"Why, I must admit you have given me a most surprise."

"U-huh, a jolly big surprise Uncle Trustee!"

"Well what do you know? Meeting you in a place like this."

"Meeting me in such a place, meeting you in such a place."

"Now, now, how are you doing now?"

"Oh, life is going ways Uncle Trustee. Do you know of the other's though?"

"The others… I only know of Colette who lives close by- everyone else has taken off on their own adventures." The wrinkled dog chucked at the wonder of life.

"Where about is home Uncle Trustee, I'm very much hoping to visit when I can get away-"

"Ge-get-Get away? Now young Annette; sneaking from the master's…turning stray? You shouldn't possibly think of chasing those sorts of tails. I, I, I couldn't think of why-"

"Uncle Trustee! You need to tell me quick before they pull you away."

"They won't be doing any of that bossing to me, and you should stop being so demanding young lady. Unrumpled that frown and stop marring your youth, you've picked up some very bad habits on your time abound. What type of company are you keeping these days, my Annette?"

"Oh Uncle Trustee, I've been in very weak hands and kept very lost company. I just…want…to see everyone…once more…"

And now I was crying, thick oily tears rolled down and as my great chest expanded to my sobs I felt the bandages tighten like evil snakes.

"Not that's not right, dogs of good homes go to good masters, sure and sure nothing too terribly bad has happened to you yet-"

"That's the thing Uncle Trustee! Jim Dear and Darling, they didn't make sure or check up on me, they just passed me off to some women! What if the others are the same? What if they need help and they can't, or, are lonely like I was or, lost or- oh, something terrible could have happen Uncle Trustee!"

"Slow down, steady, steady. What are you talking about? You're in lovely care here, why, I grew up here as a pup and made plenty of friends- you should be fine Annette, so pull your chin up!"

"But that's the thing Uncle Trustee, I'm isolated and alone and, and…I'm confused!" I didn't even bother talking through my hysteria after that and Trustee didn't try to bark over my hurricane noise.

The Bloodhound sat silently, giving me company for some time, but eventually as the call of a human rang out, he bobbed in a silent farewell and left. I stayed behind the cold bars and in the tiny cage.

Why was he walking around with no human or lead? Why was he so sure her home has not been as bad as she said? Why had be never asked about her injuries? –so pull your chin up!-

After many more days of the cage, I decided that, indeed, while my life had been in shades of grey, at least I had not ventured into the black. The vision of Grady being beaten till his blood sprayed flashed passed and images of dogs of the pound I had only been brave enough to side glanced at reappeared. With their hollows and scars; their greed and their hate.

At least there had been a strange sort of love for me at the old women's, at least in the pound there has been a growing passion of family, at least here in the kennels there was juicy cuts of hard hide and a neat kennel. A least there was a person to take me to the park, no matter how mechanical, and at least there was a vet to heal me.

When I came out of the vet cage and back to the kennels, I had changed from a pup to a dog.

I was a dog now, a bone-afied bitch.

An adult hound.

A canine of the government.

Now my cinnamon roll smelling trainer focuses less on tricks and more on my knowledge. I must know things in preparation for what I am meant to do. It's with excitement and barely concealed impatience that I follow my trainer these days. We don't just run in the park, we divert onto sidewalks and weave our way through pedestrians. I am going places no dogs go, I can smell it.

I learn how to board dinging, donging carriages and pull myself up onto trams and trains. I must get used to the horrible tip and turn of a ferry in rough weather and to farmyards and crowded markets and busy school rooms and the sound of gun fire and the cries of men in the hospital beds and the crackle of fire and…and it gets overwhelming sometimes, for the life of me, sometimes all I want to do is run far, far away.

But no, I am grown up. I am strong and resolute. –so pull you chin up!-

My trainer takes it slow with me. She reteaches me with patience if I jump in fright of the new things and guides me carefully through the thundering thunder of human creations.

I must know many things in many ways and I must know how to conduct myself everywhere.

I am learning, I am growing, I really am. That professional alter ego snaps her back straight when the choke chain collar and leather lead come for me, to bite around my neck.

Except, when we go on our walks, my trainer has noticed that police dogs make me seize up. This is something that I need to know as well, in her opinion.

I'm fine with dogs, I'm even fine with house dog weak German Shepard's, it's the Shepard's with the police department smell, it's the ones who are trained assassins…but it's also the human at their sides, the leather officer whose fist once came down and down and down.

Thump, thump, crunch.

It's more the leather officer than the Shepard, really. But they don't understand it that way. And you can't make humans understand, I find, you just can't.

It is something I just want to ignore, but my cinnamon roll trainer makes me confront it.

In one of the kennel's square, chain linked fenced so there's no escape, fields.

She walks me in, the damn traitor, her hips swishing sweetly like always. I can smell dogs all around, so I do not realise until I see. I realise, I see it, I see with horror, the clink of gate locking behind me as my dramatic realisation music sounds.

There, straightening up when they notice my trainer's presence is a huge, hungry, savage, blood shedding, bone tearing beast.

The dog at the beast's side wags his tail in greeting.

My legs wobble, no; they faint, giving out and leaving me to drop to the floor, trying to sink in amongst the brutally short grass.

Did they think I would get used to the terror? Wage an internal battle within myself and come out victorious and clean of fear? Is this meant to rehabilitating me?!

I'm breathing fast and I'm breathing heavy now. I pay no attention to what's going on in the real work, all I can notice is -thump, thump, crunch, - blood, blood, pain-

I come back with a squirrelling frenzy; I kick myself over onto my back, trying to tell the lady to 'please stop dragging me closer!'

The police dog is watching this all bright eyed, his pink tongue lolling out of his mouth, stupidly fixated on when the next treat is going to appear in the death bringer's hand. My cinnamon roll trainer stops dragging me when she realises that I'm chocking, losing oxygen here, everything is starting to go blurry.

They stand and hum, stretching their heads like rabbits, not having expected such a reaction. I take the time to breathe, to just consent rate on my soft furry paws and breathe. They have given up on moving me to them; instead, they are moving them to me. I realise in mounting waves of shock.

Legs! Legs! Come in legs! I hitch myself upright like a newborn calf, teetering and darting around behind my trainer. I try to growl them away, try to look intimidating. Intimidating? Can I even do intimidating? Of course I can, father's daughter, right? Right?

But Father is just a grey slur in my mind, what did he do when wanting to be intimidating? I can't remember!

They are growing tired now, impatient and irritated with the foolish animal. My trainer more so, I can smell, because she is a she, she is woman; her job wobbles on the edge always in the human's male society, she allows herself no mistakes.

I watch as they gabble at each other like geese and growl at me like angry, mothering magpies. Drastic measures are going to be taken; I can see it in the lines of their naked faces. The pink fat wobbles as they unclip leads and exit the grassed enclose, now watching like they're at the moving pictures, waiting for the show to start from their protected side of the chain link fence.

A weigh has just been lifted, I rise, amazed that a thing as simple as a fence between me and the death bringer can make such a difference. I feel safe, I feel myself working and clunking back into motion again. Rejoice! Rejoice! And there was much rejoicing in the ways of sitting up and panting happily at the cloud filled sky. Smell the daisies on the wind! Smell the sweat of playing children! Smell the presence of what seems a million hounds, all wrapped and hidden between the high concrete walls.

I look over to the police dog, who is watching me with her head cocked to the side in an 'are you alright?' 'do you need me to get you something?' ways. I let out a sigh and lick my nose, dropping my head to let him know that I am fine, I am more than fine. I have escaped the death bringer, I am safe! Rejoice!

He starts to come over slowly, dropping to his belly with a few meters to spare, in the universal dog gesture of 'I come in peace'. I see this and realise that the last few steps are mine to cross, heaving up with the sleepiness that adrenaline withdrawal gives a dog, I pad over to him.

"It's alright, it isn't you I'm afraid of." I let my head swirl around aggressively to the death bringer. "It's the leather man."

"The trainer?"

"I barking hate those types of humans…if he comes back near me I'll chew his goddamn face in half."

I listen to myself.

"Or have an embarrassing panic attack again." I admit under my breathe rolling my eyes and turning back to him. He looks familiar and I try to place his face.

"Panic attacks are serious," he says, suddenly sober and mature. "Scariest thing a dog can endure."

I tilt my silky head. What a sagely dog…must ponder the meaning of life frequently in his cage. He looks up and for a moment and I am hit with old memories, but the name slips off my tongue every time I try to weld it.

"Do I know you?" I finally ask.

"You should," he sounds surprise that I don't. "You're Annette, right?"

I nodded my head frantically, "Uhuh! You remember me?" He knows my name! Someone knows my name!

"Yeah," he said gruffly, shifting and rearranging his front legs. "I'm Oscar."

Suddenly, it connects; the wholesome black pup who kept to himself has grown so much, grown so strong! Grown so…grown so… I think of the bandages which nearly covered every inch of Grady and of the stitches who revealed themselves when he had attacked.

Oscar yawns and I see teeth... I realise what they have done, I realise their deeds.

"What happened between you and Grady?" I ask in a whisper, curiosity leaking out.

He stiffens at my words, perplexed by my quiet voice and then revolted when he realised what I had just asked him.

"Nothing you need to worry about," and walks away with a new toughness I had never seen between his shoulders.

He casts shadows across the afternoon landscape and I wish so deeply that I could be part of a pack again, that I could have an Alpha to look after me and litter mates to tumble with.

I wish so, so deeply that I threaten to fall apart at the seems. The strong dog act is falling, its shattering, I can't deal, I want out, I want home.

-so pull you chin up!-

But I'm still so terribly, terribly lonely.