Posted by Lieutenant Junior Grade Elaine Janvier (Chief Medical Officer) in Alt Timeline: CMO’s quaters: Enj celebrates Christmas
OOC: Merry Christmas guys! Hope you have a wonderful day.

IC: Elaine lay in her bed and stared up at the ceiling of her quaters, wondering what the time was, but not daring to ask the computer for fear of waking up Enj who was sleeping at the foot of her bed. Ordinarly she wouldn’t bother too much, since it was nearly impossible to do anything without Enj waking up, but it was Christmas Eve and even though Enj was only a dog Elaine didn’t want him to catch her sneaking gifts into his stocking. You’d think it wouldn’t matter so much him being a dog and all, but half the fun was sneaking around, and the idea of being caught just ruined it somehow. Like she was exposing some big secret that had been around since the dawn of time.

In a way she wasn’t wrong, the Christmas stoking tradition was one of the oldest Earth traditions she knew of and she had adored it as a child. Tierlessly year after year, as Elaine was growing up, her Grandmother had gotten up and filled her stockings with all sorts of treats… chocolates, sweets, small presents, and oranges. She could still remember the small childish exitment she felt when she woke to find her stocking was completely full of all sorts of treats. It had been like magic to her until someone had explained to her it was just her Grandmother. As a 8 year old she’d been crushed when she’d confronted her Grandmother (out of May’s hearing of course) and Grandmother had admitted it. Now 14 years later and she was trying to give Enj that same small magic Grandmother had given her and May as children.

Enj let out a small whine and rolled over his legs kicked back and forth as if he was running in his dream probably trying to chase a rabbit. Elaine wondered if he ever caught any in his dreams or if they all got away from him like they did on the holodeck. Enj woofed, barking at whatever he was seeing behind his closed eyes and Elaine took it as her cue to leave. Carefully she extracted herself from the bed, trying not to jostle him and wake him. She almost made it out into their living area without waking him, but the woosh of the doors woke him, and his ear twiched, one eye opening to see what was going on.

“Go back to sleep,” Elaine whispered, “I’ll be back in a minute,” Enj watched her out of his open eye for a minute, before it slid shut and he drifted back to sleep. Letting a breath, Elaine walked out the doors to their sleeping quaters and let them slide shut behind her.

Quickly and deftly Elaine grabbed the treats and presents she’d colleceted and wrapped for Enj earlier when NE Lucia had kindly taken him for a run on the holodeck. She placed them all carefully in his stocking, taking care to make as little noice as she could. She finished quickly and tiptoed back into her sleeping quaters. This time when the doors opened, knowing it was her, Enj barely twitched. She slipped back into bed, and reached down to the foot of it, grabbing the small dog and dragging him up towards her. Enj tucked himself between her arm and her ribs and she curled around his small body. Within minutes the pair of them were deeply asleep.

Lt. (j.g) Janvier & Enj the dog
CMO

When Enj saw the stocking hanging up in the living quaters the following morning, he ran wildly in circles around the room. Elaine chuckled watching Enj’s crazy excitment as he ran about the room. She’d been celebrating Christmas with him since she’d had him, and aside from the first year where he didn’t know what was going on, he loved it. As soon as he saw the stocking and the presents, he knew they were for him and he’d get so excited like he was being now.

“Alright Enj, settle,” She commanded, although she only half meant it. “Don’t you want to see what Santa Paws has left you?”

Enj stopped running in circles around the room and trotted up to her, his tongue hanging out the side of his mouth. As he reached her feet he jumped up onto his hindquaters and put his front paws in the air waving them around as if he was saying “I wanna see, I wanna see,”

“Alright then,” Elaine smiled, reaching up to grab his stocking down, and held it until Enj had settled a little bit more, so that he was no longer jumping or running, but rather sitting and wriggling his butt around as if the wag in his tail was too big to just be contained. Once he was as calm as she knew she would ever get him she sat down next to him, and placed the doggy treats and presents in front of him one by one. As each thing was placed in front of him Enj would sniff and lick it, occasionally gobbling down with gusto. His presents he paid no mind to until the stocking was completely empty and then he quietly retrieved them one by and tore them open his tail wagging excitedly the whole time.

It was only when Enj had a couple more presents to go that he seemed to settle enough to realise that Elaine was watching him with a quiet smile on her face, and that she didn’t have any presents of her own. After careful doggy deliberation, Enj picked up one of his bigger wrapped presents and dragged it over to Elaine plopping it in her lap. “What’s wrong with this one Enj?” she asked, giving him a curious look, as he looked at her and waggled his tail expectantly. When she didn’t do anything more with it, he dragged another one over, and keeping and eye on her an moving slower than he had been before, he tore it open with his teeth. He looked at her, looked at his now unwrapped present at his feet and then back at her. Thinking she was beginning to get the picture she asked, “Do you want me to open it?”. Enj repeated his previous motion, and put a paw on her lap. “Alright buddy,” she said slowly unwrapping the lamb bone she’d got for him, “I’m unwrapping it, see?”

Seemingly happy, Enj returned to his pile to unwrap his final present, happy his human now had a present of her own to unwrap. Elaine frowned at the lack of attention he was giving the bone, when by rights it should have been one of the gifts he was most excited about as it was one of his favourite foods. As the bone was fully unwrapped she shuffled over to where Enj was happliy chewing the crong toy he’d just exposed and gave him the bone. Enj looked up and gave a very human like sigh. His human wasn’t getting the message. He stood up and nudged the bone back towards her, and went back to chewing his toy, watching her out of the corner of his eye to see if she would finally get it but she just sat there staring at him.

If dogs could have rolled their eyes, Enj would certainly have been rolling his. His best bone, and his human was just looking at it. It hurt to see a perfectly good bone be wasted like that but Enj had faith his human would figure it out. She was smart - for a human. Even if she didn’t eat the bone, Enj wouldn’t regret giving it to her. After all, Enj thought looking at the treasure trove he had around him, She’s such a good human that she deserves the best. And I already have so much and all she has is that one bone.

Lt. (j.g.) Janvier & Enj the dog
CMO