AN- Another chapter, another segment. Not much to say in this note. So I'll just get right into things.

Ranuu: Aw xD How horrible to think. I mean, sure, she did seem like that. But she was just being, mayhaps, a bit manipulative, to get a place to call home xP As for action? Well, there wasn't really a way to put too much in there. I tried to balance it out with pretty words. But you want action? Well, then. I'll give you action, snickers!

Dani: Hey! Welcome back to the world of the readers, Dani Was worried I'd lost you after you never showed up for last chapter xP Glad to hear that Russet's coming along well, though. I think I've finally gotten his character down, so that'll make the re-write a lot easier to do. And as for my screen name? Here it is: M8lsem Sezow8zo

That's all for reviews. Hope you all enjoy this chapter. I've been waiting for this stuff to start up since I imagined it awhile ago. Lets kick it into high gear, people!

Through the Icy Blue: Outset Chapter 10

Ask a scientist, and they will say that dreams are nothing more than your mind flitting across the activities of the day and putting them together during the REM cycle to form strange imaginings.

Ask a writer, and they will say that a dream is a dream. It is what you make of it. A story, an adventure. A window to a whole new world. A glimpse into the 'something more'.

For moons, life was grand. He did not see the Addy-creature again, though he did look in the area a few more times, just to see. The pup was curious about these creatures...curious about their Daddys and Mommys, and why it was he could hear them but not speak. He knew nothing about them, yet thirsted to know everything. In his dreams, he imagined that they lived in great towers of stone boulders of wood. Hundreds of them in one area, walking so close they should collide and yet moving in such a weaving pattern that they never touched.

These dreams he'd never tell to his Mother, or to Russet. They wouldn't understand and...the way they'd reacted, when he first told them of Addy, made him believe that they wouldn't want to know. Chris, inside, was curious. They seemed afraid, or angry at these creatures. They seemed to want nothing to do with them, and less even than that. The yearning to know more about these creatures coupled with the inability to do so manifested itself in a curious excitement that overtook the young whelp at every chance.

How did birds manage to fly, and fish to swim? Why was it that those called meat-eaters had to kill to survive, when everything else in the world was edible as well? During these moons of learning time seemed to move without notice. Quite suddenly, and without warning, Chris was three summers old. He'd grown, finally; and was now just shy of being half the size of the two adults. Three summers, when any other wolf would have founded their own family by now, and yet he was still hanging on every word of his Mother's, every new discovery. Every dream.

Then came a dream that was newer, realer, a dream to make Chris believe he was awake, though he knew he couldn't be. Only in his dreams could he run this fast, sense everything around him with his eyes closed. As he did whenever he could, the young wolf was running through the forest to where he first saw Addy and her Mommy-creature. She wasn't there, but someone else was. A fox sat where she'd once been, staring in the direction opposite of Chris. Coming to a stop, he tilted his head curiously at the forest creature. A moment after, the fox looked back.

"Why, it's you." he spoke, getting to his paws and turning to full face the youth. "You're looking for that girl, Aderyn, right?"

A nod was given in reply as Chris took an eager step forward. "Do you know her?" he asked, "Have you seen her?" The fox smiled in a knowing way that held a note of playfulness as well.

"Follow me." he offered, and turned to dash into the underbrush. If he'd been awake, Chris would never have caught the fox; but in his dreams his paw fall flew. They passed through a small grouping of pine, and passed through an opening between two long, narrow piles of stones. In a few moments, the forest opened up. The ground hardened to where it almost hurt the youth's paws, and spread out in front of the two forest dwellers was something astounding.

"She's in there." the fox spoke, looking over to Chris from where he sat by the forest edge. "Along with many other things that you'll never have seen."

"In there?" he asked, staring wide-eyed at the scenery before him. "But it's so...so big!"

"The world gets a lot bigger than that, too." the fox went on, watching the youth with a straight gaze. "If you're going to succeed, you'll need to start soon."

Tearing his gaze away from the Newplace, Chris looked back to the fox, confused. "Su...sus. Ehm. Start what soon?"

A single ear was flicked as if the answer to such a silly question was obvious. "You'll need to make that change, before you start. They'll chase you down if you don't, and then you won't learn anything."

"Change?" Chris asked, "Start?" he flicked his ears back, furrowing his brow in confusion and curiosity, almost a bit upset that this fox was saying things that brought up more questions than answers. "What do you mean?"

"Well, aren't you going to save them?"the question was posed, a brow raised in conjunction with the question.

"Save who?" he pleaded questioningly. "Save Addy? Save Mother and Russet?" by now he was desperate for answers. How could he save anyone? He was just a runt that wasn't right.

"My my, you are the clueless one, aren't you." stated the fox, still looking at the youth with the same level gaze. "If you're going to save the world, you'll have to start learning pretty quickly. Get a move on, why don't you? Get going!" and with that, the fox turned and bounded away into the strange place that he'd led Chris to.

"Wait, come back!" a shout was sent after him, the young wolf going to run after him yet stumbling as his legs seemed to give out beneath him. Landing on his stomach, he opened his eyes to look to his front paws, gaze widening in shock as he saw how morphed they'd gone. His fur was gone, and his toes were too long, his claws to short. "Come back!" he shouted, squirming now and trying to run. But part of his mind knew that he had to be waking up, because he could once again feel his mother's fur warmth. "Fox, wait!" he shouted once more, stirring the two sleeping wolves nearby him. When he opened his eyes to wakefulness, he felt his body freeze with something not-quite fear.

"Chris, dear, what's wrong?" Alakws muttered in a somewhat worried tone, stretching her paws forward as she urged herself awake and looked over to her son.

"My..." he started, his throat tightening as he tried to get the words out. "...m-my..." but the answer was obvious enough as it was. The dream, this time, was not only a dream. His paws...were wrong. All wrong. Everything was wrong. His back paws felt trapped, and there was something soft surrounding his form, stopping him from feeling his mother's fur.

Startled and afraid for a moment, the she-wolf got to her paws and scrambled back, baring her teeth for a moment before recognizing that his scent was unchanged. "Stars...!" she gasped softly, taking a cautious step forward. "Chris, you're-" a snarl erupted nearby, and instinctively she placed herself over the frozen youth.

"Move, Lady! Are you blind?" Russet growled, hackles raised and eyes on fire. He had been a little ways off, coming over when he heard Chris' shouts, and stumbling across the two.

Alakws barked quickly back at him, dipping her head to speak quickly to Chris, knowing there would be no explaining this. How could she explain something she didn't understand. "Get up, Chris. Get up and run!" as she spoke, she sunk her teeth into the strange, loose fur covering the back of his neck, pulling him up and pushing with her muzzle at his back. "Get away!" with the last comment, she turned in time to stop Russet in his leap.

If he'd been afraid moments before, Russet's snarling reaction made him terrified. His mother's shouts did nothing to sooth the fears, nor did the way his legs didn't want to move. Chris could hear them fighting behind him - they'd never fought! - and knew he needed to do as his mother told him, to get away. Everything moved in a blur, as if time was hurling him forward. There were so many things wrong, and nothing to explain why.

He couldn't hear right, couldn't smell, and it was harder to see in the waxing light of dawn than it would normally have been. His back legs worked wrong, and his front legs were too short. His paws were broken, they had to be, and his paw pads torn off in a way that didn't create the pain it should have. Somehow, though, he found himself falling against one of the stone piles from his dream. His head collided sideways with a sharper one of the pile, bringing a yelp to tear from his vocals as he felt the stone cut into the fur less patch under his eye. Lifting his head and casting his panicked gaze around, the youth caught sight of the remembered opening, throwing himself through and continuing on his way.

Before long the forest opened up, fell back, and the ground turned to rough stone. A moment later the stone dropped away, and he found himself staggering forward onto a blacker version of the rock, shining wet with morning dew. Still he went forward, wanting to be as far away from the fight as possible. Never before had Russet shown any signs of such violence...and never before at him! What had Chris done to anger him so? What had he said to bring on the attack?

His thoughts were torn through when a bright small-sun broke through the dawn to his left. There was a loud, painful noise on the air that elicited the last bit of terror that was left for the time being, and he could take no more. Giving in to what his dysfunctional legs had been urging him to do the whole time, Chris let himself fall forward onto the black stone, curling on his side into a scared, trembling ball. There was another blaring noise, followed by a horrible screech, and then for a moment utter silence. The young wolf kept his eyes shut tightly.

There was a click, and a slam proceeding the sound of paw fall. Then something spoke, sounding panicked, "Oh, my God!" it said, the paw fall quickening and coming towards him. He must have fallen in water, because his face felt wet; strange that no other part of him did. Something touched against his back, making him jump before curling up more tightly into a ball. "Oh, you poor thing! Are you hurt? I didn't hit you, did I? Oh, my God!"

Whatever had touched his back moved to his shoulder, grasping hold of his upper front legs and pulling him quickly into a sitting position. Chris realized then that his eyes must have broken, and that was where the water on his face was from. Under his left eye felt warm and sticky as well. "You poor child!" the voice partially shrieked, the youth now seeing that this must have been another she-creature, like Addy's mommy. "You're shaking horribly! Where are your parents? Your mother? Are you hurt?"

"My..." Chris started, for some reason her quick babbling managing to calm him. Or maybe it was that he wasn't running anymore. Either way, the calm was helping him to think, and he remembered how he'd left his mother, fighting with Russet. "My...Mother! Russet, he tried..." the way his mouth was forming words felt strange. Everything felt strange. "...tried to attack me. And Mother told me to run, get away. I don't know...if she's alright!"

"Attack you? And your mother?" the she-creature trilled. "Oh, my! Where are they, sweety?" she was running her front paws through the fur on his head, and suddenly tried to pull him closer to her and move back and forth. Startled, Chris pulled back from her, casting his gaze about wildly for a moment before spotting the tree line, and pointing.

"In there, in Russet's territory!" Looking back at her, he was suddenly curious. Maybe his mother wouldn't have to fight him on her own. "Are you gonna help her?"

"In...there? Oh! No, dear. I'll bring you back to my house, and take care of you. We'll call the police, and let them go search for your mother. Come on, now, can you stand up? What's your name?" As she spoke she helped him to his paws, but as soon as she let her hand off his foreleg the youth started to fall back once more. "Oh! Come on, then, I'll help you into the car."

After the first few stumbles, it seemed that his legs began to work a bit better. It was strange, because the she-creature insisted that he walk only on his back legs. "My name's Chris..." he obligingly replied once he was getting the hang of walking this way without concentrating solely on his back paws. Once he'd given his name, as they made their way wherever she was leading him, Chris allowed himself to look around where he'd ended up, trying to take in the strange silhouettes in the scant light of morning.

He didn't recognize anything...yet at the same time he did, from his dream with the fox. Maybe...this is what he'd meant, when he'd said to change? But...if it was, then...what exactly did he need to learn? Shifting his gaze back to where the she-creature was towering over him, he thought to himself that he would ask her. Maybe she would give him answers that the fox wouldn't. And...if not, then, maybe he would visit the fox again, if only in his dreams.