When she arrived at Nico's flat she was greeted by an open door and the smell of warm roast beef and freshly baked bread. She walked in to find Nico and people she later found out to be his tenants from this and several other buildings enjoying lunch during a tenants meeting. Nico acknowledged her and waved her into the hall where they were all seated around a large oak trestle table. She had not noticed this room let alone the door to it last time she was here but his home was different. She sat in on the tail end of this meeting and just looked around this room at all the artifacts lining the walls. More family portraits some of which even depicted the men with women were placed in this room. It then dawned on her that with the exception of these paintings; there were no females present in any other painting she saw through out his home. Even the simple chairs she sat in reminded her of something she would see in an old Robin Hood movie. It amazed her the care that was taken in all these objects. Many fine far eastern tapestries adorned the walls while fine rugs lay here and there clearly of Persian or middle eastern origin. His family certainly did travel a lot.
After about 20 minutes the tenants meeting came to an end and Nicodaemus ushered his guests out and split most of the leftovers among them. The rest he first offered her and having already eaten she turned him down. He made himself one last hot roast beef sandwich and put the rest at least two pounds into a bowl. Once the last tenant left the door closed on it's own as it had done the previous week then Nico let out a banshee like shrill whistle. She then heard a loud thumping that turned into a galloping and from around a corner came a massive dog breed that she had never seen before. It had the height of a great dane or Irish wolfhound but the girth of a Neapolitan mastiff. He whistled again and two more similar dogs came tromping into the guest hall. Slightly smaller she correctly assumed they were females. They had huge broad heads with slight under bites and lots of slobber. The male was a light fawn colour with a black muzzle and closely cropped ears while the females were more of a red colour with natural floppy ears. Their paws were nearly as large as a dinner plates and they had five toes instead of four toes and a dewclaw. Although she thought better of being surprised after last week she could not help herself. "What are those?"
"They are dogges." Nico told her.
"I know they are dogs I meant what breed or mixture of breeds?" she rolled her eyes at what she thought was his clear attempt at sarcasm.
"No, they are not D-O-G-S, they are dogges, D-O-G-G-E-S."
"I feel kinda' silly her but I have never heard of a dogge before. Is it a German breed or Dutch maybe given the spelling?"
"No," Nico began his explanation. "This breed if you want to call it that predates all other dog breeds and in fact is no even Canis familiaris. Besides 7 other secluded breeders world wide and myself you will never see or hear of these animals except in very obscure old science books and some religious texts. What we call dogs today are a mixture of these guys here and earlier forms of Canis lupus and other spitz type species. These are the direct ancestors to the ancient mastiffs used by the Romans and the many other early civilizations during battles and for protection. Oddly though they are African in origin. As you know wolves can not bark but dogs can. The ability to bark comes from their "side of the family". These pups are nearly a year old and still have some growing to do."
"Pups?!? They are like three feet tall at their shoulders. My parents bred great danes and their largest make was only 38 inches at his shoulder."
"Yes the males top out at around 42-44 inches at their shoulder and females around 39 to 40 inches and weight 350 to 200 pounds respectively. Unlike many deep chested dog breeds, dogges do not have proportionately small hearts and have twice the lifespan of a typical mastiff style dog. Ok enough about Brutus and his girls lets go up to my lab and get to work.
Over the next few hours they ran first a DNA test to make sure they were the same species and began the insemination process once they confirmed it. Once more the chemistry and attraction between them was very apparent and each flirted with the other like to silly teenagers while they worked. They were almost naturally at ease with one another and even exchanged a few light friendly hits and taps at each other's jokes and lab pranks. It was early evening when they finished but being September it was still quite light out at 5 pm. He invited her out for a walk and suggested they walk the few blocks to Penn's Landing on the waterfront. She excitedly agreed and stated she could certainly use some fresh air after being at the zoo and in his lab most of the day.
Once down there they just sauntered along and walked past the ice rink, which would be opening again later in the fall season. The two just talked about all his animals and she was in awe at his extensive knowledge. Secretly and kind of humorously they each tried very hard to worm their ways into one another's mind. He bought her a pretzel and a chili dog at a street vendor and by now was not hiding his mutual feeling of enamoration with this lovely creature. He had blocked out the entire world around him except for her, noticing every line, every curve, and little beauty mark on her face and neck.
