[PRP] Every Dog is a Good Dog [ Rouge/Any Day Now/Tidings ]

[Jun]

"Yes, it really is," she said, "couldn't you do a kind deed then - a wonderful deed, and rescue this poor dear from this horrible doe?"

This poor dear was currently trying to murder this horrible doe to get at her pickled duck tongues.

[Maxx]

The horrible doe was rather trying her best to counter-murder the hound because she really liked the pickled duck tongues, and to its credit, Anyways was yapping very urgently at a safe distance, hopping in and out to nip the air around its heels.

"I'll kill you before I let these tongues go!"

Convenient speech as she gasped, swinging them out of the way.

"Well, I'd damn try!"

[Jun]

To say that Tidings was very dubious at the hot pink Acha's story would be an understatement.

"I see," he said.

He looked over at the night-black hound again. It looked breath-takingly murdery. He was almost impressed. And, to be honest, a little part of his (actually rather lonely, because the Swamp-mother was an inveterate liar, but he couldn't complain, because he was made in her image) heart was pulled towards it, because it was quite clear that it was an outcast, and outcasts had nobody but each other.

But he was also not an idiot, and made of flesh and bone.

"But I am very sorry," he said, "I don't think my lifestyle is suited to dog ownership. You see, I am rarely home. I don't have one, as a matter of fact. Very bad. I am so sorry. I must go. Gotta report back to the boss."

And then he tried to make a quick getaway.

[Jun]

"Look, you little pipsqueak," Rouge snarled before he could run, "I'm just gonna lay it out here: either you take him, or the dog gets it."

It was unclear if the dog understood (certainly it had never seemed to "understand" a single command in its life), but it stopped in its snappy tracks and tilted its head with a questioning little noise.

[Jun]

"Oh, frick," Tidings thought, "it did the head tilt."

"Surely," he grinned, a little nervously, "a lovely lady with six dogs, such as yourself, wouldn't hurt a hair on this poor dear's head?"

[Jun]

"Try me, punk," she said.

[Jun]

Tidings opened his mouth.

He had never thought of himself as a good sort, really, because he was keenly aware that he wasn't. And being a good sort, to be honest, was generally overrated anyhow. It really wasn't on him, an inveterate liar, and a knockabout trickster (and a travelling saleskin for Rise & Shine, which was something he was currently deep in the middle of regretting, dammit), a misfit, an outcast, who ran all over the Swamp, to save a terribly murdery dog from uncertain doom.

But no one wanted the dog, and neither did he - and he was rather sure that nobody wanted him either.

And the pink Acha lady did look pretty scary.

He shut his mouth.

And sighed.

"C'mere, boy."

The demon incarnate, which had a better survival instinct than obedience drive, ran over after one last futile snap at the tongues, notably taking the flank away from Rouge. Tidings couldn't say he wasn't pleased.

[Maxx]

"Turns out it's not just dogs you can train," Any Day Now sniggered, pleasurably chewing on the tip of her tongue(s).

"Just not that particular one. Should've threatened to butcher it earlier."

[Jun]

"That'll teach me to be nice," she growled, "alright, squirt, off with you."

[Jun]

He did not fight her.

"I guess it's you and me now," Tidings said, rather sentimentally, to the murder hound, as they ambled away from the does, "this wasn't how I saw it all going, but I suppose we're stuck with each other.

"I think," he said, looking up into the sky as it rumbled, with some dismay - he would be late back, if there was a storm, "I shall call you Thunderings. You have a bit of that about you, the lightning and the thunder. Well, Thunderings, you are going to be a very good boy."

And then the very good boy chomped down on his ankle, and the lesson Tidings learned that day was that no good deed goes unpunished and it was better to be bad.

END