The Adventures of a South Pole Pig

by Chris Kurtz

Each time their burdens slammed onto the floor, Flora jumped. The supplies were rolled or shoved or tossed into place, and then the men banged up the stairs, only to return with another load.

  They were all business and spoke only when they needed to.

  “Cap’n says leave a path.”

  “Cap’n says stack ’em only two high.”

  “Strap down those barrels. There’re rough seas between here and there. Cap’n says the precious cargo down here will be the difference between life and death once the expedition starts.”

  Precious cargo? Maybe the captain would come down next and inspect his supplies and his pig. He sounded like a person who could sort this out.

  The parade of men finally ended without a single one of them noticing or speaking to her or scratching her head. The last man disappeared through the doorway, and Flora was alone again.

  Was it possible ... could she be the precious cargo? Being put down here had to have something to do with being special. Or maybe it had to do with the training a sled pig needed. Yes, that was it!

  She would show the captain her best spirit when he came down to look things over—not just boxes and barrels, but his special pig, too.

  Chapter 13

  When the ship’s horn blew, it felt as though the deep sound went inside Flora and rattled around. Two more blasts came after the first. As soon as the last blast died away, Flora became aware of a low rumble.

  The ship’s engines were running. A slow side-to-side rocking motion started up and sent a thrill through Flora from the tip of her snout down to the end of her tail, despite her awful quarters.

  They were under way!

  She looked around at all of the supplies piled against the walls of the ship. Surrounding her was a wide space, a clear walking path to the stairs, and another path through the boxes and barrels. Close by was a food bowl. Flora sniffed it—spaghetti with tomato sauce and rinds of squash. Not bad, but she’d rather explore her new environment.

  Unfortunately, Flora couldn’t get farther than a few steps before she was stopped short. She walked a few more paces in the other direction until her chain pulled tight. But this time she strained against it, and the chain gave. Behind her she heard the box she was clipped to grind against the floor.

  She sat down. This could get tiring.

  But wait! That was the point! It was supposed to be hard work. Flora had some catching up to do. Stuck in her pen back home, she hadn’t trained nearly as much as the farm dogs.

  Flora pulled at her chain again and heard a satisfying growl from the box scraping over the rough wooden decking. Her leather collar dug into her neck. Good. Sled pulling wasn’t supposed to be comfortable. Too bad no one was down here to cheer her on and make sure her technique was right.

  Instead a smell wrinkled her nose. It was not a good smell. She tried to shut it out. She focused on the window in the door at the top of the stairs, on that small bit of light, and strained again. Don’t ... give ... up.

  Step. Pull. Step, step! Stop.

  As soon as Flora sat down, she heard that strange rustling again.

  “Anybody there?” she asked.

  Another rustle, or maybe it was more like scratching, came from behind a box. So did more of that bad smell. Flora shivered.

  But this was no time to be afraid like little Alfred. She dragged her box until she could peer into a dark space between cargos. The floor almost seemed to be moving, as if it were alive. Flora looked longingly at the stairs, and when she turned back—

  Yikes! She hopped backwards.

  A big, greasy rat with long, wiry whiskers and a bald patch between his ears had stepped out from behind a box and was sniffing in Flora’s direction.

  Flora tried to be brave. She tried to remember her rat-hunting moves, but suddenly attacking a crumpled paper bag or a dried orange peel didn’t seem like enough training.

  As she watched him creep closer, she worked hard to stop shaking so her chain wouldn’t rattle. Then he stood on his hind legs and opened his mouth, showing off his impressive, sharp yellow teeth. He snapped his mouth shut. Then he oozed in the direction of her food bowl.

  Flora scrambled as far away as possible and sank to her stomach. She could see him slip over the bowl’s edge and paddle around while searching out the best morsels. Evidently he did not care that his fur was becoming soggy with tomato sauce or that this was not his food.

  In a moment he was joined by two mean-looking buddies. Chewing and slurping were the only sounds. Flora imagined an ocean of rats watching from the shadows. She hid her face between her hooves.

  Once the food in Flora’s bowl had been eaten, the rats disappeared. That was good. The light at the top of the stairs was dimming. Night was coming.

  The rustling in the darkness seemed even louder.

  Flora shivered at the thought of having to listen to rat sounds all night long. The ship was bucking and pounding along. She could feel the boards underneath her shudder. She needed to think about something cheerful.

  “Hike,” she whispered to herself, and brought the pictures to mind. The snow was a glittering blanket. Across the folds of white raced Flora the sled pig. She was galloping beside a frozen lake with a team of a dozen sled dogs. Oscar was in front. At the end of the line was the sled, brightly painted in a festive blue with white stars for decoration.

  “Onward!” called Oscar.

  “Onward!” Flora echoed. “We’re tough! We’re brave! And we’re a little bit crazy!” She leaped and twisted in the air in a crazy little dance before speeding on.

  Even if sleep didn’t come, Flora’s mind was in a far better place.

  “Hike,” she murmured again and again.

  Chapter 14

  The next morning, the door at the top of the stairs opened.

  Flora leaped to her feet. Captain?

  A sailor came down, wearing a dirty apron and holding a bucket of slops. He was a giant of a man with hair on his arms as long and curly as a sheep’s and a lower lip that hung open, showing huge uneven teeth.

  “The ship’s cook wants to check on his bacon maker!” He had a voice like the scraping sound of a shovel on a cement floor. Slobber collected in the corners of his mouth as he talked. “Time for eating, my little pork chop.”

  When he dumped the slops into her bowl, Flora gladly grabbed a bite. Wonderful! Biscuits with gravy.

  “Good piggy. You ate everything from yesterday,” he said, patting her on the flank. “Amos likes a big eater.”

  Flora looked up. If only he knew who the big eaters were around here.

  “Amos wants you to grow fat! So fat! So big!” His long arms, which usually hung almost to his knees, were spread wide.

  Flora plunged her mouth into the slops. She was on her way to getting stronger. Now she needed to get bigger, too. She looked over the top of the bowl, glancing around for what she knew was waiting and watching.

  Sure enough. As soon as the cook’s footsteps faded at the top of the stairs, the three rats slipped out from between the boxes. Whiskers. Matted brown fur. Impossibly small, shiny eyes. Their leader, the one with the bald patch, clacked his curved yellow teeth together. Snap! Snap!

  Taking up the call, the other two clacked their teeth as well, and the ocean of rats she’d imagined the day before started coming out of the shadows.

  Flora swallowed a last mouthful, backed up, and locked her trembling knees.

  Then the bald rat king hissed.

  It was a terrible sound, worse than the teeth clacking. As soon as he did this, the army of rats swarmed over her food, snarling at one another as they cleaned out her bowl. When it was spotless, they slipped away into the shadows—all except for the king. He crawled back into the bowl, sprawled on his back, and began to lick the gravy from his round middle. With every lick she could see his yellow teeth. She could smell him too. It was a sour smell, and Flora guessed that all the licking in the world wouldn’t get that stink out.

  When he was done, the rat rose up o
n his hind legs. He opened his mouth and hissed again.

  Flora tried to step back farther, but the collar jammed up under her chin. What did he want now?

  Thankfully, nothing. He waddled away...

  Until Amos came downstairs with dinner.

  Flora got ready to gulp mouthfuls as soon as the slops hit her bowl. While she swallowed quickly, she kept one eye on the shadows and the other on Amos.

  Please stay, she thought.

  But as she took her third bite, he clomped off. This time he was only halfway up the stairs when eyes, ears, and whiskers slipped into the dim light.

  Flora hurried away, still chewing.

  This was too big a challenge. One pig against an army of rats didn’t seem at all fair.

  That night in her dreams, naked tails snaked across her body and twisted around her neck, choking her.

  Chapter 15

  Flora woke up the next morning with a terrible headache—but also a change of heart. She staggered to her feet. “Enough!” she said out loud.

  Sophia had been wrong when she had said pigs were like frogs. Pigs did have weapons. But what were they? Flora paced weakly back and forth. The chain around her neck clanked against the boards at every step. No answer came into her head.

  Flora ran her tongue over her teeth. They were great for chewing leftover scrambled eggs and watermelon rinds. But they didn’t feel like weapons.

  And her hooves weren’t sharp enough to put a hole through a paper bag unless it was wet.

  The door opened.

  “Good morning, delicious!” Amos dropped the food into her bowl and ran his hands over Flora’s ribs. “How is Amos’s little sausage?” Spit flew from his mouth with every word. And then he was gone.

  Flora fixed her gaze on the dark corners as she warily moved over her bowl.

  She didn’t take a bite.

  Slither. Click.

  She could hear tails sliding and toenails tapping just out of sight.

  Then a low tide of hissing rats flowed forward in a half circle in front of her. Flora realized she was more than five times as big as the largest one. None of them even came up to her chin. That gave her some confidence, but not much.

  She wanted to stamp her feet, but she was afraid her trembling knees would collapse. She tried to calm her beating heart.

  In the center of the mass, the rat king stepped forward. He opened his mouth impossibly wide, like an enormous yawn, and then brought his teeth together in a loud snap. In the next instant, Flora was attacked.

  She swung her head, sending a couple of rats tumbling. But it didn’t stop the crush of fur and teeth. Some jumped on her back while others went at her underbelly with sharp bites. She came down hard on her front feet, trying to stomp a hairless tail or two, but the rats were too fast.

  Flora scrambled backwards, and as soon as she moved away from the bowl, the rats called off their attack and scurried to get their share of slops. Flora looked down at her shoulders. They were covered with scratches and drops of blood.

  She felt dazed. Nothing had prepared her for an enemy so fearsome. Flora recalled Luna’s attack on the barn rat. What would Luna do with a whole thieving bunch of ship rats? Well, she wouldn’t give up, that’s for sure. I won’t give up either, Flora thought, trying to find the courage to believe the words. I can’t give up—they’re eating my only food.

  Over the next few days, Flora had to be satisfied with a small victory that kept her from starving.

  When Big Amos came down with her food, she found she could eat four bites by swallowing without chewing before he clomped away.

  By stamping her feet, she could usually keep the rats at bay and grab one more bite before the entire crew gathered. They were brave only in a large group.

  She also knew that when she backed off quickly, they would leave her alone.

  But all of this meant she still got little to eat. Yet Flora was determined not to give up on her dream. She continued to pull her box back and forth to improve her strength. And sometimes she practiced going a little crazy, prancing on her hind legs, shaking her head, and snorting.

  All the while she would whisper to herself, “Don’t give up!”

  The training always tuckered her out, which was just as well. It was easier for her to drift off to sleep at the end of the day.

  One night, curled up tight to stay warm, she saw two stars appear in the blackness. In her hazy half sleep, she didn’t question how stars could come down from the sky and shine in the hold of a ship. She just watched the tiny glimmers of light and remembered that night on the dock. The two stars twinkled—and then they blinked.

  Flora sat up and grunted, her chain clinking softly. Stars didn’t blink.

  She waited.

  The pair of lights developed a furry face around them. “Cat attack,” said the face.

  “Sophia!” squealed Flora. “You changed your mind. You came with us!”

  Chapter 16

  Shanghaied! Sophia yowled. Kidnapped. Stolen. Forced to come aboard against my free will.”

  “Join the club.” But Flora was so excited, she couldn’t keep her front feet still.

  “Cats don’t join...” Sophia glanced over her shoulder. “Never mind.”

  Something was different about her, Flora thought. Sophia had lost weight. She looked less confident. “Are you all right?” she asked. “You look thin.”

  “So do you—and definitely hairier.”

  Flora looked down. Her hair had always been softer than the other pigs’ hair on the farm, but now it was growing thicker, covering her body in a coat of white that could almost be called fur.

  Sophia picked up a paw and winced. There was a cut on it. “The worst thing about being on this tub is they expect you to work for your supper. I was tucked into a nice warm corner in the kitchen until the cook saw something hiding in the rice bin he didn’t like.”

  Flora had a pretty good idea what it was. The cook was lucky to have Sophia. She’d keep his kitchen rat-free.

  The cat went on. “Threw Sophia down here like a moldy, sea-soaked bag of corn. Said I had to make myself useful. Apparently there’s a rat problem on this ship that can only be solved by making a cat miserable!”

  “It’s true.” Flora peered into a dark corner. “This ship needs a rat hunter like you.”

  A scrabble of claws came from the dark. Sophia crouched and stared in the direction of the sound. “Well,” she said, “off Sophia goes, then, to do her job.”

  “Wait! Stay and talk for a little while first.” Flora strained against her chain. “You wouldn’t believe how lonely it’s been.”

  “Not lonely enough for some of us,” Sophia muttered. “Gotta go...”

  “You’re going to do great, you know. You have the perfect skills and weapons.”

  Sophia shuddered. “Yeah, perfect.”

  “But I thought you said—”

  “I like mice.” Sophia flinched and hissed as a rat popped into view for a moment. “Mice practically roll over when you pounce on them.”

  “But you told me—”

  “I might have exaggerated. Actually, Sophia grew up in a house with a carpet and a sun-warmed cushion next to the window. Sophia hates rats.”

  A loud grinding sound, like teeth on wood, started up close by. Sophia made a noise that seemed to come from deep in her throat. It sounded angry and afraid at the same time.

  “You’ll get the hang of it,” Flora said. She wished she could help somehow.

  “Oh, I’m sure I will.” Sophia sighed. “I’m a cat, aren’t I? I’m not some creature with pebbles instead of paws and teeth as dull as spoons.”

  Flora ignored the insult. “Well, whenever you need a break from hunting, I’ll keep you company.”

  The cat sniffed. “Too bad I have to go back to work at all, unlike someone else”—she looked straight at Flora—“who gets her food for free.”

  “I’ve been working,” Flora said. If the cat stuck around, she’d show her just h
ow strong her pulling muscles were getting. “And I would be happy to work more. I’m willing to do practically anything.”

  Sophia sat back. She no longer seemed eager to go on the prowl.

  The tickle of a plan crept into Flora’s brain. She sat on her haunches too.

  “Look. I can do even better than keep you company. I hate rats as much as you, maybe even more. I bet together...” Flora’s voice trailed off. She was afraid of sounding ridiculous.

  The cat’s tail swished. “What are you saying?”

  Flora sat up tall. “Pigs are not known for their rat-hunting skills. But no one’s ever tried to teach us. I can learn anything, and I would very much like to prove that a pig can be good at important work. Sophia, since you are the rat-hunting sheriff on this ship, I would be proud to be your deputy.”

  “Cats don’t work with others,” Sophia said. Then she looked up at Flora. “On the other hand, it’s not as though the rat problem on this ship is going to solve itself.”

  “I want to be useful,” said Flora.

  “Aren’t you forgetting something? You’re locked up.”

  “Not a problem.” Flora stretched out her neck. “Your teeth look just right for cutting through leather.”

  It took a while and more grumbling, but before too long Flora’s chain clanked to the dark floor, the collar chewed in two.

  Chapter 17

  Taking rat-catching lessons from someone with a different set of equipment was a challenge for Flora.

  “I don’t get it,” she said. Deputy and sheriff were in a space behind a stack of boxes that had become their training ground. “Can you explain it again?”

  “Crouch, pounce, dig in your claws, and then at the end, bite the neck to finish it off. It’s called the death bite, and anyone with a killer instinct knows how to do it.” All business, Sophia demonstrated each step with great energy, and when she got to the death-bite part, she attacked a coil of rope. “Like that. Couldn’t be simpler.”