Chapter Five
The Winchesters didn't have a chance to say anything to each other about the likely presence of another Hunter before Polly was herding them all towards an enclosure that was strewn with dog toys.
"This is the puppy pen," she informed them, shutting the gate behind them, "Where the pups can run loose safely. Now, looking around, I see they're a social bunch," she nodded to where Lars was once more exchanging sniffs and nose nibbles with Mirra the Bernese, "And socializing with others is a very important developmental activity for them at this age, so, let 'em go, people!"
The class's human participants bent to let their pups of leads, and the ensuing antics would've been enough to make Cruella de Vil decide to join PETA and become a vegan. They sniffed, licked, rassled and chased each other, yipping adorably.
"I think that watching this might be rotting my teeth," mused Sam, watching as Lars proffered a lurid orange fluffy bone to Daisy, who dwarfed him – she accepted the invitation, and began an enthusiastic tug of war with him, which consisted mostly of him bouncing up and down as she shook the toy around. Lemmy and Mirra rolled together in a happy wrestle-ball, alternatively nibbling each other's tails and sniffing each other's butts.
"That's my boy," smirked Dean, as Lemmy thrust his nose somewhere that made Mirra yip in a startled fashion.
Polly distributed name tags to the humans as the pups played, then called the class to order.
"All right, everybody," she clapped her hands in a businesslike fashion, "You'll find that in this program, we're going to do a lot of playing around with our classmates…"
"I like the sound of that," Dean smiled at the Bernese's owner again as Sam shot him a searing Bitchface #3™ (I Wish You'd Let Your Upstairs Brain Drive More Often).
"…But for now, we're going to start on some work, which is to say, a different kind of game!" she finished brightly. "Because when you're a puppy, anything you do with your human is fun!"
"Yeah, tell that to him when it's B-A-T-H time," humphed Mack's owner, jerking a thumb at the pup, and the rest of the class laughed and muttered in agreement.
"All right, I stand corrected," smiled Polly. "Visits to the B-A-T-H and the V-E-T aside, dogs just love to do things with their humans. So, first of all, we're going to start introducing them to a working collar." She opened a small box in the corner of the pen, and took out a handful of tangles. "They're too young to learn what a correction chain is, but they're all old enough to start on a martingale collar. It's a useful idea to have a distinct collar that we wear when we're working – when the collar goes on, that's the signal to pay attention." She handed them out, and demonstrated sizing adjustment on Max. "So, let your little friends sniff them – but not chew, we NEVER chew on our lead and collar! – that's it, very good, now, slip it over your pup's head, and take the other one off… well done! Now put the lead on the D-ring at the top, and we're ready to learn to walk on the lead!"
All the pups sniffed at their new collars – Lemmy got in a surreptitious little nibble – then stood alertly as leads were snapped into place.
"Wonderful!" encouraged Polly. "Now, with lots of talking and encouragement and praise, get your pup on your left side, and encourage them to walk along beside you. It's okay for them to be a bit hesitant," she went on, as the class began a tentative walk on their leads, "Because it will feel different…"
Lemmy suddenly let out a piercing squeal, and pulled backwards to the end of his lead.
"Lemmy! Hey!" called Dean, startled, "What are you doing, little dude?"
"YAAAAAAIPE!" went Lemmy, fighting on the lead light a game fish on a line. The other pups stopped, and stood or sat, watching the performance.
"That's all right, Dean," Polly reassured him as he struggled to hold onto the lead while his pup tried to pull away, "It will feel a bit strange, so just let him get used to it…"
After a solid thirty seconds of pulling, squealing and generally mortifying Dean, Lemmy showed no sign of getting used to it.
"Okay, then, just let him go," Polly instructed. "Let him run, let him see that it's not going to eat him…"
Dean dropped the lead, and Lemmy tumbled backwards. Without missing a beat, he rolled upright, and broke into a run.
He zoomed around the puppy pen, circling Dean, yelping and wailing like a demented comet orbiting a bemused planet, as Dean tried to get his attention. The other pups watched with a mixture of casual interest and complete 'WTF?'
"Don't worry," Polly told him, "We see this all the time, but you'll be amazed how quickly he'll settle down…"
Six circuits of the puppy pen later, Lemmy showed no sign of slowing. Karl slumped and started to lick his own testicles. Daisy yawned, and lay down for a nap. Lars cuddled against her.
"Come on, Lem," Dean pleaded, "That's enough, it's not going to hurt you!"
"YAAAAAAAAIPE!" went Lemmy, completing another lap. A couple of people sniggered. One of the voices sounded a lot like Sam's.
"Don't just stand there, Francis!" snapped Dean, "Get his brother out here and help stop him!"
Sam called Lars away from Daisy – Dean tried not to notice how readily the smaller pup walked on the lead in his new collar – and prepared to run an intercept tackle.
The problem with such a strategy, of course, is that it assumes that the tackler will have enough mass, and therefore inertia, to stop the tacklee…
Without slowing down Lemmy leaped, and, like a champion showjumper over a double oxer, cleared his brother with several inches to spare.
"Lemmy!" Dean yelled again, falling into pursuit behind the yelping pup.
"Ah, now, if your dog is running away from you, chasing is the last thing you want to do," began Polly in a firm yet understanding voice.
"Lemmy!" Dean continued to chase, "Stop it! Stop it right now!"
"The first thing to try is to turn your back," Polly continued, "And call your dog in a firm, calm voice…"
"Knock it off you little asshat!" snapped Dean, as Lemmy completed one more circuit, and jumped his brother again.
"Hang on, bro!" Sam left the pen, and sprinted for where he'd left his backpack.
"Sam!" Dean called after him, "Sam! Hey, I'm going to put a martingale collar on you next! Lemmy! LEMMY! Stop, you little fucker!"
With a determined scowl, Dean changed direction, and stood, deciding to intercept himself, bending down like a quarterback awaiting a particularly fluffy ball. "I gotcha now, you little bastard," he growled, as Lemmy emerged from behind the group of puppies.
If anything, Lemmy put on an extra burst of speed, and shot through Dean's legs between his feet.
Whether or not he'd pulled the through-solid-matter trick wasn't really important. Maybe he did, or maybe he just aimed for the gap, and went for it.
Whatever happened, one thing was for certain: the lead trailing behind him was most definitely a solid, three dimensional and completely unsupernatural object, moving very fast in accordance with the laws of physics, including the law of conservation of momentum. Momentum is a vector quantity, and the undulations of a running puppy trailing a lead set up a wave motion, propagating the momentum vector along the lead, where it had nowhere to go except towards the tip that was whisking back and forth at an ever increasing speed…
When the end of the lead finally snaked around Dean's leg it flicked against him like the end of a whip, with a definite snap.
"Sonofabitch!" shouted Dean, in accordance with the laws of startled Dean, hopping up and down on one leg whilst he grabbed at his calf. "Lemmy, you GET YOUR ASS HERE NOW!"
"YAAAAAAIPE!" went Lemmy, setting out on another lap of the pen.
Whoooooooonk!
At the sound of his favourite toy, Lemmy forgot all about hating his new collar, and put on the brakes.
It looked comically like the screeching four-legs-thrust-out-in-front braking manoeuvres performed in cartoons by animated characters (usually accompanied by squeal brakes sound effects). Lemmy didn't have any sound effects as he threw out the anchors, but he had been travelling quite fast, and so he still had quite a bit of momentum.
Sam would later try to console Dean by explaining that the pup had in fact been following a direct command, namely, not to mess with the fabric of the space-time-matter continuum in front of civilians. Lemmy slid like a batter aiming for home with the bases loaded, obeying not one, but two, laws of physics: 1) the vector quantity momentum (P) = mv, and 2) Newton's first law of motion, being that a body will continue to move at its current velocity until it is acted upon by another force.
In this case, the body happened to be Dean's, and the momentum imparted to it could be rendered in SI units as big for his age kilograms times puppy panic metres per second – Lemmy barrelled into Dean's other leg, knocking it out from under him, and Dean accelerated towards planet Earth at a rate of ouch metres per second per second.
"Aaaaargh!" went Dean, not sure whether to grab at his lead-snapped leg or his Earth-bruised hip. (He was not impressed when later on, Sam would explain to him that, technically, he had imparted some momentum to the planet, it's just that the planet was so much more massive than him that it didn't even feel the bump. In fact, he was so unimpressed that he threw a bundled up dirty sock at Sam's head which, in accordance with the laws of ballistics, hit his baby brother with a force of Oh gross, dude! Newton). "I'm gonna feed you Doritos and lock you in the trunk and let you gas yourself, you little bastard!" he howled, as Lemmy, suddenly finding his Alpha down at ground level, wagged his tail and kissed Dean's nose furiously.
Whonk whunk whoooonk!
"I got Oinker Stoinker!" Sam returned, triumphantly brandishing the toy. Lemmy, the trauma of wearing a new collar completely forgotten, then obeyed a law of mathematics, viz. the definition of a straight line is the shortest distance between two points – he walked across Dean, getting an "Oof!' when two large feet sank into Dean's stomach, and made a beeline for Sam and the coveted squeaky pig.
"Well done, Sam!" trilled Polly, as Lemmy sat up and put on his best Good Dog Carl expression whilst eyeing Oinker Stoinker hopefully. Sam dropped it, and Lemmy sat down and honked contentedly on it.
"Well, it keeps him distracted if he has to have a, you know, a b-word," explained Sam.
"Distraction with a favourite toy can be a very effective strategy if a pup is getting nervous or overwound about something," Polly nodded, "And it seems to have worked! So, let's all have a try at walking on the lead. Get your pup on your left side, encourage him to walk along level with your leg, okay? So, everybody step off with your left foot," she demonstrated with Max, "And give a clear command in a high, happy voice – 'Heel'!"
Puppies on leads tend to wander, get distracted, pull out in front, lag behind, or just sit down and power nap, but with a bit of encouragement, the class formed a circle, and managed to do what was clearly a try at walking at heel.
Well, except for Lemmy. He and Dean sat out for a while so he could nap, because for some reason, he was very tired.
...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo... ...oooooOOOOOooooo...
"Well, that went pretty well, for a first day," commented Sam when they returned to their room later.
"Oh, yeah, just peachy," muttered Dean.
"It certainly seems to have tired them out," Sam went on, as Lemmy and Lars flopped down on their blanket and were suddenly asleep, in the way that puppies can do.
"Yeah, well, you'd be tired too, if you'd run the size equivalent of a half-marathon before lunch," griped Dean.
"It was only their first day, Dean," Sam reminded his brother, "And the whole idea of this program, as Polly will keep telling you with an excess of cruelty to punctuation, is first and foremost to have fun…"
"You certainly seemed to be enjoying yourself," Dean grumped, "Every time Miss Polly praised that little asshat of yours, or that Wildhunt wannabe, you smiled like the kindergarten class smug nerd being told that his hand-outline turkey was better than everybody else's." He broke into a trilling falsetto. "Oh, well done, Lars! Good job, Morgan! That's just brilliant, look at these two, everyone, they know how to sit! Oh, what doggy little Einsteins, they know how to sit! Ooooh, it's the most amazing thing since the invention of hot rollers! I'm so excited I might just wet my lovely tartan skirt!"
"Well, Lars and I have done some training already," Sam reminded him, trying not to sound overly smug, "Even if it's cost a number of training clickers their lives. And Lemmy seemed to have fun, too." Then, unable to resist twisting the knife ever so slightly, he added, "For instance, when we were doing the recalls, and he looked at you and then ran off the other way and started humping Miss Polly's leg, he was a picture of gamboling doggy happiness..."
"I don't mind him having fun, Sam," countered Dean, "But I do object to him having it in a way that leaves me writhing on the ground in pain. Especially if there are hot women present; it's not a good look for the Living Sex God." He glared wistfully at Lemmy. "You'd think with those great big ears, he could at least hear commands properly."
"Dean, when you said 'sit', he didn't mishear you," Sam explained, "He simply answered a call of nature…"
"He didn't have to do it on my boot!" Dean nearly wailed, "And that release word, what's with that?"
"It's to give a dog a clear indication that he's finished working," Sam reiterated. "And the word 'free!' is quite a common one…"
"Well, he misheard that one too!" complained Dean. "My other boot started smouldering!"
"What was that about not wanting to turn your dog into a fawning yes-man?" Sam couldn't resist just a little snideness.
"Shut up," Dean told him, "Lemmy is the best and brightest of their litter," he asserted loyally. He looked thoughtful as a probably explanation for the pup's behavior came to him. "He's probably just bored, because it's all so far beneath him."
"Right," nodded Sam, "The little canine genius is not thriving in mainstream teaching, he needs to go to Advanced Placement to be fully intellectually engaged. It's obvious, really."
"Totally," Dean agreed judiciously. "Anyway, any further leads on our disappearing dog draggers?"
"I've got the names of the instructors," Sam replied, "I want to check out their backgrounds, how long they've been at Polly's Perfect Pooches, and maybe also start some checking on our classmates. Starting with the one with a Wildhunt pup – there's a damned good chance that she's a Hunter. We got no way of knowing, and we don't know what she's here for, but another Hunter could complicate the job…"
"Funny you should mention that," Dean grinned, "Because as it happens, I will be checking out one of our classmates too. Mandy. Mirra's owner? You know, the cute little thing with the lovely smile and the big brown eyes?"
"Would that be the dog, or the owner?" enquired Sam tartly.
"Well, I was talking about the pup," conceded Dean, "But it could equally apply to her human." He consulted his watch. "I'll leave you to your research then, and get on with mine," he decided, picking up his jacket and keys. "You know how they say people start to resemble their dogs?"
"Yeah," said Sam cautiously.
"Well, when I get back, I'll let you know if Mandy has a prehensile tongue like Mirra's…"
"Dean…"
"…And whether she has a fondness for shoving her face into your crotch…"
"Dean!"
"…And I'm especially keen to find out what else she likes to do doggy style besides training…"
"Dean! Shut! Up!"
As it happens, I will NOT be visiting any tumblr sites looking for... you know... That Sort Of Thing. I learned my lesson with Urbandictonary. Sometimes, ignorance is bliss (or enlightenment is bewildered horrification). Besides, the Denizens are such a depraved bunch, they are perfectly capable of imagining for themselves Winchesters in all sorts of restraints, costumes, and otherwise interesting compromising positions involving safe words, fluffy handcuffs and chocolate sauce. I know this, I read the reviews and the PMs. You WEIRDOS.
Reviews are Cute Puppies* Doing Adorable Things During Training When Introduced To Their New Collar And Lead In The Training Session Of Life!
*The more depraved of the Denizens may substitute a Winchester Of Your Choice for the Puppies, if absolutely must. Just make sure you close the curtains and shut the door and turn on a radio or something to drown out any yelping, you deviated pre-verts.