Montage 1 — Par for the Course

“Back again t-today for another round, huh? Did Mercy say…”
“Nah, it’s on me today. Wanted ta stop by and bring Sanctity ‘coz I wanted to practice that… you know what we did last time. General training.”

Every now and then Kain would be called to help Hutch out with something around the event or to double check a shipment for either shop, but today… Today was different. Kain’s harpup trio seemed to get the message, but Sanctity—as friendly as he was—needed a little extra discipline to be able to move things around in the shop without creating a mess… and who better to consult for this than Hutch! This was BASICALLY just another part of that deal that Kain and Hutch struck up anyways, so… more benefits for the both of them.

“You came at j-just the right time, actually! I actually decided to r-reorganize part of the obstacle course… before I let other folk on it, c-can you and Sanctity give it a go?” Hutch motioned to the course in the near distance as they handed Kain a bag of sesame treats. “A-and then afterward we can get training on that whole… disciplinary thing. Maybe a couple tricks under this pup’s belt will do him w-well.”
“Sure thing. Thanks.” Briefly Kain took out one of the treats, showing it to an eager Sanctity before making an arm motion to get the impup running towards the obstacle course. “Call me if ya need anythin’. Technically it’s still business even if I’ve come here in my free time.”
“O-oh, no worries! I’ve got this situation pretty much handled—” Hutch motioned to all the extra course doodads they had moved out of the way, “—so actually I’ll be by with Reginald to help test the new part of the course as well. It’s good for imps to have r-role models so they can imitate good behaviors.”
“That works for me. I’ll wait for ya, so take your time.”
“Thanks a bunch, Kain!”

As Hutch crossed their Ts and dotted their Is when it came to the course materials, they eventually dusted their hands off and jogged out to Kain and Sanctity with Reginald dutifully on their shoulder. They couldn’t help but chuckle ever so slightly as they watched Sanctity run laps around Kain’s legs… gee, this pup sure was an energetic one. 

“H-hey! Looks like a handful already… Sanctity, down!” With a treat in hand, Hutch made a downward motion that got the pup to sit for a brief moment; Reginald at that point flew off Hutch’s shoulder to sit beside Sanctity, and the two imps exchanged an intrigued look.
“Haah… thanks for that. I tried that, but…”
“I-It takes a bit of getting used to, as you know. Don’t worry, impups are k-known to be fast learners… So let's get this course down pat. This part of the course goes like… over the ramp, through this tunnel, jumping over this hurdle, then crossing this see-saw. I… t-think it’s simple enough.” Hutch motioned to the different obstacles, and Kain nodded along. “I’ll give it a run with Regi real q-quick… and then Sanctity can follow.”
“Sounds good. I’ll be taking notes… thanks.”

You could almost see Hutch’s ego grow three sizes at the simple notion of praise. With an awkward cough, Hutch nodded… and the training games began!

…

After Reginald made quick work of the course—like the expertly trained, Hutch-owned imp they were—Sanctity was more than eager to hop up to the chase… but ended up simply barreling through all the obstacles on his first go around. It took several different tries—and a little bit of goading from both Kain and Hutch—but eventually, Sanctity was able to clear that part of the course with a consistent time. And yet, even after all that running… this impup still had energy abound. Luckily, Hutch had plans for this—really, Kain was seriously impressed at all the tricks this bun had when it came to dealing with these little rascals.

“R-Remember when you had your harpups over and we were teaching them all to bring things to different places? Let’s do that again, b-but this time with more objects with varying s-sizes. This’ll be similar to what you want Sanctity to d-do back at the shop, so it’s good to get them used to this sort of thing…” Bringing them over to an assorted stack of objects, Hutch let Reginald perch on their shoulder as they started sorting them out. “I am t-truly intrigued that you managed to get your harpups to do things around the shop, though. You’ll have to s-show me later.”
“Sure thing, Hutch. Feel free to come on over and chat whenev… it’s slow most days, anyways. Ah—Sanctity, heel. Good boy…” Kain has mastered the art of “dutifully ignoring Hutch’s hiccups whenever he utters the words ‘good boy’ around them”, so he didn’t flinch when Hutch just so happened to drop a small cube before picking it back up. Heheh…
“Y-y-yeah. All good, all good. Now come on, Sanctity—here. Hold.” Hutch placed a small box on Sanctity’s head and fed it a sesame seed. Positive reinforcement! And then right on cue…
“Sanctity—come!” Kain said, and with a wobbly gait the impup made his way over to Kain’s side. The box nearly fell off a couple times… but it’d made it in one piece. Though… When Kain reached down to pick the box up—and trade Sanctity a sesame treat for his troubles—the pup’s wiggly energy caused the box to fall right off.

“Ah—ahh. There it goes… yeah, that’s the problem there.” With an underhanded toss, Kain tossed it back to Hutch… who caught it a little less than gracefully, as they were too busy paying attention to Sanctity as he made his way back across the lawn.
“O-oh yep, I’ve seen this before. Don’t worry; this may take a couple of t-tries, but with enough attempts… he’ll get it. M-maybe we can get in a couple reps before dinner? For your help, I can show you a p-place I enjoy…”
“Oh, gladly!” Despite his usual cool demeanor, Kain jumped up eagerly at the thought of a new eatery to try… causing Hutch to chuckle, and for Sanctity to wag his tail curiously.

“Ehehe… training first, though!”
“… of course, of course.”