In the early morning, three dogs were found in the Dalmatians' house's backyard, doing their thing without the knowledge of their parents and most of their siblings.
"Argh! Nothing! This scratchcard's worthless!" One of the dogs—who had a cut on his right ear, a black patch on his left eye, and wore a chain instead of a collar with a tag in the shape of the number "1"—growled in annoyance as he scratched off the surface of the card with his claw, and got nothing. He then threw the scratchcard away. "It's a loser's card!"
"Chill, dude. One of these must be a winner!" The second dog—that had a patch on his right eye, two cuts on his left ear, and wore a chain with a tag in the shape of the number "2"—tried reassuring as he was scratching at a scratchcard as well.
"RAAAARGH!" The third dog—which had a cut on his left ear and two on his right, both his eyes had patches covering them, and like the previous two, wore a chain with a tag shaped as the number "3"—furiously ripped apart a scratchcard with his fangs and claws. "TRASH! ALL OF THESE ARE UTTER TRASH!"
All three of them had black ears, the hind part of their bodies was covered in black fur on white spots, and their chains were made out of pyrite. They were… Triplets.
"HEY! HEY! Calm down, D3!" The dog with the "2" on his chain bumped the raging dog on the leg. "Mum and dad will hear ya!"
"What the…! The heck ya bumping me for, D2?! You pickin' a fight or somethin'?!" The number "3" tagged dog angrily snarled, shoving his face into his, taunting him.
"A-a-and what if I am, huh?!" The number "2" tagged dog frowned at him, readying himself for a brawl.
Suddenly, the number "1" tagged dog pulled both of them aside, away from one another and lightly smacked them on the head.
"Dimitri 3, enough with this! Mum and dad are gonna hear you if you keep yelling like that. You know what'll happen if they figure out that we've been spending money on scratchcards, we're not exactly old enough to even buy them." He scolded him. "Thank dog for Dolly."
He then turned to the other dog. "Dimitri 2, stop falling for his taunts! You know D3's temper."
"Sorry, Dimitri 1…" Both of them apologized in unison.
D1 rubbed his forehead. "Look… I know that for the past three weeks, these scratchcards weren't fruitful and we've had it with them, but we're brothers… 'The Dimitri Trio' looks out for each other, does it not?"
D2 and D3 nodded their heads.
"Good…! Next time I see you starting a fight over a small thing like this, I'll personally smack ya— you around, got it?!" D1 growled at them.
His brothers nervously bobbed their heads in agreement, feeling a bit intimidated.
They were a troublesome bunch, but they faced any problem together.
"But, still… We spend all our allowance on these cards…" D2 said, with a bit of regret as he shoved some used cards to the side.
"It was a waste of our time and money!" D3 snorted out in vexation. "Where's mah bone, I need to sink mah teeth into somethin'?!"
As he walked over to grab a bone that laid on the ground, D3 felt the earth shaking under his paws. "Ahh! What the…?!"
D3 fell on the ground as a muddy pup popped out from the dirt.
"Mmm~ Yummy!" Diesel licked his lips as he saw the bone and was about to bite on it.
"OI! OI! OI! Diesel back off from mah bone!" D3 stood up and swooped over to his bone, quickly grabbing it with his mouth, out of his younger brother's reach.
"Dimitri 3… Was that your bone…?" The muddy pup asked, innocently. "Sorry… Didn't realize that. I smelled a bone when I was in my room and I just followed my nose…"
"Honestly, how can ya even smell from within the house?" D3 leaned to him, chewing on his bone. "Go back to digging holes, why don't cha?!"
"… Okay…!" Diesel smiled at his older brother, then started burrowing back in his hole. "Oh…! Dylan told me to warn when I dig deep holes… Be careful…"
And with that, Diesel was gone under the ground.
"Jeez! Didn't even ask." D3 frowned at the hole Diesel just made.
"D3, you coming?!" D2 yelled out to him. "Leave that hole and come over here. We're gonna decide who's getting the last scratchcard."
"Huh!? There's one left?" D3 walked up to his brothers.
"Come on… Rock, paper, scissors…" D1 said as the three dogs shook their paws. "GO!"
D1 threw scissors.
D2, paper.
And D3 also threw scissors.
"Well, I'm out." D2 laid on the ground and watched his brothers continue with the game.
"… Go!" D1 said then he threw scissors.
D3 threw rock this time.
"Hmm…? Okay, guess you get to scratch off the last card." D1 told him then slid the last scratchcard towards him. "Good luck."
D3 laid down and wondered for a bit. "Tell me how this was played, again!"
D1 rolled his eyes then pointed to the top of the card. "Scratch off this area first."
D3 did as his brother told him.
"Here you see four numbers—45, 38, 54, and 66."
He then pointed under the numbers. "Now, in this area here, you can scratch everything off. If you happen to at least get one number to match with the ones shown on top, you win whatever is under that number, got it?"
"Yeah, yeah!" D3 said nonchalantly as he continued to nibble on his bone. "Leave me alone, will ya?! I can't work with ya lookin' over my shoulder!"
"Fine. Just don't get your hopes up…" D1 warned.
"Argh!" D2 beat himself on the head.
D1 walked next to him and sat down. "What are you getting so worked up for, bro?"
"I still can't believe this… Over two hundred scratchcards and lottery tickets and nothing." D2 sniveled. "We didn't even get so much as ten pounds… Dizzy and Dee Dee won twenty pounds last week, remember?"
"Come on! Get a hold of yourself, you pup!" D1 jabbed him by the side. "Crap like this happens all the time to people. We're just not lucky, I guess."
D3 was finishing scratching off the remainder of the covered area. "Let's see here…"
"Alright, Desmond, stay still." Delilah told him as she unwrapped the bandages off of his back. "It's been a week, so you should be fully healed by now."
She then examined Desmond's back. "The bruises are gone and the wounds seem to have completely healed."
"Alright, Des!" Dolly exclaimed in happiness as she wrapped her paws around Desmond's neck and swung on it.
"Gagh!" Desmond began choking. "Dolly, let go, let go!"
"DOLLY!" Delilah yelled at her daughter.
Dolly immediately let go of Desmond's neck. "OH! Oh, I'm so sorry, Des. Didn't mean to choke ya!"
"I-It's fine…" He breathed in then out. "Hurm, hurm…! Warn first, jeez!"
Dolly nervously smiled at him.
"Lilah, hurry~ or we'll be late for work~!" Doug walked into the hallway and kissed Delilah on the cheek.
"We are?" She quickly looked at a clock hooked on the hallway's wall. "Oh! We are!"
Delilah grabbed her medkit, quickly gave Dolly a peck on the cheek, making her blush from embarrassment, and rushed to the main door.
"Alright, Dolly, We're off. You and Dylan make sure the house doesn't fall apart." Delilah joked.
"Pfff! When has that happened on our watch?" Dolly tried to reassure her mother.
Before the parents walked out the door, Doug turned around and happily exclaimed. "There's still time for a hug, though!"
A storm of pups rushed out the kitchen and onto Doug, in a big hug, knocking him down on the floor.
"Oh, Douglas…" Delilah chuckled, then pulled her husband out of the puppy pile.
"We love you~!" Doug told his kids as he and Delilah ran down the street as they were running late for their jobs.
"BYEEEH!" The pups yelled out to their parents.
As Dolly and Desmond sat together and watched the parents leave the house, Dolly noticed Desmond's big, warm smile, then noted that he was like that ever since he arrived at their home.
"Hey, Des…!" Dolly turned to him. "You seem happier than usual. What's that about?"
"I agree with Dolly." Deepak said, appearing behind the two dogs. "Your aura's gushing with joy today."
"Is it because your back has recovered?" Deepak wondered.
"Actually, I'm happy because of something else!" Desmond grinned gleefully, he then walked into the living room and pulled a sketchbook from a backpack he brought with him. "Here! Look at this!"
Dolly and Deepak looked at a page filed with perfectly drawn shapes of squares, triangles, and circles.
"… Umm… Cool…? I guess." Dolly looked at the shapes with confusion.
"Right? I did as Da Vinci said, and practiced every day on them." Desmond happily replied. "Now I can draw them with no error!"
"Good for you…!" Dolly smiled at him, listlessly, as she didn't care that much about art.
"I suppose you'd like to show them to Da Vinci, then?" Deepak asked.
"Ah-huh!" Desmond nodded. "Is she in her room?"
"Yeah, go see her." Dolly told him.
Desmond quickly ran up the stairs and headed for Da Vinci's room.
"Any luck, D3?" D2 asked his brother.
"Hold it! I'm checking right now!" D3 scowled at him, then went back to the card, trying to find a number he could match.
"… 44, no.
"46, no.
"39… No!
"55, No!
"67, NO!
"54, NO! Nothin'! And all of them are so close too! ARGH!" D3 bit down on his bone harder in anger.
D1 exhaled in disappointment. "As I told you, don't get your hopes up, dude."
"Argh…! There! Now we're completely broke!" D2 blubbered.
D1 stood up. "Let's try asking some of our siblings for a loan… Maybe Dylan can lend us some money."
D3 groaned and was about to tear the card up, when he suddenly stopped himself, remembering something. "… Wait a minute… 54…?!"
D3 quickly looked over the numbers on the scratchcard, again.
He looked at the numbers on top. "45, 38, 54, 66… 54…"
Then his look slanted down to the area below. "… 54…"
"Hey… 54 and 54!" D3's ears perked up. "There are two fifty-fours…!"
"Huh?!" His brothers turned to him.
"What?" D1 pondered. "What are you freaking out about?!"
D2 tilted his head. "What is it, bro?! Tell us!"
"I have two matchin' numbers!" D3 grinned widely. "Look! Look!"
His two brothers stood in shock and disbelief.
"You aren't screwing with us, are you?" D1 wondered. "If this is a joke, I'm gonna bite your leg!"
"I'm not lyin'! Here, look!" D3 exclaimed angrily.
His two brothers walked up to him and took a close look at the card.
"… No way… NO WAY, NO WAY, NO WAY!" D2 jumped in surprise. "You do have a match!"
"HOLY CRAP! You really weren't lying, D3!" D1 exclaimed in incredulity.
"I told ya, dudes!" D3 happily chortled.
D1 then grabbed the card from his brother, wanting to see it with his own eyes.
"Alright, alright! Calm down, you two… Let's check again just in case." D1 tried to compose himself. "Let's make sure we're not getting excited over nothing."
D2 and D3 gathered around their brother, and all of them examined the card one more time.
"Ah-huh! There's no mistake, there are two fifty-fours on this scratchcard!" Confirmed D1 in joy.
"WE'VE WOOOOOOOOOOOON!" Chorused the three dogs, their eyes almost tearing up from joy.
"But what did we win, though?" D2 asked.
"Look under the number! Look under the number!" D3 told his brother.
"I know, I know! Stop nagging!" D1 fumed, then looked. "We win…Ten thousand pounds…"
"TEN THOUSAND FREAKING POUNDS!" Sputtered D1 in ecstasy.
"TEN THOUSAND?! THAT'S A CRAP TON OF MONEY!" D2 rolled on the ground. "We're rich! We're rich!"
"Now we're talkin'!" D3 spat out his bone and joined his brother, who rolled on the ground.
"This is what we've been waiting for, guys!" Declared D1 as he stood in front of his brothers. "Luck has finally aligned with 'The Dimitri Trio'!"
He and D2 then grabbed D3 and wrapped their paws around him, in a solid hug.
"And it's all thanks to our little bro, right here!" D1 tapped him on the nose.
"He's our lucky charm, it seems!" D2 patted his brother on the head.
"HAHAHA! Yeah, yeah, I'm the best!" Bubbled D3, making a big, smug smile.
"What do ya think we should buy with the money?!" D2 released his brother from the embrace. "Let's buy us actual golden chains, huh?"
"How about a big plasma screen only for us, ya guys?!" D3 announced as he broke from D1's embrace. "I'd also like to get some piercings on my ears!"
"Or what about that gaming console that came out last year?" D2 suggested.
"Oi! Oi! Let's buy a waterbed, and then to celebrate, buy the biggest pizza!" D3 proposed as he and D2 hopped in happiness.
"You, D1?" D2 asked his brother. "Whatcha gonna use the money for?"
D1 looked at the card, pondering on what he'd want when a sudden idea occurred to him. "I have a better idea of what we should do with the money…"