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It's been busy at home. There's been an ongoing manhunt for the idiots who call themselves the Butler brothers. There's been contact to make with other human communities across the world. There's been winter preparations and survival steps to take. There's been cross-planet trading that's gone to the warm parts of the world while home's been in the depths of a West Virginia winter (thank you, PIaDOS). There's been a lot of things.

Oh, and there's been puppies. Houndeyes, like Earth dogs, do breed.

Shephard's got two or three little three-legged headless blue striped alien eyeball dog things trotting after him as he heads into the Bar today. The latest litter is old enough for socializing with unfamiliar humans and other things, and where better to find unfamiliar humans and other things than Milliways?

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Gredya is making one of her rare visits to the main building today. When she sees the houndeye pups, she doesn't exactly smile, but she doesn't exactly not smile. She definitely does nod to Shephard, though.

One of the pups goes up on its hind foot and blinks in Gredya's direction with its whole entire eyeball surface. A moment later it starts to make a kind of mmmmmrrrr sound.

"Don't you fuckin' dare, girl," says Shephard. "You just go greet the lady real nice without barkin'."

The little creature drops to all threes, which is not exactly obedience, but she doesn't bark, which, well, is.

"Good girl."

Gredya spares a nod--and a hint of a smile this time--for the pup. "You are teaching them. How old are they?"

"Couple months," says Shephard. "Old enough t'make some barkin' noises, but not so old the sound'll break shit. I reckon this's a good time to git the habit down of not barkin' less'n they got permission or they're out somewheres it's safe to cut loose."

"Yes. That is the age to start teaching babies."

She crouches down next to the pup, sniffing, and looks over to the others. "I live here," she tells them. Distinctly. And a glance back to Shephard. "What do they hunt, this age?"

The pups crowd around, wiggling ecstatically as any small creature without a tail to wag might be expected to do. There's no sniffing- this is what happens when your species does not really have a nose- but there is a lot of blinking.

"Chumtoads, mostly," says Shephard. "They're about as big as my feet put together, and they don't move real fast less'n you git too close. I'll take 'em after more dangerous shit once they're older, 'long with their momma so they c'n learn how she handles things. How're your own doin'?"

Gredya laughs suddenly, and reaches out to--well, not ruffle one of the pup's fur, because that's not how they're built, but to give it a firm patting. "Brave, you are brave. Good children. --Mine are well. Next year, maybe, they will go back to our home. Look for other packs."

"Good for them," Shephard says. "Where're you'n yours hangin' out now if it ain't home? If you don't mind my askin', anyways."

"Here. These woods. The woods got bigger. Did you see that? It was when that dragon came. There is enough for us to hunt now."

She stands again and stretches a little. "You still hunt here?"

"Ain't been back here in a while," Shephard admits. "I got a ship and a crew at home. We been travelin' a hell of a lot lately. Had to hunt some places that ain't much like home- jungles'n tundra'n shit. Kind of lookin' forward to gittin' out in this place again, though."

"Jungle is hard. But maybe okay for you, if you hunt with bow or gun." It's not good terrain for Wyr, though they've learned to cope with it before. "We will watch for you hunting here," she adds politely. "The new part of the forest has some different animals. Some of them talk."

"Bow mostly. Some gun," Shephard says. "The gun's more for things I'm tryin' to clear out for safety's sake than for meat huntin'."

He rubs at his nose and considers this. "They got talkin' animals now? Ain't that somethin'. What kind?"

She had figured he'd want to know about that. "Different kinds. I saw talking owls, talking frogs. There are unicorns. Griffins."

Gredya pushes her hair back from her face. "I think it is another world that touches this one. But it moves, the way parts of this place move. Not like other worlds."

".... these frogs," Shephard says after a moment's started blinking. "Regular ol' frogs that just happen to talk, or we talkin' frogs the size of a-"

He waves one hand (the meat one) in a way that's meant to indicate a small child.

"That big? Playin' banjos or- naw, never mind, you'd'a said if they were doin' that."

Look, he may not have had the kind of upbringing or advantages other people got, but even he knows about Kermit.

"Might have to check that whole scene out. Doubt I'll git anywhere near anything fancy, but shit, I got to give it a try."

Gredya gives him a doubtful look. "Bigger than most frogs, but not that big." She gestures: a respectable-sized bullfrog. "I don't know banjos, but they just sat at a pond. --I did not eat them," she adds. Virtuously.

"I can show you sometime. It moves. But I can smell where it is. I don't think you can."

"Yeah, now, they ain't the kind of talkin' frog I was thinkin' of," Shephard says. "Wouldn't say no to the help. All's I got's a human nose. It ain't worth shit for trackin' by smell."

His kind of people have stupid noses. It's true. "You can see it's different too. Different trees and plants. But I can find it for you when you want."

Shephard grunts. "I'd say I ain't doin' much just at the moment, but it strikes me as the kind of place I oughtn't bring the pups 'til they're older," he says. "Li'l fuckers might run off on me'n git themselves lost in all of that."

...huh. Well it's about time the Last and First Marine of the Combined Earth showed up in Milliways again.

Or at least that's what passes through Beauford's head when he spots Adrian coming in with a new parcel of houndeye pups.

He's just gonna wave at Adrian from his spot in a booth, surrounded by textbooks about Greece and the Greek Language.

The motion catches Shephard's eye; he waves back and gestures to the squirmy little creatures around his ankles to change course. "Howdy there," he says as they get within range. "Been a while, ain't it?"

"Oh yeah, nearly I think a year by my timespan since I last saw you." You want to get into language for the relativistic time dialation periods between Milliways regulars, do it with as few syllables as possible. "Actually was thinking about you the other day while I was at the farmer's market."

"That so?" One eyebrow goes up. "Shit. That the kind of thing I should be worried about?"

"Only if you plan on eating some to prove your manliness." Which Shephard doesn't. Ever. He completed the Bullet Ant Rite of Passage, there is an automatic pass on macho challenges for the rest of the Marine's life. "You remember how I said that one scorpian pepper was the hottest out there and kiiiiiinda illegal to have the seeds for?"

".... just how many you got?" says Shephard after some thought. "Or this the kind of thing I oughtn't ask?"

...Oh that's a cackle that probably throws the fear of chefs into anyone within earshot.

"I don't have the seeds for that particular pepper." His grin isn't going away, but Beauford is going to be tucking a bookmark into his study material. "The thing is about peppers is that some gardeners get really competitive with their crops... Somebody in the states bred a peppers that is even worse."

Bet Shephard's regetting asking now.

"Fuck," says Shephard. "And here's me without all my hazmat gear. This is the kinda shit that leaves the fuckin' varmints dead from nibblin' on the garden, ain't it."

"You know... I didn't ask, I mean the gardener selling them at the Market called em Carolina Death Reapers so y'know..." A city boy like him didn't ask. "Better news is I did a little research on em."

Shephard nods. "I'm listenin'," he says. "Do tell."

"Well if you were the sort of skunk who'd like to cheat a a macho contest..all of the nasty is concentrated up near the stem of the pepper instead of just in the seeds or skin like most." It's a handy thing to know if...it ever came to forcing some miserable pig-fucking shit biscuit to suffer for their crimes against the world. "The scorpion pepper was rated at the same pain level as police riot-gear pepper spray... which makes this pretty close to having your mouth actually set on fire and cause blisters."

"Gimme a sec and I'll snag the bags from the freezers for you. Set up one for you and one for Mari. I really enjoyed those spiders he sent back with you last time."

"Good to know," says Shephard. "Gonna be interestin' seein' how these come in with spring comin' up back home, I reckon."

After about five minutes (look you can literally get lost in the freezers here if you're not damned careful about it!) Beauford appears with two silvery bags, each about the size of a softball. "Stress the plants out when you grow em and they will be mean things I hear."

"What kind of stress we talkin' here?" says Shephard. "Bug attack, or temperature extremes, or lack of water? I mean, one of 'em's likely to be better'n the others, 'm I right?"

"I heard a lot about a lack of water working, but not much experimentation has been done on the other two that I know of."

If he had the space for a garden, even a window ledge one in his apartment, it would be worth testing out the temperature extremes as a form of plant stressing for maximum yield. Bug attacks are impossible to control unless he had a sealed system so that is right out.

At least for his apartment. Something to bring up with the Revenant though.

Shephard nods. "I'll letcha know," he says. "You got my thanks, regardless. How you been?"

"Iiiii've been picking up more shifts ...here for work than back home." Beauford admits easily enough. "They've cut back on my hours at Q57 since it's changed ownership."

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