, but they couldn’t find Becca either. Ritchie had spied Doc wandering around the edge of the room, and figured that he to clear up some things.

“I’ll be right back, just going to have a word with a dog,” Ritchie muttered to Duchess before he walked to Doc.

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

Meanwhile, Becca had sat down gazing out of a high window at the cloudless night sky. The stars twinkled every so delicately and really made her think about some of the things that had gone on, but she was quickly taken out of her little world when a familiar paw touched her shoulder. She turned around to see Seth staring at her.

“What do you want?”

“I want our mom and dad back. I want to snuggle in our nice warm basket, to hear their voices. But that’s not going to happen…” Seth sighed unhappily as he looked down at his paws.

“Oh cheer up, things will get better, especially since we have Uncle Greg to watch over us,” she said, patting him on the back.

“Ch, he sent us off to live with other’s the first time he got the chance.”

“Don’t say that. He said that we were really important to him, and that he was only allowing us to get out and see the world.”

He looked at Becca distastefully and frowned, “But what about Stevan? He kept that good-for-nothing, and sent us packing. I’m twice the dog he could ever hope to be. I should have been the one who stayed to learn from him.”

Becca’s voice faltered and she fell silent. Seth started to walk away from her quietly, but it was her this time that put a paw on his shoulder.

“Don’t walk away angry. It only makes things worse.”

He shrugged her paw away and continued.

“I’d love to stay and talk, but I have my new mom and dad, and they’re probably worried.”

She wanted to stop him, but she really didn’t know how. They all had to grow up so fast in so short of time, and she wasn’t ready for it. Sure, they didn’t have to fend for themselves, but they had to cope with the fact that they’d never see their parents again. She whimpered quietly as she turned her head back up towards the heavens.

“If you’re watching, please help us to get through. And please, can you watch Seth? I’m started to get worried about him,” she whispered as the stars glimmered through the high windows.

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

Ritchie pushed his way through the crowd of furs until he reached a St. Bernard. Currently he was talking with a smaller scruffier dog.

“Now Mel, you can’t believe everything you hear. Do you honestly believe I would let something like this happen under my watchful eye?” Doc said.

“But now there’s lost dog posters plastered around everywhere. And there were shouts a few mornings before. I heard them!” Mel looked around cautiously and started to gnaw on his toenails, “What if we have some psychotic nut job running around and, you know? It could be anyone! We don’t even know who it was that was taken out, they must have been hidden really good!”

“Or perhaps they just went missing, and it was the owners shouting. Really now Mel, anything could have happened.”

“Well, maybe you could be right. But I heard it from Sylvia and Dixie, so we should be extra careful.”

“Please don’t worry, everything’ll be taken-”

“Excuse me, but can I speak with you,” Ritchie cut in.

“Alright,” Doc began as Ritchie led him away from the crowd, “but you do realize it’s rude to interrupt.”

“And it’s polite to lie to everyone?”

Doc paused for a moment before he spoke, “… It is if you’re protecting them. Normally I wouldn’t condone such a thing, but this isn’t exactly a normal circumstance.

“But what happens if everyone finds out Doc? What’ll happen then? It’ll just cause a bigger panic then it would cause now. I’m usually a fun-lovin’ dog, but I can’t do that when I’m debating whether I should look over my shoulder just to make sure I can live.”

“And that’s exactly why we have to keep this hushed. A first step to chaos, is paranoia. One rash decision can lead to pandemonium. As head of our town, I have to be careful with what I do and don’t do. It’s my duty to protect them from these fears.”

“And here I thought that you were chosen to be fair. Well it isn’t exactly fair to keep everyone in the dark like this, is it?”

“If you were in my position, you’d understand.”

“Don’t worry, I already do. See ya later Doc.”

Without another word, Ritchie did an about-face and padded back into the crowd, leaving Doc to think about the things he had said. The St. Bernard exhaled heavily and looked over the partygoers.

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

“No, I can’t believe you.”

“But it’s true! I heard it straight from Grams, and I told Mom too.”

“How could it have happened, Saba? I mean, there had to be someone there that could have stopped it.”

“Dingo, for the last time, I’m telling you exactly what I heard! It chills me to the bone,” Saba countered.

Denali, another sibling pushed into the conversation, “Guys, guys, there’s no point in arguing.”

“Yeah. You two can destroy each other on your own time,” smirked Haida, their brother.

Kodi glared at Haida “Now is no time for joking, and you know that.”

Haida looked at him sheepishly, and everyone turned to Kodi.

“So, what did you want to tell us again?” asked Denali.

Kodi looked around to his siblings and cleared his throat, “Does it seem like anyone’s missing to any of you?”

They all shook their heads after looking around the room.

“Well, if you look carefully, you’ll notice that a certain little purple dog isn’t here.”

“You mean Star? ..Come to think of it, I haven’t seen him at all,” Dingo stated.

“Exactly. He went missing while we were trapped in White Mountain, and we couldn’t stay long enough to find out why. I’m suspecting fowl play.”

Denali scratched under his chin. “Is there anything that seemed suspicious. It’s possible that he went out and lost track of time, but you can never shoot down any possibilities until they are proven true or false.”

“Good point, but there has to be some way to find out.”

“Well Kodi, in all honestly, you aren’t getting anywhere until you get back there,” Saba pointed out.

“There is one thing I noticed though. Our replacement dog, Lilith, seems a little off. I tried asking her about it, but she ignored me. I know it’s not right for me to invade her privacy, but something just doesn’t set right with her.”

“Well maybe she’s nervous that there are people like you that are snooping around. I mean, if you were trying to go through my dirty laundry, I certainly wouldn’t take kindly to that. Maybe even knock you one or two,” Haida smirked and shrugged, “hey, don’t blame me. I gotta try everything at least once.”

“But you could be a little bit pickier in your timing.”

“I could. But I’m not you Denali.”

Saba giggled as she saw her brother roll his eyes from Haida’s comment. She cleared her throat and fell quiet when she realized that no one else was

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