WOLVES DON'T TALK

Chapter 21. THE RESCUE

The trees blazed with flames on three sides of the clearing surrounding the chemical waste dump when we arrived. A heavy smoke hung in the air, making it hard to breathe and even harder to see. I guided the wolf and the Daphne rabbit toward the broken gate, leading them mostly based on my memory of where it should be rather than depending upon my eyes. As we moved toward it, we could hear voices shouting all around us and see vague figures moving through the mist.

"Holy cow, it's that missing kid!" one figure shouted when he popped up in the smoke right in front of us, almost stumbling over me.

I reacted by flinging myself past his outreached arm as he attempted to grab me. The wolf and the red rabbit tore past the man as well and the three of us darted through the broken gate. Then a lot more shouting and the thudding of heavy boots started echoing all around us.

The fox added to melee with a series of high pitch howls. Its sappy voice resonated across the clearing. We reeled in unison and headed in the direction of its howls.

Daphne reached the white rabbit and the fox first, almost hopping directly on top of the two before seeing them. They were both tied up to the wire fencing with ropes around their necks. They gawked at us in pure surprise.

The fox stopped howling and started snarling.

"Shut up!" I told it as I begin untying the ropes binding the horrid animals to the fence.

"Stop!" a new voice shouted, making us freeze at the command.

Except for Daphne. She lurched toward the man hollering at us and pushed the big plastic helmet perched on his head right off it with a single swipe of her hefty rabbit nose. Then she flung it onto her own bunny forehead and started prancing around, knocking the man over in the heat of her enthusiasm. He fell to the ground with an ugly thump and then just lay there, not moving.

I ran to his outstretched body and leaned anxiously over him, trying to figure out if he was still breathing. Luckily, he was. I noticed right away that he looked a lot like one of the men we'd seen earlier in the clearing fighting over what to do with the chemicals.

But there wasn't any time to think about the injured man. We had to free the hostages. The wolf joined in my efforts to do so by applying his ever so sharp teeth to the rope wrapped around the white rabbit's neck. The huge creature moaned as the wolf's incisors pressed against his soft furry throat.

The wolf snarled when the rope snapped and the rabbit broke free from his bonds. Two seconds later, my fingers came through and the fox felt the glory of freedom, too.

Then a weird thing happened: The five of us, one scraggly wolf, a small girl covered in dirt, a huge white rabbit, an evil fox, and the Daphne creature, stood there glaring at one another through the billowing clouds of smoke. We had unfinished business between us, as they say in the movies. The white rabbit and the fox had tried to kill the wolf and steal Pythia's key. I had almost set their whiskers on fire and then escaped with the golden coins.

The fox let out a long low growl and flung itself at the wolf's throat.

"No!" I screamed as I watched the hateful creature land on my friend and sink its sharp teeth into his jugular.

After that, the terror of the entire situation stuck in my throat and I couldn't get another scream out of my mouth. I just stood there frozen in the middle of all the tragedy and watched the fox sling the wolf onto the ground and shove its fangs deeper into his neck. It was a sickening sight.

Finally, after an eternity of a few seconds, the fox let out a low snarl and jumped away from the wolf and glared in satisfaction at the blood flowing from his throat. I jumped myself, toward the wolf but the fox moved faster; heading, this time, for me with its insane teeth dripping blood.

"HELP!" I screamed, my tongue finally deciding to work.

"At your service, little lady," a man's voice boomed behind me as a gunshot whizzed past my head and smashed into one of the fox's front paws, making the wretch stagger in pain.

A different voice screamed next, one coming straight out of the red rabbit's furry jaws as she rushed toward the man, trampling him and shoving the rifle out of his hands all in one mighty hop. He fell to the ground, wiggled furiously for a few seconds and then stopped moving.

Daphne thumped up to me next and wrapped her front paws around my waist and flipped me over her head. She focused her attention on the white rabbit after that.

She'd taken over. She was in charge. She glared at him; her command was clear; he was being ordered to follow her. The huge creature bobbed his head obediently, too terrified and dismayed to object.

I had other ideas. I jumped off Daphne's back and headed straight for the wolf, who lay silently on the ground with streams of blood gushing from his wounded throat. The red rabbit went after me, clearly determined to take me with her.

"No!" I shouted at her. "I won't leave my friend."

I knelt down by his side and, not knowing what else to do, started stroking his poor shaggy head.

By this time, the fire had reached the clearing and flames danced on the roof of the old shed in its center. It was clear: We had to get out of there. And fast. But I couldn't go.

The red rabbit butted me furiously with her muzzle, demanding I leave with them. I shook my head, letting her know that I was determined to stay. So she stopped butting me and began patting my back with her rabbit paw instead. In response, I left off petting the poor wolf and stood up and gave her a long hug, wrapping my arms around one of her fat legs.

"Listen," I said, choking for words and finding few. "Thank you. Thank you. I'll never forget you."

I reached into my pocket and pulled out the old raggedy strip of red ribbon I'd been toting around with me forever and tied it around her front leg.

"Remember me," I said as I completed the bow.

Daphne fluttered her long lashes at the sight of the ribbon. A few tears started to leak from her bunny eyes but she quickly contained them. The time for crying was over; she was in charge of her world now. So she slowly turned her back on me and then hopped off into the smoke with white rabbit following politely in her wake and the fox limping behind them, favoring his wounded paw, clearly too stunned to inflict any further damage on anyone.

I watched them fade into smoke and then sat down on the ground next to the wounded wolf, stretching out my legs and cradling his bleeding head in my lap.

Peering through the mist, I could make out the two men Daphne had trampled still laid out on the mud. I didn't see the third one in the trio we'd spotted earlier fighting over the chemicals. It didn't matter anyway. Flames flickered everywhere in the clearing. Our story had ended. Our travels were over.

I petted the wolf slowly and watched my fingers turn red from the blood coating his fur. I couldn't tell if he was alive or not. It seemed like I should offer up some comforting words, but all I could think to do was to ask a question.

"Who are you?" I asked.

To my amazement, the wolf groaned and replied.

"Maybe," he whispered so softly I had to lower my head to within inches of his mouth to hear. "Maybe I'm from another planet and got stuck here on earth. Or maybe I got blown up in the middle of a fantastic experiment and had all my genes transformed, turning me into a wolf. Or maybe ...," his whisper became even weaker until I almost couldn't hear. "Or maybe I'm just a friend, a boy who followed you and Brock into the forest ,"

His words trailed away into the thick smoke, crowding out the world around us as it wrapped our grief in its folds and lulled us into a peaceful sleep.