I Among Dogs

Chapter 30: The Fighting Spirit

This was it.

After many days of hard training and pushing to my limits, the day of my fate-deciding fight had at long last arrived.

I stared at the entrance of the Queensland arena, I thought back to when I first landed into Canistralia. How I had spent a day in the shoes of Chuck Nolan, to that fateful meeting of Bluey and her family, to meeting her friends and eventually becoming an official citizen.

And the fate of that status was on the line if I turned the other cheek and walked away now, there was no going back now, not when I had trained for this very moment.

Several other dogs passed by me, a few of them giving me a few glances of recognition as they continued inside, no doubt ready and waiting for the battle to begin.

I just stood there however and kept staring at the entrance, I couldn't tell if it was last-minute anxiety or anticipation holding me back, but I knew I could not stay outside forever.

I guess I should be lucky that Bandit and Chilli bought the little white lie Hachi's grandpa had told them about me going to the dojo for another round of training when he arrived earlier to take me to the arena. The only Heeler that did know was Bluey, and she swore on her heart that not a word would come out of her mouth about it.

My moment of mentally putting myself together was then interrupted by a scoff followed by a new voice, a masculine but rather deep voice with a Japanese accent to it.

"So you arrived after all, was wondering if you were going to chicken out at the last minute."

I very slowly turned to the source of the voice, and what stared back at me...

I knew very well who it was.

A black furred Spitz, the fur on the sides of his face stuck out like spikes to which they were highlighted in a maroon-ish dark red, stripes of the same red down his arms and legs and the edges of his tail, and lastly, his eyebrows, muzzle, hands and feet a clear white.

He actually looked familiar... Almost like a certain video game character.

"You're definitely not what I expected you to be... Faulkner." He said as he slowly took a few steps towards me.

"I could say the same thing... Kurou." I returned what the Spitz possibly considered his own way of greeting me as he crossed his arms.

"You know you're making a big mistake, thinking your "raw human strength" will give you an advantage over me. My kind was born to power through the harshest of winters while carrying five times our weight, to challenge a Spitz is death wish on it's own." Kurou snarled grimly at me, as if attempting to intimidate me, but I didn't even flinch.

"We humans may not have fur or your strength, but we have so many other things, we evolved to protect ourselves and others... And that's what I'm trying to do with this region." I quickly countered firmly, but Kurou only just smirked and gave out a light chuckle.

"And yet it's your kind who causes so many wars, and waste your precious lives away with things like riches and love. At the end, most of you just end up becoming miserable."

I held back a grunt at that, but him mentioning love made me remember something.

"I want to ask you something... What happened between you and Megan?" Kurou's muzzle immediately scrunched in what looked like mild disgust upon me mentioning his ex's name.