Petrash woke up early and because the scene from yesterday kept going through his mind he eventually got up and started making breakfast. He had barely finished setting up the table when the girls walked in.
'Morning. I hope you slept well.' he said, then saw Rusty and blushed.
She turned away quickly and sat down trying not to look at him. Ghost noticed and leaned closer as she sat down.
'Did something else happen yesterday in the bath as well?' she whispered smiling deviously.
Rusty grabbed a couple of eggs and hastily peeled them. 'No, nothing!'
'So,' Dice said pulling off his bandanna. 'we heard something interesting about you..'
He flattened his ears. 'Say all you want. I've heard enough bad jokes about these all my life.'
She stroked one ear. 'Oh, we'll find new ways to tease you.'
'Right.'
'So you might as well let your tail out. No use hiding it from us anymore.' Dusk said with a devious smile and smacked his ass.
'Go eat breakfast!' he said and walked into the kitchen.
The girls ate and afterwards got ready for their deliveries. Their job was delivering cargo to various scientific stations deeper into the snow ring where no air transport could go. For that they drove large tracked vehicles capable of driving large distances thanks to hydrogen generators fuelled by the snow itself.
He watched them leave and walked into the office where he found a mess of papers and binders on the wooden desk and metal shelves.
'How the hell..?'
Again he sighed, turned on the desk light and PC and sat down on the worn out chair to make sense of it all. He ordered supplies and food first, checked the mail and tried to first sort all paperwork by date. By the time he managed to make some sense of it it became time to make dinner. Just before leaving the office he received a mail telling him to deliver all due reports in a couple of days or face budget cuts.
"I can make it if I work late." he thought. "No need to really get worried."
One by one the girls came back and ate dinner. When he finished cleaning up he went back into the office and started on the reports. After a while Ghost walked in.
'Busy?'
He nodded. "I have to file these reports soon. Lots of papers to go through.'
'Ah, work hard then.' she said and left.
'Yeah..'
'I've got the next thing.' Ghost said as she undressed and crawled into bed. 'He needs to file the reports soon. Which will be difficult if they disappear.'
The other girls snickered. 'We won't have to deal with him for long.' Dusk said.
The next day he started filling in the reports as soon as the girls left and he managed to get most ready before they came back.
'How's it going?' Ghost asked.
He smiled a little. 'I can finish tonight, then double-check and send them tomorrow. Just in time.'
'Good job then.' She said smiling. 'They'll be happy with those.'
He nodded and carried on serving dinner.
Late that night he stretched after writing the last report and slumped on his chair. 'Finished.' he said to himself, made a backup copy to the external disk attached to the PC, then locked it and dragged himself to bed.
A few minutes after he left Ghost walked in, unlocked the PC, deleted his reports and backup along with other random files, then pulled the power plug.
'Whoopsie.' she whispered while plugging the power back in. 'Power failures happen.'
The next day they heard him cursing.
'What's wrong?' Ghost asked innocently walking into the office.
'The damned PC must have lost power last night. And it took all my reports with it, even the backup I made! Shit!'
She looked worried at the screen. 'Really nothing left?'
'All gone. All my work for nothing!'
'Well, I'm sure if you explained to HQ they'll understand.' she said and patted him on his shoulder.
'Yeah.' he said but knew there was no excuse they'd accept.
He couldn't start again until the end of the day after checking the supplies and equipment stored for shipping so he had to work all night.
The girls noticed he hurried with dinner and snickered at his worry.
'Worried about his reports, eh?' Dice said.
'Must be tough as a desk jockey, not delivering reports in time.' Dusk said.
'Getting chewed out by the boss is no fun, hehe.' Rusty said.
Ghost nodded. 'He'll be gone soon.'
He was busy at the office when the girls went to bed and they snickered. Later that night Ghost woke up and had to go to the bathroom. When she returned she noticed the light was still on in the office. Curious she looked in and saw him still going through binders and filling out forms.
'Hey, it's late. Shouldn't you get some sleep?'
He shook his head, barely able to keep his eyes open. 'Have to finish these.'
'Aw, that can wait until later.'
'Actually, not.' he said flipping through pages quickly.
'Why not? So you get chewed out, big deal.'
'If only that...'
She tilted her head. 'Worse?'
He nodded.
'How worse?'
'Nothing to worry your pretty head over.'
She slapped his shoulder. 'Tell me.'
He sighed and put down the binder. 'Okay, I didn't want to worry you because I knew I could have finished in time yesterday. If I don't hand in the reports before two hundred tomorrow they'll cut our budget. And that includes your pay.'
'What?'
'No funds until they are convinced we're doing good here.'
'They can't do that!'
'I'm afraid they can, and they will after all this time of no management here.'
'But then, is there enough time?'
He sagged his shoulders. 'Probably not, but I'm going to try anyway.' He grinned. 'At least I got everything sorted at date now.'
"Shit, this wasn't supposed to happen." she thought and looked around at the chaos. 'Can I help?'
'Well, if you can gather the paperwork for each month I need it would help.'
She nodded and they continued where he left off.
When he clicked on the upload button at one hundred seventy seven on the clock they let out a deep sigh of relief.
'We did it!' she said and hugged him tightly.
'Yeah.' he replied blushing. 'We did it.'
She yawned. 'This has been the most boring and tiresome job I ever did.'
He nodded and rubbed his face. 'Let's hope we won't have to do that ever again.'
He stared at the monitor for a few moments, then noticed she had fallen asleep and smiled softly. Careful not to wake her up he lifted her up in his arms and carried her silently to bed where the other girls were still fast asleep.
'Thanks for your hard work. Sleep tight.' he whispered and sneaked back out.
He figured he could get some sleep before having to start breakfast and crashed down on his bed.
By the time he woke up from his alarm clock he noticed he was late. Quickly he headed out but found the table all set with the girls eating.
'Ah?' he said. 'Who..?'
'I did.' Ghost said. 'I figured I'd give you a break for your hard work last night.'
'Ah so. Thanks.' he said smiling.
Dice stretched. 'Did you carry her to bed this morning?'
He looked up surprised. 'Who? Me? How?'
'Might have dreamed it though.' she yawned. 'It was rather weird.'
'Yeah.' he said and got himself a cup of tea while seeing Ghost glancing shyly at him.
'So, what happened to the plan?' Dice whispered.
Ghost shook her head. 'No way, it would have meant our pay got cut. He didn't tell because he didn't want to worry us.'
'Tssk.' Dice said and they all ate silently.
'Dusk, you're going to lab 54, right?'
She looked up from preparing her bag. 'Yeah, what of it?'
'Mind if I tag along? I have to have some papers looked over and I'd like to have a word with the administrator there. It's not far so if it's not a bother..?'
He looked like a lost puppy to her with his flattened ears and carefully wagging tail and couldn't refuse him.
'Alright then. Just don't make a fuss and distract me from driving.'
He smiled. 'Thanks, I'll get ready.'
Soon after he had settled in the passenger seat of her truck with a book. Occasionally he looked at Dusk who was concentrating on driving.
'What?' she asked.
'Eh, what?'
'You keep looking at me, you want something?'
'Oh! Ah, no. Just admiring how you can drive this thing every day. I think I'd end up buried in the snow after ten meters.' he said with a grin.
She blushed. 'Just read your book.'
Eventually they ended up at the lab, a series of red coloured low metal buildings. Petrash met with the people in charge there and Dusk helped with unloading the cargo. After going through the numbers and schedules he got taken on a small tour of the facility. He found it interesting to see what they did here so Frant, the administrator, was keen on showing. When they walked out the back at the kennels they met with shouting and Petrash recognised Dusk's voice.
'You can't do that!' she shouted.
They turned the corner to see her and Kull, the caretaker, shouting against each other.
'I can and I will because I have to!'
'Wow, what's going on!?' Frant asked.
'He wants to kill her!' Dusk shouted.
'Wait, what? Kill who?'
'You know the young husky-wolf who's mother died last week?' Kull, the burly feline explained. 'She's going wild and attacks all coming close to her. I have no choice but to put her down.'
'She's hurting! You can't put her down for that!'
'I can't keep her here if she doesn't calm down! This is no charity!'
Dusk turned to Petrash. 'You say something too!'
He saw the frustration and tears in her eye. 'Hang on.'
He watched the blue-grey husky huddled all the way back in the corner and thought of what he could do, then leaned over to Frant.
'Mind if I give it a try?'
'Sure. I don't like to have to put down an animal so if there's a chance..'
'Okay.' he said, opened the kennel carefully, walked in slowly despite the growling from the husky, pulled out his book and sat down on a potato bag used by the dog to sleep on.
'What are you doing?' Dusk asked.
'Don't worry. Why don't you get some rest before we're taking the trip back. I can see you're very tired.'
'I'm not!'
'Just do it. Nothing you can do here now.'
She sulked as she left for the transporter.
'Are you going to be okay?' Kull asked.
'I will. I just have to try anything I can because I don't like to see Dusk this sad.'
The men nodded. 'If you need anything, just call.'
Petrash pulled out the carton of cookies from his coat, pulled one out and laid the carton next to him. Then he started to read his book and nibble on the cookie, ignoring the growling from the corner.
After a while the growling became softer and stopped. Petrash occasionally pulled out a cookie and this time he tossed it over to the husky. It looked wary at it at first, then watched him eat another cookie and started sniffing it. Slowly she crawled closer and licked it once. It must have tasted good because she carefully ate it and he smiled softly.
When she looked at him as if asking for one more he tossed another one, only a little closer to him so she had to crawl closer to get it.
After she finished that one he laid a cookie next to him, then ate another one and continued reading his book. She crawled a little closer but stayed put for some time before she dared to crawl closer again. It took quite a while before she got close enough to snatch away the cookie making him smile once more.
This time he took another cookie and held it out to her on his flat hand. She let out a growl at first, looked sideways a few times, sniffed carefully, then carefully took the cookie from his hand and ate it.
'So, feeling better now?' he asked.
She sniffed his hand once more and gave it a lick.
He patted on his lap. 'How about coming here so I can pet you?'
Carefully she came closer and laid down on his lap and he gently ran his fingers through her fur. It was really thick and soft and he scratched her head a little. He could sense her warming up to him as her tail started to wag more little by little. After bribing her with a few more cookies he knew she trusted him.
'So, what are we going to do with you?'
At that time Kull returned to check up on him and smiled. 'Looks like you managed to get through to her.'
'Yeah. And now I don't know what to do. I'm thinking of taking her off your hands if that's okay with you.'
Kull nodded. 'She's attached to you now so it would be bad to break her bond again. I have no problem with it, if you can let her stay at your place.'
'We'll manage.' Petrash said to the husky.
In the meantime Dusk had woken from the nap she managed to get and by the time she got out of the transport he stood outside with the husky next to him.
'How?' she asked, not really believing what she saw.
'I hope you don't mind if we take her with us.'
Her eyes grew bigger. 'Can we?'
He nodded. 'Yeah, she can live with us if you girls don't mind having her around.'
She held out her hand to the husky. 'Are you okay with it?'
The husky stepped forward, sniffed her hand and gave it a lick.
'Well, guess that's settled then. Let's go home.'
After Dusk and Kull exchanged apologies they drove off to home.
'What's her name actually?' Dusk asked.
'Dawn.'
'So how did you do it?'
'Well, to be honest I thought she looked a little like you with the same colour fur. And then I thought of how you love cookies and how I had taken a carton to bribe you with if I needed to. So I took the chance of bribing her with it.'
She looked at his embarrassed grin. 'Right.. She does have the same colour though. But she has grey eyes, just like you.'
He nodded. 'Looks like she got those from her wolf father.'
He snickered suddenly and she raised an eyebrow. 'What's so funny?'
'I was just thinking, with her name, her fur and her eyes it almost like she could be our daughter.'
'True.' Dusk snickered, then blushed hard. 'What are you thinking of!?'
The next moment he found himself kicked out in the snow and heard her shout. 'You can walk home!'
Luckily the sad face from Dawn made her turn back and pick him back up but she felt embarrassed all the way home.
Ghost saw them acting strangely when they walked into the living room, 'What's up with you guys?' she asked, then noticed Dawn. 'And how did you get this?'
Dusk blushed harder and stepped quickly to her room. 'Go ask that pervert!'
He explained how he got close to Dawn, and turned red when he explained what happened to make her mad at him.
The girls laughed.
'Pervert is right.' Rusty said. 'You're not going to make up for that for a long time.'
'Crap.' he said and looked at Dawn. 'I hope you can do something about it.'
Later that evening Ghost nudged Dusk. 'So, he got to you?'
'What do you mean?' she asked quickly.
'I see you looking often at him, then turn away quickly.'
'It's just that Dawn is so close to him and I'd like to pet and hug her too.' she pouted.
'Okay, if you say so, hehe.'