Sitting in the dark living room (wasting electricity for lights he did not need was bad for the environment), Cadis Etrama di Raizel was reading the Gaming for Idiots book Frankenstein had rebound into an attractive hardcover when he lifted his head.
Frowning, he put the book down, carefully placing the bookmark, and walked upstairs to the balcony. Jumping off it, he took off into the night.
"Hey, M-21?" Tao said in the control room, seeing the moving shape on his sensors. "He decided to go for a walk."
"Heading for that place with all the neon?" M-21 asked to confirm, adjusting his course. 'The Red Light District' was the more direct way to say it, but the thought of Cadis Etrama di Raizel going there for that instead of because the lights were pretty was just brainbreaking.
"Huh, no," Tao said, puzzled, and M-21's ears perked up, paying more attention. Had he gotten confused and headed off in the wrong direction?
"I should go after him then." In case he'd gotten lost. Or it was possible he'd detected a threat and not wanted to bother any of them. M-21 felt his fingers grow short claws, the way they wanted to sometimes when he got a little irritated. Not at Raizel, no, even if he didn't want him to go spend his life and leave M-21 out of it feeling helpless, but at anyone who dared attack them.
That was what he told himself, anyway.
"Roger, M-21," Tao said cheerfully, and M-21 knew Tao was just about to ask them to do that.
It didn't take long to get a visual – sometimes M-21 thought the moon was deliberately taunting him with how often it was full. A moment after he did, Raizel dropped down between two buildings. M-21 moved faster.
When he jumped down after him, he saw Raizel standing in front of a small pile of trash in the alley, looking at a small dog that was picking its way out of the trash towards Raizel, stubby little tail wagging desperately as it whined.
Watching them with a sinking feeling, M-21 instantly knew how this was going to end.
The dog rubbed against Raizel's legs before sitting down at Raizel's feet and gazing up at him, still whining. Well, that was better than barking? Maybe it was a quiet dog? Just how dirty was it?
"Tao?" M-21 said quietly into his communicator, turning away. "We're going to need a bath for a dog."
Silence for a moment. Only a moment. "He's bringing home a dog?" Tao almost squealed. "Or is it a werewolf?"
M-21 turned to look at it. "Looks like a mutt," he said, based on the dogs he'd seen while out on missions for the Union. "Small. Looks like a puppy, maybe."
"A puppy?" Tao did squeal now. "I've got to show it to Ikhan! I should warn Boss, though."
Wincing, M-21 said that, "It's… pretty filthy. He might not want to be upstairs until we get it clean."
The Noblesse and the puppy were still staring at each other, although the puppy turned to look at M-21 and wagged its tail when he glanced at them. Raizel turned his head to see what the puppy was looking at before nodding at M-21 and turning back to the dog.
What was he looking so serious about? M-21 wondered, then thought about how Raizel took a lot of things seriously, though. Taking them in. Keeping Frankenstein's things neat – the dog hair was going to be a problem. Didn't they shed? M-21 definitely did, all of them had to brush their hair twice a day so it didn't decide to fall out random places. M-21 was lucky the extra hair vanished after he transformed back.
The dog's tail was wagging less often now – little thing looked tired. Raizel bent down and picked it up, holding it carefully in his arms and jumping up into the air. M-21 followed quickly enough to hear the pup's whine. When Raizel landed on the roof he pat the dog on the head carefully and walked across the roof before making a slow jump over to the next roof.
M-21 wondered if he should report that they were returning slowly, but Tao would notice and figure out their ETA.
Tao was there when they landed on the balcony. "Can I see?" he asked, already leaning over towards Raizel. "Miss Seira's making the puppy-safe wash formula I found, and I've got a bath already drawn in one of the guest rooms."
Raizel nodded when Tao seemed to require a response.
"Rael's out getting brushes and dog treats," Tao chattered as Raizel followed him into the house and M-21 followed Raizel. It wasn't too late, there were still people out on the streets, so there might be a petstore open somewhere in the country.
Regis inclined his head towards Raizel when they passed him in the hall: his hands were full of folded towels.
When they reached the bathroom, there were towels spread out to cover the floor, and even a towel in the tub, covered with a few inches of water with a couple of balls floating in it. The bathroom was really large and had metal bars at around waist height in a few places for some reason. Well, the size made it good for this – Tao must have picked out the room. Tao gestured for M-21 to sit down before sitting down himself. "Sir," he said to Raizel, "Could you put him down on the ground so we can introduce ourselves to him before he gets introduced to the bath?"
Raizel complied, kneeling down and releasing the puppy, who went straight for M-21.
M-21 stared at it, not knowing what to do. The dog stared back, panting and tired but still wagging its tail. The doggy smile seemed to be waiting for something so M-21 patted it on the head, and hid a wince when his hand came back sticky.
His eyes widened. Raizel's clothes! What if he'd gotten dirty from carrying it, should someone go get him a change of clothes before Frankenstein saw him? Looking over at Raizel, though, he seemed just as neat as when he headed out for school that morning.
The puppy had scampered over to Tao now, and Tao was holding out his hand with his fingers down so the puppy could sniff the back of it, talking in a soft but still energetic voice about how cute the puppy was and stuff like that. The puppy's tail wag sped up a bit, but then it sat down on the towel.
M-21's nose wrinkled. Oh shit. Literally.
"Regis!" Tao was already calling, slowly and carefully pulling the towel out from under the puppy as he gestured the dog towards Raizel. "Get rid of this towel!"
Grimacing, Regis took it delicately by the corners and it vanished from his hands.
"It's okay boy, so we're going to have to potty train you, or maybe you were already being trained to only go outside and on the towels?" Tao tried to pet the puppy, who backed away from him and quickly ran over to M-21, climbing into his crossed legs. M-21 stared down at it.
"Alright, M-21!" Tao said as though M-21 had one something other than getting to be the one to, "Pick him up – gently – and put him in the bath."
M-21 obeyed gingerly. Yeah, the water was shallow, didn't come up to the thing's knees. The dog immediately sat down.
"Ball?" Tao asked, picking one of them up and waving it in the dog's face. It turned away with a whine. "Aww, you're tired, aren't you. Ok, let's try and gently figure out what color he is under there – we need to let him get used to the water."
Tao and M-21 rolled back their sleeves and got to work. The dog perked up with them rubbing at it. After a couple minutes Tao took washcloths from Regis and they started using those. The color they found under the grime was dirt – pale brown, kind of a grayish brown maybe. While they were working at it, Regis spread out another towel on the floor to replace the one that got dirty and Takeo brought up a cup of tea for Raizel and a bowl of beef chopped up very small.
"Hey, you hungry?" Tao asked gently, taking the bowl from Takeo and putting it down on the ground, then picking the puppy out of the bathtub and setting it down next to the bowl. "I'm going to replace the water and make it a bit deeper this time, since he seems fine with it."
Raizel put his teacup down by the puppy. As soon as his hand was off it, Tao snatched it up quick. "I haven't had a chance to look up if tea is good for dogs yet," he said apologetically, handing the cup back to Raizel. "But if you finish the tea we can fill it with water for the puppy.
Rai drank his tea obediently as the puppy stuck his face in the foodbowl and inhaled it instantly, looking up hopefully when it was done. There really hadn't been a lot in the bowl – Takeo should have been able to chop up more than that, right, even if he wasn't a knife specialist?
"It might not be good for him to eat too much all at once," Tao explained. "RK, would you guys mind taking over while I do more research? Don't let the water get too deep."
"Of course," Takeo said, sitting down and patting the puppy on the head when it came over to him. Hoping for more, probably. M-21 kept an eye on the tub.
The puppy drank a little from Raizel's former teacup, but not enough for it to really have been thirsty. That made M-21 worry a bit what it had been drinking. Maybe people had poured some bottled water out for it? Would soda make dogs sick?
What about ramyeon? Raizel had already tried to serve it tea.
Seira came in with a jar of something that smelled like soap to M-21 – must be the shampoo – and M-21 turned off the faucet.
"Should we put him back in the water or do dogs need to wait after eating?" Takeo wondered.
"It's not that deep," M-21 said, a little stung for a moment, like Takeo was implying the puppy might be in danger from the water when M-21 took responsibility for it. "If you're worried about it, we need to get it clean so we can bring it down to the lab." It was still way too dirty to be around Frankenstein. "That alley was filthy, it might be sick or something."
The puppy whined, probably wanting more food. Raizel looked alarmed – right, it wouldn't have occurred to him that somebody or something might be in danger of disease, even if the kids had been out with a cold a few times. It hadn't been anything serious, just gross enough for Tao to set things up so they visited the kids at home instead of bringing snot into Frankenstein's place. M-21 had seen how he reacted to the news that one of Master's friends was sick, and that was clearly on the list of things that set him off, so they'd avoided mentioning it around him after that.
"I'll help you clean him," Takeo said, and M-21 nodded thanks because with all that hair, Takeo should be able to figure out how to wash fur, right?
The puppy was fading fast now, but it didn't mind them getting in under its fur and scratching a bit to get anything matted under there. It was actually a little cleaner underneath, which made M-21 hope it hadn't been in that alley for too long. How long had it been alone? Was it even going to remember its mother? Did it have a family, had somebody named it? Tao would know how to find out if anyone was looking for a dog. If it already had a family and a name Raizel wouldn't keep it away from them.
The dog sat down in the water again. What if it wanted to lie down? Had M-21 run the water too deep? He hurriedly let some of it drain while Takeo kept working. "I think we've got most of it," Takeo said finally. "We might be able to rinse him off in the sink.
"Yeah, that'll save time," M-21 said, because the sooner they were done here the sooner they could take the dog down to Frankenstein and the dog could get some sleep while the scans or whatever were going. "Come on, almost done," he told the dog, picking it up and plopping it in the sink, running water over it carefully.
"You are a good boy," Regis said, and they stared at him. He stared back: what? "That is what you say to dogs."
Right, M-21 remembered the seeing-eye dog on campus. Most of the time everyone ignored the dog while it was working so they didn't overwhelm it, but sometimes at the end of the day the student would let one person come up to it at a time so the dog didn't get overstimulated. "Good boy," M-21 said experimentally, and the dog perked right up.
"Should I get us both a change of clothes?" Takeo asked M-21.
He nodded. "Sure," most of his attention still focused on getting under the hair and around the ears to be sure the dog wouldn't taste soap when he licked himself. Did dogs do that? The alley cats he and M-21 had watched while on missions sometimes did.
When he was pretty sure he'd done okay he took the dog out of the sink and set it down on the ground, where it promptly peed on his shoe.
Choking back a cry of alarm, M-21 quickly stripped off his shoe, but hesitated before handing it to Regis. He wrecked enough of his own clothing – would cleaning it get rid of the smell? Seira gestured for him to hand it to her and he held it out, only for her to touch it and pull back her hand. Looking at it again, he saw that it was dry and let out a sigh of relief.
Takeo had already taken the dog and was rubbing it down with a towel. The bath towels dwarfed it – it was really small, huh. "Who's a good boy?" Takeo was saying, smiling. "Oh yes you are!" The dog ignored him, looking around the room for Raizel and M-21 for some reason.
"Rael found brushes!" Tao called, coming into the guest bedroom with Rael behind him carrying two grocery bags. "And I'm thinking we should train him as a security dog! That way he won't be home alone all day, he can come to the school with everyone!"
Raizel brightened, very happy for the dog. M-21 had to admit he thought it was a good thing too: they all loved the school. Only question was how much trouble the dog was going to be. "Tao, did you look up potty training?"
Tao laughed ruefully. "Yeah, teaching him that's going to take a few… days, maybe?"
"M-21 can teach such things to him," Raizel said, speaking aloud for the first time since dinner, as far as M-21 knew.
They all looked at him. "Because M-21's a werewolf?" Tao guessed and Raizel nodded.
Well that was convenient and it was going to save their asses because Frankenstein was a hair's-breadth away from going berserk when the house or the school were contaminated, but M-21 didn't know how he felt about being a little less human.
Not that the nobles weren't okay, but M-21 had the werewolf heart stuck in him in the first place by Crombel and the only werewolves he'd ever heard of were the one stuck in the basement that attacked Raizel and separated him from Frankenstein for that long, and the one that was a Union Elder, just like Crombel. He wasn't going to ask if werewolves were evil or prone to turning on their friends out of the blue and practically killing them or it was just those two, not when that would give away that he was worried about going berserk or no longer being him and he didn't want the others to worry about him. Tao would try to cheer him up.
Takeo said, "Tao, do you think you could do the basic tests? That way Frankenstein can leave the lab." And wouldn't have to be around the puppy tonight, so M-21 didn't have to talk to it now.
M-21 scowled at himself for letting Takeo spot that he was uncomfortable with the subject. "I'll go tell him," he said, and slipped past Rael to the door.
When M-21 got to the lab he heard the ding of the cookie machine, but it didn't smell like the regular recipe. Realizing that made him realize just how used he'd gotten to using his sense of smell. Sure he used his other enhanced senses too, but when he could apparently speak dog… "Dog's clean," he told Frankenstein, hands in his pockets. "Experimenting with the cookie recipe?"
"These are dog biscuits," Frankenstein told him. "Only the highest quality ingredients, of course. I should have tried getting Master a dog back then," he said, eyes going to the capsule with Muzaka in it and aura of menace rising.
Frankenstein thought that dogs and werewolves had something to do with each other too, then? "Tao said he'll run the basic tests," M-21 said, before he could get too wound up about that or Frankenstein's menacing aura could rise further.
"How considerate of him," Frankenstein said, giving a polite smile instead of a sharp one as he took the dog biscuits from the cookie machine and piled them on a plate. They looked the same as the regular cookies, M-21 noticed, and realized he'd better make sure Tao and Raizel didn't accidentally eat any.
Frankenstein handed him the plate, going past him to the elevator, and M-21 went into the elevator with him to bring Raizel the puppy treats and let Tao know the lab was free. He saw Frankenstein go into his office and relaxed.
When he got up to the guest bathroom again, more of the towels on the floor were wet but the puppy looked mostly dry. It was curled up on Raizel's lap but as soon as M-21 went into the room it came over to him.
Probably smelled the treats, M-21 told himself. "These are for the dog," he told the others first thing, before handing the plate to Raizel. Raizel put it on the ground. Didn't you give dogs dog treats one at a time?
"Maybe we should give them to the puppy as a reward for going through the testing?" Tao said, picking up the dog a moment after it pounced on the treats, sending most of them flying off the plate. Takeo and Regis scrambled to pick the treats up before they got wet and started to disintegrate. "Maybe we can teach him that when he goes to the lab he gets treats."
"Then he'll be trying to get into the lab all the time so we'll give him treats," M-21 said.
"The houseowner would not appreciate that," Regis agreed.
"But a lot of pets end up scared of medical offices and labs… But I guess the scanning beds won't be as invasive as whatever they use for testing," Tao realized. "Takeo, grab some towels! We can make a dog bed on the scanning bed and he can sleep through being in the lab."
Takeo nodded, picking up the remainder of the stack by the door. M-21 took the plate followed them out but Seira and Regis remained behind, picking up the towels and getting rid of the residue in the tub.
When they reached the lab, Takeo put down the towels and fluffed them up around the edges and Tao put the puppy down in the middle. M-21 held a treat out for the puppy to take it in his mouth while Tao switched on the scanner. The puppy didn't seem bothered by the light or motion of the scanner, from the way it turned around and flopped in the bed.
"What do you think?" Tao asked.
Takeo and M-21 looked at him.
"About him having a dog as a pet! Well, if he's a service animal, we'll mostly be training him – or M-21 will be," Tao said completely shamelessly, "but aren't pets supposed to be good for people? I'm happy with the goldfish."
The goldfish. M-21 smirked. Tao had a noble soul weapon, power the bastards back in the Union craved and were willing to throw away people's lives to get, and he called it 'the Goldfish.' It wasn't quite the same as hearing Rael insult the Union, calling them all the things M-21 wished he'd had the guts to call them aloud back when they controlled him, but it still made him smile.
The elevator door opened and Raizel stepped in as Tao asked, "Where will he sleep tonight?"
"I will take responsibility for him," said the noble, and smiled. "I am glad he has somewhere to belong."
Even Tao was silent for a bit after that. Raizel's smile… It made M-21 feel small and big at the same time. Like he felt so small compared to Raizel, but that wasn't a bad thing. It didn't mean Raizel was looming over him, or he was in danger. Just small like the puppy was small, when Raizel found it in an alley and practically walked home because long distance jumping was upsetting the puppy and Raizel wouldn't do that. Big, because… He didn't have words. Just that Raizel approved of what the three of them were doing. Approved of M-21, after he'd endangered the kids and been wrong about M-24 and made Raizel spend his life to Awaken him when he fought the infected and. He didn't deserve for Raizel to smile at him like that but. He still did it.
Raizel walked forward slowly, reached his arm out, and carefully patted M-21 on the shoulder. Pat, pat. Like M-21 was a puppy – no, like Frankenstein that time, when the school was damaged. He didn't know how to do or react, especially when Raizel took two more steps forward and wrapped his arms around him carefully.
M-21 hadn't been hugged since he was with the M-series, and even them only once. The one that came up with the idea of hugging people? That meant he was 'weak' and they picked him to test to destruction sooner rather than later. They'd leaned against each other to take up less space and have the comfort of a solid body, slept next to each other so they'd know if someone was taken away in the night, and those were almost the same thing as standing here with arms around him now.
He closed his eyes, pressed them against Raizel's jacket, and Raizel stroked his back gently.
They didn't move for awhile. Everything was silent except for the sound of the scanner, up until the puppy woke up and made hungry whimpering sounds until someone – Tao, from the light steps – hurried to give him a cookie. Dog biscuit. Hearing the happy crunch brought M-21 back to himself and he stepped back. "Sir," he said apologetically.
Raizel shook his head and patted him again. Once, twice, on the head. M-21 ducked his head, smiling or maybe smirking. Just at his own embarrassment. It wasn't like Raizel minded.
It wasn't like the other M-series would mind.
Raizel turned away and picked up the puppy, wrapped in one of the towels that made his bed, and held him to the chest the way he had brought him here. He took the plate of cookies from Takeo and walked to the elevator.
As soon as the door closed behind him Takeo asked, "What kind of dog is he?"
"Well, according to the tests, he's a Common Korean Mutt."
A mutt – a mix of things, like M-21. Nothing special about either of them, except the fact that Raizel had seen they didn't have a place to call home and taken them in.
"I'm going to bed," M-21 said. "We have work in the morning."
Tao looked between him and Takeo, getting his cell phone out of his pocket. "Regis is awake too… Maybe Miss Seira will be willing to take the second patrol shift. That way we can get some sleep and Regis can get some practice as mission control…" He started to walk towards the elevator too.
"I'll get the towels," Takeo said kindly. Tao and M-21 both froze when they realized they'd almost left a pile of towels that used to hold moist dog on the scanning bed in Frankenstein's lab. "You two have a good night."
"You too, Takeo!" Tao waved and M-21 nodded.
They passed through the living room on the way up, checking in on Raizel, who sat there with a cup of tea, a cup of water, a plate of cookies and more finely chopped meat in front of him on the table, a book in his hands. Miss Seira was sitting next to him, and Rael was in the kitchen, drying the cutting board and putting it away.
M-21 felt guilty – doing the dishes was his job, but of course Seira was going to make sure it got taken care of when she didn't know when M-21 would come back up from the lab or if he'd notice the dishes.
"Miss Seira…" Tao hurried over to her. "Would you mind doing second patrol?"
She nodded, set down her cup of tea and headed for the door.
M-21 almost jerked when Raizel said, "M-21."
"Yeah, sir?" he said, going to stand next to him.
"Will you please tell the puppy to let me know when he needs to use the bathroom?"
"Yes," M-21 said quickly, breaking out in a cold sweat. He'd almost left Raizel sitting in the living room with a puppy that might go to the bathroom on him? For a moment, the hairs on the back of his neck screamed that Frankenstein was right behind him and he didn't try to whirl and defend himself because it was already too late. "Hey," he said carefully, looking at the puppy. Was he supposed to do anything special? "Tell him if you need to go outside, or to the bathroom or whatever."
The puppy stood up and wagged its tail at him.
Did that mean it understood? M-21 looked at Raizel.
Raizel nodded his approval.
"I'm going to bed," M-21 said again, and headed up to bed a second before Rael finished and came to glare at him for standing at Raizel's side. That position was Rael's when Frankenstein wasn't here, and the noble was damn territorial about it.
M-21 woke up sometime around five to a knock on his door. Instead of calling over, he went over and opened it, then stared. Why was Raizel here at this hour instead of choosing a shirt.
"The puppy wanted to explore everyone's rooms," Raizel explained, as the dog sniffed M-21's pants leg and slid past him to explore his room.
Wait, when he told the dog to ask Raizel if it wanted to go places, had he volunteered the Noblesse as a dog taxi service?!
M-21 went back to bed and waited for the dog to finish nosing around and head back to the door, which Raizel closed behind it. Frankenstein was going to kill him, he thought, staring at the ceiling.
Well. He'd had a good life, at the end there.
Sooo the puppy from Noblesse S is adorable and I should have brought him into the fic earlier, but. Better late than never. This is quite a bit different from the version in Noblesse S.
I was not expecting M-21 to get his hug in this chapter, but I'm glad he did.