by Bobby D. Lux
Dog Duty
by Bobby D. Lux
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, organizations, or locales is entirely coincidental.
DOG DUTY. Copyright © 2014. Bobby D. Lux. All Rights Reserved.
No part of this work may be reproduced in any form, electronically or otherwise, without express written permission from the author.
To request permission to reprint any portion of this book, email the author directly at [email protected]
Cover art by Tory Hoke. www.thetoryparty.com
Table of Contents
CHAPTER 1 - On the Job
CHAPTER 2 - Just Another Head on the Wall
CHAPTER 3 - The Long Leash Goodbye
CHAPTER 4 - Speaking in the Second Dog (in the Room)
CHAPTER 5 - You Ever Read “No Exit”?
CHAPTER 6 - Be On The Lookout
CHAPTER 7 - The Hunt
CHAPTER 8 - This Is Happening Right Now
CHAPTER 9 - Everyone Pretends They’re Something Sometime
CHAPTER 10 - The Unveiling
CHAPTER 11 - On the Other Side of Town
CHAPTER 12 - A Mild Distraction
CHAPTER 13 - The Ballads of Chucho and Lincoln
CHAPTER 14 - A Routine
CHAPTER 15 - Of Things Concerning Ugly Little Bugs
CHAPTER 16 - What’s Morality When It’s Time To Eat?
CHAPTER 17 - South Side, Grand City
CHAPTER 18 - Inside The Dogcatcher’s Net
CHAPTER 19 - A Lot Happens in a Moment
CHAPTER 20 - The Tenth Race
CHAPTER 21 - The Post Race Wrap Up
CHAPTER 22 - Life is a Jung Man’s Game
CHAPTER 23 - The Lady in the Backyard
CHAPTER 24 - The 34th Annual Grand City Dog Show
CHAPTER 25 - The Docks
EPILOGUE - One More Place Left to Mark
Copyright
Acknowledgments
Author’s Note
About the Author
For Nipper, Ernie, and Missy.
I hope your real life adventures when our family was asleep were as exciting as I imagined them to be.
Dog Duty
CHAPTER 1 - On the Job
I focused on the criminal I was chasing between the buildings on the outskirts of Grand City’s industrial section. A part of the city the taxpayers would have left off the map if they could’ve. That’s where I was. I felt right at home.
My first mistake was thinking it was just another night on patrol. After eight years on the job, it was an honest mistake. I was guilty of getting caught up in the routine of day-after-day, every day. Eight years, also nearly three-quarters of my life up until that point. There had been talk around the department that they wanted to retire me two years prior. Once I again passed all the required tests, they couldn’t find a legitimate reason to send me packing. Not that I was complaining. What else was I going to do? What else was there to do?
Nothing and nothing, that’s what.
The mundane in this case was the one hundred and sixty pound bag of sweat I was gaining on. I’ll give it to this guy, The Perp, he was fast. Not fast enough. Nobody was.
His attempts to lose me were comical. Faking right before turning left as if something so trivial would throw me off. I could still see, even if only in black and white. I could run through the arteries of those back alleys in my sleep. They didn’t go on forever. This human clot would soon find a clogged one.
The Perp got tired of trying to lose me and resorted to knocking things over to try and trip me up. A sure sign of desperation. This chase would be over in no time. Then I smelled the distinct reek of rotten tuna.
It was dinner time for a fat cat who was about to feast on a half-opened can of fish. I know humans have a different definition of fat cat. For me, in this setting, it was all too literal.
My fat cat was perched atop of one of the stacks of boxes The Perp hoped would slow me down. The Perp made a swipe of his right hand and sent the boxes, the rank tuna, and the cat flying my way.
They say cats can adjust themselves to land on their feet in under a second. The look of panic smeared across this guy’s face told me that he was going to need help with his landing. I’ve never had the same problems with cats that other dogs do. I don’t particularly like them. I don’t dislike them either. They’re just cats. I jumped over the boxes. I figured, since I was up there anyway, I might as well catch the damn thing. It really was the least I could do.
“Nooooooo!” the cat screamed, as he fell nice and snug into my jaws. The poor jerk didn’t even have his claws. We landed safely and I dropped the cat. My hunches were right. He plopped flat on his back before getting up to his paws. “Don’t eat me.”
“I’m not going to eat you,” I said.
“Oh, you’re a cop,” he said, as he stared in awe at my collar engraved with Grand City K9. “Thanks, Officer.”
“Fritz is fine.”
Introductions aside, I had other pressing matters. The Perp’s distraction bought him a smidgen of time. I’d make up those extra yards in a few seconds. I took off again down the alley. Again, this was all too routine for me.
I’d lost sight of him. I followed the sticky scent of sweat and the sound of pounding feet. I rounded another corner and found myself facing a dead end. There was a wall directly ahead of me, too high for The Perp to climb over. The footsteps had stopped but the scent was right there. The sirens were still in the background. I was on my own while backup played catch up. Not that I needed it. If the sweat didn’t tell me where to go, the shivering refrigerator box may as well have had a neon sign above it with an arrow pointing down. The Perp was right there.
I should have just kept my position. I should have started barking. I should have waited for backup to arrive and skipped this entire mess that is about to follow. Instead, I was dulled by the routine ease I’d experienced up until that point. I pounced on that box and tore through it. I got a good, deep bite on The Perp. Suspect detained. I could keep him at bay without having to tear his arm off.
“If I were you,” a voice rumbled, out from behind me. “I’d let go of him right now.”
I swung The Perp around and took my first glimpse of Clay, a Rottweiler custom built with one-syllable efficiency. Bite. Maim. Kill.
“This is none of your concern,” I growled, out of the side of my mouth that wasn’t holding on to The Perp. “Turn around and go home.”
“If you’re smart,” a voice said, one that hovered near Clay’s shoulder. A voice that sounded like the screech of air from a balloon. “You’ll be the one who lets go and goes home.”
“Shut up, Scamper,” Clay said.
Scamper, a Jack Russell Terrier, and Clay’s parasitic sidekick, stepped out from behind Clay. The lightweight wasn’t my main concern. That was saved for the dog with shark eyes who descended upon me.
“This is official police business,” I said. “You’d best be advised to leave.”
“Oh no,” Clay said. “That’s where you’re wrong—”
“Stop barking,” The Perp said, crying out. He relaxed his arm as best he could, considering the circumstances. Too many people think their arm is stronger than it really is and have tried to shake me off. They’d have better luck trying to swim up a waterfall. Some have tried to use their other hand to pry my mouth off. An excellent way to lose fingers. This Perp was smart. He knew his way with dogs. “Get him. Clay, attack!”
“Dead wrong,” Clay said, finishing his threat.
I let go of The Perp in time to maneuver away from Clay’s pounce. The Perp got up, took his shirt off, and wrapped it around his arm. Clay
and I circled around one another.
“Don’t worry, Clay,” Scamper said, who appeared behind me, showing his needle teeth. “He can’t leave now.”
“Maintain silence during the operation,” Clay said.
The Perp darted into one of the buildings. I made after him. Clay took me down with a precision bite to my arm. He pulled it out from under me. I was pinned down and Clay was going for my neck.
“Oh, my Lord,” Scamper said, taunting. “I’ve never seen such a beating delivered in all my years of watching this most brutal of all sports. I thought I’d seen it all until tonight. This is carnage at its finest or worst, depending on your perspective.”
I kept my head moving so Clay couldn’t get a good crack at my neck. I got my hind legs under Clay’s chest and pushed him off me. I shook myself off and we were face-to-face. It was time for Clay to be another notch on my dance card. A lightning bolt shrieked up my tail.
I yelped and turned. Scamper was trying to take my tail home for a souvenir. The dirtiest move a dog could pull on a fellow canine. It’s the human equivalent of a kick to the jewels.
“I got him,” Scamper grunted, through his closed jaw. “I got the cop. I did it.”
“You got him,” Clay said, “but I’m gonna finish him.”
I kicked my leg back and caught Scamper clean in the skull. He let go and I turned back as Clay lunged on me. Clay was on my leg pulling it out of socket. I could feel the muscles peeling away off my bones. My body froze with pain while Clay’s jaw grinded into my leg. I jerked at my leg to free it. Instead, Clay bent it in the wrong direction. No half measures with him.
So this was it. I tried to get back on my feet and failed. I wasn’t going to lay there and let this happen. I heard the tendons pop and snap near my foot. I couldn’t stand. I looked like a fish trying to flop its way off a boat and back into the ocean.
“He’s done,” Clay said, his teeth coated with my blood that was smeared across his face.
It was The Perp who saved me from a further mauling. He distracted Clay by lurching his head out above the safety of the other side of the wall. My neck was fully exposed and my head felt like concrete.
“Clay, Scamper,” he said. “Let’s go. Come. Back to the docks…”
And that was the last I remembered before the pain and the darkness squeezed out the remainder of my sight. There was no time to process the ridiculous possibility that “dock” might have been the last word I ever heard in my life.
I must not have been out long because when I opened my eyes, I saw Scamper balanced on a shaky ladder of boxes, trash, and broken appliances. He moved his hips back and forth trying to generate the momentum to jump over the wall.
The voices of the other officers approached, calmly giving The Perp’s description into their radios. Male white, early thirties, six feet, hundred fifty pounds, dark hair, wearing a black, long sleeved shirt, blue jeans, unknown weapons. I barked so they would know where to find me.
I tried to get up. I couldn’t. My head was spinning. I saw the blood around my body. I wanted to let everyone know I was okay. The Perp was getting away and I saw which direction he went. He went through the building. I could still get him. I just needed someone to get me back up on my paws, dammit. My partner, Officer Hart, was the first to find me.
“K-9 unit down,” he said, into his radio. I barked and tried to point my head in the direction of the building. “It’s okay, Fritz. Just stop right now. Relax.”
The barking made me dizzy. It bothered me that Officer Hart didn’t seem to care about catching The Perp. I wanted to bite Officer Hart for not going after The Perp. I was fine. Officer Hart kept his hands on my leg to stop the immediate bleeding. My blood was already all over his dark pants. It wasn’t until more officers arrived that they continued the search and established a perimeter. The Perp was probably already long gone by that point.
As if things couldn’t get worse, Nitro was with the officers arriving at the scene. He was a rookie. Typical. A cowboy who relied solely on a belief system that got him through each day: himself. Nitro’s partner let him off the leash and he ran over to me.
“Which way did they go?” Nitro said.
“He went into the building,” I said, shivering. “In that door over there, nearest the wall.”
“How long?”
“Maybe four ago. I don’t know. I was out.”
“You couldn’t stay awake?”
“I don’t know what happened.”
“So much for the investigation then.”
“The other two went over the wall,” I said.
“What other two?” Nitro said. “There was only the one guy.”
“He had two dogs with him here in the alley.”
“Fritz, the only one who cares about any dogs around here is you.”
“I see they still keep you on a short leash,” I said.
“Not for long, Fritz. Tough break.”
“It’s not broken, Nitro,” I said.
“I’m not talking about your leg,” Nitro said, as an ambulance pulled up to the end of the alley. Two EMTs jumped out and came over to me. Officer Hart stood, wiped my blood off his hands as the medics tended to me, and conferred with Nitro’s partner. “This is my case now. It’s about time they let the real cops on the scene. Your ride is here. Your chariot awaits.”
Officer Hart and the EMTs scooped me up and placed me into the back of the ambulance. My leg seized and I cried out. The larger of the EMTs put both gloved hands on my leg and tried to hold it steady. I had to control every instinct I had not to bite him. They gave me a shot in my good leg and any fight I had left in me evaporated.
Before they closed the door to the ambulance, I watched Nitro make a show of going to the building I pointed him towards. Nitro sniffed around the door then he looked up and barked to make sure all eyes were on him. When they were, he scratched at the door with one paw.
“Excellent work, Nitro,” Nitro’s partner said, as they entered the stalagmite of a building.
“Don’t worry, Fritz,” Officer Hart said. I could barely hear him over the sirens as we rolled out of there. “We’ll take good care of you. You had a good run, boy. Real good.”
Then my eyesight lost a battle to the suffocating nothingness. For the second time that night, everything went black.
CHAPTER 2 - Just Another Head on the Wall
The lights were darkened. There I was up on the new big screen, high def TV for my peers to see. A TV ostensibly intended for detailed viewings of grainy surveillance footage. Instead, one that found more use on Sunday afternoons in the Sergeant’s office during football season. I realized how much fur I’d shed since those early days. I was a halfway decent looking dog. I couldn’t have been more than a year and a half old when this clip was filmed. Chief Lennox, Officer Hart, and I had gone to visit the kindergarten class at Twain Elementary School for my first recorded public relations spot. Now it was being displayed as the beginning clip of my greatest hits collection at my retirement celebration.
According to the vet, I was lucky to still have my leg and I would never be the same. Someday, I might be able to run again. Maybe. They rushed me into emergency surgery and repaired everything. Some repair job. Repair means back to normal. This was back to we-don’t-need-you-anymore. This was sayonara, Fritz. Thanks for the memories.
I should have been more embarrassed that this video was being shown to my sworn comrades. Not that they were all watching. Most of them were typing away on their cell phones. Their sense of nostalgia seemingly matched mine.
Not too bad looking up there, sure, though I was embarrassed to even make eye contact with myself. I had no on-camera experience and while it may seem easy to sit there and act natural, try doing it while being fully aware that you’re trying to seem like you’re just being yourself. It’s a real mind trap. Go ahead, try it. Act natural. I’ll be here waiting for you.
I looked more nervous on screen than I actually was thanks to my eyes anxi
ously darting across the room. I had to force myself to stay seated. The scent of whatever contraband the teacher had concealed in her middle drawer tugged at my attention.
“Since I’ve been sworn in as the new chief here in Grand City,” Chief Lennox said, the star of the video, “major crime has dropped in every category including auto theft, assaults, and even cheating on homework.” Chief Lennox leaned in and winked at the students. They were instructed to laugh and some of them did. “Crime is down big time. And it’s thanks to the hard working men and women of The Grand City Police Department. But it’s also thanks to our citizens who we rely on to be our eyes and ears out there and to let us know when things are happening in their neighborhoods. So that means when you see something or someone who doesn’t look right, you pick up that phone and give us a call. And if it’s an emergency just dial 911 and we’ll be there faster than Fritz here can chase down a bad guy. And that’s pretty fast. Speaking of Fritz, he’s the newest officer on our roster and this is our way of introducing him to the citizens of our wonderful city. Come on up and say hi, kids. He’s friendly as long as you’re not a bad guy.”
A few pre-selected little kids ran up and rubbed and wiped their dirty, sticky, little hands all over my fur. One in particular kept coming in over my head even after they were all told beforehand to not touch my head or face. They pinched, pulled, and tugged at me while Chief Lennox wrapped up our promotional video.
“The children of Grand City love our police dogs,” Chief Lennox said, as he walked towards the camera, “and if I know Fritz, he loves them right back. The Grand City Police Department and our K-9 unit, it’s what keeps you safe.”
The director, who stood behind the cameraman, waved her hands at me. When she had my attention, she softly clapped her hands at me with pleading eyes. That was my cue to end the commercial with a playful bark. It took Chief Lennox six tries to get his speech right. I nailed the bark on the first take.