Hammers in the Shadows

Part One: Shadows And Ice - Chapter Three

"Kinda like daddy saved me?" He asked Adam, before something bumped into my legs and woofed. "Adam what's this dog doing here?" I asked since it wasn't Charlie or Altair.

"That's Sampson, the dogs have free range on the territory, and come and go as they wish" Adam replied.

I was definitely surprised when Shawn wiggled a bit to tell me to let him down before he engulfed the dog in a hug. "He wants to be my friend daddy!" he shouted happily and I cocked my head at Adam and shrugged my shoulders.

"Guess he's getting one too." I told him before we proceeded down to medical where Beth would spend the rest of the afternoon helping my boy.

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While working in his office Zane had felt what was going on in the classroom and shook his head before he sent to Adam, *Adam we could use some help in the waste treatment plant. After their week is over assign their parents there. I wish I had understood why Shawn was not happy and I would have dealt with it before you needed to.*

Adam grinned, *A half day each should work wonders to let them know to teach their pups not to be bullies...*

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The next four weeks were highly educational, and sometimes even enjoyable for myself, my family, and the pups we had to bring with us to visit the Bengal Tiger Pride. After we brought him back, the youngest pup, who was the same age as Shawn gave him a hug and apologized. What was surprising was the very first night we spent at Nam Cho, Sergey went crashing through three cats to get to a beautiful young woman who had been setting a table and shouted "Mine!" before hugging her tightly, as soon as she realized what was going on she hugged him back just as tightly and growled at another female who was nearby.

"Mark, remember that day for us?" Anna asked me softly before bending over to kiss my neck gently.

"Yes, I do my dear, it was one of the most wonderful days of my life so far." I told her returning her kisses gently, though the frightened pup pushing against my leg did dampen my ardour. I knelt down to him and gently rubbed his shoulder. "Relax, they aren't that bad. We aren't trying to hurt you." I told him softly. "We just want you to know what it's like when you are the only one here that is different."

As the youngest of the three that had been making Shawn's life miserable, he shivered and I could see that he was trying to be a brave boy. I was about to say more when Shawn came over from where he'd been having some fun with the local cubs running and bouncing around with them.

"Come on Paul, let's have some fun." He paused and then walked up and gently took the pup's hand in his. "We won't bite, please, we won't hurt you."

I could sense the pup's nervousness before I nodded to him. "Paul go have fun with the other cubs, and keep an open mind. Perhaps you'll see why it wasn't nice to try and be a bully to my cub."

For the rest of that visit, and all that followed I saw an encouraging trend in their behaviour as the three pups learned to respect Shawn, and after their punishments the four of them actually started playing together with the pups helping Shawn and watching out for him, though his having Sampson around probably encouraged them that it was a good idea not to pick on him.

By the end of the first Semester everything had settled down and we were working hard to learn all of the skills and techniques that we were being taught by the instructors, though I found that in a couple of courses that I was being given some tasks that were more instructional than they were educational.

One of the more interesting encounters I had when I was in the academy was with the Pack's Master Smith. When he saw the blade, I was carrying on the way to practice he stopped me with a large hand on the chest and asked me in heavily accented English. "Where did you get that weapon?"