Chapter 25

When the bright white light finally faded, Kodi found himself and Steel just outside of Nome, and sure enough, there was evidence that Shadow had been there. Kodi started to head towards the town, but stopped. The last time he'd been there, they had wanted to kill him, or at least find him. Balto had said that he was going after Kodi alone. Even though Balto had only been gone for about a week, it was still enough time to put their minds at work. There were all kinds of rumors floating around about Kodi.

Now if he were to just waltz in and talk about all that had just happened to him, it would just confirm the label of 'crazy' that he likely already had.

"I need to clean myself off." Steel said.

Kodi turned to look at him, and saw that he had a lot of blood streaked on his fur, and that looked quite suspicious.

"You can go ahead if you want to." He added.

"I can't, they want to hurt me, remember?"

Steel frowned. "Damn, I forgot about that. This will be a lot harder. I could always go in, since they probably don't suspect me quite as much."

"If possible, talk to my mom. She's probably worried sick about dad and I."

It took Steel only a few minutes to clean himself off, before he went into town. He received quite a number of suspicious looks but no one approached him. He looked around for a good hiding space that Shadow could use. The dog was smart. He would likely try to hide in a place with a lot of people and animals. Safety in numbers and all that.

Steel did notice Jenna though. The red female was on the side of the street opposite of him. He pricked an ear as he walked by to try to catch a bit of her conversation.

Steel didn't hear too much, but from what he did hear, it sounded like Kodi was correct. She was very much worried about her son and mate. If only she knew what danger he is in now. It was only mid-day in Nome, just a little past noon. It was Sunday, and most of the folks in town were congregated at the local church, leaving the town largely abandoned, except for the dogs.

Steel saw a flash of red moving across some of the rooftops, and noticed it as Kodi. How foolish was he? Coming in here in the middle of day?

Unfortunately, Steel was not the only one to see Kodi.

Someone else saw him, and they immediately raised an alert.

"It's Kodi!"

Said dog walked right to the edge of a roof, and looked down upon the dogs in the town.

"You gotta help me! Balto's in serious danger from a dog named Shadow, he's mostly black, and pretty large too."

More and more dogs began to gather, some of them debating whether or not Kodi's story was true.

"You gotta believe me! I know I've done something to make you doubt my word, and even my intention, but don't let my dad die for it."

Someone in the crowd called back. "I bet you killed him yourself!"

Doc, the dog who served as the town judge for dogs, silenced him and spoke to Kodi.

"Come down and we'll escort you to the mill, you'll be given a fair trial for your crimes, and an opportunity to prove yourself innocent."

Something snapped in Kodi's head. The saw mill! To someone who didn't know about Nome, that would be the perfect place to hide! It was abandoned on Sundays, since people usually didn't use said saws then.

Steel came forward as well.

"It was not Kodi who attacked Dusty, I did. And yes, his father is in danger, extreme danger, as are you all. If we don't find Shadow, we could be in trouble."

Kaltag, one of the dogs who'd once been on Steels team, when he was pretending to be a sled dog to get Balto, confronted him.

"You could be lying too! Why should we trust you?"

Kodi took this time to slowly sneak away, and it wasn't for a few minutes that anyone had noticed.

"Kodi's gone!"

There was a flurry of comments at once.

"Search for him! All over town!"

Steel was taken to the boiler room, where he would be kept as a prisoner until Kodi was found. It was not good. Now Kodi would likely have to fight Shadow alone.

. . . .

Kodi had gotten out of town, and was at the entrance to the mill. He pushed the doors open slowly and entered. Once he got about five feet in, the doors slammed shut behind him. Kodi turned to face who he knew was already there. It was Shadow. The dog was indeed smart, as he pushed the board into the slots on the doors, locking Kodi in, and the rest of the town out.

"Kodi, how nice of you to join me! Now your dad can watch as I kill you too!"

"You're not immortal anymore, so you better be careful." Kodi informed him.

In front of a stack of boards, lay the beaten and hurt figure of Balto. Shadow had broken two of his legs to make sure he didn't go anywhere. His eyes were silently pleading Kodi to run, to jump out a window, or something.

"I'm not leaving you here."

Shadow took a step toward Kodi, and Kodi took a step back.

"Aww… you afraid? You should be."

Shadow again took a few steps towards Kodi, who this time stood his ground. With a lightning fast movement, Shadow's paw flashed out aiming for Kodi's head. He only barely ducked in time, and felt the claws swish through his fur.

Shadow lashed again, this time catching Kodi in the face. The first thing he realized was that the dog was incredibly strong, which he learned when he went tumbling to the ground. Kodi rolled over, and came up on his feet.

"Impressive."

Shadow lashed out for a third time, his paw connecting with Kodi's left shoulder. The dog was so strong Kodi went through the air a good six feet before smashing his head into the side of the huge saw machine. Shadow walked over to him, and took Kodi's neck fur in his teeth, swinging him around in such a way that he went flying again, this time into a wall.

Kodi's whole left side went numb from that blow, and it was quite difficult for him to get up. He was already this tired, and Shadow was only playing with him. He couldn't imagine what would happen if Shadow got serious. Kodi took a few steps forward, trying to ignore the horrible pain in his head.

Shadow tried to lash him again, but Kodi had taken enough. Anger powering him, he swiftly ducked and took Shadows other forepaw in his mouth. He jerked and this time it was Shadow who fell to the ground, nowhere near as hard as Kodi had though. Still it felt good.

Shadow was on his feet in an instant. Both he and Kodi got up onto their back legs, but it was not a smart choice for Kodi. Shadow got the better of him in only a few seconds, and pushed him back and into a button.

The saw machine started warming up, the blades slowly spinning faster and faster until it was deafeningly loud. The conveyer belt that humans would put logs on started moving as well.

The sound of the mill being started alerted the dogs that were searching for Kodi, and they all hurried towards building.

Kodi's vision was blurry; it looked like there were two Shadows. He tried to shake it away, but to no avail. Shadow lifted him up again, and placed him on the conveyer belt that was normally reserved for logs, and slowly climbed up and sat on top of Kodi, who was on his back.

Kodi knew what Shadow was going to do. The belt was moving ever so slowly, and the way Shadow had him pinned aligned his head with the row of spinning saw blades. Shadow intended to decapitate him.

Kodi immediately started struggling, but could barely do anything due to the crushing weight on top of him. By now the first group of dogs had arrived, and had begun shouting and banging on the door. As the saw blade came closer, Kodi became more frantic. Before that saw was another one, that was just above where Shadows head would be in a few seconds. Kodi saw the lever that would lower it, but there was no way he could get to it.

"I'm gonna miss you Kodi!" Shadow said over the roar of the saw machine.

"I'm going to miss you too!" Kodi shot back.

Summoning every ounce of strength he had, Kodi convulsed as if he were trying to cough something up. It barely moved Shadow, but it was enough. He freed one of his back legs and kicked at the lever to lower blade. His paw hit it dead on, and with a loud clang, the saw lowered.

It cut right into Shadow's neck, spraying Kodi's face and chest with literally buckets of dark crimson blood. Kodi scrambled off the conveyer belt, receiving a small nick in his ear from the same saw blade that had killed Shadow. It was a very small wound though, at least in comparison to what had happened to Shadow. Kodi got over to his dad as fast as he could and fell down beside him.

Upon hearing the sound of flesh on saw blades, the dogs at the door increased their efforts to get in the door. With one final push of about twenty dogs, they broke the board that held the doors in place, and poured in.

They saw a bloody Kodi, a hurt Balto, and a decapitated Shadow. Most turned away from the horrible sight, but one pressed the button to deactivate the saw mill and the blades slowly wore down until they stopped completely. They finally realized that Kodi had been telling the truth about not hurting Dusty.

Some dogs stepped forward, most notably, his mom. She hurried to Balto's side, comforting and reassuring him.

Kaltag went up to Kodi.

"I guess you were telling the truth. You didn't hurt her, not the second time."

Kodi shook his head.

"Where have you been all this time? And who the hell is this guy?"

"That's a long story…" Kodi began.

"Tell us! But first you go get yourself cleaned up."

While Kodi did so, Balto was taken to the doctor as well, where they learned that his broken legs were actually only dislocated. It was an easy but painful fix, and Balto would need to rest for a while, as he did still have a number of bruises on his body.

Later that night, a lot of dogs gathered in the boiler room, where Kodi, Balto, and Steel told their story.

Not many believed it, but that was to be expected. The three of them knew the truth though.

Steel had said he would take full consequences for his actions, but Dusty, being the compassionate dog she was, decided not to punish anyone, but to instead forgive them. It would take a while for the dogs to trust Kodi again, some would never trust him again. Kodi and his friends would eventually make up though, and he was thrilled to find out that he'd be able to run in the mail team next year.

Steel left Nome the next day, saying that it was time for him to return to his own time, but not without talking to Kodi first.

"I can't thank you enough Kodi. By beating that game, you freed my world. You restored our lives."

"Nah, I only did it because I wanted to keep my dad safe."

"And in doing so you freed my world."

"You bought me the time."

"Roles reversed, I could've never done what you did. You're a hero, Kodi. To my entire world." Steel left it at that, and headed off towards the mountains in the distance to use the time travel machine one last time.

What Steel said was true. For many generations in Steels time, Kodi would be remembered as the one who freed them. The one who restored their lives.

...

That's it. As I sit here looking back on this, I feel quite proud of myself. This isn't the first fic I've written, but it's the first I've stuck with and actually completed. I hope you enjoyed reading it, because I sure as hell enjoyed writing it. It feels good to finally have this out of my head. I don't know where I'll go from here, I'd like to keep on writing, the only problem is lack of ideas... if you have any, you can feel free to leave an idea in a review or a PM. With a good weekend here, I might think something else up though.

That brings me to another note. Reviews. Mike and Mojo, I cannot say how much your comments helped me. It really was encouraging to know that two people were out there that cared about this story. Thanks guys. And to anyone else, feel free to leave any comments if you want to.

Until next time,

Peace.

ANonymousReviewer7