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I left the employment queue, keeping my anger in check. It was bad enough that they weren't going to give me a job at this high-and-mighty office complex; I wasn't going to give them the excuse to have me incarcerated as well. Just as well that it wasn't unlawful not to have a smile on my muzzle, but it was still in my best interest to keep my mug as neutral as possible. I padded back out into the street, my pace steady, my posture unthreatening. As I passed by the food vendor's cart near the corner, the old mastiff hailed me with a smile.

"How'd it go?"

"I guess they didn't like my face."

He nodded sagely, sadly, moving to prepare another coffee, like the one I'd had before the would-be interview. I waved him off, but he kept going. "On the house," he said. "Consider it a free refill."

As when I was in the office building, I kept my anger in check. I wasn't mad at the mastiff; he was one of the good ones, and I knew it. I was pissed off with the system, and I didn't want the old dog's genuine caring to go unappreciated. I think he knew it, as he looked into my eyes with understanding that I didn't often see. I thanked him graciously and moved off toward the park and a bench where I could sit quietly for a little while, at least until some uniformed thug came to suggest, in tones not to be argued with, that I "move along." I always did, of course, but I liked the idea of being able just to be out in the open air for a while, consider my options (which took about five seconds), and let my mind drift and my body relax, my thoughts carefully to myself. The sun was warm, and it was still free, at least so far. A sip of the hot, well-prepared coffee went down well; the memory of it would keep me warm when the night grew cold.

"Excuse me, young fur; may I sit down?"

Breaking my reverie, I scooted over a little. "Of course, Sister."

She thanked me, gathering up the folds of her habit and sitting almost carelessly on the bench. She wore the more traditional garb of the Church, rather than some of the simpler, more modern dresses that nuns were allowed to wear. I wasn't sophisticated enough in the ways of Catholicism to know what denomination she belonged to; for all I knew, it could be the Little Sisters of the Sniveling Poor. There's also no way to tell how long she'd been in the habit (I can never resist that pun), and I couldn't guess her age either. The garb itself tends to add years to any female who wasn't in her early 20's. If I were forced to guess, I'd have put my odds on the later end of the 50's. I fought the ageism of youth, imagining such an age to be swiftly advancing upon decrepitude. Being a Shiba Inu, she was comparatively short, but she was anything but "out of shape." I had the feeling that, if you put her into the right athletic gear, she could wrestle down anything under 75 kilos while breaking only the mildest sweat.

"What brings you out on such a fine morning?" she asked.

"Job interview."

"May I ask what sort of work?"

"Office stuff. Pretty basic -- data entry, that kind of thing."

"How do you think it went?"

The line was good enough for the vendor, so I tried it on her. "I guess they didn't like my face."

She paused, glancing at me. "Seems a perfectly good face to me, unless someone slams a door on it."

I snorted. "It happens a lot."

"Maybe it's the market. Can you do other work?"

"My degree was in accounting, although it hasn't done me a lot of good. I've done handywork before, the odd jobs that want doing from time to time. I'm allowed to work inside a house, if there's someone to look over my shoulder."

The sting in my voice wasn't lost on her. "Have you been out of work long?"

"A while now. What's it to you?"

"I take no pleasure in seeing another half-breed on the street," she said with care in her voice.

"Right," I said. "Fine. Ya got me. Before you ask, Daddy was the fox and Momma was the Husky. They loved each other very much and, one night, they shared a super-duper ultra-special hug, and that was how I got here. That was a long damn time ago, and I'm sick of having to argue about it."

"I'm not looking for a fight," she said, her voice again soft and careful. "I'd like to help."

"Then what's this 'half-breed' crap about?"

"Do you prefer another descriptor?"

"Why does it matter?"

"Because you're an individual, an intelligent being, and you deserve to take advantage of whatever this broken system can offer."

"A meal in one paw and a whip in the other?"

"No," she said. "A meal, yes... but, to use a cliché popular in my religion, no room at the inn." She looked into my eyes, this small but somehow commanding Shiba Inu in a nun's habit, and despite my desire to yank my gaze from her, she held it closely. "The meal-and-whip system was created by the full-bloods to salve their conscience while enslaving others not like them. So use it, young fosky. It will help to get a room for you at a nearby shelter until you can get back on your hindpaws. And more than that, having any form of residence will qualify you to get work at my sanctuary. You said you've done handywork, and you look strong enough that you could work more full-scale construction. We're trying to add a dormitory, to supplement the shelter I mentioned, which is in danger of overcrowding. The state and the diocese provide funds for those they condescendingly separate with their labels. Use it. That's what it's there for."

I looked at her for a moment. "Why are you telling me this?"

"Because I'm exhausted from having to deal with lying bishops and professed religious politicians violating the only law of any religion worth keeping, including mine."

"Which is?"

"God is love. The rest is, as you say, crap." She looked up at me again. "Now, young fosky... how about that meal? We can talk a deal over lunch, and you can learn how to game the system. Capise?"

Despite myself, I smiled. "Are you sure you're a nun?"

She winked, tapping the side of her muzzle. "Show me the Commandment which says 'Thou shalt not be streetwise'."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

In some ways, it was strange to be walking beside a nun yet not being dragged by the twisted ear down to the Reverend Mother's office for further discipline. (For the record, when I mentioned this to her, she offered to oblige me "...but it's a long way to the church, and my ear-twisting grip isn't as strong as it used to be.") It was one time when my half-breed status was actually beneficial: If anyone did spare us a glance, they made the (in this case correct) assumption that I was a charity case in her charge. This gave us a strange cloak of safety. Even those who aren't Catholic are loathe to be outright difficult with a nun. After all, steel rulers are easy to conceal, and they've yet to be classified as deadly weapons. They are, however, good deterrents to rowdy behavior.

At the church, the nun led me to an annex where meals were being served to all who wished to partake. Another advantage to being with a nun: She cut us to the front of the line with no one daring to protest. I wasn't foolish enough to imagine that I could get this treatment on a regular basis, so I thanked those in line for letting us ahead. A few furs smiled and nodded, perhaps remembering their own first times here. With our plates filled, the nun led me to a small room with a table and a few chairs, closing the door behind us.

"Is that allowed?" I teased her.

"There's no lock on the door, and I don't fancy your chances trying to take me down, pup. Now sit down and behave yourself."

"Party pooper."

"Famous for it. Let's start with introductions. I'm Sister Hannah."

"Duane Robbins." I offered a forepaw across the table; she took it with a grip that made me think she'd lied about her ability to twist ears. When she released me, she folded her forepaws for prayer, and I did likewise.

"You needn't join me unless you wish to. It's not a requirement."

"When in Rome..."

"...remember that Vatican City ain't just a suburb."

I tried not to laugh out loud as she said a brief but sincere grace, followed by, "Dig in while it's still reasonably warm."

The food was a good temperature and, perhaps surprisingly, had a good flavor as well. The proverbial "soup kitchen" isn't always known for its culinary excellence, but someone here had made sure that things tasted like food and not merely sustenance. "This is good."

"The cooks here care about what they serve as well as who they serve it to. I tease them about it, asking about their time at Le Cordon Bleu, but they know it's all in fun."

The smile on my muzzle felt more genuine than before. "Do I get to find out how and why you became a nun?"

"Privileged information. Let's see if you earn the privilege. Keep eating and, in between, tell me how you landed where you did."

I did my best to remember my table manners while I dragged out my life story. I glossed over the usual bits of half-breed life -- being bullied in school, until I was able to hold my own in a fight. The authorities called the first part "roughhousing" and let it pass; the second part was due to my being a "disruptive influence" and perhaps a "danger to other students." I kept my head down, kept the violence off the school grounds, yadda yadda yadda. It was cliché enough to be embarrassing, right down to being dismissed from high school, a travesty carefully crafted by others to appear to be yet another example of the inferiority of "mongrels."

Self-teaching and certification, plus a quota system at the university, hard work, and ignoring the jeers and snubs from the genetically elite landed me a Bachelor's in accounting and a good track record on the Dean's List. The next stumbling block was trying to find a place that wanted to take in an intelligent, educated, hard-working half-breed. Since the latter descriptor clearly negated all of the former, it wasn't easy to get a paw in any door.

"I'm a bit torn." Sister Hannah had paused in her eating and was looking at me with a wry grin. "We need more workers here, if we're to get the dormitory built. However, I also know several businesses that are more forward-thinking, even a few that were founded and run by... what term do you prefer? I hear that 'mixed-breed' is becoming more popular, being more inclusive of those who have more than merely two in their genetic makeup. I'm not sure what they're going to call those whose parents crossed the species gap."

"It hasn't bothered the rest of the world; it's just here that it's a problem."

"Ye don't tell me!" she whispered in perfect Irish mock shock. "Saints preserve us; what's the world comin' to?"

I gave up and laughed. "You're way too much fun to be a nun."

"Nuns are allowed to have fun; they just have to be careful what kind."

"Point taken." I indicated my plate. "I've done more talking than eating. It's your turn, if you think I'm worthy of the privilege."

She smiled at me. "I'll take the chance. How much do you know of Catholicism?"

"I'll just say that it's not my cup of tea. Or wine, perhaps."

Nodding, she whispered, "Mine either, some days. Oh, make no mistake, pup, I'm generally glad of being here, doing what I'm doing. There are times when the show seems to be nothing more than fancy-dress jiggery-pokery, professing one thing, doing another."

At that remark, I exaggerated choking on my food, but not by much. "Does that count as blasphemy?"

"It depends on how far you want to take the definition. Technically, simply saying that religion isn't something you revere could be considered 'speaking against it,' which is the essential meaning of the word. I draw the line, respectfully, at taking the Lord's Name in vain. That doesn't mean that I'm disallowed from dropping an F-bomb; that's merely vulgarity, and I avoid it simply because I prefer more eloquence in my swearing." She paused for a sip of her lemonade before declaring, "It catches modern speakers off-guard when I call someone a churl, or a one-trunk-inheriting cocklorel."

"I haven't the faintest idea what that second one means," I chuckled, "but I don't think it's a compliment."

"You know the first?"

"I know 'churlish' as an adjective, so I'll make a guess that it's a noun."

She nodded, a smile curling at her lip. "You know more than just numbers, fosky."

"While I was scrounging to pass the GED, I fell in love with libraries. It always annoys the ruling class when they discover that a mongrel doesn't 'talk good' but 'speaks well'."

"Then yes, Duane. You're worthy. I'll ask your indulgence to keep our conversation to yourself. The essential facts I'll relate are known; the way in which I relate them, not so much."

She folded her forepaws and set them in front of her on the table. "I was raised Catholic, and I was fervent in my belief. That made it easier for me to convince myself that my various social and academic failings were due to my being truly called to become a nun. I wed my Savior, left the world, and took the habit, all the while ignoring the way that females are treated in the Church. We are unpaid labor, convinced that all we do is for the greater glory of God. There is some truth to that, just as there is truth to the statement that blind faith is merely blindness and not faith at all. It's astounding to wake one day and realize a dozen or so years have passed in a haze of ritual, meaning those of the religion and those of the chores and duties of each passing day. What had I to show for it?

"At first, I questioned my faith, became determined that leaving orders and doing without the church was the only solution. The answer to this, we are told, is the retreat. Have you noticed how much of the religious language is militaristic? The Archangel Michael, with his flaming sword, is the leader of God's Armies, and always onward, Christian soldiers -- a term itself that should be oxymoronic. It's all about struggle and battle, the constant fight against evil, the never-ending guard against temptation, wickedness, and the smell of brimstone. More than that, however, is the fight against any disbelief in the church, the rightness of scripture, the infallibility of the Pope. So there came a retreat for Sister Hannah, and I did what I could to swallow the Kool-Aid."

Shaking her head, she said, "Yes, that really is blasphemy, meaning speaking against the church, and I offer my mea cuplas. But you see, Duane, that was the point that I was wrestling with. A question of faith, yes, but faith in what? My first true loss of faith was of faith in myself. Were I to leave the church, I'd be on the street, with few skills, no prospects, and a long fight that I didn't think I could win. Then, I began losing faith in God, because why would He forsake me?" She smiled again. "Yes, I stole that line. Practical lesson: Only plagiarize from the best."

She paused for a moment, and I waited quietly for her to continue. There were a few variations of the story that I had figured were coming, but this one was taking a slightly different tack. At least she'd kept my attention.

"It's always a temptation to spin out a yarn as far as possible, when one has a captive audience. Some temptations, like chocolate, should be yielded to; not so here. The slightly shorter form could be described as a conversion, an epiphany, a revelation, all of that. Going on retreat is supposed to help provide that, and it did, but not in the way that they intended. After three weeks at the retreat, I realized that my personal answers weren't going to come to me all that easily but that I still needed the cloak, or perhaps the veil, of the Church to keep myself together. Feeling very much the hypocrite, I told them what they wanted to hear and return to my daily duties.

"I spent a few years going through the motions, trying to understand what I was really doing with myself, with my life. I had all the cliches of mid-life crisis, without having had much life in the first place. I stuck with it, however, if only because I'm a stubborn cuss."

"Ye don't tell me!" I echoed her and smiled.

"Save your applause for the end," she grinned back at me. "I'll skip to the juicy bits. In a literal sense, I'm a heretic. I don't hold by all of the revealed truths of the Church. That revelation I spoke of was what I told you before. The essential point of 'God is Love' is the only irrefutable point to believe in; the rest is the dogma and teachings that the Church has put forth as 'revealed truth.' The stinker in me started wondering who concealed it, who revealed it, and for what purpose. I mean, look at all the rules and regulations being thrown about, and to what good purpose? The traditionalists of the Church favor Latin, so let's use some: Cui bono?"

"Who benefits?" I nodded. "Simply asking that is heresy, I suspect."

"You'd be right. 'Ignore the man behind the curtain' stuff." She sighed softly. "That was the question, and the answers I came up with might have gotten me chucked out on my ear. Instead of giving up, I turned the question slightly sideways. I don't know enough Latin to conjugate it, so pardon my English: Who could we benefit, meaning provide benefit to? There is no question that the Church, on the whole, has done immense harm in this world. The wars, the tortures, the hypocrisy, all are rampant and in plain sight. The Pope dines with gold and silver plates and utensils, while children starve or save up their allowance money to put into the collection plate. Civilizations have committed wars in the name of religion, this one and others, while the highest of the pecking order of both Church and state not only survive but prosper and profit. It's not a pretty history."

"And yet...?" I questioned in the pause that followed.

"And yet... look at individual stories. The parish priests who listen and help. The nuns who can truly teach, and who do so eagerly, imparting some of their love of learning into their charges. The members of the clergy who bend some rules in order to follow the most central rule of all." She raised an eyebrow at me for my input.

"God is Love."

She nodded sagely. "At a Catholic retreat, the theory is that one leaves behind the distractions of the world so that one may reconnect to one's faith in Catholicism. Having been on three such retreats in my checkered career as a nun, I've cheated: I renewed my faith in God and, in so doing, I've let my actions speak louder than my ritual prayers. I doubt that I'll change the Church itself, but I can use my situation as a means to put into practice all the things we profess to and don't always follow through with. As a wise priest once said -- privately, of course -- sometimes, one must honor one's faith in God by being just a bit of a heretic toward the Church."

"A case of changing the system from within?" I asked.

"I doubt that's possible. More like making sure the system actually does what it can. The Church has always had programs and processes to help those who need it; the trick is to make sure that the help gets where it's supposed to go. No one is surprised when some TV preacher gets caught with his paws in the collection plate. Stories like that are always in the news. Less discussed is how the older religious orders have put away huge amounts of money, in one way or another." She leaned closer to me, tapping the side of her muzzle again. "Ya don't get ta be dis big widdout da backin' for it, ya got me?"

I chuckled quietly, feeling that perhaps I shouldn't draw outside attention to us. "I always thought there was something more behind that whole 'kiss the ring' thing." With a short, soft sigh, I asked, "Okay, Sister Hannah Corleone. What do I do now?"

She shook her head, smiling. "In the world, I was Hannah Machree, which explains why I'd worry about ascending to the place of Reverend Mother."

My forepaws racing to my muzzle to stifle the guffaw that threatened to fly forth, I found my mind recalling the lyrics of the old Irish tear-jerker song, wondering if there were indeed "dear silver" in the headfur beneath the nun's coif. The sister herself, self-admitted stinker that she was, waited for me to compose myself with only her smirking smile to keep me company. Eventually, I managed to get myself back together and address her with a proper raspberry. I had my sire's fox tongue and my dam's healthy Husky attitude toward using it. It got a giggle out of my co-conspirator, and I began to feel that I just might be able to trust her as she'd trusted me.

"So let's say that I'm interested in this Irish mafia you got here," I grinned at her. "What's the rules?"

"First, we get you off the street. You must have somewhere you keep your worldly goods, whatever they may be, but you look to have been living rough for a while."

"Egad, Sherlock!"

A snerk from Her Holiness. "Any reason why you'd be denied shelter somewhere? You're not on the run from the law?"

"Only if they're rousting me from a park bench. No wants, no warrants, no record. If that counts as a miracle, I'm glad to give the credit where it's due."

She rose, and I stood with her. "Let's bus the table, get this back to the kitchen, then we'll take a little visit down the street a ways. I've got someone for you to meet."

I didn't expect that she was taking me to meet a mountain.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Victor Elias Sandoval may well be the largest collection of fur outside of a commercial dryer's lint trap during shedding season. Another mongrel like myself, his body shape favored his dam, who was a black bear; his fur favored his sire, a white Siberian tiger, in a melanistic way -- creamy white striping all across his otherwise mahogany fur. He stood well over two meters tall, seemed just about as wide, and when he stood over you, he had the effect of blotting out the sun. For some years, he performed as a pro wrestler under the moniker "Victor the Rasslin' Bear," a reference to a non-sapient bear exploited for years by an unscrupulous handler. He put himself out to pasture a half-dozen years ago and preferred being called "Elias" ever since.

He grinned as he put a forepaw out for me to shake. He took mine gently enough to assure me that he wasn't going to rip off my arm at the shoulder and firmly enough to let me know it would be unwise to put that assurance to the test. "You come highly recommended," he said, his deep rolling basso making me wonder why the windows weren't shaking gently around us.

"I do?"

A quick glance at Sister Hannah cleared up what should have been obvious to me, and his grin put me at ease. "I figure you need a room, and she needs another strong back for that chain gang of hers."

The Shiba Inu, seemingly a third his size, fetched a sharp slap to his massive forearm.

"Work crew," he corrected himself.

"I see that you two know one another well."

"He's worthy of certain amounts of trust," Sister Hannah observed quietly.

"As the old comic books used to tell us, 'nuff said." I grinned at the pair of them. "I'm entirely in your paws, Elias."

I bid Sister Hannah a grateful farewell, promising to call in on her again after I'd gotten "properly settled in," as she put it. Elias led me up the stairs clearly labeled MALES, which lay opposite other stairs for FEMALES. "We're not prudish here," the tigerbear explained, "but anyone who's been on the streets knows what sorts of abuse happens out there, so the separation helps some of our female boarders."

"It happens to males, too."

Nodding, Elias said, "We watch for that, and we make it clear that we listen. Generally, the first rule is courtesy from each to each; they may not think much of us out there, but in here, we are our best selves to each other. That's why we don't have big, dormitory-style sleeping rooms with a dozen bunks each, because there's just times when we don't feel like being good to anyone, maybe even ourselves."

He led me down a surprisingly large hallway with smaller ones at intervals, and lots of doors, each with a number and a couple of acrylic frames to hold full-sized sheets of paper. Each occupant had made use of them by having (at the least) his name and/or nickname on a sheet; some had made designs, drawings, doodles, wise sayings, jokes, anything that made the door unique. "The room has a number," Elias said. "You don't."

Along the way, as he spoke about other rules and regs of being "a guest of this fine establishment," my benefactor pointed out toilet rooms and the communal showers and sinks at the far end. We turned the last hall to the right, where two doors each to the left and right bore the numbers 21 to 24. Like the other short halls I'd seen, this one ended in a small sitting area and a large multi-paned window that looked out on a city that had grown too large around it. Elias opened the door to number 24 and stood aside to let me have a look.

It was a bedroom space, perhaps three-by-four meters, with a desk and chair at one side, a small lamp, a full-sized bed (bare, at the moment), and a small closet with a pocket door. The ceiling was high, with a fan and attached light fixture hanging from the center; in the corners of the ceiling, four thick glass windows, perhaps half a meter to a side, brought in some natural light.

"You've probably noticed how much the place is boxed in," Elias said, as I looked at the skylights. "It's a renovated warehouse, left over from a time before so much of the area became 'gentrified,' as the real estate johnnies call it. In order to make the most of the space, we've had to make concessions to putting in walls, closets, all of that. It also means that windows are at a premium. These rooms are sparse and closed in enough to resemble prison cells; the ceiling panels are probably the equivalent of 'having to pump in daylight,' but it helps prevent claustrophobia. It's also why we have sitting areas near all the big windows."

"You've thought this out."

"Not me personally, but yeah." He smiled again. "Come with me, and we'll get you squared away with pillows, sheets, etc. I'm not sure what you'll get; we do accept donations, and not all of the females like frou-frou, so you might end up with flowers."

"They could be cartoon characters, for alla me," I chuckled. Pausing, with another glance around the room, I asked, "Could I just... sit in here for a coupla minutes? I'd like to feel it out, connect with it a little. Does that sound weird?"

The tigerbear shook his large head. "Not even a little. Here." He tossed me the key to the room -- my room -- and jutted his chin toward the hall. "Small signs on the walls, so you won't get lost. Come downstairs when you're ready. I can't exactly say 'welcome home,' but I can say 'welcome' and mean it." He smiled a little. "See you soon, Duane."

He pulled the door almost closed, which was good enough for the moment. I sat on the bed, noting that it was new enough still to be comfortable, then leaned against the wall to relax a little. It was a room, with a door, with a closet, with outside light from ceiling windows, with whatever central air would provide for heat and cold, but it was inside, not out in an alley somewhere. I was inside.

Closing my eyes, I focused my thoughts very carefully, breathing slowly, feeling comfortable and relaxed. After several seconds of this, I felt my mind shift into its other mode, and I thought, I'm in.

Well done, said a familiar voice. Are we secure?

Within reason. No suspicion that I can tell.

Good. We'll move forward slowly.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

For all of his huge build, Elias Sandoval was very quiet on his hindpaws. He padded downstairs at a moderate pace, waved a kind hello to the various inhabitants he happened to see, and went directly to his office. Once there, he closed the door softly, breathed in deeply, exhaled slowly.

"He's in."

"Then that's one thing done." The visitor in the chair opposite the desk nodded approval. "We'll have to see if he'll fit in properly."

"He might. He seems to have the right qualifications; it'll take several days, maybe a week, and I'll know his colors."

"We've got time. It's got to be done right."

"You don't have to tell me my job."

"Don't ever make me have to do that. I don't think you'd like it."

Elias continued to breathe as calmly as he could. It wouldn't do to show his displeasure at this stage.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Sister Hannah had some free time in the afternoon, and she took it in the quiet of her solitary room in the convent. On her knees at the modest prie-dieu, she murmured a small prayer by rote, unsure if she felt the sincerity behind it at all. Her sincerity rose considerably when she said softly, "He's in."

"Good."

"Is he the right one?"

"Trust me."

The Shiba Inu smirked softly. "You know what that means in Hollywood, don't you?"

"Since when are we filming a movie?"

"I just worry about the drama of it all."

"I know. Just know that it's started."

"About--" She caught herself, then continued, "doggone time."

"Funny a dog should say! Now, go take a nap."

"I oughta bite your ankles."

"You may get your chance, unless someone thinks it's kinky. Go rest, Hannah. It's started."

"Yes, it is." She crossed herself with a bit more in her heart than the mere gesture and, being obedient (when it suited her), she lay down on the bed to put her hindpaws up for a little while. This battle had been brewing for a long time, and God only knew how it was going to turn out.

Well, she considered as she let her mind drift a little, maybe not just God...

To be...?