Work Text:
A dog is obedient. No, that wasn’t right, was it?
A dog has gnashing teeth, a bottomless huger, and a keen nose, the ability to sense which prey is weakest, endlessly chasing in pursuit. A dog likes to play with its food before consumption.
So then a dog must be feral. No, that isn’t it, either.
A dog, too, will sit and heel, shake hands, perhaps even speak, performing trick after trick to a captive audience, mouth agape. A dog can be far more clever than one could imagine.
On occasion, two dogs may find that their paths have crossed. Surely one barks and snarls, long fangs slashing through stale air. The other turns its nose away, uninterested, as if not to lower itself to that of the life form that has been dragged parallel to it.
And yet, both dogs have been led to their own particular cage, each one feasting on flesh harvested from the same source. A collar jangles around a muscular neck, a coin of branded metal knocking fervently against a cold floor. Twin hungers, hidden beneath bone and skin and fur.
A dog is a dog, and that is simply all they will ever be.