Butch has been rescued from the Fight Farm. He has refuge and new friends.
Butch’s Big Adventure: Part 6:
I like puppies. I’m helping Rex with their training. The human carers teach them basics, like sit and stay, but good dogs know more than how to follow commands. Like what a dog can do for their owner without their owner even knowing they’re doing it.
Good dogs read their owners, how they look, how they move and smell. They know when their owner is sick or unhappy, if they want comfort or cheering up play. They know what their owners like and what to chase away. They know how to greet their owner’s friends (no jumping) and how to scare bad people to behave. Pups learn these things best from other dogs.
When I was a pup I belonged to a security guard. He was a bad man. He taught me how to chase and bite other bad men, like robbers. So I teach the pups what I learned from him. Not how to chase and bite though, I teach about bad men and how tricky they are.
Like the thieves who stole me. They offered me some meat and I hopped in their van. Simple and stupid as that. They were tricky, but no dog should be that stupid. A lesson for the pups.
I told them about beatings and hot sticks and dog fights and Chopper. Scared the hell out of them. Woof.
I’ve been here for a month now. It’s full moon again and there’s something in the air. Humans tend to miss this, how energy flows. It’s part of the work we do for them, to let them know when they need to be careful. Or we try to at least, they rarely listen.
Anyway, for the last few days Cain and Abel have been on edge. We dogs are always excited by the moon of course but this is something more. I can’t see what’s coming, but I know it’s coming for Cain and Abel.
The day of the moon a family came to visit; a mother and father, a boy and a girl. Marla already told us they wanted a dog to join their family so we were ready to show ourselves off.
We were all excited. It’s true the pack will lose someone, but a pack also wants what’s best for the individual. We will share the lucky one’s happiness. Marla told us they had a farm with cows and a river. Their dog had died because he was old and now they wanted another one, for their children. And to help with the cows.
As soon as they arrived I could tell they were good people, kind people. We all lined up in our kennel yards and they walked along, saying hello to each one of us. When they reached the brothers Cain and Abel, who shared a kennel yard, they spent more time.
The children asked Marla if they could play with Cain and Able so she opened their gate. The brothers trotted out, tails wagging like mad. They bumped the children and mouthed their hands but they didn’t jump up. Good dogs.
The mum and the dad patted them too, then the boy threw a stick for them. I know for a fact that Cain and Abel have never chased a stick in their lives. They grew up on the fight farm. No one ever played with them there. But they straight away got what the game was, racing each other, mock fighting over the stick then trotting back holding it together. And they let it go as soon as the boy reached for it. That was impressive, that they knew to do that, to let the stick go.
The family clearly liked them and when Marla put them back in their kennel yard, they asked about them. Cain and Abel, Amazon and me, we could all hear them. Most people don’t know this, that we understand them. Not so much the words, it’s more that we hear what they’re saying before they say it. If these folks had known that we understood what they were saying, they probably would have moved away a bit. Like parents do when they talk about their children. Because they were talking about which one to choose, Cain or Able.
We all felt it, like a knife, cutting.
Cain and Abel have never been separated. They’re from the same litter, grew up together on the fight farm. They licked each other’s wounds, made each other strong, kept each other happy when all around was despair. Together they survived the farm.
For what though. Was this freedom? They had no more say in their lives than they had at the farm. Dumb dogs waiting for their human gods to do with as they wished. Good dogs maybe, but still fate’s property.
Remember Chopper? Chopper was a bad dog. He killed the master and ran away. Chopper is free. We’re not.
The father said they’d think about it and come back tomorrow. That afternoon, in free time, the pack stayed close by Cain and Able. The brothers were quiet. Later that night they lay flank to flank, staring at the moon.
In the morning the family returned. Cain and Abel greeted them politely, but anyone who cared could see the drooping tails. Marla came over.
“Have you chosen?”
“Well, no. We couldn’t.”
The father turned to Cain and Able.
“Good dogs.” he said. “Yes you are.”
Back to Marla.
“We’d like to take them both.”
It took a moment to sink in.
They’d take them both.
The relief, the joy, hit Cain and Able and spread through the pack.
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To be continued …..