Disclaimer: I own squat.

Author's Notes: I am amused by this problem in the Dog series, but I couldn't work this scene into the currently unfinished one, so I wrote an ending for it and am posting it as a short.

Story Notes: Dog universe, though I took out Dief's lines. Helps to know that Thatcher and Kowalski have buddy-simpatico from some of the stuff that happened earlier in the series.

This story is a sequel to: Talking to the Dog series

Ray whistled a bit as he opened the door to the consulate. "Hey, T. Where's--"

Then he got a good look at Turnbull, and at Diefenbaker, who was standing to Turnbull's immediate left. Both of them turned and looked at him kind of desperately. They'd been staring at Thatcher's door.

Ray didn't even ask. "Ah, shit." He went to the doors, grabbed the handles and lunged in, flipped them half-shut behind him. Fraser and Thatcher were both on the opposite side of the desk, near the window, holding forms, staring at each other, and sweating.

"Hey!" Ray whistled a look-here. "You guys! No fucking, damn it, no fucking!"

Both of them immediately homed in on the distraction. He turned just slightly to shut one of the doors and apparently some kind of mountie distraction-tropism kicked in, because when he turned back less than a second later, they were about to lock antlers right in his face.

"Stop! Hold it!" Ray waved his arms wildly. "You! Get in the corner!" He grabbed Meg by the shoulder and swung her around, aiming her back toward the desk. "Look out the window and think about dogsleds! You! Over there!" He likewise spun Fraser and sent him off with a shove. "Wall behind the door! Pretend she's Turnbull! Now, both of you, say it with me! 'I will not fuck this person because I WANT to KEEP my JOB'! C'mon, I ain't kiddin' around! Say it! 'I will not fuck this person--'"

"I will not fuck this person," Fraser sighed.

"Do I have to say 'fuck'?" Meg groaned. Ray was surprised it wasn't Fraser who'd said that.

"You just did. Both of you. 'I will not fuck this person...'"

Finally he managed to drag them through a couple of repetitions of the phrase, and was pretty sure that it had done the trick. They were both edgy and pissed off at the world in general now, not horny.

"Okay. Meg, chair." He pointed to the desk chair. "Fraser, chair." He pointed at one of the two chairs in front of the desk, and Fraser trudged over to very nearly flop into it. Boy, Fraser was losing it.

Ray looked through the slightly-open door. "T, could you maybe get us some tea here?"

"Right away, Detective," Turnbull said gratefully, bolting for the kitchen, followed by Dief.

Ray sighed, approached the other chair, and leaned himself against the back of it with one arm, absently checking his hair with the other hand. "Okay, this is getting ridiculous. What are we gonna do with this, guys?"

"Maybe hormone therapy," Fraser said dully.

"You don't want that, constable," Thatcher said, just about as dully. "Trust me."

"There's always castration," Fraser tried, and Ray winced.

Thatcher raised an eyebrow at Fraser. She said "I think you were the one who somehow ended up mentioning the sexual staying power of the average eunuch the other day in this very office."

Fraser's mouth quirked in acknowledgement. "How about suicide?"

"Drastic, but your most compelling idea so far," Thatcher nodded. "Ray, do you have your gun?"

"Nobody's dying or gettin' their nuts ripped off. Or out, in Meg's case." Ray thought a moment, then said "Well, this is kind of a desperate idea, but...maybe if you just did it and got it over with? You think that'd help?"

"I think we'd probably go into a feedback loop," Fraser sighed. "Never stop."

"Die, possibly," Thatcher seemed to be considering the idea seriously. "Of dehydration or some such."

"Okay, bad idea," Ray said. "Here comes Turnbull with the tea--" and he got the hell out of the way as Fraser and Meg both leaped for the tray Turnbull was trying to set on the desk. Fraser ended up taking it out of his hands and finally getting it set down. The three-mountie tealock devolved to only two as Turnbull, who could be very resourceful when necessary, managed a Twister maneuver with his hips that allowed him to kind of duck down and squish out from between them, which, considering his size, was both impressive and an indicator of his level of desperation. Fraser barely managed not to wrestle the teapot away from Thatcher as she filled two cups with less than perfect coordination, shoved one at Fraser, and grabbed the other cup--for a second there Ray expected her to start drinking right out of the pot. "Christ. You people and tea."

Fraser was already going for the pot again, having emptied his cup. "Indeed," he muttered.

"Okay, we got you teaed up. Thanks," he added to Turnbull, who was sighing and closing the door as he left the office. "You know, if nothing else, you're torturing that guy out there with this. He doesn't have any idea how to handle it--he's low guy on the totem pole, what can he do? He doesn't have the authority to fill in for either of you every single day, even if he could. What's he supposed to do while you guys are in here not getting anything done?"

"He's usually oblivious," Thatcher said, reaching for the teapot again in turn. "Off on one of his tangents or something. Waxing the parking lot. Whatever."

"He ain't any more. He was beggin' me with his eyes when I came in."

"He's right," Fraser was muttering, fiddling with tea things, absently staring out the window, with his head braced on the other hand. "Sir, this has gone beyond an inconvenience. I believe we need professional help."

"You need a cold shower," Ray muttered.

"I can't work in the shower," Thatcher told him. "What kind of professional help? Believe me, I am open to ideas, here, Constable."

"I was thinking of something similar to classical conditioning. The professional help would largely be supervisory."

Ray asked "What, like, look at Meg and jab yourself in the leg with a cattle prod? Are you nuts?"

Fraser glanced at him. "That's a rather overconsice way of putting it, but essentially, yes, something like that. That would be solely negative reinforcement, though, and a combination of positive and negative is usually considered to be most effective."

Thatcher groaned. "Pain. Wonderful. This figures, coming from you, Fraser. Ray, why don't you just...I don't know, take him home and wear him out? If one of us kept our, uh...I mean, if he can just peel me off him, that'd be enough to keep things moving around here. And of course I can, um...can see what I can work out along the lines of, uh, something similar."

"Because just getting it someplace else doesn't seem to be making a difference," Ray said. "FYI, I do wear him out. He spots you and gets a second wind. It's more than anything his age and human--and a guy, I guess--oughtta be able to do, but we both know Fraser excels in just about every area, don't we?" Ray glared back when Fraser glared in his direction, then finished "I am not some kind of sexbot. I can't do it more than we do it! We do it all the time!"

"This is unbelievable," Thatcher groaned, folding her arms on the desk and resting her head on them.

"Um, I think we might be overlooking something here," Ray said. "A resource we might not be plumbing, here. I know nobody really thinks of Turnbull as, like, this big strong guy, but he is."

Fraser stared at him, waiting for him to finish. Thatcher peered out of her slump at him with one eye.

Ray threw his hands in the air. "Do I have to spell it out?"

Thatcher picked her head up, thought, and said "I don't think that'll be necessary, Detective." She sighed, poinked the relevant key on the phone, and said "Turnbull, could you come in here, please?"

The following week, Ray came strolling into the consulate, leaned down to pat Dief, and noticed that Turnbull wasn't at reception. He was just about to head back to Fraser's office when the sound of two very loud slaps, each followed by an equally loud thud, sounded from Thatcher's office.

"Oo," Ray said, sucking air sympathetically through his teeth and shaking his head. "That's gotta hurt."

The office door opened and Fraser appeared, wobbling seriously, with Turnbull's arm around his waist. One side of his face was bright red. Turnbull had big hands.

"Hello, Ray," he said dizzily. "I'm almost ready to go. I just need to woops--" He swayed and Turnbull steadied him carefully, watching.

"I'll take him," Ray said. "You better go peel Meg up."

"Thank you, Detective," Turnbull said, letting Ray slide in and get an arm around Fraser.

"They been good today?"

"Hellions," Turnbull sighed. "This is the third time I've broken them up--and the third time constable Fraser's been in to speak with the Inspector. They never earned their tea at all today."

"Well, I had a cat I used a water squirter to train to stay off where he wasn't s'posed to be," Ray said as Fraser leaned heavily against him. "Maybe you could try that."

"It would take a fire hose. Really, all this extra duty--" he shook his head, dropped whatever he'd been going to say and went back into the office. "Sir? Ah, there you are, let me just give you a hand up...did you want the Solarcaine this time?"

"I'll live," Ray heard Thatcher mumble.

"Your hair is all fuzzy today, Ray," Fraser said, reaching up to play with the stiff blond strands that happened to be right in front of his nose.

"Hey, T, you think you could tone it down a little? Fraser's gone stupid again."

"Sorry," Turnbull said, emerging from the office. "The inspector is easy--it doesn't require much to turn her attention, because she's far more aerodynamic than Constable Fraser. With him, I'm sometimes not sure how much is enough."

"Yeah, I see your point. If you don't slap him hard enough you might have to try a take-down, drag him out of the room or something, and he's not easy to take down."

"Exactly." Turnbull shook his head. "I could do it, but I'm loathe at the thought of hurting him seriously, of course, and it might. They generally don't thank me at the time, but later on, they often stop at my desk on the way out and express their appreciation. One at a time, of course." Turnbull shook out his stinging hand. "I hope the conditioning sets in before too much longer."

Ray grinned, and started walking the still-slightly-woozy Fraser back to his office. "We all love you, T. Thanks a bundle."

"Always ready to serve," Turnbull said brightly.

"Hand that man a racket," Ray mumbled.

"Are we going home now, Ray?" Fraser wondered.

"Whenever you're ready, Frase. Real soon."

END

End Helping Hand by Blue Champagne: bluecham@mindspring.com

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