A/N: Thank you to everybody who read and reviewed the last chapter. I am so sorry that I kept everyone waiting an extremely long time for this chapter. I hope I still have some readers left. I can't wait to see what you all think of this chapter. So, here it is; enjoy.

~ Chapter Four ~

~~ The Lookalike Horse ~~

A couple days later,...

A knock sounded on the other side of the trailer door. Ty was seated on the bench seat at the kitchen table, putting on his shoes. He leaned over to look out the window, and found his friend, Caleb, at the front door. "Come on in," Ty called, loud enough for Caleb to hear him. He went back to tying his shoe.

The door opened with a squeak, but Caleb took his time coming in. "Is everybody decent in here?" he asked, one foot on the step.

Ty chuckled. "It's okay, Caleb, Amy's not here," he told him, putting his foot down on the floor.

"I just don't want to cause any awkwardness by walking in on anything," Caleb said, as he entered the trailer. "I know what it's like to be on the other end." He was referring to Thanksgiving when Georgie had walked in on him and Ashley in a compromising position in the barn loft at Heartland. It was an embarrassing situation all around, and they all wanted to forget that happened.

Ty laughed, closing his laptop that sat on the table next to a paper plate with toast crumbs on it. "Well, Lou is taking Amy furniture shopping today, so Amy thought it would be easier to just sleep at Heartland," Ty explained. He pulled his bag over and started going through it, making sure everything he needed was in there.

Caleb opened the refrigerator, looked in it for a minute, and then chose an apple. "That's good, man," he replied, leaning up against the counter. "I thought for a second that there was trouble in marriage paradise for you and Amy." He bit into the apple with an a loud crunch.

Ty chuckled, "No, Amy and I are better than good, actually. No trouble here." He stood up, and, after patting his pockets, went in search for his wallet. "So, what brings you here?" Ty asked, squeezing past Caleb to get to the other side of the trailer.

Caleb munched on his apple, watching his best friend move around. "Well, I just thought I'd stop by to tell you I'm starting a rodeo class next week," he revealed, biting back his smile. "I'm still doing the horse backing, on the side though."

"Wow, that sounds great, man," Ty replied, finding his wallet on the floor by the bed. He picked it up and slid it into his back pocket, flashing a congratulatory smile at his friend.

"Yeah, I'm going to do things differently this time around with Ashley," Caleb explained. "I'm not going to let money become one of our problems."

"I'm happy for you, Caleb," Ty said. "I hope things work out for you and Ashley." He was about to ask Caleb more about the rodeo classes he'd be teaching, when his phone buzzed from the kitchen table. He told Caleb to hold on and went over to his phone. Ty picked it up, seeing that it was Bob calling him. "Hello?" he said into the phone. "Don't worry, I'm on my way now."

"Don't bother," Bob replied, from the other end of the phone. "I just received a call about a coyote caught in a fence over on Old Creek Road. I'm going to need your help. It's in pretty bad shape, but I'm bringing some sedatives just in case."

"Ok, got it. I'll meet you over there," Ty acquiesced, nodding. Bob rattled off the address of the woman who had called it in. Ty said okay and then ended the phone call. "Sorry, Caleb, I'm going to have to cut this short," he apologized to his friend.

"Hey, that's cool, man," Caleb assured him. "Work calls."

Ty pocketed his phone and slipped his bag over his shoulder. He opened the trailer door, but turned back to Caleb. "But I still want to hear about this new job of yours. I'm curious to know how you're going to handle this."

Caleb laughed, following Ty out of the trailer. "Yeah, and Ash and I would like to know when you and Amy will be moving into the ranch?" Caleb joked, but still serious. "Heartland's barn loft has an astounding lack of privacy."

Ty laughed with him as he walked over to his truck. "When we know, you'll know," he told him. He opened up the driver's side door, tossing his bag inside. He leaned on the door, as Caleb got into his own truck. "In fact, I just recruited you to help fix up the ranch with us."

"You know we'll help you in any way we can," Caleb accepted, climbing inside of his truck. "Especially if it gets you out of here faster." Ty and Caleb laughed and grinned at each other, then waved goodbye. They went about their days after that.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Ty followed the directions Bob had given him, pulling his truck up to the small, quaint, cozy house. It was white, with blue shudders, and a pretty garden of flowers along the front. It was a small farm, a chicken coop sat off to the far left side of the house. It matched with the same colors of the house, except some of the paint was chipped on the side. Chickens roamed around the yard, pecking at the ground. Ty pulled his truck in the driveway, parking behind Bob. Ty got out of his truck, bringing his vet bag with him just in case the coyote needed immediate medical care. As he walked over to where Bob was standing waiting for him, Ty glanced around but he couldn't find any fence with any coyote stuck in it.

The front door of the house opened right then, and a middle aged woman with honey brown hair hanging just above her shoulders appeared and she huddled inside of a navy blue light jacket. She walked over to Ty and Bob. "Oh, good, you're here," the woman said, by way of greeting. "I was getting worried for the coyote."

"You must be Mrs. Baker," Bob replied, shaking her hand quickly and efficiently. Then, she shook Ty's hand. "Let's get down to business of rescuing this coyote. Where is he?"

"Yeah, he's just down the hill over there a little ways," Mrs. Baker explained. She started walking, leading them to where the coyote was. They fell into step alongside her. "My husband was out in the yard earlier this morning, when he heard a strange sound. It was like a howl and a moan mixed together. He went looking for it and found the poor animal tangled up in the fence. My son, Dean, is over there now. He's such an animal lover, I can't get him away. I warned him not to get to close to it, and not to close to the fence, either."

"Well, we want to thank you for calling this in," Bob thanked her. "A lot of people would have seen this one and taken a gun to it. Every animal deserves a chance, no matter predator or prey."

Mrs. Baker nodded and smiled. "I love my chickens, but Dean would have never have let his father shoot the coyote, even he wanted to," she replied. Then, her smile faltered some as it looked like she just remembered something. "Oh, the fence isn't actually ours. It's on our neighbor's property. Hank Caldwell."

The two men stopped and looked at her. "Will there be a problem?" Ty asked.

"Well, there's a rule in this neighborhood," Mrs. Baker started to explain, "Don't get in Hank Caldwell's way. He doesn't like anybody on or near his property. He has shot one of my chickens for being too close to the fence, that's why I warned my son to stay from it. Hank is not very neighborly, but maybe if you let him know what you're doing, he won't take extreme measures."

They came to the wire fence that ran along the edge of both properties, ending at the street. The first thing they saw was the back of a sixteen year old boy sitting on the ground. He had the same honey brown hair as his mother and he hunched forward toward the fence. His mother called to him and when he shifted, they could see the crumpled form of the coyote. He was a mess of fur, wire, and blood, a lot of blood. It looked like he had tried to get through a hole in the fence, but, of course, didn't make it. Dean climbed to his feet, turning to Bob and Ty.

"I tried to keep him as calm as I could," the teenager explained, nervously rubbing his hands on his jeans. "He was thrashing around a lot more than this, I think he was digging the fence in farther in his wounds."

"You did a good job," Ty praised the boy, clapping his hand on the boy's shoulder. Dean smiled at the compliment. "We'll take it from here."

"Ok, see? They can take it now," Mrs. Baker said to her son. She put her arm around his shoulders and started leading him away from the scene. "Now, let's get you to school. You shouldn't miss the whole day." The pair began walking back to their house, Dean retelling enthusiastically everything he did for the coyote.

Bob walked over to the fence and knelt down a couple feet away from the coyote. He took tools and other stuff out that he would need. "Ok, I'm going to get started here, assess what needs to be done," Bob announced. "Will you go down to Mr. Caldwell's house and fill him on what we're doing. The last thing we need is to get arrested." He laughed on the last part.

Ty nodded, but he was a little nervous to go talk with the guy. He walked along the fence toward the street, and then he turned onto the Caldwell property. As he walked down the driveway, Ty noticed that the house and yard was not well-kept. Some of the windows were either missing shutters or had broken ones. The house was in need of a new paint job, and the porch was missing a couple of rails and one dangled in half off the porch. The grass had grown to about mid-calf and was a yellow shade almost brown. Ty could make out a barn behind the house, in worse shape than the house. It was a great hulking shadow, sitting and rotting.

About a hundred feet away from both the barn and the house, was a round pen with the rails taller than a horse's head. Ty studied it more and realized there was a horse in there. He was standing still, his body extremely tense like he was ready to bolt. He was staring at Ty, and started stretching his head through the fence, sniffing loudly. The horse snorted, growing still again. Ty nearly came to a stop as he realized that this horse was all black, looking nearly identical to Amy's horse, Spartan. If he didn't know any better, he'd think this was Spartan. The only difference was that this horse was strung like a live wire, ready to go off at any moment. As the horse stared at him, something in the back of his mind screamed wrong, wrong, wrong.

"What the hell are you doing on my property?!"

Ty jumped, startled. He looked away from the lookalike horse, finding the front door was now opened and a man stood on the doorstep. He was a middle-aged man, with an average build and a nearly shaved head. His eyes seemed penetratingly dark, and he held a rifle in one hand. Ty licked his lips, growing nervous from the man's defensive stance.

"Uh, um, Hank Caldwell?" Ty asked him.

Hank just narrowed his eyes, without saying anything.

Ty cleared his throat and decided just to start talking. "I'm part a wildlife rescue team," Ty explained, "Your neighbor reported a coyote trapped in your fence over there. We just wanted-"

"-I sure as hell didn't put it there," Hank interrupted, quite crudely.

"No, no, I didn't say that," Ty corrected him. "I just wanted to let you know that we might have to cut into your fence to free the coyote. It's pretty banged up."

"Want to borrow my gun?" Hank offered. "It will be a whole lot easier than tearing apart my fence. Put the damn thing out of its' misery."

Ty tried not show what he really thought about that idea, lest it make him angry. "Uh, thank you," he said instead, "but I think we're going to handle this in a more humane way."

Hank shrugged, and started to turn away to go back into the house. Ty was about to leave, until his eyes flicked over to the horse again, who was still staring at him. He turned back to Hank. "Hey, funny thing, uh,...about your horse?" Ty said, chuckling a little bit.

"What about him?" Hank retorted, gruffly.

"Nothing, I,...he looks identical to my wife's horse," Ty explained. "It's really weird."

"I didn't steal him," Hank interrupted again, a little defensively. "I bought Spiridon with my own money, from an auction."

"No, I wasn't accusing you of stealing," Ty assured him. "I just thought it was kind of cool or something."

Hank made an indistinguishable sound under his breath, and then turned back around. He disappeared back inside the house, the door slamming shut. Ty turned to leave, trying to figure out what to make of this interaction with Hank Caldwell. He stared walking back down the driveway, but then stopped and turned back. He could see Spiridon's eyes through the fence rails, staring back at him in a haunting and powerful way. All of a sudden, Ty got a funny feeling in the pit of his stomach.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Georgie! Over here!"

Georgie moved out of the lunch line after paying for her meal, consisting of tuna casserole, green beans, a fruit cup, and carton of chocolate milk. She looked around the cafeteria and found Stephen waving to her from a table over by the windows. Her smile was instantaneous as she started to walk over to the table. A bunch of other kids were also sitting at the table; Gus, Abigail, a boy with blonde hair falling in his eyes named Cyrus, and, unfortunately, Olivia. Luckily, Olivia was sitting closer to the other end of the table, her tray pushed up against Cyrus' tray. Georgie slid onto the bench seat across from Stephen, while also saying hi to the others.

"What's going on?" Georgie asked, glancing down the table. Gus had pulled out his iPad and laid it on the table, searching for something. The others were leaning over, too, and chattering.

"Well, we were talking about the new Inside Out movie, everybody wants to go see it," Stephen explained. He looked over at the other kids and shrugged. "I don't know what they're doing now." He spooned some chocolate pudding out of the plastic cup on his tray, sliding the spoon into his mouth.

Georgie snickered, biting her lip and covering her mouth with her hand. Stephen looked at her curiously. "What?" he asked.

"You have some pudding on your lip," Georgie told him through bouts of giggles, tapping the top of her own lip to show him where it was. Stephen ducked his head bashfully and reached for his napkin. They spent the next minute laughing and Georgie trying to tell him exactly where the pudding was on his face.

After Stephen wiped the pudding off, he sobered up and glanced up, watching Georgie. She was opening up her carton of chocolate milk, still giggling a little bit. In her concentration, a strand of hair fell into her face and she pushed it back behind her ear without faltering.

Stephen cleared his throat quietly. "Um, Georgie?" he started to ask.

Georgie glanced up, sticking a straw in her milk and taking a small sip, innocently. "Yeah?" she answered. Stephen suddenly got shy under the weight of her gaze and couldn't speak for a second. He wet his lips, and opened his mouth to say something.

"Ok, guys, look! It's been posted." Gus announced, shattering the moment. Stephen looked away somewhat relieved and disappointed at the same time. Georgie looked over at the other kids as well, none the wiser. Gus slid his iPad to the center of the table, where everybody could view it. Even Olivia seemed interested enough to want to know what it was. Georgie leaned across the table next to Abigail to see.

It appeared to be some kind of website on the screen of the iPad. At the top of the screen, in big bold letters, read the name of the website: Man Vs. Horse. There were different links taking the visitor to different parts of the site, but the one Gus had clicked on was like a blog post. A sick feeling began creeping in Georgie's stomach again and it only grew as her eyes traveled over to the photo next to the text. The black horse stood tall and rigid in a high-fenced pen, staring at the camera with a wary gaze. Georgie let out a small gasp as she had a sudden terrible thought that this horse was Spartan. It looked just like him. As much as it scared her, she told herself that Spartan was safe and sound back at Heartland, grazing on grass in the paddock.

Gus made himself the narrator. "They posted the new horse for the next episode of the show," he paraphrased. "It sounds like it'll be the best showdown yet. This horse is stubborn and unruly, more than the others have been. It says he was the leader of one the wild herds."

All of a sudden, Georgie couldn't stop herself. She dropped her fork onto her tray. "How can you enjoy watching that show?!" she exclaimed. "That man is obviously kidnapping those horses and abusing them. It's so sick and disturbing that he's calling it entertainment!"

"It's just a show, Georgie," Gus argued, slightly. "None of the horses are harmed or anything. They have to make things big and look dangerous to make a great show."

"Yeah, I'm sure all of the trainers and people make sure all of the horses are okay," Abigail added, quietly.

"You guys don't really believe it, do you?" Georgie continued. "Have any of you ever been to this place? You don't know what's really going on there,..." She looked around at the others, trying to plead with them to understand where she was coming from.

"No, but that would be so awesome," Gus replied, getting all excited. "I would love to go see that place, visit the set. Maybe get a live viewing." Then, they all started talking about how cool it would be to the set and all of the things they would see.

Georgie turned back to Stephen. He gave her a small smile, shrugging his shoulders. Georgie picked up her fork again, and began picking at her tuna casserole. "It's just all very disgusting and suspicious," Georgie sighed. "Why doesn't anyone get that?" She murmured, leaning her chin in her free hand.

"I get it."

Georgie turned to see who had spoken. Olivia had gotten up from the table and was walking to dump her tray in the trash. She stopped right beside Georgie. They looked at each other in silence, and then they smiled at each other.

For once, the two enemies were in complete agreement.

A/N: Did you all like it? I hope it was worth the long wait I put you all through. Mmmm, things are starting to heat up. Any new theories popping up? Please review, I love to hear from all of you.