Atlas has been a hero twice now. keep in mind that he's deaf, this was all just him SENSING that something was wrong. =]
last summer, he and I went to the river to swim almost every afternoon. the town we lived in had a lot of homeless people living along the bike path, and they occasionally came down to the river to bathe. they left us alone for the most part, and we usually just kept our distance. one day, another young woman and her Lab were swimming down stream from us. I was facing away from her when I heard her scream. as a turned around, I saw one of the homeless men threatening her with a small blade. I just froze, I had no idea what to do. in that split second, before I could grab him, Atlas flew at top speed away from me. the woman's Lab had run off somewhere, but Atlas was heading for them. he was so smart about it, to this day I'm AMAZED at his thinking. instead of just barreling straight into danger, as I had expected him to do, he ran onto the bank and into the brush behind them!! he was out of sight for a moment, and then BAM, he shot from the bushes and threw his entire body weight into the man, who fell to the ground and dropped his knife. as the man got to his feet, Atlas was snarling and looking more threatening than I ever thought he could. that was it, the man took off back up the bank and was gone. the other woman and I were both utterly SHOCKED. neither of us could believe it. GOOD BOY.
his second time being a hero was just last week. I was home alone, and it was around 11:00PM. we were playing a game of "find the tennis ball" in the living room, when I heard the back door being unlocked. thinking it was probably just my boyfriend's dad coming home, I wasn't worried. but when the door opened, Atlas stopped in his tracks and looked towards the back of the house. there was that snarling again. his teeth were showing, his hackles were raised, he looked downright scary. suddenly he was creeping, low to the ground, into the kitchen. then he was barking, and he NEVER barks. loud, threatening barks. I got up and followed him just in time to see the intruder taking off back out the door. Atlas chased him to the gate, and then stood there barking for a moment as if to say "yeah! and stay out!!" he was hyper-alert the rest of the night, but still managed to lick the faces of the police officers who came to investigate. =P