Our Journey

chapter 8

"Ciel! Your retirement is today!" I giggled softly while waking up from my sleep looking at his curled-up body upon my pillows next to my head, his excitement snapped his head up and started to kiss my face. Petting his head while running towards the door letting him out of our room and into the living room "lets GOOOO!" yelling loudly waking lylace up from her sleep, she had fallen asleep on the couch her short hair stuck up into the air, a small giggle left my lips as she slowly sat up. She stood in front of me giving me a small peck on the lips before walking towards the gear closet.

"I got you two something for this big day!" looking at her confused as she gently pulled a box out. Gently taking it from her hands "when did you buy this?" My voice filled with curiosity Acheron and Tyler's door opened quickly "wait for us!! We want to see!!" their excitement filled the air making Ciel zoom across the floor, quickly setting the box down then started to chase Ciel "zoomies!!" Acherons voice rang over the chaos that I started.

The front door flung open as mystery charged into my home "let's do this!" she yelled with toby giggling behind her. "Charge!" he repeated behind her, catching Ciel's collar stopping him from running and tackling him to the ground his playful barks entered my ears while he licked my face. The box sat next to my head waiting patiently to be opened, "open it!" my head snapped over to Acheron laughing at the fact there are imprints upon his face. "Did you fall asleep on your watch?" I asked laughing harder while he ran to the bathroom to check the mirror.

I used Ciel to gently lift myself off the floor and grab the box. Smiling at everyone as I grabbed a knife from the kitchen and sat on the couch. Patting the spot next to me inviting Ciel to sit. "let's open our gift Ciel" I giggled while cutting the tape apart to see the gift that was being held hostage inside the box. My eyes widened as a full purple tackle harness laid with in, "you were talking about getting him one for so long and I thought maybe this is a perfect time for one" my wife voice rang as joyful tears filled my eyes as I slowly lifted the harness showing everyone, within the room. "There are more" Acheron stated gently looking back in the box and seeing patches with the words "retired service dog" and "beware of dog kisses" written in white bold letters.

Throwing the box away from me and turning towards Ciel, "DOO YOUU WANNA-" he pivoted off the couch and ran towards the front door, his tail wagging a thousand miles per hour excited to go to work one last time. Laughter filled the air as I gently put his new patches on his retirement harness that no matter what no other dog will wear. Soon we were all ready to leave and head towards his party, a celebration of his 5 years of challenging work was ending. The ride to his party grew silent 'be strong scar, for him' my thoughts rang loud as I slowly began to pet his head feeling his soft ears between my fingers.

Closing my eyes, feeling the bumpy ride underneath me soon faded away, soon we entered the building that held his party and sat at our assigned seats. Mother soon stood in front of everyone that had come to his joyous occasion "today we celebrate the long years of hard work and dedication to his Ciel, he is the first one in our program to Retire and has set examples of everyone with in our program, we have a few speakers who will explain. Who Ciel is and what Ciel has done, starting off this celebration is lylace." Mom slowly walked off the stage while my wife stood and walked towards the stage, I watched her shift a few times before clearing her throat "hello everyone Thank you all for coming" she swallowed hard before continuing.

"If you do not know Ciel I will tell you a bit about him, Ciel was a dog that we took a chance on many years ago, we were told he was a fully trained service dog that knew all the bells and whistles of what it meant to be a service dog. He was originally meant to be the #2 to a tandem team with my previous service dog Navi, his best friend. But when I say this dog knew nothing, I mean it. He did not know his name or even the most basic commands, this dog did not know how to come, stay, walk on a leash or even the most basic things like SIT" her voice rang while she moved her hand for Ciel to sit next to her. "He was nearly 3 years old!! I mean we only paid like $50 to get him from some rando on KSL but still!"
We spent the first little while just calling him "bubba" while we decided on a name. One day we joked we should name him Ciel after Scars favorite anime that we liked to watch together, and this dog snapped his head around and came running over to us with a wagging tail as if he were picking that name for himself. It did not take long before I quickly realized he was more bonded to Scar than he was to me, but I was fine with that our rule is you cannot force a service dog to work for you if they do not want to. We started at the basics, just like all of you. And he was a rockstar, almost anything you would throw at him, he would learn so fast! Before we knew it, we were doing practice outings at our local Lowe's to see how he would react to the environment around us, and he rocked that too. They became a team that was unstoppable, they were just going to keep getting better and better. In the time that we have had Ciel in our lives he has taught me so many things, like how to earn a dog's trust, because he is not the most trusting dog at first. Or how to teach a dog that it is okay to play! Have you ever tried to teach a dog they can play?" she questioned with her hands up in the air before placing them back at her side.

"I do not even just mean play with a toy I mean this dog had no sense of enjoying himself outside of sleeping, never had the zoomies, would never pick up a stick or ball. Not even a squeaky toy could phase him for a while, we thought he just was not interested. However the day I first saw him playfully grab a ball I had thrown for his brother and get the zoomies all around our yard carrying the ball like the most happy dog you've seen I almost broke out in tears I was so hyped for him and that's when I realized maybe it's never been that he wasn't interested in play maybe it was he couldn't trust people around him to be that vulnerable and excited? This is still true for him. If Ciel does not trust you it does not matter, he will not play with you. Scar and Ciel as a team was something that inspired so many people, others were in awe how a bomb could nearly go off next to them, if he were in gear he was not interested-." her voice cracked as she slowly raised her hand to her face for her eyes filled with tears.

"He was looking right at his mom with the only thoughts in his head was to keep her safe. Many groups' outings we would be walking around and all the sudden we look back and Scar is in the ground with Ciel fully laid across her stomach and chest applying pressure to his very unconscious mom, and nothing could pull him off until he could smell the episode passing. It got to the point that we almost always knew she was safe if she had her bubba there. Whenever we would be getting ready to leave somewhere and his mom would so much as LOOK at this man's gear, he would bounce from whatever spot he found the most comfortable and barrel towards her crying out in excitement jumping up and down almost to the point she could barely get the harness over his wiggling body. "Laughter filled the air, feeling Ciel's ears once again trying to calm my tears. 'Be strong scar, Ciel taught you to be strong.' biting my lower lip to hold the sob the threaten to show itself.

"Time has passed, maybe if you don't know him you wouldn't believe it but he used to have a pitch black muzzle, but now that time has caused all his little silver greys to show, "he is getting older" we told each other and those greys used to pain me because I know that the more greys that come also come closer to the time as animal owners that we all hate. But I have started to see his greys in a different light. I almost see every little grey on his body and face as a memory that we now share together. We saw his age creeping up on him as he got less and less excited to see his gear and would often sleep around more. When we started to notice these changes, we knew this day was coming so we brought Sitka home which we were SO scared to do. We were scared that Ciel was not ready and that it was not going to work out, but we were wrong. Ciel embraced his successor much faster than we had anticipated. The more she worked with Sitka the more Ciel happily declined to go out. He was telling us he was ready.

And now we are here. Bubba, you are the best dog anyone could ask for and the shoes Sitka is going to have to fill are MASSIVE just like your heart. We will always love you and cherish you but now you can enjoy your days of retirement, bask in the sun, steal everyone's chairs as they move and crawl up right between me and your mom where you belong when we all cuddle in for bed at night. I will always have these amazing memories of watching you become your mom's first and best savior. I do not know what I would do without you. The best money we ever spent was bringing you into our lives I love you Ciel, happy retirement. "Tears fell from my eyes as I held on to Ciel, as if this were the last day to spend with us upon this earth.

"We will find the fountain of youth!" Mystery's voice rang as she ran over to lylace hugging her tightly, "he's not going anywhere" mothers voice chimed in while tears fell from her cheeks. She slowly walked back on stage wiping her tears away while looking at me "thank you Lylace for that wonderful speech now it's for the handler's turn Ciel's owner and best friend Scar" she smiled warmly at me while I stood handing Sitka off to lylace as we passed each other stepping towards the stage feeling my heart race as the lights flickered above me.

"Are you strong enough?" A deep voice came back looking behind me seeing everything stood still no one was moving, the lights slowly started to turn off one by one, till the room was black, turning around franticly "Ciel?!? Where are you?!?!" shouting around, reaching forward as a spotlight turned on. It shined over Ciel, his tail wagging as he whined softly at me a halo started to form above his head. "Don't go, please don't, I can't live without you!" shouting as he slowly started to drift away.