"Jen." a gentle voice called. "Come on girl, wake up. Time for dinner."
Jen stirred groggily. She was still flat on her back where Betty had left her and someone was rubbing her belly. She dragged her eyelids open and stared blearily up at Alice. Alice smiled down at her and gave her exposed stomach a couple of gentle pats.
"I heard you had a busy afternoon." she said cheerfully, "Betty really put you through your paces huh?"
Jen blushed and tried to roll over. Alice had to help her because her limbs were still shaky. Once she was back on all fours she noticed a bit of a commotion outside her cage. A group of carers were standing in the aisle, whispering to each other and gawking at Mina's cage. As they milled about Jen caught a glimpse of Mina. She was at her food bowl, alternately taking bites and gazing up at her audience with heavy-lidded eyes. She kept waggling her hips like an over-excited dog wagging its tail and making noises that were half bark and half sexual moan. Jen could see the telltale sheen of fresh juices on her thighs as she rubbed them together. She quickly looked back at her own and saw the dried traces from her earlier excitement.
"Oh my god, look at her." one of the carers stage whispered.
"What's wrong with her, is she in heat or something?" said another.
"I heard she was getting off at night watching Jen while she slept." said a third, "Ms. Lockehart has video!"
"She was also getting naked and pretending to be a dog. I overheard Betty and Lissa, from HR, talking about it."
"No way! Really?!"
"Yeah! And she actually chose to do this rather than get fired. Betty was complaining about how difficult it was to finish her enrollment exam because-"
"All right ladies, that's enough gossiping for now!" called a familiar voice over the hubbub, "You all have tasks to complete before your shift ends so hop to it and leave the poor girl alone. You'll have plenty of time to play with her later."
Betty strode into view, shooing the gaggle of women away with her hands. They grumbled but obeyed, each going off to finish their jobs for the evening. Mina gazed after them, clearly disappointed at the loss of her audience, but perked up and gave Betty a hopeful look. Betty just scowled back at her.
"Don't go giving me that look, girl. That was a one-time freebie. You'll have to work extremely hard to earn any more rewards from me."
Mina's head drooped and she tried to look as pitiful as possible. Betty turned away and ignored her.
"How's Jen doing." she asked Alice.
"A little shaky, but otherwise fine. I was just about to feed her."
"Excellent." Betty said, clapping her hands. "I take it you're going to go with Ms. Lockehart's offer to cover Mina's shifts for a while?"
"Yeah. My boyfriend tried to talk me out of it. He's upset that it will take away all of the free time I had to spend with him, but the pay is seriously good so I talked him down. Ms. Lockehart promised she would hire someone new as quickly as she possibly could, but she said it might be even more difficult to find someone now."
She looked pointedly at Mina who seemed to preen at the attention. Alice rolled her eyes and stood up to grab the food container from the cart so she could fill Jen's bowl. As Jen ate the two women talked about Mina's fate.
"Ms. Lockehart is being extremely generous." Betty said. "If she had caught anyone else doing what she did they would have been fired on the spot. I think she has some kind of soft spot for the girl."
"You think?" Alice replied. "I don't know why she would even offer the choice she did, let alone that anyone would take it."
"Jen probably had something to do with it."
"Yeah but Jen's different. She did this because she wanted to help her dog, even if it didn't work out that way. Mina on the other hand seems to be some kind of deviant freak."
"Hey!" Mina nearly shouted. "I'm not a freak!"
"Excuse me." Betty said threateningly, turning to face Mina again. "Did I give you permission to speak? Keep quiet or you'll be gagged again. I might even see if I can adapt one of the muzzles to fit you as well."
Mina whined and crouched down. She was working her jaw back and forth. Jen guessed that the ball gag must have been uncomfortable.
"She'll learn." Betty said to Alice again. "Ms. Lockehart is going to train her alongside Jen. She asked me to get out all the supplies I had prepared for Jen's training that we didn't need. She thinks that Mina will be a difficult student."
"I'll bet." Alice said ruefully.
Jen finished her first bowl and looked up at Alice. Alice filled the bowl again placed the container back onto the cart.
"At least we have one good girl to use as an example." Alice said as she prepared the cereal bowl for when Jen had finished the main course.
"Yes, and she is a very good girl." Betty switched to the type of baby talk people use on dogs and other cute animals. "Who's a good girl?"
Jen blushed, but responded with a quiet bark. This caused Mina to start barking as well, hopping up and down and clearly hoping to get attention. All it did was cause several of the other dogs to bark in response. Betty pulled a rolled up magazine from her pocket and used it to smack Mina on the nose while Alice shushed the others. Once peace had been restored the two women made sure that the girls had their cereal bowls and prepared to leave. Alice packed the food cart while Betty reached into another pocket and pulled out a large padlock. She used it to secure the the latch on Mina's cage.
"Wow," Alice said, "We haven't had to lock a cage in ages, not since that pair of Labradors got out and ate half the food in the storeroom."
"Ms. Lockehart insisted. She has a feeling that Mina might get up to mischief at night if we're not careful."
Mina looked affronted, but had the sense to keep her mouth shut.
At this point the lights began to dim. Alice and Betty began making their way out of the kennel.
"Did Ms. Lockehart explain the changes she wants to make to the patrol schedule?" Betty asked as they walked away.
"Yes, instead of three thorough patrols she wants one quick one every hour, focusing on the kennel. Mina did get us ahead on the kitchen prep so that won't be a problem for several days, and Yuri said he could cover the laundry."
"Good. I'll give you a key to my office. The breakroom can be rather creepy at night and my office has snacks and cable TV so you won't get bored. I'll also get the security feed set up on a monitor so you can keep an eye on things even when you're not patrolling."
The two women left the kennel and the door shut behind them, leaving the dim room in a silence broken only by the random snuffling and shuffling of dogs bedding down for the night. Jen made to crawl for her own bed when she heard a small cough. She turned and and saw Mina leering at her. She was up on her knees, gripping the bars above her head as best she could with her gloved fingers. When she saw she had Jen's attention she spread her legs and cocked her hips forwards while puffing up her small chest. It was clear she was trying to entice her.
"Looks like we're gonna be playmates." she said in a low growl that Jen assumed was meant to be sexual. "I can't wait to finally get my paws on you."
Jen decided that since attention was clearly what this girl wanted, she wasn't going to give it to her. She flopped onto her bed with her back to Mina and settled in for a good nights sleep. Despite her earlier nap she was still quite tired from her session with Betty, more tired than she had been all week. She was just starting to doze off when she heard a rattling sound punctuated by grunts of effort. She twisted so she could look back over her shoulder to see Mina trying to climb up the cage door. The cages were the standard ones you found in kennels. They had three cinderblock walls that were so tall that only the most determined dog would be able to jump high enough get a paw on the top, but still fell several feet short of the high ceiling. The doors were made of close-spaced bars in a grid pattern and above that was standard chain-link fencing. Mina was struggling to get purchase. An unencumbered human could have easily climbed it, but the gloves made it so she could only grip with just the tips of her fingers. The pads on her legs and feet were worse. Since she couldn't straighten her knees she was forced to spread them wide and twist her ankles so she could hook her toes in. It looked a little painful.
Jen watched as Mina inched her way upwards. She was only a couple of feet up when her strength gave out and she fell back with a thump onto her bed. She tried a couple more times but never got any higher. Jen stopped watching and curled up. She fell asleep to the sounds of Mina's frustrated attempts at escaping.
---
Jen woke up a few hours later. It wasn't anywhere near breakfast yet so she wondered what had roused her. As she shifted position she realized that she needed to pee. Normally she went in the side yard before returning for dinner but the schedule had been interrupted by Mina. She rolled into her hands and knees and looked at the cage door. She remembered that Alice was supposed to be patrolling every hour to check on them. Maybe she could somehow get her to take her outside? But, no. No dogs were allowed out of the kennel at night except in an emergency. Needing to pee wasn't an emergency. In fact, there had been preparations made for just this sort of thing. She turned to the back corner where the piddle pad was laid out. Jen had never needed to use it before, but it was there for her if she needed it. Now she needed it.
She crawled over and situated herself on the center of the cloth-like plastic. It suddenly struck her that it was lucky she didn't have to poop. Having to spend the night next to her own solid leavings would not have been pleasant. She wasn't sure about doing so with a puddle of urine either, but it was better than the alternative. She shifted her weight and squatted down. She was used to peeing like this now, it didn't take any effort for the flow to start. The stream hit the pad with a pattering hiss that seemed loud in the quiet dark of the kennel. The pad was made to absorb fluid as quickly as possible and by the time Jen was done relieving herself there was nothing more than a small dark patch in the light blue. She turned to crawl back to her bed and caught movement out of the corner of her eye. It was Mina. She was lying on her own bed, one leg up in the air and a hand pawing fruitlessly at her pussy while staring at Jen. She must have been watching the whole time.
Jen shook herself and lay back down on her bed again, her back to Mina like before. She was used to people seeing her pee in the yard so that wasn't much of a problem. Mina's expression, however, was not the happy smile of the carers and trainers who praised her for a job well done. It was the lusty smile of a pervert. Jen closed her eyes and tried to fall asleep again. She could hear Mina moving around in her cage and shortly after heard the hiss of urine against a pad. It was somehow louder than her own had been, Mina must be forcing it to get her attention again. She ignored the girl and managed to drift off once more.