Arc One: Zillah, My Shadow

Chapter Three: The Fix

Prompt 024: Family

Summary: In which Charlie first met Zillah, and decided to keep her.

Translation notes: English is a stupid language - it doesn't have words for the human parents of a dog. So I turned to Swedish, which does. 'Matte' is for the mother, 'husse' is for the father. I figure that Susan found this out and told Charlie, and so they both use the terms.

-ZMS-

It was raining.

Charlie groaned to himself as he stepped in yet another puddle. There were times when he really hated living in England. It was such a far cry from California.

He shifted his book bag again in an attempt to keep his precious notebooks dry. It didn't seem to make much of a difference. Looking up, Charlie spotted the flat he shared with Susan and smiled. How he'd managed to get into a relationship with her, he still wasn't sure. But he was thankful for it. Charlie was head-over-heels for her.

As he was fishing in his pocket for the key, he looked up and saw some kids further down the street kicking something. He didn't pay them much mind, until he heard a whimper. Looking closer, his stomach tightened in disgust. They were kicking a puppy.

"Hey!" He shouted, letting the anger fill him. The kids looked up, then took off running. Charlie jogged up to the puppy and knelt next to it. There didn't appear to be a collar, or any obvious injuries. It started whimpering, and without thinking, Charlie started stroking its head.

"Shhhh," he whispered, "it's okay. You'll be okay." The puppy seemed to respond to his soothing voice, and its tail started to wag. It looked up at him with deep amber eyes – and Charlie was hooked. He gently picked it up, noting how it was shivering, and placed it underneath his t-shirt. With the warmth and security from his body, by the time they reached the vet's office the puppy had fallen asleep.

-ZMS-

Zillah whimpered as she licked Charlie's hand. He was still sleeping, and she didn't understand why. Don and Alan were worried, she knew, and so was she. Charlie was asleep in a strange bed in a strange building, filled with strange people and the smell of sickness and death. Zillah didn't like it here. She wanted Charlie to wake up so he could take her home.

Don stood guard at the door, to make sure no one found out that he'd smuggled the huge dog inside. It had taken some pretty fast talking to get the nurse to help, but in the end his most charming smile had worked. He could twist any woman with that smile, and knew it.

He just hoped that he'd been right, and that Zillah's presence would help Charlie to wake up.

-ZMS-

At first, Susan had been reluctant to take in the dog – but when it and Charlie gave her nearly identical puppy-dog-eyes, she'd given in with a laugh. And now, she was glad that she had. It had been nearly a month, and Zillah (as Charlie had named her) had yet to have an accident in the house. She was getting over her nervousness of strangers, and obviously adored Charlie. She was also very fond of Susan, but was definitely Charlie's dog.

Susan smiled as she retrieved her key from her handbag. She could hear Zillah's tail thumping against the wall, eager to see 'matte'. Susan let herself in and knelt to pick up the puppy.

"Hey there, Zillah," she laughed. "You missed me, huh? Was husse not paying enough attention?" Zillah just wriggled, trying to get close enough to lick Susan's face.

Smiling, Susan carried the wriggling bundle of fur into the kitchen. She laughed again at seeing Charlie completely spaced out at the dining table, surrounded by notebooks. He was writing furiously, a lot of numbers and symbols that Susan didn't understand. Zillah let out a small whine, and Susan put her down on the floor with a sigh.

Zillah was, for some reason, a very quiet dog. Sometimes she'd whimper or whine, very occasionally she'd growl, but she never seemed to bark. She was also growing at an alarming rate; soon they wouldn't be able to pick her up any more.

As Susan watched, Zillah trotted over to Charlie and began to whimper, before head-butting his leg.

"Just a minute, Zillah," Charlie muttered, and Susan felt an irrational pang of jealousy toward the dog. When Charlie was in the zone, she literally had to pry him away from his work. She stamped it down though – being jealous of a puppy wasn't something she was proud of.

Charlie finished writing then, and pushed his chair back from the table. Zillah's tail was going a mile a minute – she knew what time it was. Charlie chuckled, then went to fetch her lead. The puppy needed a lot of exercise to keep her from getting bored, and secretly Susan was glad – it meant that at least twice a day, Charlie would step away from his equations and go out into the real world.

-ZMS-

A year passed, and these days, they didn't need a lead. Zillah would happily run forwards for a while, then turn and run back to Charlie, always staying in sight. At a call, she would trot back to his side, and would always stop and sit when she came to a road. Of course, she now had a collar and microchip just in case, but Charlie wasn't worried about Zillah running away.

She'd grown a lot, too. Susan smiled as she threw a Frisbee for the dog. Zillah was now tall enough that her head was just below Susan's hips. Her paws were still large for her size, and Charlie had estimated that she was going to grow even more.

Charlie looked up from his position on the park bench, and laughed at the sight of Susan attempting to retrieve the Frisbee. Normally Zillah had no problem returning things that had been thrown for her, but every now and then she decided that she wanted to play tug-of-war. Given her jaw strength, and generally well-muscled build, it was no surprise that Zillah always won. But she liked to play anyway.

"Come on Zillah, darling," Susan was pleading with the hound. "Give the Frisbee to matte." Zillah just shook her head, while still holding on to the disc.

"I don't think she wants to cooperate," Charlie called out, and received a glare from his girlfriend in response.

"I'm aware of that," she called back, hiding a smile. "Whoa!"

Susan was caught off-balance as Zillah suddenly lunged forward. Next thing she knew, Susan was flat on her back, with a happy dog standing over her and licking her face and neck. She laughed and tried to fend off the hound, with little success.

Charlie smiled, and the image was forever burned into his mind.

-ZMS-

At an excited 'yip', Don turned to glare at Zillah, only to find that Charlie's hand was stroking her head. The young man turned half-lidded eyes to his big brother and smiled.

"Heya, Donnie," Charlie whispered.

"Charlie!" Don rushed to stand next to the bed and hit the call button for the nurse, forgetting Zillah's presence. "Good to see you again."

"You too. And you, Zillah," Charlie smiled at his beloved dog, who was wagging her tail happily. At that moment, a nurse came in and froze when she saw Zillah.

"What is that dog doing in here?" She stepped forward to throw Zillah out, but the hound put her ears back and bared some impressive teeth. She didn't growl just yet, but looked intimidating all the same.

Don and Charlie shared a grin, before Don stepped to one side of the room.

"Zillah, come here. Let the nurse check on Charlie."

Immediately, Zillah's ears perked up again, and she trotted over to sit next to Don. She kept a watchful eye on Charlie as first the nurse, then a doctor checked him over. The doctor was a friendly older man who loved to talk.

"So, young Charlie, how do you feel?" He asked his patient as he checked the bandages on Charlie's abdomen.

"Like I just got shot in the stomach," Charlie muttered, making Don smirk. That was the spirit.

There didn't seem to be any damage from staying unconscious for so long, but they'd take him off for various scans anyway. Zillah was not impressed when they wheeled Charlie's bed away, but a simple command kept her at Don's side.

Anyway, Charlie was awake now. She knew he'd come back to her sooner or later.