The Black Hound of Bakersfield

Breaking the News

The email came early one Saturday morning. Frank sat at the table, Ollie across from him. Argus, as expected, was still asleep. The bolded letters reading 'urgent' caught Frank's attention as he scrolled through the pages of mostly junk mail. Clicking the email, he skimmed it quickly.

"Ollie, does this sound fake to you?" Frank questioned, catching the curly-haired intern's attention. Ollie put down his phone and looked up.

Frank read the email out loud, "Do not ignore this email! All employees of groups for those with abilities, powers, shifting, eat, must have their credentials updated. The 2016 review brought to our attention that many of you do not have the proper training, or have not done an updated training course. All courses were updated in 2015. If your training was done before then, you will need to report to one of our 4-day training conferences in one of the many convenient locations around the USA." Frank paused for a moment, and then added, "There are some dates and locations listed here. The closest one to us would be in L.A."

"I don't know... sounds pretty real to me. Can you call someone higher up and ask them about it?" Ollie stated. He hated when he was asked to give advice, mostly cause he feared being incorrect.

"You're probably right. I'll call them today, see what they say. When was your training, Ollie?" Frank questioned.

"Didn't have any. As an intern, I'm technically not considered an employee..." Ollie shrugged.

"Alrighty then. Looks like we'll all need it if this turns out to be real." Frank stood up, and exited the room.

....................................................................

Turns out, they didn't have to question much longer the validity of that email.

Lexi and Max laid sprawled out on the sofa, waiting... listening. Sure enough, right around ten am, the deep rumbling of the mail truck could be heard, struggling its way up the hill that Lorh was situated on. The girl leaped up and raced to the window, peering out. Max, the black Newfoundland, got up and ambled after her in his slow, Newfie way.

She waited until the mail truck was once again out of sight, and then raced down the long driveway to the mailbox. Shortly after that, she ran back inside, slamming the door behind her. The dog followed her into the kitchen, where Argus and Rex were eating breakfast. Flipping through the mail, she snatched one out of the pile and declared, "It's here!". Poorly tossing the rest of the mail onto the table, Lexi dashed out of the room.

"Hey!" Argus stated, watching the rest of the mail fall to the floor and scatter.

"What did you get?!" Rex asked, jumping up from his chair and following her out.

But the girl was gone before either of them got a response. Max stood where she had just been, looking around sheepishly. The big dog picked up one of the many letters that were on the floor, and brought it over to Argus.

"Thanks, boy," Argus said, taking the slightly slobbery envelope from him. Reading the address label, he called out, "Hey Frank! Come here. This looks important."

The letter had almost exactly the same information as the email. However, this one was addressed specifically to them, and told them that these courses would be required to be completed before the end of October, or else Lorh would be shut down indefinitely.

"Well then... Looks like we better sign ourselves up." Frank stated after reading the whole thing. Argus pulled up the website on his laptop, and began to fill out the form.

"How long is this course?" Frank questioned.

"Four days," Argus responded, typing away, "The 28th through the 31st."