What The Dog Saw
Title: What The Dog Saw
Pairing(s): QMi
Genre(s): Romance, comedy
Length: 2057 words
Rating: PG-13
Summary: In which Ni Qiu saves his master from losing his sanity.
Inspiration(s): My dog watches me a lot, so I just wanted to capture what was in his mind. The title is from a book of the same name (totally recommended, by the way).
```
Ni Qiu had never understood why grown-ups could be so stupid at times. I mean, they had brains, didn’t they? There was no excuse to be stupid, dammit!
His owner, for instance. Normally Zhou Mi was a perfectly level-headed guy who remembered to feed him every day and who never said no to a good and thorough rough-and-tumble. He never failed to take him out on morning strolls, nor did he ever forget-not once!-to give the puppy a nice warm bath on Sunday evenings (scentless shampoo, thank god). After all, Zhou Mi was a freaking store manager. He’d be out of a job if he wasn’t able to pull himself together when the going gets tough and the tough gets going.
But then, sometimes he was just so daft! And it was all Kui Xian's fault. Ever since Zhou Mi met him, he had been acting so strange and retarded that every so often the puppy wondered if human IQs dropped suddenly after a certain time point. In fact, Ni Qiu went so far as to sniff through Zhou Mi’s stack of newspapers and read an article about an experiment carried out in the United States, where they found out that “perception deficits gradually appear over the lifespan of individuals and seem to reach problem levels in older adults and can greatly impact functions in people with dementia or other cognitive-impaired conditions” (Gilmore 2006). Whatever the hell that meant. The puppy gave up after three paragraphs and peed on the stack out of spite. Zhou Mi pretended to hardly notice the wrinkly yellow stain the next morning.
For example, Zhou Mi seemed to develop an intense hyper-responsiveness to the phone all of a sudden. Yah, that’s right, the phone. Ni Qiu never understood the importance of phones, really. They were just large dried black slugs with a chopped-off antenna (in other words, a loser slug, and seriously, slugs at their greatest were already losers so that was saying something). In the evenings, Zhou Mi would gaze longingly at it or wait by his bedside and stare at it intently. Seriously, it looked like he was practicing his terrible telepathic skills and using the Force, Luke. Whenever the phone rang, he dropped absolutely anything he was doing (yes, even the cooking pan that required extra attention since it singed meat easily, which was not too bad because then Ni Qiu had meat for dinner) and flew to its side, checking the caller ID. Usually then he would calm down, an expression of disappointment slash relief slash annoyance on his face, and answer normally. If, however, the caller ID read a certain Kui Xian <3, Zhou Mi’s eyes would bulge out of their sockets and his heartbeat became so loud that even Ni Qiu’s less-than-average-for-a-dog’s ears could hear it. Then he would count aloud to himself-one, two, three-before pressing the green button and placing on his singsong-y voice that previously had reserved only for Ni Qiu. “Hello? Oh, Kui Xian! How are you?”
Ni Qiu therefore concluded that Kui Xian was dangerous.
Annoyed with what he was sure was Zhou Mi’s downfall in sanity, Ni Qiu pretty much self-appointed himself to let this so-called Kui Xian know that he was not welcome in Zhou Mi’s life, thank you very much. Every time Kui Xian was on the phone with his owner, the puppy would bark and yelp and howl as loud as his little lungs allowed him to, hoping that the man on the other side of the phone would get the point and recoil at the sound of his deep and manly voice and leave his poor owner alone. However, this only seemed to amuse the humans and instead of the desired effect, Zhou would only smile into the phone with a cheerful “Ni Qiu says hi!” on his lips. Kui Xian would then say something back that would make Zhou Mi blush and laugh behind his hand like a little schoolgirl, further losing his mind. Like, what the fuck?
The next tactic Ni Qiu tried out had better results. The next time Zhou Mi started ogling the home phone or his cellphone or any mono-antenna slug in general, the puppy jumped into his lap and started barking his disapproval. “This is a bad idea!” he yelped. “Bad, bad, bad! Do not want!” And his tall lanky owner seemed to be pleased that Ni Qiu cared so much for him because he got the belly rub of his life, and before long the dog was lying on his back, tongue lolling out as Zhou Mi scratched at his Very Happy Place. Success!
That was, until this Kui Xian showed up at the doorstep a day later with flowers. Flowers. More specifically, lavender roses. Holy shit, this was getting completely out of hand! Never fear, Ni Qiu to the rescue! Hold on, Zhou Mi, your loyal canine will protect you! Ni Qiu fired up his doggy biscuit energy and while barking at the top of his little doggy lungs, he charged at the enemy, intent on pushing him out the door and out of his owner’s life. As he charged, he felt himself transform into a gigantic Rottweiler able to knock anything down and ravage in blood and gore-in other words, a muscular drooling killing machine.
Unfortunately, he must have used up all of his transformation powers in the ambush, because by the time he made it to the enemy, the best his little paws could do was claw at Kui Xian’s thighs, barely making any scratches on his ragged jeans.
“Aw he likes you already!” Zhou Mi cooed. “Don’t you, Ni Qiu?”
Ni Qiu did a double take. “Are you out of your mind?!” he yapped hysterically. “No, I don’t! Get back, Zhou Mi, he’s a monster! You’re not safe! Hurry, run for your life and don’t look back!”
To the puppy’s utter dismay, Zhou Mi had already stopped paying attention to his miniature poodle and made the biggest mistake by letting Kui Xian into the apartment, smiles and all. To make it worse, Zhou Mi decided that it would be a good idea to take the roses and put them in a vase in the kitchen! Leaving the enemy free to roam home base! “Make yourself at home,” he said, gesturing towards the living room, and Ni Qiu almost fell over from how naive his master was.
Retreat! The enemy has breached the castle! Retreat! Retreat!
Now, Ni Qiu was a quick thinker. Well, of course he was, he was a poodle. Aside from Border Collies, poodles had the highest IQs of all the dog breeds. This was proven in some experiment carried out by some random Canadian professor a decade or so ago but that’s beside the point because oh my god Kui Xian was about to sit on the couch! No, anywhere but the couch! Zhou Mi had made it clear that nobody except himself was allowed on the furniture. Heck, that was probably the first lesson he learned when Zhou Mi had adopted him; he had actually gotten the Bad Dog! spiel for clambering onto the couch after a long walk in the rain, and Zhou Mi almost never gave him the Bad Dog! spiel!
And now this stranger was just going to waltz right in and sit on the couch? Not if Ni Qiu could help it! Who knows where Kui Xian’s nonexistent butt had been before coming in! The puppy sprinted towards the outsider, intent on intercepting the blasphemous act of Doggy No-No’s, and resolutely plopped himself in between Kui Xian’s butt and the couch cushion. Luckily Kui Xian had seen the dog before sinking into the cream-colored KLOBO loveseat that Zhou Mi had bought from IKEA twenty years ago, or else Ni Qiu would have been a puddle of fluffy poodle goo.
The man sat up abruptly, and Ni Qiu let out a sigh of relief. Until Kui Xian decided to scoop him up, sit down (no, not the couch!), and proceed to hold onto him for dear life while Ni Qiu struggled and wiggled and kicked with all his might. “Help! I’m under attack! Help!” he whined. “DO NOT WANT!!!”
Ni Qiu’s eyes shone with hope and relief when Zhou Mi came back from the kitchen, but instead of getting mad at Kui Xian (“Bad Kui Xian! Bad dog, Kui Xian!), Zhou Mi laughed at the scene.
Oh that was cruel. Immediately the poodle stopped writhing in Kui Xian’s grasp, promptly bursting into tears (figuratively, since dogs don’t conventionally cry, per se). He was being held hostage and Zhou Mi actually thought it was funny? Double agent! Traitor! Judas! Chihuahua!
“He’s a feisty one, isn’t he?” Zhou Mi grinned, unceremoniously plopping down next to Kui Xian. He ran his hand through his dog’s fur, relishing the softness in between his fingers. “I bought him from a breeder, and he was the liveliest of his litter.” Zhou Mi laughed again. “You both have the same hair!”
Ni Qiu had never been so offended in his life, and sneezed his discontentment at being compared to the monster giving him a lifetime’s worth of do not want’s.
Kui Xian only smiled and tentatively started stroking the ball of fur in his arms. “I’ve always wanted a dog. They are loyal and ready to protect their owners.”
“You bet I am,” Ni Qiu sniffed, pouting as he gnawed at Kui Xian’s thumb. “Now if you don’t leave on the count of three, I’ll bite your nose off.”
“Um, Zhou Mi,” Kui Xian started off timidly. “I know we’ve only met two weeks ago, but I already think that you’re a great person and a great storekeeper and just an overall great guy. So I was wondering if, um, well, if you would go out with me-ouch my nose!”
“Ni Qiu, no!” Zhou Mi made a lunge for his dog but the miniature poodle dodged, which messed up his owner’s center of gravity and made him topple over onto Kui Xian’s smaller form. They landed on the carpet, Zhou Mi on top, his torso between Kui Xian’s legs. Personally Ni Qiu saw absolutely nothing awkward about it, but apparently the humans did, as their faces turned beet red (wait, more like dark grey since Ni Qiu was colorblind, but he guessed that in human view it was beet red).
“Sorry,” Zhou Mi apologized, scrambling up and helping a flustered Kui Xian to his feet. “Ni Qiu’s usually not like that. I think that he’s just not used to company. How’s your nose?”
“Nothing broken. Only scratched it.”
Ni Qiu’s face fell. He was sure he felt a bone crack.
They stood in awkward silence for a few moments before Zhou Mi broke into a grin. “Yes.”
Kui Xian tilted his head. “What?”
“Yes. I’ll go out with you.”
The poodle watched as Kui Xian failed to hold back a smile and put his hand over his mouth to stifle a giggle while Zhou Mi brought his official boyfriend closer and pressed a chaste kiss on the shorter man’s lips. It was like a romantic chick flick scene except in 3D. Despite the circumstances, Ni Qiu almost wished that he had popcorn at hand (wait, paw, he had no thumbs dammit).
“You dog is watching us,” Kui Xian noticed.
“That’s because he’s happy for us,” Zhou Mi interpreted blindly. “We’re going out, remember?”
Ni Qiu had no idea what Going Out” meant in human terms, so he did the tedious process of logical thinking.
Alright, so Going Out meant Zhou Mi Getting A Coat And Opening The Door which sometimes meant that he would be Bringing Ni Qiu Along. Ni Qiu’s tail straightened. When Zhou Mi Brought Ni Qiu Along, it usually had something to do with a Long Walk In The Dog Park. Bingo! Going Out meant Can Has Long Walk In Park! Going once, going twice, sold!
Kui Xian, he concluded, was not dangerous after all. So with that in mind, he lolled his tongue out and started wagging his tail, charging towards Kui Xian with the intention of jumping into his arms and licking his face with extra drool.
Every dog knew that no human being can be dangerous if they took you out for walks!
Pairing(s): QMi
Genre(s): Romance, comedy
Length: 2057 words
Rating: PG-13
Summary: In which Ni Qiu saves his master from losing his sanity.
Inspiration(s): My dog watches me a lot, so I just wanted to capture what was in his mind. The title is from a book of the same name (totally recommended, by the way).
```
Ni Qiu had never understood why grown-ups could be so stupid at times. I mean, they had brains, didn’t they? There was no excuse to be stupid, dammit!
His owner, for instance. Normally Zhou Mi was a perfectly level-headed guy who remembered to feed him every day and who never said no to a good and thorough rough-and-tumble. He never failed to take him out on morning strolls, nor did he ever forget-not once!-to give the puppy a nice warm bath on Sunday evenings (scentless shampoo, thank god). After all, Zhou Mi was a freaking store manager. He’d be out of a job if he wasn’t able to pull himself together when the going gets tough and the tough gets going.
But then, sometimes he was just so daft! And it was all Kui Xian's fault. Ever since Zhou Mi met him, he had been acting so strange and retarded that every so often the puppy wondered if human IQs dropped suddenly after a certain time point. In fact, Ni Qiu went so far as to sniff through Zhou Mi’s stack of newspapers and read an article about an experiment carried out in the United States, where they found out that “perception deficits gradually appear over the lifespan of individuals and seem to reach problem levels in older adults and can greatly impact functions in people with dementia or other cognitive-impaired conditions” (Gilmore 2006). Whatever the hell that meant. The puppy gave up after three paragraphs and peed on the stack out of spite. Zhou Mi pretended to hardly notice the wrinkly yellow stain the next morning.
For example, Zhou Mi seemed to develop an intense hyper-responsiveness to the phone all of a sudden. Yah, that’s right, the phone. Ni Qiu never understood the importance of phones, really. They were just large dried black slugs with a chopped-off antenna (in other words, a loser slug, and seriously, slugs at their greatest were already losers so that was saying something). In the evenings, Zhou Mi would gaze longingly at it or wait by his bedside and stare at it intently. Seriously, it looked like he was practicing his terrible telepathic skills and using the Force, Luke. Whenever the phone rang, he dropped absolutely anything he was doing (yes, even the cooking pan that required extra attention since it singed meat easily, which was not too bad because then Ni Qiu had meat for dinner) and flew to its side, checking the caller ID. Usually then he would calm down, an expression of disappointment slash relief slash annoyance on his face, and answer normally. If, however, the caller ID read a certain Kui Xian <3, Zhou Mi’s eyes would bulge out of their sockets and his heartbeat became so loud that even Ni Qiu’s less-than-average-for-a-dog’s ears could hear it. Then he would count aloud to himself-one, two, three-before pressing the green button and placing on his singsong-y voice that previously had reserved only for Ni Qiu. “Hello? Oh, Kui Xian! How are you?”
Ni Qiu therefore concluded that Kui Xian was dangerous.
Annoyed with what he was sure was Zhou Mi’s downfall in sanity, Ni Qiu pretty much self-appointed himself to let this so-called Kui Xian know that he was not welcome in Zhou Mi’s life, thank you very much. Every time Kui Xian was on the phone with his owner, the puppy would bark and yelp and howl as loud as his little lungs allowed him to, hoping that the man on the other side of the phone would get the point and recoil at the sound of his deep and manly voice and leave his poor owner alone. However, this only seemed to amuse the humans and instead of the desired effect, Zhou would only smile into the phone with a cheerful “Ni Qiu says hi!” on his lips. Kui Xian would then say something back that would make Zhou Mi blush and laugh behind his hand like a little schoolgirl, further losing his mind. Like, what the fuck?
The next tactic Ni Qiu tried out had better results. The next time Zhou Mi started ogling the home phone or his cellphone or any mono-antenna slug in general, the puppy jumped into his lap and started barking his disapproval. “This is a bad idea!” he yelped. “Bad, bad, bad! Do not want!” And his tall lanky owner seemed to be pleased that Ni Qiu cared so much for him because he got the belly rub of his life, and before long the dog was lying on his back, tongue lolling out as Zhou Mi scratched at his Very Happy Place. Success!
That was, until this Kui Xian showed up at the doorstep a day later with flowers. Flowers. More specifically, lavender roses. Holy shit, this was getting completely out of hand! Never fear, Ni Qiu to the rescue! Hold on, Zhou Mi, your loyal canine will protect you! Ni Qiu fired up his doggy biscuit energy and while barking at the top of his little doggy lungs, he charged at the enemy, intent on pushing him out the door and out of his owner’s life. As he charged, he felt himself transform into a gigantic Rottweiler able to knock anything down and ravage in blood and gore-in other words, a muscular drooling killing machine.
Unfortunately, he must have used up all of his transformation powers in the ambush, because by the time he made it to the enemy, the best his little paws could do was claw at Kui Xian’s thighs, barely making any scratches on his ragged jeans.
“Aw he likes you already!” Zhou Mi cooed. “Don’t you, Ni Qiu?”
Ni Qiu did a double take. “Are you out of your mind?!” he yapped hysterically. “No, I don’t! Get back, Zhou Mi, he’s a monster! You’re not safe! Hurry, run for your life and don’t look back!”
To the puppy’s utter dismay, Zhou Mi had already stopped paying attention to his miniature poodle and made the biggest mistake by letting Kui Xian into the apartment, smiles and all. To make it worse, Zhou Mi decided that it would be a good idea to take the roses and put them in a vase in the kitchen! Leaving the enemy free to roam home base! “Make yourself at home,” he said, gesturing towards the living room, and Ni Qiu almost fell over from how naive his master was.
Retreat! The enemy has breached the castle! Retreat! Retreat!
Now, Ni Qiu was a quick thinker. Well, of course he was, he was a poodle. Aside from Border Collies, poodles had the highest IQs of all the dog breeds. This was proven in some experiment carried out by some random Canadian professor a decade or so ago but that’s beside the point because oh my god Kui Xian was about to sit on the couch! No, anywhere but the couch! Zhou Mi had made it clear that nobody except himself was allowed on the furniture. Heck, that was probably the first lesson he learned when Zhou Mi had adopted him; he had actually gotten the Bad Dog! spiel for clambering onto the couch after a long walk in the rain, and Zhou Mi almost never gave him the Bad Dog! spiel!
And now this stranger was just going to waltz right in and sit on the couch? Not if Ni Qiu could help it! Who knows where Kui Xian’s nonexistent butt had been before coming in! The puppy sprinted towards the outsider, intent on intercepting the blasphemous act of Doggy No-No’s, and resolutely plopped himself in between Kui Xian’s butt and the couch cushion. Luckily Kui Xian had seen the dog before sinking into the cream-colored KLOBO loveseat that Zhou Mi had bought from IKEA twenty years ago, or else Ni Qiu would have been a puddle of fluffy poodle goo.
The man sat up abruptly, and Ni Qiu let out a sigh of relief. Until Kui Xian decided to scoop him up, sit down (no, not the couch!), and proceed to hold onto him for dear life while Ni Qiu struggled and wiggled and kicked with all his might. “Help! I’m under attack! Help!” he whined. “DO NOT WANT!!!”
Ni Qiu’s eyes shone with hope and relief when Zhou Mi came back from the kitchen, but instead of getting mad at Kui Xian (“Bad Kui Xian! Bad dog, Kui Xian!), Zhou Mi laughed at the scene.
Oh that was cruel. Immediately the poodle stopped writhing in Kui Xian’s grasp, promptly bursting into tears (figuratively, since dogs don’t conventionally cry, per se). He was being held hostage and Zhou Mi actually thought it was funny? Double agent! Traitor! Judas! Chihuahua!
“He’s a feisty one, isn’t he?” Zhou Mi grinned, unceremoniously plopping down next to Kui Xian. He ran his hand through his dog’s fur, relishing the softness in between his fingers. “I bought him from a breeder, and he was the liveliest of his litter.” Zhou Mi laughed again. “You both have the same hair!”
Ni Qiu had never been so offended in his life, and sneezed his discontentment at being compared to the monster giving him a lifetime’s worth of do not want’s.
Kui Xian only smiled and tentatively started stroking the ball of fur in his arms. “I’ve always wanted a dog. They are loyal and ready to protect their owners.”
“You bet I am,” Ni Qiu sniffed, pouting as he gnawed at Kui Xian’s thumb. “Now if you don’t leave on the count of three, I’ll bite your nose off.”
“Um, Zhou Mi,” Kui Xian started off timidly. “I know we’ve only met two weeks ago, but I already think that you’re a great person and a great storekeeper and just an overall great guy. So I was wondering if, um, well, if you would go out with me-ouch my nose!”
“Ni Qiu, no!” Zhou Mi made a lunge for his dog but the miniature poodle dodged, which messed up his owner’s center of gravity and made him topple over onto Kui Xian’s smaller form. They landed on the carpet, Zhou Mi on top, his torso between Kui Xian’s legs. Personally Ni Qiu saw absolutely nothing awkward about it, but apparently the humans did, as their faces turned beet red (wait, more like dark grey since Ni Qiu was colorblind, but he guessed that in human view it was beet red).
“Sorry,” Zhou Mi apologized, scrambling up and helping a flustered Kui Xian to his feet. “Ni Qiu’s usually not like that. I think that he’s just not used to company. How’s your nose?”
“Nothing broken. Only scratched it.”
Ni Qiu’s face fell. He was sure he felt a bone crack.
They stood in awkward silence for a few moments before Zhou Mi broke into a grin. “Yes.”
Kui Xian tilted his head. “What?”
“Yes. I’ll go out with you.”
The poodle watched as Kui Xian failed to hold back a smile and put his hand over his mouth to stifle a giggle while Zhou Mi brought his official boyfriend closer and pressed a chaste kiss on the shorter man’s lips. It was like a romantic chick flick scene except in 3D. Despite the circumstances, Ni Qiu almost wished that he had popcorn at hand (wait, paw, he had no thumbs dammit).
“You dog is watching us,” Kui Xian noticed.
“That’s because he’s happy for us,” Zhou Mi interpreted blindly. “We’re going out, remember?”
Ni Qiu had no idea what Going Out” meant in human terms, so he did the tedious process of logical thinking.
Alright, so Going Out meant Zhou Mi Getting A Coat And Opening The Door which sometimes meant that he would be Bringing Ni Qiu Along. Ni Qiu’s tail straightened. When Zhou Mi Brought Ni Qiu Along, it usually had something to do with a Long Walk In The Dog Park. Bingo! Going Out meant Can Has Long Walk In Park! Going once, going twice, sold!
Kui Xian, he concluded, was not dangerous after all. So with that in mind, he lolled his tongue out and started wagging his tail, charging towards Kui Xian with the intention of jumping into his arms and licking his face with extra drool.
Every dog knew that no human being can be dangerous if they took you out for walks!