[Chr24] Sled dogs

Akela breathed in, the frosty air filling her lungs everything surrounding felt so familiar to her; the powdery snow under her paws, the cold air, and her gear slipped over her feral form. Everything was tailored to her; she should be in her element, but there was just one thing: one glaring standout throwing her off. Other sled teams surrounded her, and the gathering crowd on the sidelines was something she was not remotely used to. Her team was not a competitive team, they were a delivery team all the more reason they shouldn’t be doing this she thought. Her team had a job to do, but Kirsch had the bright idea to enter a race something; about how this would be great for team building, Akela wasn’t exactly convinced, but she couldn’t turn a blind eye to the prize money once Kirsch showed the number to her.

As the minutes ticked by, nearing closer to the start time Akela glanced around for her other teammates. She spotted Kirsch her co-lead first, seeing he was seemingly flirting with some other buck on the sidelines she rolled her eyes, not daring to approach and interrupt, she’d never hear the end of it. She saw Arven next, one of their swing dogs. Akela hadn’t spoken to him much, he was one of the two bucks they had found interested in competing to fill in a missing position within their team. He seemed to be a cocky fellow, and somehow even more unbearable than Kirsch to be around. From the few things she had heard from him, it seemed like he would join a team and then get kicked off for one reason or the other, but according to him he was never at fault and they just couldn’t handle him. He wasn’t exactly a fan of when Akela told him that she could see why they didn’t want to keep him around. Even if she had wanted to talk to him, he seemed to be playing with his bavee, and she couldn’t help but think that the little pest suited his off-putting personality. Her eyes also briefly wandered over to 2 of the girls on her and Kirsch’s usual team however they seemed to be engaged in their own conversation. Finally, her gaze landed on another one of their temporary teammates, a huge alpha ascendant and sundire cross named Torben. He seemed to currently be hanging around his gingerbread shoon, calming his mind before the race, she thought it was a fitting creature for him. Akela hadn’t talked much with him either, though the buck seemed to just be more of the quiet type rather than explicitly not wanting to converse. He sort of gave the vibes of a gentle giant in her mind, she had all the confidence that he could pull the weight of the sled and that's all that mattered to her for right now.

Akela decided to approach Torben, “Getting your shoon to clear your mind before the race?”

“Mmm,” the brown and green buck gave a short sound of approval and looked down towards Akela.

“Personally I think the adrenaline helps to keep my mind sharp, gotta strategize and make those split-second decisions for the team as a lead dog.” 

“Good thing I’m pulling the sled then and not leading.” Torben mused and stuck his tongue out to grab another gumdrop that his shoon deposited from its cloud.

“Ah, it wasn’t supposed to be a jab against you, I didn’t mean it that way only that the pressure almost helps me to make the best decisions and see the best path.” Akela’s voice pitched upwards as she tried to explain herself.

Torben let out a low rumble, what Akela thought may have been a laugh as the corners of his eyes turned upwards, “Don’t worry Akela I know you weren’t insulting me.” The large male paused “You really take sledding seriously, don’t you?”

As the female opened her mouth to explain that this was her whole life, another voice cut in from behind her.

“If you ask me I think she takes it too seriously, it's practically all that she ever thinks about! She won’t even join us for a night out on the town when we have to stop somewhere during our long legs half of the time.”

 Akela’s ear flicked backward as she recognized the voice coming from behind her as her other leads. “Kirsch, how nice of you to join us. Finally done flirting with the locals?”

Kirsch planted his behind in the snow right beside Akela, “Hey now, there’s nothing wrong with getting a little motivation to keep me going.” He gave Akela a little wink, playfully bumping her shoulder, “You should try it sometime.”

Akela shook her head in mock disappointment but gave a friendly bump back to Kirsch despite often butting heads the two had come a long way since they had first met, “I’ll stick to getting my motivation elsewhere.”

As the three were gathered they finally heard the hosts start calling for all teams to gather together at their starting positions. Akela gave meaningful looks to both Torben and Kirsch, “I guess that's our signal, let’s go.”

The six bucks on their team slipped into their gear, Akela took a deep breath, filling her lungs to capacity, taking a moment to close her eyes and feel the snow between her toes before letting it all go. Now was the time to leave all their worries and anxieties at the start line.

“I hope that you two are good leads.” Arven’s snarky comment cut through the silence, and thus Akela’s moment of peace. She shot an icy glare back at the bearing blitzer, “All you need to do is follow the calls we make, don’t try and be the hero Arven.” She warned and looked over at Kirsch who may have been glaring back at Arven even more intensely.

“You’re a swing, do your job and we’ll do ours.” Kirsch’s voice was harsh, when it came down to it he knew when to get serious, and Akela knew that this was just as much his life as it was hers.

Akela focused her gaze back on the path ahead of them when the gunshot signaling the start resonated throughout the air. On instinct her paws immediately started moving, it took a little bit but her team finally began to pick up speed with Torben and the other wheel pulling the weight of the sled. It was a good start, not a great one but good enough to put them neck and neck with two other teams for the lead, each team pulled ahead of the others at different times, but none enough to get a good breakaway. The team approached the first sharp turn of the leg, Akela met Kirsch’s gaze and they both immediately had an understanding of how sharp they would have to take this turn.

“Haw!” Akela shouted out to let the team know of the course of action they needed to take. As they took the turn Akela could feel some resistance on the line directly behind her, “Arven! I told you that you follow us!” Arven was not taking the turn harsh enough, causing them to lose momentum, falling behind the other leading teams. 

Kirsch let out an annoyed growl, “What the fuck are you doing Arven?! Are you purposely trying to make us lose, we already told you that you are to follow us!”

“Your turn was too sharp! It wasn’t necessary it could have been done with a much shallower turn!” Arven protested, while finally falling back into line with the leads.

“You’re no lead Arven, those calls aren’t your job you take the turns with us, not against us! Look at what happened because of your insubordination! I’m not sure we’ll be able to close the gap now!” Akela shot back and Arven fell silent.

After ten or so minutes of a straight run, Kirsch spoke up spotting a shortcut that could give them the chance they needed, though it was a risk. “Akela if we go to the right we could take the lead back, it’s our only shot.”

Akela’s mind raced and she instinctively opened her mouth to counter Kirsch’s suggestion she wasn’t a risk-taker like her co-lead and they often argued about the best course of action. She tried to parse out the pros and cons of Kirsch’s proposal, but they only had a few moments to decide, and Akela knew that he was right this was their only shot to take the lead due to the race being such a short one. She gave a nod to Kirsch, “Gee, now!” She called out, picking up speed to take the turn.

The team took the turn, and much to Akela’s surprise she felt no resistance behind her from Arven’s line, after a few moments of picking up speed her team disappeared behind the treeline cutting them off from the sightline of the other crews. However, that meant they had no way of gauging the other groups' positions to know if they had made the right call either.

Akela didn’t know how long it had been since they made the decision to try out the shortcut, but her lungs were burning, and she could no longer feel even the chill of the air. 

“Look ahead to the left! I see where we’ll merge back with the others!” Kirsch called to Akela.

“Let’s do it! Haw!” Akela shouted to her team as they approached the merge. Once they made it back to the normal path Akela glazed behind them, she could see one team behind her. Because they had no line of sight on the other teams for so long there was no way for her to tell if where they were in placement and what had gone on while they were cut off. “Well, we could be first, we could be second to last, or even really anywhere in-between, there’s no way for us to know.”

“I just have a feeling it paid off,” Kirsch replied, and Akela knew there was a smirk spread across his face just from the sound of his voice, he was always too cocky for his own good.

They probably ran for a good thirty or forty more minutes before Akela spotted the bold red color of the finish line. The ribbon stood there, connecting the two poles, clearly untouched by any other team. She could feel the excitement exuding from her teammates behind her, and she couldn’t help but let her paws speed up, and it seemed Kirsch felt the same as he easily met the change in speed. What was likely only ten seconds felt like it was ten minutes before she felt the snap of the ribbon against her fur and the roar erupt from the crowd at the finish line, it was done, they had been victorious.

Akela panted, taking in their victory it didn’t feel as good as delivering supplies to the people who needed them, nor traversing the harsh winters with her full team for weeks at a time, but she could definitely get used to this feeling. Not to mention the prize money sweetened the feeling at least a little bit. Once she caught her breath she slipped out of her gear. Just when she was free of her equipment she felt a heavy presence crash into her side, it was Kirsch of course.

“We did it, we did it! I told you that it would pay off to take the shortcut! See you should listen to me more often!” He butted his head against Akela’s in a show of camaraderie before stepping away to allow her to get to her feet.

“If I listened to you more often we’d probably end up caught in a snowbank and stranded more often than not.” She teased.

“Ehhh getting caught in a snowbank, reaching our destination pretttyyy much the same thing if you ask me. Now that we’ve won I’ve got a date with a lovely vulkit I promised my time to earlier.” He gave her a wink before racing off.

Her eyes glanced over to the rest of her team, moving over Arven who had already retreated, not that she had the intention to celebrate with him anyway, and she had already scolded him enough during the race. Thus she padded over to Torben, “You did a great job out there, and honestly if you ever wanted to do a run with our regular team we’d love to have you.”

“Mmmm…” He glanced over towards what looked like two small children cheering a ways off. “I have some things keeping me here, but I appreciate the offer.” 

“I get it, well the offer remains open if we ever find ourselves back in town.” She nodded to him before he padded off in the direction of the young bucks, and she intended to find her place at a local tavern to celebrate.