You make the effort to lift your arms and hug him, because if this is the only kiss you're getting today you want it to count. When you finally part, you say, "Hand me my phone. Text me when you decide where you're getting food from, and I'll decide what I want." "Cool beans," Pancho says, fiddling with her own phone. "You took photos of us kissing, didn't you." "Nope." "Pancho..." "Video." "I hate you forever." She just makes her phone shutter-click again. "Sulk cam!"
You laugh a little and push back from him. "I don't really have the clothes for walking around with you as a human," you try to explain to Pancho. "And hind leg injuries really mount up, when you're bipedal, so I'll be going on all fours most of the time, especially this close to the moon... I don't know morse like all the rest of you lot, so it's a wag for 'yes' and a huff for 'no'. If your dog pushes me around I will bite."
"Yuck, no. The condition isn't even transferred like that." You scratch your nose, considering. "And I think it mostly kills dogs, that I've heard."
"Then don't bite her. Swat her on the nose. She'll figure it out. Okay, bro, text you in a bit," you say to Bel, and offer him a fistbump, which he meets with a slight wince. Fingers still fucked up. Oh well, he needs to keep moving them anyway.
You give Bel a last kiss, change, lick him messily across the mouth just for fun, and hop off the bed. The local anesthetic makes your flank feel a little strange, but you can move alright. "I need my collar but I don't know where it is," you announce, and go sniffing around. Purple is a lot easier to spot with primate eyeballs.
"I think Dad has all our stuff from the trip," Bel says. You wave to him, open the door for Erskin, and take a moment to squat down and collect the crumbs your silly beast left in the hallway. This is such a nice house, you're not going to track sloppy all over it your first visit.
You watch her pick up all the crumbs in polite confusion, then lick them out of her hand. They were Floor Crumbs. She probably wasn't going to eat them. After that you go thumping down the stairs to ask Alex where your collar is. Or... try to. Maybe Pancho will catch up and translate.
You dump the crumbs in the kitchen trash and give Colonel Kadros a summary of the situation. He seems pleased with the whole business, and fetches Erskin's collar, not at all disturbed by the fact that you're going to take his son's boyfriend walkies. Collecting Logan is no trouble; as soon as Erskin comes out of the house, she comes galloping up to try her friendship dance again, and you get her leash on her while she's distracted. "Lead on, bro. I'm game for a jog, I'm just not sure where to do it around here."
You're bristling and hesitant about the big white monster: she's friendly, but there's such a thing as too friendly, and she seems like the kind of lady who never got explained what 'personal space' meant sharply enough. When she tries to bop you with a paw you fold your ears back and dance off sideways. "Right, okay," you go. "Sure. Um. Let's go to the lakeside?" You set off, keeping your tail well clear of Logan's leash radius. You can feel her nose against your unmentionables from a meter away. Unsure where the lake is, exactly, you just sniff around and head as best as you can towards the smell of pine trees and water.
Between trying to keep Loggan from annoying the hell out of Erskin or getting tangled in her leash, and trying not to have stupid walking accidents due to the still-deepening snow, you don't notice you're cutting across private property until you're being stared at by two kids building a snowman and a woman who looks more like a nanny than a mom. "Uh, hi?" you grin sheepishly. Suddenly the kids are making keysmash noises interspersed with PUPPY! and Logan is doing the friend dance and all is chaos.
You're tremendously glad not to have to contend with a leash: you lope across the street and go stand behind the flimsy cover of a mailbox post, then watch in relative comfort and security while the dog is mobbed by children. Or, you have to amend, the dog mobs the children. It's a bit of a scene, but everyone seems extremely pleased about it, except for maybe Pancho. When she looks around to see where you've gone, you stick your tongue out at her in a deliberately human gesture. No social niceties for you, thanks!
There's a brief, awkward exchange where you're trying to ask directions to the public lakefront, the lady is trying to be polite about reminding you that a) leash laws and b) not your yard, and the kids are loving all over Logan and you're trying to keep her from knocking them down. The lady mutters, "Dios, vaya día." "Si, verdad?" you sigh. Her face lights up. You have the conversation all over again in Spanish, and somehow it works a lot better. You tell her you're a private nurse for the Colonel's son, and you're trying to take your patient's service dog for a walk, and he's heel-trained, but he was already on edge because Logan's too playful and now there's kids and apparently he's decided to just wait over there. He won't make mischief, so please don't call the police about the lack of a leash. She says she won't, and that you've been going the wrong way, the public lakefront is thattaway, and isn't the Colonel nice? And handsome too, but his son, whew, what a movie star, you lucky girl! Rather than tell her anything about being gay, or army buddies, or how bel's already taken, you just grin and shrug. "Okay, kiddos," you tell the lady's charges in English, "I need my dog back. Say bye!" "Bye!" they chorus, and you take your leave. As you join Erskin and say "Rusty! Heel!" for your audience, you reflect on such topics as working-class solidarity, heteronormativity, and how much you want a grilled cheese sandwich.
You fall in behind Pancho, hastily switch to the other side when Logan makes a lunge backwards, and swat the dog's nose. After a bit of confusion with leashes and legs and someone's tongue in your ear, you get yourselves more or less sorted and head off in the way that Pancho apparently knows to go now. Oh! Your dad! You can smell your dad on the wind! You bounce excitedly and nearly leave Pancho behind, only just barely remembering to fall back to her side. And swat Logan again. "It's my dad! He's by the lake! Can you walk faster?" you say to the human as best as you can.
What you get from this is that Erskin is eager to pick up the pace, and once you're on the road you trust your footing well enough to comply. You speed up to a doubletime lope, keeping an eye out for icy patches.
You know it's just a, a whatsit, a psychological effect of running side-by-side with someone, but by the time you make it to the lakeside you're feeling almost tolerant of Logan, who is at least not actively trying to smother you while she's busy trotting. And of course, Pancho was never not nice, so that's alright, then. She's a good egg. At the second bench in to the lakeside trail, there's your Dad! He's getting to his feet to greet you, but goes back with a wuff! when you bound up and get your paws on his shoulders. "Dad dad hi dad hallo there hi yes I love you!" you let him know, licking his chin. "And hello to you too, you scoundrel," he says back in english, and also licks your ear. You wag like mad. "Who's this fearsome companion you've picked up, then? One tough customer wasn't enough for you?" He extends a hand out past you towards Pancho. "You must be the inimitable, irreplaceable Sergeant— was it Sergeant?— Pancho. Delighted to meet you. I'm Reginald Aspera." "He's my dad," you put in, by way of several more happy chin-licks.
Erskin's enthusiasm tells you this guy is all right, so you're pretty relaxed as you shake his hand and say, "You have the advantage of me, sir." (erskin never said his last name when he introduced himself!)
"Not for long, I should think, ma'am," he says easily. "I'm this furry reprobate's father, for my many and various sins. Heard he and a friend had gotten in to some trouble and popped over to see what I could do. I've been bunking in Kadros's guest room— I suppose we must have just missed each other, what? Terrible shame you didn't come by earlier, breakfast was excellent." "I missed breakfast," you tell your father mournfully. "The last time you missed a meal it was because you were still in utero, you fat liar," your dad tells you, and pulls at your whiskers. You drop back to all fours, deeply wounded. "I'm deeply wounded," you say. "And well fed." "Not by half! We're getting lunch." "Oh! Well then!" Your father looks back up at Pancho. "Lunch, eh? Know anywhere good around here?"
"Nope, I'm one hundred percent lost," you answer cheerfully. "Bel and I were friends on base, I'd never been to his home before. I think the plan was that we were following our noses toward the smell of melted cheese."
It takes you a moment to realize, but she does seem to be taking it awfully well that someone who looks like your dad is biologically related to someone who looks like you, when she just found out about werewolves an hour ago. But then, some humans are the unflappable types. She seems about as flapless as you can get without killing a flock of birds. Your dad's gotten to his feet and is suggesting some sort of trip around the lake, which you wouldn't mind at all, lunch or no lunch—when the wind changes, and you bristle. Hot terror drills through your muzzle. "Deer smell," you say urgently. "That hunter's sort of deer smell." You cut your eyes towards where you think it's coming from. Your dad tenses. This is the suburbs; it could be an innocent deer hunter coming home from a trip, or even an actual deer. But then again: it couldn't. To Pancho, he says, still smiling, to all appearances cheerfully relaxed: "A hunter is here. We're probably all going to get shot as we leave. Did you bring armor, or should I cover you?"
