Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts, its characters or storyline. This collection is mine, as is Duke.

This prompt warmed my little heart, as it explicitly demanded more of my dog OC, Leon's pet Duke the golden retriever. Reader response to this character has given me warm fuzzies, and I'm glad you guys like her so much. Enjoy!

..:-X-:..

013 – Lather, Rinse, Repeat

(For Axenthia; Prompt: 'Duke')

Duke was filthy. Leon had no idea what the dog had gotten into, but she was not allowed back in the house until she got a proper bath. Of this, Leon was sure. Unfortunately, Duke had decided that she WAS allowed in the house and no, she did not want a bath.

"Stay!" Leon snapped, chasing the golden retriever down the hallway. "Duke, stop!"

Duke yipped and ducked out of the hallway, bolting through the kitchen and into the living room, claws clacking across the wooden floor as she did so. Leon skidded on her mud trail as he made after her, grabbing onto the corner of the wall to keep himself upright.

"Bad dog. Sit! Duke." He ordered.

He managed to get her into a corner in the living room, blocking her path. She pawed at the floor, mouth open in a canine grin, her dirty tail smacking against either side of the wall corner. She thought this was a game, that they were playing something. That was going to make this more difficult.

"Easy." Leon spread his palms, taking one slow step closer. "Don't make this hard…"

Duke bobbed her head and perked her ears, lolling her tongue at him. As he took a step closer, the dog made her move, darting past him. Leon stumbled and tried to grab her, but only managed to get one hand around her tail. He quickly let go as she passed, not wanting to hurt her, and ended up sprawling to the floor for his effort. Duke, for her part, crossed the living room and hopped out the front door.

Rolling back up to his feet, Leon went after her. "Duke!"

The dog had made it out the front door, across the front yard, through the gate, around the fence, and into the neighbor's yard. Leon gave chase, darting around the fence and nearly wiping out on the neighbor's shrubbery. He managed to leap over it like a hurdler and nearly faceplanted into the grass to regain his balance. Duke was barreling around to the neighbor's backyard. Herman, Leon and Tifa's neighbor, leaned around from the back porch.

"Bath day?" He offered as Leon ran past after the golden retriever.

Herman's two kids, twin five year olds Parker and Zach, squealed and joined Leon in chasing Duke, but they soon gave up after both dog and man lapped them. Duke tore through the garden in their front yard, where Herman's wife Charlotte was nursing her suffering plants. She cried out in surprise as Leon barely sidestepped around the mess.

"Gah! Leon!" She put a startled hand over her heart.

"Sorry! Sorry!" Leon staggered after the dog, "Duke, stay!"

Chasing her back onto his and Tifa's front yard, Leon closed the gate to keep her contained and got between her and the backyard. He spread his arms.

"All right, this is how this is going to go." He said lowly, out of breath from the chase. "You're going to get a bath, whether you want it or not. So just…stand still…and stop running."

Duke bounced to her left, and Leon side stepped to his right. The dog hopped backward and then immediately to her right, so Leon shuffled to his left, blocking her at each turn. The dog snorted once at him and lowered her head and forelegs, sticking her back end up in the air playfully. Her tail swished so hard that her butt wiggled.

Leon smirked. "There we go…Stay still…"

The dog straightened her legs and barked at him, keening once and licking her nose. Leon took a cautious step toward her, carefully balancing his weight on his toes just in case she bolted. When she didn't, he reached out with one palm toward her face. Duke canted her head and pushed her cool, wet nose against his hand. He took that as encouragement and leaned forward, closer, and ruffled the fur on the side of her neck.

"Okay…there we go…" He murmured, sneaking closer.

Making eye contact with her, Leon started to reach for her collar, for something solid to hold onto to keep her still.

"Stay." He said lowly, firmly.

He got two fingers under the collar on the back of her neck before Duke seemed to realize what he was doing and made a break for it. She dropped to her belly on the grass and, seeing an escape route, shot through the gap between Leon's legs and up the steps, across the front porch, and through the door back into the house.

"Oh for the love of…" Leon staggered, pivoted on one foot, and took off after her.

This time, Duke was making a bee line straight through the foyer, down the main hallway, and toward the enclosed back porch. Leon almost caught up to her, on her heels as she clamored under the patio furniture on the porch. He kicked the back door closed and locked it behind him, hastily crossing over to the door that led from the enclosed back porch to the back yard, closed it and locked it as well.

Now the two of them were locked in the porch area together. Like a cage match.

Cue standoff music.

Leon had looped the garden hose and left the towels and the bottle of soap beside the back door. That had been the visual trigger that set off the dog's warning signs and sent her into this tizzy. Now, acknowledging that neither of them were going anywhere fast, Leon slumped into one of the plastic porch chairs, wheezing from the chase.

"Duke…you're a menace." He dropped his head back against the chair. "What is wrong with you?"

Duke, for her part, just wagged her tail at the sound of his voice, giving him an innocent canine look from under the table as though to say: who me?

For several seconds that turned into a few minutes, Leon caught his breath and just looked at the dog. Duke used to love baths. She used to practically leap into the bath tub at their old apartment. Since she had grown into a full sized, adult golden retriever, however, they had decided to start giving her outdoor baths during the warm seasons. She just caused too much of a mess inside. Now, this chase scene had become the routine on bath day.

"Y'know…" Leon finally peeled himself away from the backrest of the chair, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. "Eventually Charlotte is going to get tired of you trampling through her tomato garden."

Duke huffed and snapped her teeth at something that he couldn't see—a bug maybe.

"I know," He pushed himself up to his feet again. "Everything that she plants dies anyway, but that's no reason to destroy them before she can."

He plucked off his gloves and on second thought decided to remove his jacket too—it was hot enough and would probably get soaked anyway—and tossed them on the patio table. Squatting in front of the table, he held out a hand to coax her out.

"C'mon." He clucked his tongue at her. "Duke."

She keened and shifted her paws on the floor, but then begrudgingly started to shuffle forward and out from under the table.

"I know, I know, but you smell." He murmured softly, luring her out.

Once Duke was clear, she stood up and looked flatly unhappy about this. Frowning, Leon decided to test his luck and flicked the knob on the faucet where the hose was hooked up. It hissed and spit as the water coursed into the long green tube, bubbling and then streaming out of the nose.

Duke's lip curled and she sat up straight, but didn't growl or make another run for it. They both knew she was cornered and that this was inevitable. Better to just get it over with. Leon sighed and sat on a closer plastic chair, stretching out his bad knee and picking up the hose.

"All right, come here." He tapped his other knee to signal her to come.

Duke ducked her head and her tail fell still, looking at him pathetically.

"No." He pointed at her. "Your puppy eyes aren't going to win this time." He tapped his knee again. "Come."

She looked from him, to the hose in his hand, keened in her throat, and looked back at him as if to say: but I don't wanna…

Leon tilted his head and scooted forward to the edge of the chair. "It'll be over before you know it. Come here, honey."

With a reluctantly trusting look, Duke obeyed and moved into the line of fire. Leon coaxed her on until she was situated right in front of him. He restrained her there with a gentle hand on her chest, and then he slowly ran the hose across her back. She shuddered and brought a paw up onto his thigh. Sighing, Leon ruffled the fur under her jaw as he finished soaking her with the hose. He reached back and turned off the water, picking up the soap bottle and facing her again.

He drew a thick line of the soap down her spine and set the bottle aside again, getting both hands on her back and lathering the soap into a froth. He worked the lather into her fur as best he could down her back, shoulders, haunches, and then around her chest, belly, and legs. Duke managed to get her wet and soapy head against his ribs, nosing at his hip and continuing to paw at him.

"I know, I know, I'm sorry." He muttered as he scrubbed at her fur, "If you would stop getting into dirt and other mess, then we might not have to do this as often, but noooo, you just have to be a little adventurer."

After soaping her fur to its maximum soapiness, Leon took the hose to her again, running the water stream over her until it carried the soap and the dirt and loose hair from her skin, splashing to the floor and running between the wooden boards to the hollow under the porch. Making sure that all of the stuff had been rinsed out, Leon turned off the faucet and sat back.

Duke tugged away from him a little—but not far enough—and shook herself violently. A small rain shower of water was flung off her thick fur and splattered on the floor, the plastic furniture, and Leon, who just barely lifted a hand to shield his face. She shook herself a few more times before Leon coaxed her back with one hand, taking up a towel with the other.

Upon seeing the towel, the canine seemed to see that the end was in sight and sat relatively still as Leon draped the towel over her shoulders and started ruffling the cloth over her to pat her dry. Rubbing the towel over her back, chest, neck, and any other part of her that she would sit still enough for him to reach, Leon let her once more stuff her wet face against his chest. Her fur was so thick that it would take a lot of toweling to dry her completely, so Leon soon discarded the first towel and took up the second. Golden retrievers had relatively water repellent fur to begin with, being bred to 'retrieve' water fowl, but that didn't make it any easier to dry with a towel, she was dry enough for him to take up the brush and take on the task of brushing the shed fur from her body while she started licking at his neck.

"There. Done." Leon finally announced, sitting up and tossing the brush aside.

Duke's tail was wagging again and she got to all fours, nosing at his chest again. Leon stretched his back after being hunched over her for so long, and scratched behind her ear.

"That wasn't so terrible, was it?" He asked her.

She responded by hopping up and licking the entire length of his face before hopping backward and bounding toward the door to the back yard.

"Gah, why with the licking? Always the face." He ran his forearm across his face. "My mouth was open, you mutt."

Standing, he rotated his bad knee a few times to stretch it out and made his way over to the door. He unlocked it and pushed it open.

"There, be free from your big mean owner who doesn't want you to smell." He said.

Duke bounced down the steps, and Leon stepped down after her, no longer in pursuit but rather just watching her dart around the yard. The dog darted to and fro for a few seconds, sniffed at the fence that separated their yard from Herman and Charlotte's, circled around the only tree on their property, and promptly lay down on the grass.

Before Leon could take two steps, she had commenced rolling her freshly washed, dried, and brushed self around on the ground. Her legs flailed as she wiggled around on the grass, pink tongue lolling happily. Leon sighed and hung his head. Getting the lark out of her system, Duke remained on her back, giving him an upside down, canine grin.

Problem? She seemed to taunt.

Too exhausted from the whole ordeal to even be properly exasperated, Leon just sank to his knees beside her and rolled over onto his back on the grass. He reached over and patted her chest. She curled her paws up to her neck, and he started scratching her belly while her back leg started kicking contentedly.

"You're impossible." He grinned, retracting his hand and letting both arms flop to his sides on the grass.

The afternoon sunlight was warm as it hit his legs, but his upper body was in the cooler shade under the tree. Duke eventually shifted onto her stomach, lying down properly beside him in the grass. They stayed like that for a while, until…

"I take it that the ongoing saga of bath time had a successful episode this week?"

Leon peeked open one eye to see Yuffie, hands on her hips and looking utterly gleeful, looking at him and Duke from in front of the porch. She had probably knocked and then come around back when no one answered the door.

"Semi successful." He corrected flatly.

Yuffie cast an eye over his soaked appearance, "Which one got the bath? You or her?"

"Both." He clarified, pushing himself up on his elbows and looking at Duke. "I think we owe the neighbors an apology…again."

Duke perked her ears at him and snorted, lowering her head back to her paws.

..:-X-:..

A/N: Of my three primary OCs, it seems that Duke has the lead in reader popularity, followed by Jake and then Private McCallister…because dogs are awesome. Duke made her debut appearance in my oneshot Man's Best Friend, and has pretty much been a staple in my Alliance-verse stories since.

Thanks for the great prompts, once again! More to come!