Smittened Pups (Part 1)

It was a cool and breezy Sunday evening in the Camden town of London. With dusk soon approaching, the humans of the small town started to head back to their homes and all activities were gradually dying down as everyone was ready to call it a day.

However, the very opposite was happening at house number 101 on Dalmatian Street. Within the backyard of the townhouse, loud raving music blasted into the surrounding atmosphere while colourful neon lights flashed about in sync with the beat of the blaring music.

One might pass by the backyard and assumed that a pack of rowdy teenagers were the cause of the chaotic atmosphere, but take a look inside, and they would find that it was actually an entire pack of Dalmatian puppies having a party of their lives.

D.J. Dalmatian wore a wide, toothy grin on his muzzle as his paws fidgeted about his sound-mixer that was placed on a makeshift stage in front of a rowdy audience of 90 other partying puppies.

"Everybody howl in the air like you just don't care!"

His iconic catchphrase was enthusiastically met by his hyped-up siblings, as their scattered howls rang out into the surroundings.

Within the crowd of yelping and howling puppies was their eldest sister Dolly, who was laughing her heart out at seeing all her younger siblings having the evening of their lives. "That's right, everyone! Howl like it's the last howl of your lives!" She laughed, and was met by waves of cheering from the puppies. "This is probably the only time you'll ever get to howl your heads off without Dylan spoiling the fun! Woohooooooo!"

Dylan would have usually disapproved of such a wild and almost out-of-control party taking place in the backyard, but as it turned out, he came down with a terrible case of the sniffles that particular day, and was forced to coop himself up in the living room where he nestled himself in his basket under layers of blankets.

Back at the yard, Dolly began bopping her head to the beat with Dizzy and Dee, all three of them giggling away as they danced away into the dusk. That was, until Dolly suddenly felt someone tapping rapidly on her shoulder.

"Dolly… are you sure letting everyone howl like this is an acceptable idea? They could get dysphonia and have a sore throat, or even lose their voices! Not to mention all the unpleasantries that we're causing to our neighbours…"

Dolly looked behind to see Dawkins standing among the other pups and bearing a concerned look on his muzzle.

"Oh, relax Dawkins! No dog's ever lost their voice from howling!" Dolly grinned at her younger brother. "Come on, lighten up! Even if Dylan's asked you to take over his duties, you don't actually have to be like him, you know!"

"Yeah, Dawkins! Don't be 'classic Dylan No. 2'!" Dee-Dee giggled and leaned against him. "Just join in and dance with us!"

"No… I will not be a part of this ludicrous tomfoolery," he objected rather sternly as he pushed the giggling Dee-Dee away from him. "Dolly! You just have to stop this madness before either the puppies lose their voices, or we receive an eviction notice from the Municipality for outrageous disruption of peace!"

"Hmmm… yeah, alright, we'll stop this madness…" Dolly nonchalantly shrugged, which caught Dawkins off guard. "… in 5 hours' time!"

With that, Dolly erupted into laughter and was joined by both Dee-Dee and Dizzy. Dawkins let out an unamused sigh and trudged his way through the sea of giggling black and white. "Might as well get some peace and try to think of some good lawyers…" He grumbled to himself before reaching the house and slamming the door behind him.

Even with the door shut, the walls of the house rattled to the bass of D.J.'s wild music. Dawkins decided he had to get far away from the backyard as possible if he wanted a moment's peace. He sulkily made his way through the house, having made up his mind to step outside the front door for a while.

Along the way, he happened to pass by the living room where he could hear Dylan's string of sneezes.

"A'tchoo!" "A… A'tchoo!" "A-A-A… A'TCHOOO!"

Dawkins briefly paused in his tracks and peered inside. He saw Dylan curled up in his basket with his back towards the living room's entrance and underneath 5 layers of thick blankets.

Dawkins' sulking face morphed into a look of guilt when he saw Dylan in such sorry state. His older brother had relied on him to take over his daily tasks while he recuperates, yet the entire day: he failed to keep an orderly atmosphere during breakfast and the pups ended up wrecking the kitchen with the Kibble Blaster, he failed to control the pups during the midday playtime and now all the rooms upstairs (except his own) were upside down, and just twenty minutes ago, he failed to control everyone from making a thundering ruckus in the backyard and increasing the possibility of them being evicted from their own house.

And where was Dolly throughout those episodes? Well, she was doing either one of two things: joining in on the mess with the pups or encouraging them to 'spice up the fun'. For once, Dawkins finally understood why Dylan was always getting worked up whenever he talked to Dolly.

The walls of the house rattled again and disrupted his train of thoughts. He let out another annoyed sigh and decided to just forget about everything for now. Eventhough most of the house was still a complete mess, he could always have it cleaned up later on and pretend that everything had been going well when Dylan wakes up much later. But for now, he just needed some time to himself after a day of failures and havocs.

He went straight to the front main entrance and hoped through the pet door. Once he was outside, the blaring of D.J.'s music became clearer once again now that he was in the open air. He noticed the humans passing by were giving incensed looks at the house as walked past.

Yep… one imminent eviction notice coming right up… he mentally sighed to himself.

With all the stares and D.J.'s music, Dawkins felt the desperate need to just get as far away from the house as possible and have some peaceful time alone.

Perhaps some time alone in the park would do the trick?

He hoped off the two small steps in front of the door and proceeded to-

Wait… why are those dog bowls outside the house?

He let out an annoyed grunt as he stared at three dog bowls that were strewn about next to the two small steps, each one clearly labelled with their respective owners' name: Dimitri-1, Dimitri-2 and Dimitri-3.

Of course the Dimitris would be sloppy enough to leave their dog bowls outside the house. What were they doing with their bowls outside the house? Dawkins shuddered to even think of the reason why. He decided the least he could do was to bring them back into the house.

Dimitri-2's bowl was the only one that was right side up and had some clear water in it. He picked up the bowl in his jaw and turned around to return back to the door… Only to freeze in his steps and almost letting go of the bowl.

His pupils dilated and his breathing intensified. Approaching towards him were two trotting female Samoyeds, their thick coats of white fur fluttered against the evening breeze with each trot they took. One appeared to be older than the other, with the younger one looking like she's about his size and age.

They both stopped short just a few feet away from him and Dawkins' ears pricked up to hear the older one talking to her younger companion.

"Wow! Today's 'Power Trot' definitely felt much livelier than yesterday's! Definitely more things to see along the way!"

The younger Samoyed grinned at her. "That's because we took my route today, sis! I told you that this is the more interesting part of town!"

Her older sister rolled her eyes in good humour before turning her gaze towards the direction they came from. "Seems Harry had a little trouble keeping up with us," she snickered. "Those two-leggers get lethargic so easily, don't they?"

The younger one chuckled in agreement with her sister, but then happened to notice Dawkins in front of her.

Dawkins' heart went on a frenzy when she started approaching him. He gulped the large lump in his throat as his eyes wandered around the approaching Samoyed; her soft white pelt that waved along with the breeze, her smile that graced the ends of her soft lips which slightly revealed her shiny fangs, and her-

"Hey there!"

A choked gasped escaped through Dawkins' jaw when he realized that she was now standing right in front of him. The sweet scent of crushed peonies that emitted from her fur had a somewhat lustful effect on him and his eyes once again ghosted about the young Samoyed's figure.

This certainly did not go unnoticed as she watched him take her in. "Whoah… calm your eyes there, pal," she teased him with a grin.

"Wha- what? Oh, pardon me! I- I'm do apologize for starin- I mean… looking at you," Dawkins stuttered nervously as the Samoyed continued to eye him in amusement. "It's just that well… uh- I've never actually seen you around here before, so I-"

"That's understandable, we're new around here," she replied. "We've just moved in on Arlington Road three days ago."

Dawkins' ears pricked up. Arlington Road was just about 5 blocks away from the house, and hearing this got him excited. "Ah, I see… well, I uh… hope you enjoy our humble town of Camden." An idea then suddenly flew into his head. "Might I interest you on a brief tour around Camden? I'd be more than delighted to show you some of our town's more prominent landmarks! We have the Camden Market, Primrose Hill Park, the-"

"Actually… I'm more interested in having some of the water in that bowl you have in your mouth at the moment. Would you mind if I have some?" she asked.

Dawkins was slightly taken aback before he realized that he was still holding Dimitri-2's bowl of water in his jaw. "Oh, of course! Please, allow me…"

He then gently placed the bowl in front of her before sitting back on his haunches and gazing at her with a dreamy look.

The young Samoyed proceeded to drink the water from the bowl, well aware that the Dalmatian pup's gaze was firmly locked onto her with the goofy look plastered on his face.

After a few gulps of the water, she raised her head once again. "Hey, thanks for that! Really need to rehydrate after three hours of Power Trotting," she said to the still goofy-faced Dawkins. "Anyways, the name's Sammie. What's yours?"

"Sammie…"

He sighed his response as his eyes kept zeroing in on her jade orbs.

"You're called Sammie too?" she asked with a confused raised brow.

"Hmm? Wha- Oh, sorry! My name's Dammie- I mean DAWKINS!" He nearly burst out his name and couldn't stop letting out a nervous laughter after that.

Sammie the young Samoyed grinned in amusement. "Dawkins… how cute."

Hearing this, Dawkins giddily felt that he could melt into a puddle right then and there. He realized that he needed to get some conversation going if he wanted her to remain interested in him. "So, uh… do you happen to Power Trot around here often?"

"Well, my sister and I do Power Trot every evening, but this is the first time we've actually come to this part of Camden. And I think even my sister agrees that this is the more eventful part of the town. We might just start coming around here more often," she explained, before noticing the sudden twinkle in his eyes. "You know, you're quite an interesting character, aren't you, Dawkins?" she quipped with a soft smile. "I think I might just like you."

Imaginary fireworks immediately began erupting in Dawkins' mind as he mellowed at her last sentence. "Oh, I uh- well- I'm, uh- heh, it's a-"

Dawkins desperately tried to find his tongue and come up with a coherent sentence, but her sudden giggle at his antics made it an impossible task.

"Sammie! Sandra! There you are!"

Both pups were interrupted when a male human jogging attire arrived and called out to the Samoyed sisters. "Come on, girls! We… we really h-have to be back home now," he panted with clear exhaustion.

Sammie's older sister Sandra had already started prancing about her human's legs.

Sammie turned to give Dawkins a brief "See ya!" before joining her sister and human.

"S-so long…" Dawkins finally managed to bid his goodbye, although Sammie and her sister were now too far away to hear him. He stared after the three of them before they disappeared around a corner.

The same goofy look remained plastered on his face for the next several seconds before he suddenly shook his head as his senses returned itself back into his mind.

My goodness… what did I just experienced? This feeling of… being attracted… feels so bizarre, he pondered to himself, staring into the distance where he last saw Sammie.

This was the first time he overcame with such a peculiar feeling, and yet, it felt… great! He giddily smiled to himself when he remembered how she had said that he was cute.

But then he recalled her saying something else: 'You're an interesting character, aren't you, Dawkins? I think I might just like you!'

The goofy smile suddenly vanished and his brows furrowed in confusion.

She thinks I'm interesting… yet she says she might just like me… does that mean she doesn't like me despite finding me interesting? He quizzed himself. She's called me cute, she found me interesting… but why doesn't she like me?

The young Dalmatian pup heaved a heavy sigh. Sammie was the first female outside his family that he interacted with… and already it's gotten him feeling confused. He knows for a fact that he really likes her, but… does she actually like him back? Well, he certainly wanted her to like him back. She's pretty, she seems smart, she's witty, she…

Dawkins froze mid-way.

… goes Power Trotting every evening…

He then shifted his gaze at Dimitri-2's now empty bowl where she had her drink earlier. He then remembered how she said she would be passing by the area from then on for her Power Trots. So… that would mean more opportunities for him to offer her a bowl of water every time she passes by, then…

An idea suddenly plonked itself into his head. But it was a radical one, and for a brief moment, Dawkins wondered if such an idea would be ethical.

Well… she said she might like me… is it such a crime to make her actually like me? He reasoned to himself.

He pondered for a few more seconds, before eventually convincing himself that his idea would, at most, be deemed 'unorthodox'. Yes, that's right. Unorthodox, unconventional, the likes. Certainly not unethical or even illegal.

With that settled, he picked up the empty bowl and went straight inside the house. He completely ignored the continuous rattling of the walls, the chews toys strewn about on the staircase and the horrendous state of the upstairs rooms as he passed by them on his way to his own room.

Once inside, he shut the door behind him and looked around. His eyes scanned around the various devices and contraptions that were neatly arranged around inside the little room, until he found his digital tablet resting on some books on his study table.

From the data library of his tablet, he searched for the term 'pheromonol'. In an instant, everything he needed to know was displayed before him. A giddy smile formed across his lips as he started rapidly tapping away on tablet. Seconds later, one of the contraptions at the far corner of his room which was remotely connected to the tablet sprang into life.

An empty beaker was placed inside a small chamber in the belly of the funny-looking machine. After a few whirs and a sputter, a small nozzle above the beaker filled it with a crystal-clear liquid up to its brim.

Meanwhile, Dawkins had taken Dimitri-2's bowl and separately filled it with tap water before returning in front of the machine. Holding his breath, he then carefully removed the beaker from the chamber and held it in his paws.

He stared at the clear liquid in the beaker, his lips curved slowly upwards in a triumphant grin. The liquid may have fooled anyone else into believing it was just plain water, but it was in fact a chemical that-

"ACK!"

Dawkins violently gagged after he let go of his breath and accidentally took a whiff of the liquid.

Ok… perhaps nobody would ever mistake this as plain water with a stench that bad… he concluded while desperately holding his breath again.

He then inferred that maybe the stench wouldn't be so bad if he reduced the liquid's concentration. So, he then gently poured in some of the liquid into the bowl of tapwater before putting the beaker of remaining liquid back into the machine's chambers.

Slowly and ever so surely, he inched his nose closer to the bowl and soon, despite some hesitance, he mustered enough courage to draw in another whiff. He mentally prepared himself in case he threw up, but to his surprise, the water in the bowl didn't smell too bad. However, the water still slightly reeked of the stench, and that still posed a problem for Dawkins.

Hmmm… perhaps some fragrance will mask the odour, he thought to himself. He then recalled his encounter with Sammie and remembered that she had this distinct, heavenly scent of crushed peonies that seemed to have this lustful effect on him.

That's right… perhaps he should mask the scent with a fragrance that had the essence of flowers in it! So, for a moment, he thought of using his tablet to whip up that specific fragrance using the same process as the strange liquid, but then he remembered that someone in the household already had such a fragrance in her possession:

Mum!

He carefully placed the bowl of infused water on his table and promptly left the room without shutting the door. He assumed he wouldn't take more than a few seconds as he knew that Delilah kept her belongings on a specific cabinet in the corner of the room. However…

Oh good heavens…

Dawkins stared in dismay as he saw that his parents' room was completely thrashed upside down like all the other rooms (besides his own) with chew toys that didn't belong in there strewn about on the floor and all his parents' belongings lay cluttered randomly at different spots of the room.

He drew out a long, tired breath before deciding to go on ahead on a treasure hunt and find his mum's fragrance as soon as possible. He was determined to finish off his little project first before commencing Operation Clean-Up-The-House-In-One-Hour-Before-Mum-And-Dad-Gets-Back. With that, he started searching up and down and all around the room for the bottle of fragrance.

And while he was doing that, two pairs of pawsteps could be heard making their way up the staircase that was soon followed by two bickering voices.

"Dude, it's not exactly my fault that the extension cord decided to fail midway into your 'Howlfest', D.J.!"

"But I put you in charge of setting up the stage for me, Dante! The least you could do was choose a higher quality extension cord to connect to my sound mixer."

"Nothing actually stays 'high quality' in our house, you know…"

The two brothers stopped once they reached the top of the stairs and into the cluttered hallway. Dante, who was carrying the faulty extension cord in his jaw, peered into the first room. "Whoah… it's going to take a while to find a replacement cord in this mess," he commented as he stared at the state of the cluttered playroom.

D.J., however, caught sight of the adjacent room that was the odd room out in the entire floor that was left with its door open.

"Hey, let's check out Dawkins' room. If he's got all those weird machines in it, I'm pretty sure he would have a simple extension cord to spare," D.J. suggested and entered his genius brother's room.

Dante wasn't so sure about it. "Hey, man… I don't think we should go in there," he warned in a shaky voice as he sat in front of the door frame. "My senses are telling me that a certain doom awaits us if we go in there!"

D.J. rolled his eyes and turned to face his older brother. "Well, my senses are telling me that if I don't get my music back on, the restless pups will just storm the house and make another round of mess again. Can we just quickly find an extension cord and get back out there?"

Dante hesitated at first, but eventually conceded that what D.J. said was true. "Okay… let's just hope Dawkins doesn't mind us poking our noses about in his room…" he said as he walked inside.

D.J. ignored this and proceeded to scan around one part of the room. Dante placed the faulty cord on the floor before searching about the bookcases in the other part of the room.

After about five minutes of thorough searching, D.J. found no extension cord at all, but he did picked up a sudden dehydrating thirst. He hadn't a drink since before his 'Howlfest' started, and his need to rehydrate brought his attention to Dimitri-2's bowl sitting on the study table.

Oh, thank goodness… he thought to himself as he went over and looked into the bowl.

His tongue dipped itself into the clear water and pulled the water down into his throat.

"YUCK! What is that?!"

His usually calm face twisted into a weird grimace and he shuddered violently in disgust after taking only a gulp of the water.

Dante nearly jumped out of his fur when D.J. made the sudden exclamation, and he immediately rushed over to him out of concern. "Whoah, what happened, man?" he asked.

"That water… it tasted so weird!" was all D.J. could say as he was now furiously rubbing both paws against his tongue to get rid of the horrible taste.

Dante then shifted his gaze to the bowl on the table. He gently took it with both paws and stared at the water in it out of curiosity. The odour of the water was quite off-putting, but yet, he proceeded to dip his tongue into it to have a taste, again out of pure curiosity.

"Ugh… that is gross…" he reached the same conclusion. "Wonder what it is…"

D.J. was about to say something when Dawkins suddenly emerged at the door while holding a bottle of fragrance between his jaws… but it promptly crashed onto the floor and shattered into pieces when his jaw gawked open after seeing his brothers fidgeting with the bowl.

"DON'T TOUCH THAT!" He frantically yelled out before making a mad dash towards them.

Unfortunately, he failed to notice the faulty extension cord that Dante had left on the floor, and before he realized it, his paws got tangled into the cord which sent him careening straight into Dante.

"OOF!"

"OUCH!"

Dawkins groaned after the two collided. Something started dripping onto his snout and at the same time, he tasted something unpleasant that lingered in his mouth.

Dawkins' eyes shot wide open with horror when he realized what happened. The bowl of liquid was now upside-down on his head above his snout, and whatever that was left of the water either had drenched both him and Dante… or had been ingested by him.

With a panicked cry, he stood right up and began furiously rubbing his tongue to get rid of the liquid. D.J. watched in surprise at seeing Dawkins doing the same thing that he did just a couple of minutes ago.

"Hey, Dawkins, what exactly is that strange water?" He asked, while helping Dante get up on his fours.

Dawkins immediately stopped rubbing his tongue and glared furiously at his two brothers after hearing D.J. speak. "Strange water?!" He repeated D.J.'s words in an angry cry. "Forget about the 'strange water'! What are you two doing in my room?!"

"Whoah, calm down there. We just came in to see if you had an extra extension cord," D.J. explained.

"So if you're looking for an extension cord, why in the name of the great heavens did you start drinking that bowl of water?!"

"Well… I was feeling a little thirsty after searching high and low in your room," D.J. admitted, and felt a heavy guilt when Dawkins slapped his own forehead in exasperation. "Look… I admit that I owe you a deep apology for touching your things, and I'm truly sorry," D.J. said with his utmost sincerity. "But seriously, Dawkins… what exactly was that water that we drank?"

Dawkins drew out a long breath. "Well… if you really must know, that liquid is actually Pheromonol. It's um… it's…"

His brothers looked at him with a raised brow, wondering why he was being hesitant.

"… it's actually- a chemical that induces the consumer to immediately become attracted to another individual of the opposite sex."

He paused to see that his brothers clearly didn't understand his sentence. He let out a sigh. "In other words… the dog that drinks this water will immediately become attracted to another dog of the opposite sex."

Finally understanding what he said, D.J. and Dante exchanged awkward glances.

"Wait… you mean to say that if we drink this water, we will be immediately attracted to a girl?" D.J. slowly asked with a raised brow.

"Yes… that was how I engineered it," Dawkins sighed. "Although I certainly didn't plan for it to be consumed by any of us," he grumbled with a disgruntled look.

"So… who was supposed to consume the water, then?" D.J. shot back with a quizzing look.

Dawkins once again became hesitant as he didn't want to admit to his brothers that he was smittened by another pup. D.J., however, seemed to have clicked the pieces together and finally realized what was going on. His lips curved into a smirk, but before he could make a teasing remark, Dante interrupted him:

"Wait! Did you say that if we drink that water, we would immediately be attracted to a girl?"

"Yes. I thought I made it clear about that."

"So… considering that all three of us had drank the water… what happens if we see one of our sisters…?"

"Well, we-"

He cut short his sentence when he realized the point that Dante was making.

The three brothers exchanged horrified looks with each other before letting out a low groan in unison.

"Okay… this is very bad." D.J. said in a panicked tone.

"I told you a doom will befall on us if we entered his room!" Dante lashed out at D.J. before cowering back in fear. "What do we do now?!"

"Okay… we just need to maintain our composures first. There's absolutely no point in bickering at each other," Dawkins said, trying his best to remain calm and rational. "I admit that the effects of Pheromonol lasts 28 hours at the minimum," he continued, much to his brothers' chagrin. "However… my database shows that there's another chemical that has the ability to extinguish the Pheromonol in our systems and reverse its effects."

"Okay, great! How soon can you make it?" D.J. asked with desperation tinged in his voice.

"Well, the molecular structure of this potential antidote is slightly more complicated than that of Pheromonol, so it would take at least an hour for the machine to produce it," he explained, before making his way towards the door. "So, until the antidote is produced, I suggest we shut the door and confine ourselves in-"

His sentence was cut short for the third time that day when all of a sudden, Da Vinci appeared in front of the stair case, directly outside his room.

Their unsuspecting sister was making her way back to her drawing room when she passed by Dawkins' room. She paused in her tracks when her peripheral vision picked up an unusual sight inside the room.

She raised a confused brow when she saw D.J., Dante, and Dawkins staring at her with their jaws gawked open and a smittened look that lingered in their eyes.

"Um… are you three okay?" she slowly asked with genuine concern for her brothers as they continued staring at her with their goofy looks.

Much to her utter surprise and further astonishment, all three of them then let out a dreamy sigh in unison. "Oh, Da Vinci…"

To be continued…