Name: Leroy Jeremy Smith

Age: 11 years

Parents: deceased, lives with adoptive parents

Siblings: one younger brother (adoptive)

Partner/crush: none (too young)

Children: None (way too young)

Personality: Leroy is a typical young boy, he is cheeky, wild, always up to play and easily bored. He is quite sociable and loves to play with his friends. At school he is rather calm and tries to listen to the teacher´s words, more or less sucsessive.

Likes: Soccer, playing outside, making friends, candy, dogs, ice cream

Dislikes: Boredom, being alone, most type of vegetable excepts carrots, darkness, his parents being mad at him

History: Leroy was born in Tanana, Alaska. He was an only child. Due do his parents working alot he spend lots of time at his grandmother´s house. He didn´t mind, his grandmother was always nice to him and he had lots of fun playing with her or simply listening to her stories. He even went for sleepovers to her without his parents having to work. One of those sleepovers even saved his life.  While Leroy has been at his grandmother for the night the house of his parents burned down due to a lightning strike. His parents had no chance to get out. 

So, his grandmother took the 6 year old and cared for him. But soon she died of high age. So the only place for Leroy was the orphanage. The care assistants and even the other kids have been nice to him. But as the care assistants told him that he will get adopted by new parents one day he started to dislike the place. He couldn´t understand how some strangers should replace his parents. So, one night he decided to run away. He escaped through a window and took the very first train as stowaway. People from the orphanage did search for the 10 year old but without sucsess.

The train took him to White Mountain. As an old man asked him where he´s cme from and if he´s alone, offering to help him to search for his parents he ran off and hid in a small plane. But before he could get out again the plane started. So he was trapped. As the train landed he sneaked off, not knowing where he was, lost in a foreign town.

Soon he figured out that the plain took him to Nome. He soon found an old, abandoned shed where he used to hide and sleep. He stole food to survive and tried to appear as normal as he could. He knew if someone would figure out he´s an orphan he would have been taken back to the orphanage.

One day he found some stray pup, she followed him whereever he went so he decided to keep her, even though it meant he had to feed two mouths now. Soon he and the short-legged fluffball became close friends. After all they have been the only company they had. They´ve been keeping each other warm during the night and shared their food.

One day, Leroy has been playing on the ice of a frozen lake. Yara, how he named the dog, was too afraid so she waited on dry land. After about an hour, and Leroy´s constant calls she got over her fear and followed her master onto the ice.  Not long after the ice broke, causing Leroy to slip under it. Instead of helping her owner Yara panicked and ran off. Somehow Leroy managed to find a way back to the surface. Luckily an old lady heard Leroy´s scream as the ice broke and rushed over to the lake. She took him to the local hospital to make sure he will be fine because there was a high risk for hypothermia.

The old lady took him home as soon as the doctors let him off. She has seen him roaming the streets quite often and has always wondered where the boy came from. So she started to try to get him to talk. Even though Leroy avoided adults, fearing they would take him back to the orphanage he somehow trusted the old lady. Somewhat on her reminded him on his beloved grandmother. He just knew that this woman wouldn´t do him any harm. So he told her the whole story and asked her to promise not to take him back to the orphanage. The lady willed in, knowing that he couldn´t stay alone on the streets either. So she allowed him to stay at her house. In the evening when Leroy was sleeping she did sent out a telegraph to the orphanage, letting them know that Leroy is save and she knows a young pair who´d love to adopt such a little boy because they cannot have a child on their own. Also she asked if he could stay at her care until all paperwork for the adoption is done.

Glad to know Leroy is still alive and doing fine the care assistant willed in and soon the adoption was official only thing left was Leroy to be okay with his going-to-be parents.. At first Leroy was shocked and angry as the lady told him but as she said that the pair which was going to adopt him where her son and his wife and that she´ll be his new grandmother then Leroy calmed down. He willed in to meet the pair and he liked them. About a week later he was allowed to move to his new parents, who treatened him like he was their own. Everything was fine, excepts the fact he was still missing his dog, he wasn´t sure if she died in the water or not. He has been searching for Yara but he couldn´t find her.

Some months after he got adopted his new parents announced that he is going to get a baby brother. Even though the doctors said that his mother can´t get pregnant it did happen. Leroy was excited to become a big brother and couldn´t wait for the baby to be born. And to top that he did find Yara after almost 6 months of searching. Telling his parents that she was the dog he kept talking about they allowed him to keep her.

Relation to Balto: Lives in Nome, hid in Duke´s plane which took him to his new hometown, is a classmate and friend of Rosie.