Prologue:

Up in a high peak of northern Alaska, where the cruel wind and snow combined their forces and buffeted the scraggly pine trees, there was a cave, and in that cave there lived a wolf pack, sheltering themselves from the harsh winter.  And among that wolf pack, there was a leader.

Or at least, there had been.

In a lonely little cave overlooking the snow-capped mountains, the thought in the gray she-wolf's mind seemed to echo loudly in the valleys far below.  Do we really have to go through with this?  It's just so unfair to him!  Between her shaggy paws was a slumbering pup, the object of her questioning.  He was small, with a chestnut-colored coat and pale, startling markings around his amber eyes.  When they were open, they were as bright and sparkling as the Northern Lights, full of intelligence and as sweet as his mother's, gentle Anana's, had once been...before she had departed from this life.  The she-wolf shuddered.  She could still remember the shock that had come from the news of her friend's death, and even worse, realizing that her son - her only son - had nowhere to go.  A torrent of frustration and helplessness swept through her body.  The pup between her paws turned over, nestling his head against her shoulder.

A single tear dripped onto his back and slid down his belly.  It's all just so unfair, the gray wolf thought.

The Forgotten One (The Story of Juneau) 

Juneau was having a wonderful dream.  It was a gorgeous day in his dream, and there was something around his neck and chest, like ropes...oh, it was a harness, of course.  And he was running, and there were dogs cheering, cheering and chanting and yelling his name, louder and louder and louder...

"JUNEAU!"  The voice swelled and grew rougher until it banged against the young dog's sensitive eardrums.  Waking from his dream suddenly and uncomfortably, he kicked out, his short legs becoming entangled in the worn burgundy blanket he slept on.  "Awww...Boris..."  One piercingly amber eye glared from the fabric's confines.

"Juneau, let's move!  The race!  The race!  Get up!"  The Russian snow goose flapped awkwardly in an attempt to budge the six-month-old mixed-breed pup.  He pushed and shoved as hard as he could and with as much strength as his wings could muster.  Suddenly Juneau rose of his own accord, knocking Boris flat on the creaking boards beneath them.  Grumbling loudly, Boris scrambled to his feet and followed the unrepentant young puppy out of the deserted schooner in which they lived.

Chuckling to himself, Juneau lifted his large, pointed nose to test the wind.  His nostrils caught the piney smell of the woods beyond the cold beach, and beyond that the faintly familiar scent of humans.  Sighing loudly, he turned back as Boris waddled hurriedly towards him.  Upon catching up, Boris threw out a wing and caught his charge around the neck, pushing him forward.  "Hurry, boitshick!  Uncle Balto and Kodi are waiting!  We are not wanting to miss the race!"  With an inward smirk, Juneau followed.

The hustle and bustle nearly overwhelmed Juneau as he scampered along behind the goose.  Although he would never admit it, he was afraid of all the noise and the lights and the people; it was one of those strange instincts he couldn't understand about himself.  Grabbing Boris by his feathery wing tips, the pup lunged out of the way of a large posse of humans.  Laughing and talking loudly, the humans never noticed the strangely quivering boards stacked against the wall nearest them.  With a shaky, puppy-like sigh, Juneau emerged from behind them with his feathered "uncle" and began walking again...but suddenly had a better idea.  Abruptly changing course, he threw himself onto the nearest window sill, and then up the gutter.  Clawing for a better hold, he scrambled up the bricks and then proceeded to grapple with the edge of the precarious tin roof.  Hearing squawks and loud honks behind him but paying no mind, he pulled his red-brown body over the side.  Pausing to catch his breath, he couldn't help but grin.  That was fun!

But one more glance behind him told Juneau that his fun was about to end.

Caliber, the young, handsome dog affectionately referred to by the young female pups as 'Cal', was pacing swiftly over the hard-packed snow.  His bright green eyes lit up when he saw Juneau, the new-found object of his subtle yet humiliating jibes, and the light gray husky began to run.

Panic wracked poor Juneau's body, and his under-developed, foolish instincts took over.  Juneau jumped straight over the edge of the roof and braced himself for impact.  When he heard the cocky laugh of the older, stronger Swiss-bred pup just behind him, he instinctively threw up a paw, and the result was horrifying.  Juneau thrust full weight on his right paw, and pain coursed through the corresponding leg.  Dropping onto one shoulder, he was conscious of a large, hulking figure to his left.  Staggering and panting, he heaved himself up and to the right.  Caliber, close at hand, chuckled.

"How are you today, mutt?"  The tone of his voice was, as always, smooth and melodramatic, and Juneau knew the reason behind it.  But he wasn't some silly girl in love with Cal's looks and potent speed.  He was a friend of Balto, the hero of Nome, and he was even allowed to call him 'Uncle'!  "Just fine," said the smaller puppy in his pride.  But his leg was throbbing uncontrollably and painfully.  He had to get out of this quickly, but his stubbornness wouldn't let him.  And yet there was no way out.  He'll probably finish me off, once and for all, he realized.  For the second time that day, young Juneau braced himself for a great deal of pain.

 "What in the world?"  A high, imperatively female tone cut through the tense scene.  Cal looked slightly amused at the sight, but Juneau groaned softly to himself.  Whoever she is, if she gets hurt, it'll be my fault.  This, of course, wasn't true, but to Juneau it seemed so, and now he had to deal with Cal and a silly girl, too.  He groaned again.

  "Back off, horseshoe!"  The young female was referring to Cal's distinct toe-markings that looked uncannily like horse hooves.  Juneau almost giggled.  Cal growled and lunged at him, but the girl shrieked, "Watch it, he didn't say anything, I did."  Her pale blue eyes gleamed dangerously.

Cal rolled his eyes.  "Why can't you mind your own business for once?"

 The fiery girl glared right back.  "Hurting other dogs isn't supposed to be your business in the first place.  Is it?"

For a moment the two glared at each other, almost nose-to-nose.  Juneau wondered briefly who would win-the tough, pure-bred Cal or this sassy girl who looked more Border collie than anything.  To Juneau's amazement, it was Caliber who backed off first.  Cal was about to say something sharp to the female pup, but suddenly a tall, crooked shadow cast its mark over all three of them.  The girl gulped; Cal looked grim and resolutely stood his ground, but Juneau cried, "Uncle Balto!"

   "Hey, sport.  Sorry I wasn't at the boat this morning."  The hero of Nome scrubbed Juneau on the head.  Suddenly he stopped as Juneau whined in pain.  He narrowed his eyes as he leaned down to get a good look at the puppy's foot.  "What's wrong with your leg?  How did it happen?"  Immediately those yellow eyes followed Cal, who looked ready to make a break for it.  The little female, however, relaxed, seeing that this older dog was friendly.  After all, she hadn't forced that poor pup to jump off a roof!  

Balto gave Cal a stern look and said quietly, "Come here for a minute, please."  He turned away, as if expecting Cal to follow him, which, in fact, he did.  For several moments Juneau and the girl stood staring at the ground.  Then she looked up and began to stare at him, which unnerved him even more.  Aftera while of this he forced himself to look up.  "Thanks for your help," he said simply.  He wasn't great with words and hoped that she would understand the meaning in his voice.  Juneau expected her to say something like, 'For what?  Oh, that?  It was nothing.'  Instead, the collie-girl shrugged and said, "Sure."

Soon, Balto returned, taking with him a humbled Caliber.  With one long, last baleful look, the older pup scurried away.  Juneau could tell from Cal's unusually bouncy gait that he was trying to pretend nothing bad (or embarassing) had just happened.  Beside him, the girl muttered just what Juneau had been thinking, although he knew he couldn't really do it.  "I'll take that bounce out of your step for you.  Gladly," she growled.  Surprised, Juneau turned to her.  She just shrugged again.  "He's my cousin.  We fight a lot."  Juneau's eyes were wide-he'd never thought of fighting with relatives, mainly because he hadn't any that he knew of.  Without really thinking about what he was saying, he blurted, "I'm Juneau."

"I'm Brite."  The collie-mix stated.  Once again catching Juneau unprepared, she softened and giggled.  "What kind of dog are you, anyway?  You don't look like any that I've ever seen."

"I'm part...well, part...something.  I don't really know.  Neither does uncle Balto."  The wolfdog about which Juneau was talking smiled slightly as he quietly paced away.  Juneau needed a friend, and this unlikely girl looked like just the type he needed.  She was outgoing, stubborn, and just a little bit blunt-the complete opposite of Balto's young charge.  All except the stubbornness part, he thought amusedly.  Neither pup realized that Balto was leaving.

"Really?"  Brite jumped to her feet.  "That's really cool...almost like a mystery.  I'm part husky, part Border collie.  But I kinda wish I was a purebred," she added, looking mildly annoyed.

"You...you think that's cool?"  Juneau gawked at her.

"Well, why not?" Brite replied in that blunt way of hers that Juneau was just beginning to recognize. 

"I dunno..." Juneau trailed off lamely.  She'd caught him completely off-guard again.

"Well, I probably gotta go.  My dad's running in a race in just a minute.  See ya."  And she took off, pelting through the crowds, without a backward glance.  "See ya," Juneau murmured. 

Oh no!  The race!  It hit him a second later.  Cross at himself, he charged, on three legs, as bravely as he could into the throng of human beings.  From quite a ways behind him, Juneau thought he could just barely make out a sound-the sound of squawking, like a goose.  And not just any goose, he thought with a grin.

"Junie, let me have a look at that leg of yours."  A auburn-and-white husky was closely examining Juneau's wounded leg.  At least, she was trying.  The squirming puppy sure was making it hard.  "Jenna, please don't call me that."  Juneau had just enough time to be slightly put off by the nickname before the starting gun went off for Balto's son, Kodiak's, race.  As the dogs roared by in a blur of speeding color, Juneau hopped up and down, being careful not to land on his bad leg.  "I can't see!  I...can't...see!"

"Easy there, sport.  I'll help you out."  With a look to his mate like, Give the poor thing a break for just one second, Balto scooped Juneau up carefully and swung him onto his broad, warm back.  Although Balto wasn't the tallest dog in Nome, Juneau was able to see a great deal better that before.  He strained as far forward as he could, and before he knew it he was scaling the fuzzy heights of his caretaker's head.  But Balto didn't mind, even though Juneau was about half his size and therefore weighing him down.  He understood perfectly the pup's urge to see the races.  After all, that was his own passion, his obsession.  Why shouldn't this pup be able to dream?  And anyway, he reasoned, At least he's not part wolf.  That makes things a thousand times harder.  Sighing, he watched as Kodi and his team slowly ebbed out of sight beneath the early sun.  He must give Juneau every chance under that sun.

The next day Juneau awoke to something painful.  Struggling to wake up fully, he reached back into the misty folds of his puppy memory.  Something had happened yesterday that hurt...that much he knew.  But what?  As he saw Jenna bending over one of his legs, his right forepaw, it came to him in a wave of painfulness.  "YOOOOOWWWW!"  He screamed.  "That hurts!"

"I was hoping you'd stay asleep for this part."  Balto's mate never looked up from her position, hovering over his leg.  "Your leg's pretty stiff.  Not surprising at all."

"Since when were you a doctor?"  A very sleepy Balto murmured from Juneau's left side.  He grinned as he half-sat, half-sprawled and stretched.  "You could've nursed yourself back to health after you injured your leg in that fight with the bear."

"What bear?"  Juneau sat up, but quickly collapsed again after being hit by a wave of nausea. 

Jenna fussed over him a little and gave Balto a warning glance.  "What bear?"  Juneau repeated, looking from one to the other after clearing his foggy head.  Balto got a strange, faraway gleam in his eye.  Jenna rolled hers.  Shaking her head, she continued binding the leg as Balto reached back into the depths of his mind.  Oh, he could remember the story all right, unlike Juneau...he just wanted to use the right words to describe one of the most thrilling moments of his life to the pup.  "Well, I was out in the woods, searching for Steele's sled team..."  Juneau became so engrossed in the story that he forgot his pain.  Jenna made the most of this, and by the time Balto had gotten safely out of the freezing water and on his way to the mountain trail in search of Steele again, the bandaging was all done.

"There you go," declared Jenna triumphantly.  "Finished."

"Thanks!"  The wrapping was done up so tightly, Juneau could put almost all of his light weight on his right leg.

"Say, you wanna come with me into town, Juneau?  I just remembered, I've got a sled to pull today, one of the mail dogs was sick."  By himself, Juneau wouldn't have, but he felt safe with his uncle Balto nearby. 

"Okay," he yipped.

Later that morning in Nome, Juneau scanned the streets out of curiosity.  There was that girl, Brite, again, this time without Cal.  Thank goodness, Juneau sighed inwardly.  But Brite spotted him and came barreling towards him and Balto.  "Hey," she panted.  "You're back."

"Yeah," he replied awkwardly.  Once again, Balto saw a perfect opportunity for a friendship.  "There's the team," he said, although in truth that wasn't the sled he'd be pulling.  His would arrive in another ten minutes or so.  Either way, Juneau fell for it.  "All right, Balto."

"Have fun," Balto said almost gleefully over his shoulder as he loped over to the wrong sled.  Luckily the pups didn't notice the strange looks the musher was giving him.  "Wrong sled, boy," the Inuit man murmured in puzzlement as he petted the wolfdog.  Balto wagged his tail.

As Brite and Juneau played on the sand dunes, Juneau became more and more comfortable aound her.  He didn't like her or anything, it was just that...well, she was so unlike him that for a while he had felt like he was constantly off his feet trying to keep up with her barreling pace-of talking and running.  As she suddenly took off, he panted to maintain the rapidfire pace as they cavorted across the sand.  Finally Brite stopped, laughing.

"You're a slowpoke, you know that?" She rolled over and over until she was barely a foot from the water's edge.  As the tide rolled up to greet her, she whapped it with a speckled paw.

"Yeah, right..." Juneau leaped in and boldly sprayed her by skimming his own paw across the surf.  Brite shrieked and toppled farther into the water.  Scrambling to her feet, she dashed after Juneau, intending revenge.  But her wet, salty coat proved too heavy this time.  By the time she'd caught up with him, he was stretched out on the sand, feigning sleep.  She playfully kicked sand into his face, and Juneau led her on a mad chase through the seaside scrub.  This is the life, he thought happily.  She's not so bad after all.

Balto's muscles were pleasantly warm after the easy run.  He barked goodbye to the other dogs, who hastily reminded him that he was welcome to join them again at any time.  He noticed some of them were panting harder than he.  As for him, he felt he could've run another route and still be ready for more.  The icing on the cake would be if Juneau had a good time while I was gone, he thought.  Bounding over the hard-packed snow of Nome's main street, Balto was bursting with bottled-up energy.  Little did he know, he was soon going to need it.

As Balto headed toward the beach, he slowed to a steady trot.  From a distance, he heard a faint sound, growing louder.  It was a loud honking, loud enough to wake the dead.  Balto stopped in his tracks, then began to run, much faster than he had in harness just moments before.  It must be Boris.  He'd gotten himself into trouble.

The squalling reached an almost deafening pitch as Balto reached the schooner's ramp.  Jenna wasn't there.  However, there was a canine...just not one that Balto had been expecting.

It was a small, lithe wolf.  And it had Boris's feathers, which were, of course, still attatched to the goose's wing-tip.  As soon as the wolf caught sight of Balto, he let go of Boris, who brushed himself off disgustedly.  Balto guessed from the surprised look on the creature's face that he hadn't been able to smell Balto until now.  But that was no advantage, because the wolfdog was equally stunned.  "What do you want?" Balto finally got out.

"There's a wolf pup somewhere in this town," the wolf rasped.  "Shonee-that's our clan's alpha leader-said something about our old leader's brother...some guy named...Balto?"

"Why isn't he back yet?"  Stretched out under the setting sun, which was dropping below the sea like a speeding comet of fire, Juneau lifted his head to test the wind for the umpteenth time.

"Awww, come on.  Balto'll be here."  But as Brite saw the look of concern on her playmate's countenance, she quickly offered to walk with him to the boat.  Juneau smiled gratefully and accepted.

"Uh-oh.  Trouble," warned Brite.  None other than Caliber himself was strutting towards them across the sandy hills.

"What do we do?" asked Juneau in a hushed whisper.

"Simple," she replied.  "Distract him as soon as he gets near that clump of dry grass.  What are you waiting for?" she prompted at the look of panic on Juneau's face.  "Go on.  You'll be okay."  He stumbled forward in response.

"Hey, look who's here."  Cal advanced in on Juneau, who had decided that the way to go was to act as helpless as possible.  The tight white wrapping around his right foreleg helped considerably, and Cal fell for his pleas for mercy.  Cal chuckled, not a nice thing to hear.  "Come on and fight, whimp!"  He launched himself at Juneau, who cowered in mock fear.  Then he sprang out of the way, and Cal crashed straight into the grass clump.

"OOOOWWWWW!!"  Cal yelped.  There were prickly, sticky balls all over him, and, much to the other pups' delight, there was a particularly painful-looking one right on his sensitive black nose.  "Let's run for it!" whispered Juneau furiously.

"What!?" cried Brite.  But her comrade was already gone, pelting straight for Balto's boat.  "Darn it.  And I was looking forward to a good fight," she muttered, loping along just behind him. 

When they'd gotten far out of the reach of Cal's wrath, they found themselves only a few yards from the boat.  But still they could still hear Caliber's yowling.  It sounded like a frightened cat.  Juneau sniggered.  Brite giggled.  Before they knew it, they were unable to stop laughing.  Suddenly, however, the fun was broken up by a few snatches of conversation from inside the schooner's inner chambers.  Instantly hushed by the tone of the voices, the pups wriggled into the shadow of the doorway and listened as best they could.

"He can't be...isn't wolf..."

"Part wolf...part husky..."

"But...never knew...how?"

"Clan needs...go back..."

Juneau dashed to the boat, up the ramp, and into the inner room, their sleeping quarters.  He gasped aloud.  For there, right in front of him, was Balto...facing a lone wolf.  "How...what...?"  The puppy shouted.

"Juneau, WAIT!"  Brite came sprinting into the corridor also, with an equally shocked reaction.  She, however, remained silent.  It wasn't her adopted uncle facing a rather savage-looking wolf.

"Juneau..."  Balto stepped protectively to the pup's side.  "See?"  He practically shouted at the lupine.  "See?  He's only half-grown!"  Juneau had never heard his uncle use that tone of voice before.

"Nonetheless..." the wolf trailed off.  With a searching look in its slanted eyes, it inspected Juneau.  The wiry coppery hairs stood up on Juneau's ruff, and his eyes gleamed dangerously.

"Now do you see?"  The wolf chuckled, not unkindly.  "He's part wolf."

All of a sudden, the defiant light in Balto's eyes died.  He stepped back and gazed at the young dog a moment.  Juneau looked at him helplessly, trying to take as non-wolfish a stance as he could.  Please...please...I don't want to be...  "You're right," Balto murmured in realization.  "He is."

"What do I do?"  Gripping panic seized Juneau's insides.  "What now?"  For, as he thought about it, there was no way he couldn't be part wolf.  He'd always been impulsively wolfish, like just yesterday, when he'd jumped off the roof...and his fear of human beings...  He gazed balefully at his wrappings, gleaming orange in the dying sun's glow.

"Well, Juneau," Balto said slowly, "it'd be best for you to stay here with me."

"But...we need him-" started up the wolf, his golden eyes glowing fitfully.

"Y' see...you've gotta understand..."  Balto continued as he hadn't been interrupted.  "Juneau, you father is m

y brother."

In the dead silence that followed, you could have heard a pin drop.  "But...but...who was my father?"  Juneau's eyes were half-wild with confusion and desperation.

"His name was Bering."   For the second time that day, there was a reminiscing gleam in Balto's eye.  "A good, honest canine.  We had our disagreements, but - oh, well.  He was the leader of a wolf clan, the last I saw of him.  But if what this wolf-" he jerked his head towards the canine, "-says is true, then Bering is dead now."

As the wolf nodded, Juneau murmured, "I thought as much."

Suddenly Brite jumped back into the picture.  "What did you mean, you needed Juneau?"  She inclined her head at the wolf.  He spoke, "Our new alpha is corrupt.  Several don't want another half-breed leader, but the older, wiser wolves say to seek out Bering's son in the closest town, where they dropped him off originally.  One gray she-wolf in particular wants you back, Juneau.  Guess I picked the right boat to drop in on, huh?"  He chuckled in the rough way that was his own.

"Say, what's your name, anyway?" queried Juneau suddenly. 

"Pawnee," the wolf promptly responded.  "Now are you coming or not?"  He looked from Juneau to his uncle Balto.  (Ironic as it seemed, Balto really was the pup's uncle, after all.)  "Well...?"  Pawnee tapped his foot.

"Let me sleep on it," said Juneau after a considerable pause.  His mind was a mass of swirling thoughts.  My dreams of a sled dog, a normal dog...all that's gone up in smoke now.  He knew well enough from Balto's many stories that being a wolfdog was no picnic.  Overwhelmed, the young half-breed abruptly sat down, stretching his long forelegs like tent poles to support him.  After a moment of staring down, he raised his head and gazed at them all with a surprisingly calm expression.

"Do you mind if I spent the night, then? Assuming there are no humans coming here, of course?"  Pawnee glanced inquiringly at Balto, who was obviously the main "owner" of the schooner.

"Sure, as long as you don't eat Boris while we're sleeping," Balto laughed.  Pawnee flushed.  Brite stood awkwardly in the doorway, and Juneau came quickly to her side.  "I'll walk you home," he offered.

"Okay," she accepted, remembering just minutes before when she'd walked him to the boat.  With Cal at home napping, the trip was uneventful.  When they reached Brite's doorway, they stopped in front of it.  "Goodnight," said Juneau.  "Goodnight," said Brite.  They both turned slowly away.

Suddenly Juneau whirled about to face her again.  "Do you still think that my breeding's cool?!" he shouted, his voice cracking.  With a shock, Brite realized there were tears filming his amber eyes.  She stepped back, appalled.  "Of course I do," she said, almost haughtily, as if the very idea that it might not be cool was ridiculous.

"Okay," Juneau gasped.  "Good."  Then he turned homeward.  She didn't think he was weird, he could tell.  That was enough, for now.  As Juneau approached the boat, Balto appeared at the entrance and slung his large paw across the pup's shoulders.  "I know it's a lot to take in," he muttered.  "And I'm sorry.  I really didn't know."

"But what should I do?"  Juneau nearly wailed in despair.  Nearby, Pawnee snored loudly and turned over.

"Shhh...It's up to you."  Balto met the question in his nephew's eyes head-on.  They clambered into tattered blankets for the night, and as Juneau rolled over he thought about how much differently this day had started.  In less than one day, he had unlocked a key to his past.  Not the key, but one key.  One key, and there were definitely more to come.

Balto, Jenna, Boris, Kodi (c) Universal Studios and Amblin Entertainment

Juneau, Brite, Cal, Pawnee, Bering (c) Iditarod