FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

From the moment I first laid eyes on him, something seemed off about our new freshman goalie. To be fair, anyone who's played hockey before could tell you that goalies tend to be eccentric individuals, full of secret game-day rituals and odd behaviors, and the others I'd played with on the NHSU Newts were no exception. Furthermore, anyone who's been to college before could tell you that freshmen are bound to exhibit some awkwardness and look out of place while they're adjusting to unfamiliar settings. An untrained eye may have written the dog's peculiar behavior off as some mixture of those two adages, but I couldn't shake my suspicions that there was something else going on. After all, whose nose is more highly trained to sniff out fishy situations than a bear's?

In the locker room before our first practice of the season, all us upperclassmen were catching up with one another after our summer apart, but I made sure to keep my eyes peeled for any unfamiliar faces as well. Four freshmen had made the final cut for the varsity team, and as the newly-minted captain, it was my job to make sure they felt warmly welcomed. Three came in earlier than most of the older guys, clearly jittery and eager to get on the ice. I showed the wolf, coyote, and husky to the far corner where newbies' lockers were, and was surprised to hear that none of them had any clue who the fourth was, or where he would be. As I slid my shoulder pads over my head and unfolded the black jersey in my bag, staring down at the long-awaited white "C" decal embroidered on the chest, a single set of footsteps echoing down the hallway caught my attention.

The first thing to stand out about this guy was clearly his size; if all you saw of him was his lanky limbs and glossy sand-colored coat, you'd think he was a horse. The black-muzzled face and stubby tail quickly gave away that he was a dog, but he stood almost a head taller than any other canine on the team, surpassing even the veritable mountain of a Saint Bernard we called Denis. His size wasn't what struck me as odd, though; it was what he wore. Namely, whereas the rest of us showed up in street clothes, t-shirts and gym shorts to beat the humid September heat, and most of us were down to our jocks and socks as we passed the time chatting, the new guy arrived with his black lycra baselayer already on, and a baggy pair of fleece sweatpants on over his tights. He lingered in the archway, fiddling with the small gauges in his ears and scanning the room with a posture that screamed how tense he must have felt.

"Too cold out there for shorts, eh?" I chuckled casually, leaning against the wall beside him.

"No, I..." he muttered, his amber eyes warily meeting mine. "I didn't want to worry about having time to change."

"Smart. Coach runs a pretty tight ship, and if you're not geared up by 6:15 sharp, he'll make the whole team skate double laps." I stretched out a paw toward his, surprised at how meekly such a large paw could grip mine to shake it. "Name's Mack, by the way. You're the new goalie?"

"Hopefully." He grinned faintly. "Elliot Humboldt. Still not sure how much action a third-string goalie can get in a 40-game season."

"We all gotta start somewhere." I laughed. "The other freshies' lockers are in the corner there. Here, let me..."

I reached for one of the two hefty gym bags he'd set down when he walked in, but he hastily snatched both up.

"I got it, thanks." He made a beeline for the remaining empty locker in the corner, and I watched with suspicion as he opened the door only halfway. Standing directly in front of it, he unloaded one bag in such a way that no one could see what he was taking out of it, then removed all his pads and helmet from the other.

It was entirely possible that he was just one of those types who get shy stripping down in front of other guys. I don't know how anyone could make it through the years and years of hockey needed to reach the NCAA level while still keeping that up, but it was a definite possibility. Similarly, not letting anyone else touch his equipment could have been one of those quirks that goalies are reputed for, even though most only get superstitious on game days. Hell, maybe he was just wound up with nerves. Whatever the reason, the way he acted made me suspicious.

Once Coach Wilde entered the room and gave everyone his typical "welcome back" spiel, the greying retriever introduced his new assistant coach, a welcome sight to all the veterans in the room except myself: my older brother Maverick. While he promised me that he wouldn't interfere or embarrass me (as he was so prone to do), after telling the freshmen that they should go to their captain if they're feeling lost or out of place, he felt it necessary to add that if the captain is ever, "too much of a Mr. Grumpy Bear", they could always come to him. On that note, I was coaxed into giving some kind of speech for my first official act as captain, but all I could cook up on the spot was a bunch of platitudes about putting in hard work and never giving up. Coach and the upperclassmen knew I was never one to rattle off meaningless bullshit, but I could have put together something a bit better if my mind weren't so distracted.

We were ushered out onto the ice to run drills and get our blood flowing. I'd kept up my regimen of training and working out all summer, but getting back into what Coach semi-jokingly referred to as "a light warm-up" left me panting and sweating in minutes. Perhaps the only thing keeping me going, aside from my obnoxious brother shouting to "get my fuzzy ass in gear, or else go home and take a nap", was wanting to watch how Humboldt held up in net. Once Frisk, the second-string goaltender, rotated out and the big dog came in, I was pleasantly surprised to see him poised and positioned like a pro. As the skaters made their way down the ice to fire off shots at him, his long arms batted the pucks away like they were nothing but mosquitos, and his legs were like springs, propelling him side-to-side in the event a puck went out of his ample reach. He seemed perfectly at home, a jarring contrast from his demeanor in the locker room.

When the strenuous, toilsome first hour of practice was up, we had more than earned the 15-minute respite before scrimmages would start. While everyone else made a mad dash toward the locker room, I remained on the ice until everyone was off, like a shepherd making sure his flock stayed in line. The last man off was none other than Humboldt, who regarded me just as curiously as I did him.

"Sorry for being short with you earlier." He remarked as he skated past. "I thought you were just some random older guy giving me a hard time."

"Hey now, I can be the captain and still give you a hard time." I snorted. "How're you holding up so far?"

"Pretty good. Thirsty, though." He slid his helmet off and strode through the gate to the bench. Taking a seat next to the big orange cooler, he took a cup and watched as lime green Gatorade poured in, eyeing it ambivalently. "They don't keep any water out here?"

"There's a spout in the hallway back to the lockers." I pointed. "You gotta start loading up on fluids an hour or two before practice, though. Pre-emptive strike against thirst."

"I'm kind of...specific about what I drink and when I drink it." He lowered his eyes, tossing the cup and unlacing his skates.

"You goalies are a weird breed." I sighed. "Guess that means you don't have to spend your whole break waiting in line for the urinals like the other guys, though."

"Mmm." He turned toward the hallway, water bottle in hand, and my eyes were drawn toward the volume markings on its translucent surface, clearly drawn and labeled by hand. It seemed like the harder I looked at this guy, the more strange stuff I would notice, and I seriously began to wonder if I was overthinking the whole thing.

Scrimmages were equally as draining as warm-ups, but the rush of getting out there with my teammates and playing some semblance of real hockey was exciting enough to power me through it. I tried not to consciously split my attention from my own play, but kept finding my eyes on Humboldt, who was playing just as strong as Swift, our starter, if not stronger. When me and the rest of the "A Team" were pitted against Humboldt and his "C Team", I took note of what seemed to be his only flaw so far: he seemed a bit slow to flip his stick around, meaning his five-hole would be harder to block in an instant if he were caught off-guard.

That meant that, as soon as the puck reached my stick in the offensive zone, I had to test my theory out. I saw my opening and wound up for a slap shot, tilting the blade deceptively to make it seem as though I'd be shooting off-center and top shelf. The stick whipped through the air, striking the ice just behind the puck, and down the ice it rocketed, heading straight between the goalie's legs. His stick was outstretched to the side, but as he tracked the puck and reevaluated his strategy, he did something almost unthinkable: from his crouched butterfly position, he dropped even further, nearly into a full split, and stopped the puck with his crotch. Knowing my slap shots had a reputation to practically edge up against the sound barrier, I winced reflexively, imagining how much pain a shot like that could cause when it struck the most sensitive place possible.

Without so much as a flinch, he scooped the stopped puck in his glove, and the whistle blew from the sidelines.

"Thank your lucky jockstraps, boys!" Maverick bellowed from the bench, slapping his knee as he laughed raucously. "Humboldt, you still kicking, bud? Need an ice pack or something"

"Uh, yeah? I'm fine." He shouted back. "Good shot, Mack!"

I mustered up a smile and thumbs-up, while internally, my jaw hit the floor. Even with a cup made of titanium, I'd never seen someone take a shot to the bits like that and not be in some kind of pain. He had to be hiding it and keeping a straight face; that was the only logical answer.

When practice was over, I thought I spotted evidence to support that. As Humboldt took his skates off on the bench and made his way back to the lockers, something in his gait had changed; his thighs seemed spread apart, giving him a bit of an unstable toddle as he trailed behind the rest of the team. After talking with Coach to get some notes on the scrimmages, I followed likewise, and when I entered the locker room, half the team was already stripped down and in the showers. My suspicious freshman, though, had left his pads on the floor in front of his locker, and I barely caught a glimpse of his tail stub rounding the corner to the long-disused private stalls. Not about to trail him in there, I peeled off my uniform and pads to join the guys in washing up. The relief of cool water flowing through my fur distracted me from my thoughts, until a nearby voice jarred me.

"Hey freshie, you still got both your balls attached?" Swift boomed, almost striking the showerhead with his antlers as he doubled over laughing. "I took one of Mack's slappers to the hoof once, and had to sit out for two weeks. Can't imagine how you're even walking right now!"

Sure enough, as I whipped around to look, Humboldt was hanging a towel at the entrance, buck naked.

"I think they look alright, how about you tell me?" He grinned slyly, cupping the trimmed fur of his pendulous balls in a paw and giving them a slight squeeze for theatrical effect. At that, the whole room erupted in raucous laughter and hollering. With the tension broken, he took a free space between the other two goalies and started building a foamy lather of shower gel between his paws. He seemed to catch on well enough with the others, and my theory that he was uncomfortable in the nude flew straight out the window. Why had he gone to the stalls to strip down, then? Things weren't adding up, and not being able to figure it out was starting to test my patience.

Being the last two to reach the showers, it made sense that Humboldt and I were the last ones in there, though I may have waited around intentionally.

"Sorry I made you eat that shot, kid." I offered from across the room when we were finally alone. "But if you're ever hurting, you need to speak up. I saw the way you were walking back from the bench."

"What do you mean?" He raised an eyebrow. "I told you, I'm fine."

"People who are fine don't walk like_this_." I mimed out a bowlegged cowboy stance. "Don't feel like you have to act tough to fit in. Nine times out of ten, playing on an injury is only gonna make it worse."

"I appreciate the concern, but seriously, I'm good." He turned off the water and walked to the exit. "I wouldn't have dropped down to block the shot if I didn't think I had enough protection."

"Still, though, that's a risky call." I grabbed my towel from the hook beside his. "I don't wanna see you get hurt, bud. Promise me you'll take care of yourself?"

"Made it this far without too many problems." He smirked, and we rounded the corner to where the others were getting dressed. "But for your sake, fine. I promise."

"Good." He reached into his locker, guarding the door just as before, and pulled out a small drawstring bag before closing it and pacing back toward the stalls. "Hey, where are you going?"

"To go change." He stood his ground, but I couldn't help but notice a faint blush creeping across his cheeks. His mouth opened like he had some further explanation, but he turned on his heel without another word.

"Well, listen, there's gonna be a little get-together at the hockey house in a couple hours. The other freshmen should already know, but make sure you guys are there at 10 sharp. It's mandatory for the team."

"Sounds like Coach isn't the only one who runs a tight ship." He muttered over his shoulder. "Gotcha, 10 sharp."

As he left the room, I seriously contemplated sticking around even longer, just to see what else I could figure out about this mysterious dog. My common sense got the better of me; not only did I have to set up the house for later and speak with the upperclassmen before it started, but I didn't want Humboldt thinking I was stalking him. The last thing I needed was him thinking it was me who was out of the ordinary.