Dogsitting for Great Justice [Log, closed]
Kiba offers to leave Akamaru with Ukitake while he's at school on Friday. Ukitake agrees. Dog-lovers unite.
--
Kiba's passage down the stairs was usually very distinct; he had a peculiar way of thundering that made it sound as if half a dozen or so hungry elephants were converging on the stairs, rather than one hungry rugby player. With Akamaru at his side, though, he managed to more or less sneak from the second floor down to the first, and then to Apartment Two. Fingers hooked under the collar of the enormous white dog at his side, he cast a quick, nervous glance over his shoulder before knocking rapidly on the door.
The night before could certainly have been better, Ukitake thought. He'd given up on sleep a long time before, his coughing disturbing things more than he's have liked. Still this was a day where he actually felt well enough to get out of bed, so that had to be something.
He knew Kiba was coming, though so he got up from where he was reading to go and answer the door, checking through the spyhole first.
Kiba waved cheerfully at the spyhole, then pointed out of Ukitake's range of vision. The dog, obviously. Akamaru caught the gesture; he was a smart dog, and he'd figured out by Kiba's careful and thorough grooming this morning that something was up. He barked cheerfully.
"Hush!" Kiba snapped quickly, rapping his knuckles against the dog's head. "Ukitake? It's me, Kiba."
Ah good. The door was opened quickly, it wouldn't do for someone to see Akamaru in the hallway after all. "Hey nice to see you" Ukitake greeted cheerfully, and opened the door widely enough to fit both man and dog through. "So this is the famous Akamaru?"
"Yep!" Kiba tugged the husky through the door quickly, then released the leather collar as soon as Ukitake had shut the door. "Say hey, Akamaru."
The husky sat back on his tail and held out a paw, big blue eyes widening as he looked up at Ukitake. Kiba stifled a snigger. Okay, so maybe the sickly man was screwed...
... he was. He really was screwed, because there was no way he could resist puppy dog eyes like those. With a small laugh, Ukitake reached out and shook Akamaru's paw. "Nice to meet you." Yes, Akamaru was going to be spoiled. "He's a gorgeous dog."
Kiba rocked back on his heels, beaming with pride. "Isn't he? Not show-standard, 'cause he's too big, but he's strong and fast and the best friend anybody could want." He scrubbed the dog's head with a familiar hand, and Akamaru whined and licked his wrist. "You ever had a dog?"
"Show standard doesn't mean anything in my eyes," Ukitake said, leaning back again. "I prefer to see a well loved and well cared for dog." And Akamaru obviously was. "Yeah, but I had to give him away." Ukitake said, replying to the question. Obvious reasons, there.
"Yeah, show guys tend to be kinda..." Kiba flipped a wrist uncomfortably, leaving it vague as to whether he was referring to the dogs or their owners. Or both. They sort of tended to blend together, in his mind. "And big is good 'cause Akamaru and I can roughhouse together without holding back." He pushed up the sleeve of his hooded sweatshirt with obvious pride, displaying forearms slashed with numerous tiny white scars. "Spent more time in the kennels when I was a kid than in the house or the school. Put together, probably."
"Too bad about your dog," he added with genuine sympathy in his voice. "What was he?"
Ukitake grinned and nodded as he inspected Kiba's many small scars. "You must have been around a lot of dogs when you were a kid, then." It made him wonder just how Kiba ended up in 311, but he certainly wasn't going to ask.
"He was a German Shepherd cross with a Golden Retriever," Ukitake said, recalling his dog in his mind. "A huge thing he was."
"My family runs a kennel out in the country. Well, sorta. It's more like a huge collection of dogs we've bought, bred, rescued...My sister's a vet technician, and my mom runs the farm, so I sorta guess I'm following the family tradition." He frowned. "They're not really happy to have me here in the city, but the University offered me a scholarship and I couldn't turn it down." The frown brightened into a flashing grin. "At least I don't have to pass physics to keep it!"
Akamaru whined and sniffed at Ukitake's leg, obviously intrigued by this strange men. Kiba's grin widened, then abruptly fell. "Ah, hell, Akamaru, don't--"
He jumped for the dog's collar at the same time as the husky reared up onto his hind legs, planted his paws on Ukitake's shoulders, and gave the man's face a thorough swipe with his tongue. Kiba dragged him back by the collar, face red with embarrassment. "Geez, I'm sorry, he doesn't usually do that..."
"At least you can go back to them once you've gotten your qualifications," Ukitake reasoned. Kiba seemed like a lively and honest person, and he liked that. "But they let you take Akamaru with you, never the less?" Then again, if Akamaru was Kiba's companion, Ukitake could see why they did.
When Akamaru jumped up, Ukitake certainly wasn't expecting it and had to shift his footing to accomodate for the sudden weight on his shoulders, but the second surprise got him even more. Once Kiba had dragged the dog away, Ukitake rubbed at his damp cheek with his sleeve. "Don't worry about it, it's not like he bit me."
"He doesn't bite," Kiba assured him. "Um. Much. Not other people, at least. And it's more like love-bites anyway."
...Uh. "Not in any weird sense," he said quickly. Not that he thought Ukitake would take that the way, say, Anko or Naruto would, but he'd gotten enough jokes in the last few months that he was trying to learn to be careful of his words. Try being the operative word; Kiba's words never seemed to detour from the straight route from mind to mouth.
"Affectionate nibbles?" His own dog used to gently take Ukitake's arm in his mouth and bite on it gently in affection. Ukitake leaned down to give Akamaru a good scratch at the ruff of his neck, and behind his ears.
"Yeah," Kiba agreed in relief. Nice guy, Ukitake. Good with dogs. Akamaru was leaning into the scratch, tail thumping happily on the floor. Kiba sighed in relief. He couldn't have told anyone but Akamaru how worried he'd been about this; it was the first time he'd dared to leave his dog with anyone but one of his roommates, and he didn't know Ukitake very well. But the guy knew how to treat a dog, and he knew how to make people (and dogs) comfortable. Kiba rolled his sleeve down and jammed his hands in his pockets, grinning.
Ukitake was notorious for keeping to himself, but he was friendly and kind to anyone he met. It was a strange combination, sure, but that was him. Friendly and approachable.
"Oh yeah," he said suddenly, straightening up, "You wanted to borro-" his sentence was cut short with a few coughs as he covered his mouth, and then continued as if nothing had happened, "borrow Fluke. I'll get it for you."
"Oi," Kiba said nervously. "You okay? You sure it's fine for me to leave Akamaru here? I mean, I don't want you to be fussing yourself watching after him, or anything." Of course, if anything did happen to worsen Ukitake's condition, it'd be good to have the dog there; unless his roommate (who seemed to be competing with Shikamaru for the title of Laziest Man Alive) was there, the man could lie alone for hours before anyone got to him.
"I'm fine" Ukitake said, waving Kiba off. "I cough like this without anything making me, Akamaru's not doing anything." Plus, he liked the idea of actually having something to do that wasn't for himself. And no, he wasn't going to run about after Shunsui.
Coming back with the well worn book, Ukitake handed it over. "That wasn't even a bad one."
"Hate to see one of the bad ones," Kiba said, a little nervously. He could think of one time he'd been sick. Total. He'd been five years old, creeping into the kennels to play with the puppies his mom had told him to stay away from, and the bitch had bitten him on the shoulder before he'd managed to get away. Scared of what his mother would say, he'd hidden the injury until it managed to get thoroughly infected and land him in bed with a raging fever. Though even that had turned out okay; he'd missed three days of school, and once the fever had broken he'd spent the next two days of his "recovery" time with his mother drilling lessons of how to behave around bitches with puppies. Which meant, of course, that he'd been able to spend those two days almost entirely outside with the puppies. Bliss!
Ukitake didn't tell Kiba it was a bad day when he coughed up blood and was to weak to get out of bed, he didn't want to worry him. It was bad enough that Toushirou knew. It wasn't that Ukitake was embarrased, he just hated worrying people. Before he'd gotten cancer, he'd rarely gotten sick, but after treatment (that didn't even work) his immune system was so low that he tended to catch everything going.
"It's okay, anyway" He said offhandedly, offering the book to Kiba again as he scratched behind Akamaru's ears once more.
Kiba accepted the words and the book with a nod and without a protest. You didn't push hurt people any more than you pushed hurt animals (except to maybe set their broken limbs or jam a pill down their throat, and he didn't think either would help Ukitake.) "You'll be okay with Akamaru, then?" he asked. "I need to head to class now, I'll be back by six or so. If there's a problem, you can call Shikamaru--he should still be at the apartment--and he can come get Akamaru. If you can convince him to get off his lazy butt." He grimaced; Shikamaru's laziness was always something of an irritant to his own energetic nature, although he was sure he tired Shikamaru even more.
"Yeah we'll be fine. Go before you're late, huh?" Ukitake laughed a little to hear about Shikamaru. "Well, if he's worse than Shunsui is, then I pity you." Then again, he'd known Shunsui since they were tiny, so he was pretty much used to it by now. He was grateful that Kiba didn't push any further. He'd made it a policy with himself to admit if anyone asked directly, but he'd never tell anybody unless they wanted to know.
"Eh, we get along." Kiba shrugged. "He's really a great guy. Lucky I ended up with guys like Shikamaru and Chouji instead of, uh, Sasuke or somebody?" They'd drive each other mad within days.
He paused another moment to scratch Akamaru's head, then another moment while the dog jumped up to plant his paws on Kiba's shoulders and lick his face messily. Laughing, Kiba pushed him down. "Okay with me, boy, but don't try it with Ukitake. Don't wanna knock him over." He hesitated as if he were about to turn to the door, then dropped to one knee swiftly and buried his hands in the dog's thick ruff. A moment of scratching, and he was on his feet again and reaching for the doorknob. "Thanks so much for looking after him, Ukitake. Be a good boy, Akamaru! I'll be back in a couple hours!" He snapped a sloppy salute and ducked out.
Ukitake followed him to the door and stood there so he could shut it behind Kiba. "I find Sasuke okay, but then again, it might be a different story if I lived with him." But then again, Ukitake found it easy to get along with people. Ukitake chuckled at the moment between Kiba and Akamaru, they really were obviously close. "I'm sure we'll be fine. I'll see you later." He waved Kiba off, and then shut the door, not wanting prying eyes to see Akamaru.
--
Kiba's passage down the stairs was usually very distinct; he had a peculiar way of thundering that made it sound as if half a dozen or so hungry elephants were converging on the stairs, rather than one hungry rugby player. With Akamaru at his side, though, he managed to more or less sneak from the second floor down to the first, and then to Apartment Two. Fingers hooked under the collar of the enormous white dog at his side, he cast a quick, nervous glance over his shoulder before knocking rapidly on the door.
The night before could certainly have been better, Ukitake thought. He'd given up on sleep a long time before, his coughing disturbing things more than he's have liked. Still this was a day where he actually felt well enough to get out of bed, so that had to be something.
He knew Kiba was coming, though so he got up from where he was reading to go and answer the door, checking through the spyhole first.
Kiba waved cheerfully at the spyhole, then pointed out of Ukitake's range of vision. The dog, obviously. Akamaru caught the gesture; he was a smart dog, and he'd figured out by Kiba's careful and thorough grooming this morning that something was up. He barked cheerfully.
"Hush!" Kiba snapped quickly, rapping his knuckles against the dog's head. "Ukitake? It's me, Kiba."
Ah good. The door was opened quickly, it wouldn't do for someone to see Akamaru in the hallway after all. "Hey nice to see you" Ukitake greeted cheerfully, and opened the door widely enough to fit both man and dog through. "So this is the famous Akamaru?"
"Yep!" Kiba tugged the husky through the door quickly, then released the leather collar as soon as Ukitake had shut the door. "Say hey, Akamaru."
The husky sat back on his tail and held out a paw, big blue eyes widening as he looked up at Ukitake. Kiba stifled a snigger. Okay, so maybe the sickly man was screwed...
... he was. He really was screwed, because there was no way he could resist puppy dog eyes like those. With a small laugh, Ukitake reached out and shook Akamaru's paw. "Nice to meet you." Yes, Akamaru was going to be spoiled. "He's a gorgeous dog."
Kiba rocked back on his heels, beaming with pride. "Isn't he? Not show-standard, 'cause he's too big, but he's strong and fast and the best friend anybody could want." He scrubbed the dog's head with a familiar hand, and Akamaru whined and licked his wrist. "You ever had a dog?"
"Show standard doesn't mean anything in my eyes," Ukitake said, leaning back again. "I prefer to see a well loved and well cared for dog." And Akamaru obviously was. "Yeah, but I had to give him away." Ukitake said, replying to the question. Obvious reasons, there.
"Yeah, show guys tend to be kinda..." Kiba flipped a wrist uncomfortably, leaving it vague as to whether he was referring to the dogs or their owners. Or both. They sort of tended to blend together, in his mind. "And big is good 'cause Akamaru and I can roughhouse together without holding back." He pushed up the sleeve of his hooded sweatshirt with obvious pride, displaying forearms slashed with numerous tiny white scars. "Spent more time in the kennels when I was a kid than in the house or the school. Put together, probably."
"Too bad about your dog," he added with genuine sympathy in his voice. "What was he?"
Ukitake grinned and nodded as he inspected Kiba's many small scars. "You must have been around a lot of dogs when you were a kid, then." It made him wonder just how Kiba ended up in 311, but he certainly wasn't going to ask.
"He was a German Shepherd cross with a Golden Retriever," Ukitake said, recalling his dog in his mind. "A huge thing he was."
"My family runs a kennel out in the country. Well, sorta. It's more like a huge collection of dogs we've bought, bred, rescued...My sister's a vet technician, and my mom runs the farm, so I sorta guess I'm following the family tradition." He frowned. "They're not really happy to have me here in the city, but the University offered me a scholarship and I couldn't turn it down." The frown brightened into a flashing grin. "At least I don't have to pass physics to keep it!"
Akamaru whined and sniffed at Ukitake's leg, obviously intrigued by this strange men. Kiba's grin widened, then abruptly fell. "Ah, hell, Akamaru, don't--"
He jumped for the dog's collar at the same time as the husky reared up onto his hind legs, planted his paws on Ukitake's shoulders, and gave the man's face a thorough swipe with his tongue. Kiba dragged him back by the collar, face red with embarrassment. "Geez, I'm sorry, he doesn't usually do that..."
"At least you can go back to them once you've gotten your qualifications," Ukitake reasoned. Kiba seemed like a lively and honest person, and he liked that. "But they let you take Akamaru with you, never the less?" Then again, if Akamaru was Kiba's companion, Ukitake could see why they did.
When Akamaru jumped up, Ukitake certainly wasn't expecting it and had to shift his footing to accomodate for the sudden weight on his shoulders, but the second surprise got him even more. Once Kiba had dragged the dog away, Ukitake rubbed at his damp cheek with his sleeve. "Don't worry about it, it's not like he bit me."
"He doesn't bite," Kiba assured him. "Um. Much. Not other people, at least. And it's more like love-bites anyway."
...Uh. "Not in any weird sense," he said quickly. Not that he thought Ukitake would take that the way, say, Anko or Naruto would, but he'd gotten enough jokes in the last few months that he was trying to learn to be careful of his words. Try being the operative word; Kiba's words never seemed to detour from the straight route from mind to mouth.
"Affectionate nibbles?" His own dog used to gently take Ukitake's arm in his mouth and bite on it gently in affection. Ukitake leaned down to give Akamaru a good scratch at the ruff of his neck, and behind his ears.
"Yeah," Kiba agreed in relief. Nice guy, Ukitake. Good with dogs. Akamaru was leaning into the scratch, tail thumping happily on the floor. Kiba sighed in relief. He couldn't have told anyone but Akamaru how worried he'd been about this; it was the first time he'd dared to leave his dog with anyone but one of his roommates, and he didn't know Ukitake very well. But the guy knew how to treat a dog, and he knew how to make people (and dogs) comfortable. Kiba rolled his sleeve down and jammed his hands in his pockets, grinning.
Ukitake was notorious for keeping to himself, but he was friendly and kind to anyone he met. It was a strange combination, sure, but that was him. Friendly and approachable.
"Oh yeah," he said suddenly, straightening up, "You wanted to borro-" his sentence was cut short with a few coughs as he covered his mouth, and then continued as if nothing had happened, "borrow Fluke. I'll get it for you."
"Oi," Kiba said nervously. "You okay? You sure it's fine for me to leave Akamaru here? I mean, I don't want you to be fussing yourself watching after him, or anything." Of course, if anything did happen to worsen Ukitake's condition, it'd be good to have the dog there; unless his roommate (who seemed to be competing with Shikamaru for the title of Laziest Man Alive) was there, the man could lie alone for hours before anyone got to him.
"I'm fine" Ukitake said, waving Kiba off. "I cough like this without anything making me, Akamaru's not doing anything." Plus, he liked the idea of actually having something to do that wasn't for himself. And no, he wasn't going to run about after Shunsui.
Coming back with the well worn book, Ukitake handed it over. "That wasn't even a bad one."
"Hate to see one of the bad ones," Kiba said, a little nervously. He could think of one time he'd been sick. Total. He'd been five years old, creeping into the kennels to play with the puppies his mom had told him to stay away from, and the bitch had bitten him on the shoulder before he'd managed to get away. Scared of what his mother would say, he'd hidden the injury until it managed to get thoroughly infected and land him in bed with a raging fever. Though even that had turned out okay; he'd missed three days of school, and once the fever had broken he'd spent the next two days of his "recovery" time with his mother drilling lessons of how to behave around bitches with puppies. Which meant, of course, that he'd been able to spend those two days almost entirely outside with the puppies. Bliss!
Ukitake didn't tell Kiba it was a bad day when he coughed up blood and was to weak to get out of bed, he didn't want to worry him. It was bad enough that Toushirou knew. It wasn't that Ukitake was embarrased, he just hated worrying people. Before he'd gotten cancer, he'd rarely gotten sick, but after treatment (that didn't even work) his immune system was so low that he tended to catch everything going.
"It's okay, anyway" He said offhandedly, offering the book to Kiba again as he scratched behind Akamaru's ears once more.
Kiba accepted the words and the book with a nod and without a protest. You didn't push hurt people any more than you pushed hurt animals (except to maybe set their broken limbs or jam a pill down their throat, and he didn't think either would help Ukitake.) "You'll be okay with Akamaru, then?" he asked. "I need to head to class now, I'll be back by six or so. If there's a problem, you can call Shikamaru--he should still be at the apartment--and he can come get Akamaru. If you can convince him to get off his lazy butt." He grimaced; Shikamaru's laziness was always something of an irritant to his own energetic nature, although he was sure he tired Shikamaru even more.
"Yeah we'll be fine. Go before you're late, huh?" Ukitake laughed a little to hear about Shikamaru. "Well, if he's worse than Shunsui is, then I pity you." Then again, he'd known Shunsui since they were tiny, so he was pretty much used to it by now. He was grateful that Kiba didn't push any further. He'd made it a policy with himself to admit if anyone asked directly, but he'd never tell anybody unless they wanted to know.
"Eh, we get along." Kiba shrugged. "He's really a great guy. Lucky I ended up with guys like Shikamaru and Chouji instead of, uh, Sasuke or somebody?" They'd drive each other mad within days.
He paused another moment to scratch Akamaru's head, then another moment while the dog jumped up to plant his paws on Kiba's shoulders and lick his face messily. Laughing, Kiba pushed him down. "Okay with me, boy, but don't try it with Ukitake. Don't wanna knock him over." He hesitated as if he were about to turn to the door, then dropped to one knee swiftly and buried his hands in the dog's thick ruff. A moment of scratching, and he was on his feet again and reaching for the doorknob. "Thanks so much for looking after him, Ukitake. Be a good boy, Akamaru! I'll be back in a couple hours!" He snapped a sloppy salute and ducked out.
Ukitake followed him to the door and stood there so he could shut it behind Kiba. "I find Sasuke okay, but then again, it might be a different story if I lived with him." But then again, Ukitake found it easy to get along with people. Ukitake chuckled at the moment between Kiba and Akamaru, they really were obviously close. "I'm sure we'll be fine. I'll see you later." He waved Kiba off, and then shut the door, not wanting prying eyes to see Akamaru.