Tricks And Treats

This fine morning in Burrowgatory, when the town was it’s brightest, Elio had brought Buddy his black impup for a walk in the imp park. Hutch and him had been raising this little boy to be a star pupil! But so far it wasn’t going too well. They’d taught him to sit - barely - but he didn’t really want to do anything else. 

Elio wanted to help Hutch prove a point to the Pedigree Pet’s owner Quince. She believed that imps should be able to eat what they wanted where Hutch was incredibly strict when it came to the diets of his beloved pets. Which Elio understood. 

He had to admit, he’d fed his Chirop Grape a few ube dangos over the years but usually stuck to sesame treats and seeds. 

Lost in thought he looked down to Buddy who was running around and barking like a maniac!

“Buddy, sit,” Elio called trying to get him to stop but the little impup wanted the treat in Elio’s hand so bad that he just kept running and running. 

“Buddy, calm down,” Elio said as he tried to dodge the yapping impup as it attempte to grab the black sesame seed treat from his hands. He growled and quickly popped the snack in his mouth only to get a shocked whine from the little pooch like imp. 

“That’s what you get,” Elio said to him, struggling to chew through the dense, cardboard like sesame seed imp treat. 

“Oh that’s gross,” he growl and attempte to remove every remnant of sesame seed taste from his mouth. He rolled his tongue and tried to build up saliva but it just wouldn’t wash away.

“I need a drink, god damn it,” Elio grumbled as he called buddy over, putting his leash on so he could walk him toward a shop. The little impup was looking at him with big sad brown eyes - at least that’s what Elio imagined. Really he was looking at him with empty, soulless orbs of white. 

Terrifying. 

Elio sighed and shook his head.

“Stop that now buddy, you’re not to be bold, I told you to sit for your treat but you just kept on bouncing and yapping…bold boys don’t get disgusting cardboardy treats,” he said to him simply. “Come on we’re meeting Hutch in town so lets get going.”

He walked with the sulking imp across the park and toward the shopping district. He sighed with relief as he saw a small coffee stand and purchased a bottle of water. 

“You’ve got some shit in your teeth you know,” he heard somebody say and he glanced over.

“Oh, Jidao, god damn it, yea I know, sesame seeds,” he grumbled and downed the water, the taste of imp treat finally being washed away from his mouth. 

Ugh, so gross.

“Why…did you eat a pet snack?” Jidao said with a grin forming on his stupid face. 

“I did not?!” Elio hissed in defense - a complete lie. 

Buddy barked and barked and Elio told him to shut up but Buddy just wagged his tail and jumped around the other. 

“Wow seems like even your imp knows you’re lying,” Jidao laughed.

“Okay fine, yes, I ate it, but Buddy wouldn’t do his trick and kept demanding more and more treats so I ate it to prove a point,” Elio told him and Buddy whined.

“Did it work?” Jidao asked. 

“No, not really, Buddy is hard to train to be honest,” Elio admitted and Jidao thought for a moment. 

“Well why not try something else, Dan sells black sesame seed dango, maybe they’ll help your good boy?” Jidao suggested and Elio thought about it. He couldn’t remember Hutch having any issue against black sesame seed dango, plus he was pretty sure he’d seen him feed it to his own pets before. 

“Alright, I’ll go get one, thanks for the tip Jidao,” Elio said and looked to Buddy. “Come on you scamp.”

“Bye Elio, see you later,” Jidao called and waved good bye, watching Elio head over to Dan’s Dango. 

Elio gave a small smile in greeting as he walked up to the stand. 

“Hey there Elio, the usual?” Dan asked. Elio would always order strawberry dango when he visited Dan, it was his favourite and Dan made the best dango in the whole city!

“Yes please Dan, and one sesame seed dango for this guy,” he said and Dan peered over at the impup. 

“I didn’t know you had an impup,” he said simply before starting the dango. 

“Well, yea, I didn’t but I’m helping Hutch train him,” Elio explained as they waited. Buddy was scratching behind his ear and looking around. Giving off the occasional yap at another nearby imp. 

“He’s very cute,” Dan said giving Elio the two dango when they were ready. Elio paid and thanked Dan before wishing him a good day and going to a nearby bench. 

Sitting, he took a bite of his dango first - perfect as always. 

Then he looked down at Buddy. 

“Alright Buddy, you listen to me, there are three mochi, you’re going to do three tricks for me and you get one for each trick okay,” he said to the imp and could have sworn the imp nodded. 

“Okay, sit,” Elio said simply and Buddy sat. He told him he was a good boy and petted his head affectionately before feeding him the first bit of dango. Buddy devoured it. His tail wagging quickly from side to side. 

“Good job Bud, okay now roll over okay,” Elio instructed and to his surprise Buddy did it. He rolled over before happily accepting pets and a second piece of dango. 

“Elio,” a voice called and Elio looked over to see Hutch walking over with a bag full of imp supplies under each arm. “Did I just see Buddy roll over?”

“Yes you did,” Elio said to him and grinned. “Now watch this.”

Elio looked to Buddy and smiled widely. 

“Alright Buddy, last one, you got this…beg,” Elio told him and Buddy raised onto his hind legs, putting his two paws infront and whining.

“Good boy,” Elio said and gave him the last piece of Dango. 

“I am in shock,” Hutch said and sat next to Elio. “I didn’t think he’d actually do more tricks…he must really like those dango.”

“Oh yea, think we have the key to Buddy training,” Elio joked and offered Hutch some of his Dango. The pair shared the last bit as they watched Buddy happily eat the rest of his.