7 {Job|Solo}

Tane was in Magnolia Town again now. She was here to relax. Basically, she had traveled from her previous town to a random place in the outskirts and had ended up in this lonely part of Magnolia. Or so she thought. Until she heard someone talking in a worried tone to her north east. Her eyes flitted towards the source of the sound as she walked faster towards it. Ah, lovely. A human in need. Time to aid him in his needs! Tane was barefoot, as always. She wore a snug light brown sweater and jeans. It was not that cold, but she wore it anyway. It had rained a few hours earlier. Thus, it was slightly chilly with the cold of the rain still lingering. On reaching the man’s side, she tapped his arm. “Hello. Do you need any help?” she asked in a soft tone and a small smile.

The man blinked, but after realising what the girl was here for, he grinned, saying, “Yes! Please help me!” His hands clapped together and his eyes lit up as if he had found a treasure. Tane smiled even wider and asked what he needed help with. It took almost ten minutes for him to finally get to the point. He seemed to like to talk about his puppies a lot. But he was going to sell them. This made Tane feel slightly sad, but he was a human and humans had seriously messed up thoughts. Tane nodded at everything he told her, pretending to understand whatever he wanted her to understand with all the stuff he was saying before telling her why he needed help. “So...yes. Please find my beloved puppies for me! Seven of them! I’m sure they would not go too far.” Tane nodded one last time.

“Worry not, sir,” the Prestigious said before turning on her heels and heading for the first place she thought young dogs would go to. The park that was close to the town square. But of course, to keep them under control, she would need to get some dog reins. She was not quite sure what humans called those, but since ‘rein’ fit perfectly, she used it. Tane took a winding road to the local pet store where they sold accessories as well. She grabbed seven of those dog reins and a tool that attached all the reins to one’s wrist. According to the owner of the puppies, they were easy to convince and bring back. Tane purchased the equipment and paid extra before heading out with reins attached to her wrist. Yes, she looked funny as of now. She did not care, however. She was not asked to not look silly, she was asked to find puppies, and so she left for the park in Magnolia.

Since the man had told her the appearances of each puppy very clearly, giving her seven images of small dogs to memorize through words alone, it would not be too hard for her to find them. Besides, she would hear the voice of the man when she saw his puppies. This was a big advantage, being her, her sense of hearing. Once she had reached the park, she would notice a dog right away. But it was not one of the puppies she was asked to find. Plus, he already had an owner with a rein attached to its neck. It was too big to be a ‘puppy’ as well. Tane turned the other way and squinted her eyes as if that was going to help her find the puppies. There were not too many people in the park. She would have to go to the section with less people and benches.

Just as expected, Tane found a lone puppy in what looked like an abandoned part of the park. It was small, it was a pale brown and it had so much hair. With enough concentration, she could rewind the time of the sounds that lingered around her, to when the guy was with the puppy. Perfect match. She made a clicking noise with her tongue and snapped her fingers at the young dog. It turned its small, fluffy head, giving full attention to Tane while wagging its tail a bit. Its tongue was out. Tane felt this was because it was tired. She had seen other dogs do the same with their tongues hanging out, drool dripping disgustingly, when they were tired. She could hear the soft panting noise he was producing as well. “Come here, puppy,” she called with her hands out. The small puppy came straight away without complaints.

With a ‘woof’, the puppy leapt straight into her open arms. Tane gave it a loving snuggle before attaching the rein to its neck. It did not seem bothered by the loss of freedom. Maybe they had been in reins for so long they no longer minded them anymore. They - meaning the puppies. Tane then walked out of the park. Her instincts told her she was not going to find another puppy there. Besides she could not hear any more sounds that puppies made in the entire place. So she walked out. She noticed that the dog with the owner she had seen when she entered was gone now. Maybe they had headed home, or not. She heard that people liked to take their pets out for walks or things like that. There was a special curer for animals called a ‘vet’ or something like that. It was strange how it rhymed with ‘pet’. Maybe they invented the word for that reason?

So now it was time to search for the remaining six puppies. According to what she had gathered, puppies were sometimes attached to this ‘vet’ person who cured anything for them. And sometimes, they liked to visit them. Maybe this man used to take his puppies to the vet and one of them was attached to the vet! This was basically a theory that she had come up with and something she was not sure might actually be true. The habit of assumption was something that the humans had taught her as well. Humans liked to assume things. Moreover, they liked to judge each other as well. It was a strange thing really, how the humans were. Their tiny little brains...much, much to learn. There were few wise ones among them, but the utmost wisdom that they can come up with, compared to a Fismuthian wise person, is half the size of an electron. Of course Tane was not all that wise, nor was most of the people she knew, but she was much more intelligent and wiser than the humans.

Tane stood at the junction of two roads. She knew where the vet was, or rather, his ‘clinic’ of sorts. She had a GPS kind of thing in her brain. Well she did have to do something like installing a map into an actual GPS device. She had to go around town, around Fiore, and mark down things - in her brain. Basically in her head, she had a roughly drawn map of the human world that is Earth. Fiore was the most detailed country on the map of course, as the others were just countries to her and they could simply be flat land masses for all she knew. Back to the situation at hand. Tane crossed the road as soon as the traffic lights were red. She stepped gracefully across the concrete road, waving at the people in the vehicles. Yes, she was that sociable. Not. She just liked the idea of waving at random people. And if she was lucky, at times, she would get new friends after waving at the random people!

Finally, she stood at the entrance of the vet’s clinic, not sure if she should just push the door and walk right in or wait for the vet to invite her in. Thus, the Sabertooth mage stood awkwardly at the door of the clinic with six empty reins and a puppy attached to her wrist. The vet noticed after about a minute of course since there was a shadowy figure in his doorway. So he rose from his seat and walked over to the young Prestigious asking, “How may I help you?”

The vet was a charming human with brown hair liked Tane’s and a thin layer of stubble. It would have been attractive to Tane if she were one of those hormonal female humans. She said, “Hello,” and walked in, as the vet held the door for her. He wore a white coat, like most doctors. Only, he was not called one. He was the animal doctor. Tane took a seat on the first chair she saw, not wanting to stand. She did not know why she chose to do this, however, as her job here was to find lost puppies.

It was time to search, why had she sat down? Tane stood up again, and awkwardly at that. She grabbed a little further down the rein so she was pulling the puppy closer. “Oh, uh, I was looking for lost puppies,” she began, stuttering a little. It must have been harder for the vet to understand her as she had a strange accent as well. “If you allow, I would like to look around this establishment,” she said. In that moment did she realise that he was the person in charge of this place and if there were any puppies wandering the place, he would be the first person to notice this. She almost pinched herself for being clumsy right now. “I am sorry. I meant to ask if you have seem some puppies around here?” she corrected herself. It was very tense now. The vet did not spoke, instead, he blinked and stared at her like she was some puzzling enigma.

The vet then raised both his eyebrows and opened his mouth to speak. “Are you here to retrieve them?”

“Yes, I was sent to,” she spoke honestly. The innocence in her voice and features rang through the vet’s ears as he would walk into the back of the clinic and bring out three puppies. Tane’s eyes widened. Three in one place! She was over the moon. This was going perfectly. All she needed now was to find the remaining three and get back to the man. She attached the reins to the recently discovered puppies and thanked the vet for keeping them. “Goodbye,” she told him. He was staring at her still. Probably because of her glowing skin? Tane with four puppies at her wrist was now walking towards the town square. That was the only place she could think the rest could be. Plus, it was an open space.

Once at the town square, Tane began making a clicking noise with her tongue and snap her fingers. She learnt this was the way to call for dogs. It was awkward, though, since there were not too many dogs. Apparently, all the humans in the area looked at her as if she was an asylum escapee or something like that. She cleared her throat and straightened her spine, now looking warily around. The glow was an enough attention grabber, but now that she was doing something stupid, more people were looking at her. It was not embarrassment she felt, but more like danger. She did not get looked at too much in Fismuth. And if she did, that person was probably a threat. Yes, that was the difference between being looked at on Earth and in Fismuth. But after the period of time she had been on Earth, she had learnt that not all those who stared at her posed a threat.

There they were! Tane spotted their familiarity almost immediately and picked up the voices of the owner from them. Perfect! There were exactly three of them all huddled up together near a bench with a pile of food near them. Someone must have thought they were stray dogs and fed them out of pity. That was nice of them. Tane called for them and they came to her, noticing the four puppies with wagging tails attached to the reins that were attached to her wrist. The made woofing noises and seemed to be greeting each other. Tane would have understood what they were talking about if she had not always been listening to the humans too much. Yes. She had lost one ability since coming to Earth. When she first got here, she could understand each and every single creature’s languages. She could talk to animals. But when people started to look at her like she was abnormal whenever she tried to communicate with animals other than humans, she stopped. And lost it altogether.

Now that she had all the puppies, she called back the moment she met the man, the owner of the puppies. The GPS in her head gave her a route that would lead her to the man from where she was. Small roads, then cross a larger one, a few more minutes walking and she would be there. With a clear route in her brain, the Sabertooth mage began her journey back to the man. The puppies were very well trained. They behaved, not struggling against the reins or dragging her to another place. She was delighted to have them as her company along this lonely road. It was empty for the most part. However, she did pass by some people who seemed to be busy with whatever they were busy with. They did not smile or even look at her, so she decided to do the same. It was quiet the whole journey.

The puppies seemed to be tired, and they were almost there. The line that showed the route on the GPS in her head was shortening by the second, getting really short now. She was almost there. Tane was not tired the least bit. She was worried the puppies might burn out in exhaustion. That was obviously not the favorable outcome here. With a lift of her wrist, she began picking up her pace. Checking the puppies, they seemed to be more thrilled than tired, to meet their owner, probably. Well, that was what Tane thought anyway. After all, who did not like the feeling of returning to home. The man was probably their home. But the sad thing was, they were going to be sold. Tane could not think of a reason for this man, who the puppies seemed to cherish, to sell his pets. Pets were your best friends.

Finally, Tane reached where the man was. He was so happy to see her and his puppies. With a grin that almost stretched out to his ears, he called for all seven of his puppies by their names. Tane removed the band from her wrist and handed it to him. “Thank you so much!” he exclaimed. For a fraction of a second, Tane thought she saw a mischievous glint in his eyes. She ignored it. These were his puppies. He was free to do whatever he wished with them. Tane had no say in this matter. And so she bowed, almost turning to leave when the man said, “WAIT!” She turned back, noticing the money in his hands now. Wow. Another human who thought money was a payment of gratitude. She did not feel like refusing, and so she thanked him before turning to leave for real. Goodbye, innocent puppies.