The Heroic Heralds of the Hermann Horde

Milo

When Christopher got home from work, three out of five kids ran to hug him. They clamoured over one another for his attention. That was the first red flag, because if he was being honest with himself, they'd all grown out of their 'I missed you so much dad' phases. They got a little worried when things were bad, but they were all convinced that they were grown up enough that they didn't need him anymore. Then they tried to stop him from going upstairs. Red flag number two. When he turned to look at his children Annabelle suddenly appeared from upstairs and gave her cutest puppy-dog eyes. Red flag number three. "Alright, where's Lee Henry and what are all of you hiding?" Their meshed voices and excuses were interrupted by a ball of brown fur and the oldest Hermann offspring chasing after it.

"What the hell?!"

Lee Henry appeared in front of his dad with a cat in his arms. "Dad-"

"No."

"But-"

"Absolutely not. I don't want any pets in this house." He met all of his children's eyes with a stern gaze but could see fire burning behind each pair- this wasn't something he could just order his way out of. This was going to be a war.

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Hermann had to admit, his kids were clever. Too clever. Annoyingly clever. Not only had they come up with a well-drafted plan to take care of the cat, but they had already been doing so. For two months, apparently. In the back of his mind he was slightly worried about how good his kids were at hiding things from him and wondered if there was anything else he should know about, but he had to focus on making sure Cindy wasn't blinded by cuteness otherwise they would definitely end up with a cat.

He failed.

They ended up with a cat.

He snooped and found out Kylie kept a stash of clothes in Lee Henry's dresser.

He really needed a drink.

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"Good morning!"

"Your smile's blinding me Brett, cool it will ya?"

"Hey, Hermann." He nodded apologetically in Brett's direction after Casey's sharp voice cut through the air. He should have known better, honestly. He shouldn't have snapped at Brett at all, let alone when Casey was around. Severide chuckled at Casey's defensive behaviour before his eyes settled back onto the grumpy man who's been mumbling under his breath and rubbing his face since shift started. "So, what's up your ass, Hermann?"

"The kids brought home a cat."

"Ginger, right?" Hermann stared blankly at Kidd, unsurprised and annoyed. "Of course you would know about this, you know, a heads up woulda been nice." Stella held her hands up in her defense, "don't look at me, they suckered me into it. You know how cute that cat is, right?"

"I don't care if it's cute, it costs me more money and it shits in a box! I mean, how weird is that?"

"Okay, first of all, I know for a fact that your horde of children have been paying for it and will continue to pay for it, second, would you prefer it crap on the floor? And third, we all do our business in what are essentially porcelain chairs. It's not that weird, Hermann, and your kids are responsible. You'll come around."

"No, I will not."

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Hermann got home from shift exhausted. He'd had time to shower after shift before heading home thankfully, but it didn't change that they'd spent hours at a house fire with an unfortunate death toll. Both parents and the family dog. What he really needed was a hug and fatty-carb-loaded food. Instead, he found Milo curled up on his favourite chair. He let out an aggravated sigh and lumbered into the kitchen for a cup of coffee. Milo took that as a sign that he was going to be fed, apparently. He brushed against Hermann's leg mewling, looking at him with big round, dismally adorable, eyes. "What? I'm not going to feed you, y'know."

"Mew."

"You're not my cat."

"Meeeew."

"No. Now go away." But Milo didn't go away, and Hermann did feed him. But it was only to get him to shut up. Definitely not because Milo looked up and him with big, adorable eyes... Nope. Not. At. All.

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It became something of a routine, come home, feed Milo, feed himself, go take a nap. Cindy was always teasing him about it, and Lee Henry had loudly proclaimed "I knew you'd come around!"

"I didn't come around, I just didn't want him meowing at me when I'm trying to sleep after spending the past twenty-four hours, y'know fighting fires." Everyone had rolled their eyes at him, he'd always thrown that phrase around as a joke of sorts for longer than all of his kids had been alive. But it didn't stop at being fed. Milo started following him around the house, jumping on his lap the second he sat down anywhere, curling up on his feet at the dinner table, and had even started sleeping in his bed, right between him and Cindy. And at first, Hermann was grump and mumbling about it, but he eventually sighed and just accepted it... In front of his family. When they weren't around, though, it was a completely different story. Hermann had discovered that Milo's favourite place to be pet was the front of his neck, he preferred food with chicken as opposed to fish, and that he absolutely loved to be brushed. When no one was around Hermann would coo at Milo in a high pitched voice and brush him with the metal pronged cat brush he favoured... Yeah, no one could ever know that he loved Milo. Ever.

But he was found out. By everyone. Kenny had forgotten his english book so he'd come back just a couple minutes after he and his siblings had left the house for school and found his dad on his hands and knees petting Milo, brushing his exposed stomach, and baby talking at him. So naturally, he pulled his phone out and started recording. "Who's the furriest kitty? You are, you are- Kenny. Hi. You are here, not on your way to school... And you have your phone out."

"Yup. Aaand I already sent it."

"... To who?"

"Oh, just Lee Henry, Luke, Max, Annabelle, mom..."

"Okay, at least it's not-"

"And auntie Sylvie."

"Crud."

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He almost called out sick, but thought better of it. It wouldn't be that bad, he was a lieutenant, after all.

"Not your cat my ass, Hermann!"

He walked into the common room to see Cruz, Kidd, Casey, Severide, and Boden all crowded around Cruz's laptop bemusedly watching the footage.

"Crud."