The dog slunk through the sewers, his affect matching and channeling their dark and stifling atmosphere as usual. He had never managed to come to terms with his existence here even after spending... however long his life had been so far eking out a pitiful existence from the trash that ended up here seemingly as meaninglessly as he had and what little socialization he could manage to derive from the Rats, and his hope that he would either be able to do so or establish a better life somewhere else had long since been extinguished in its murky, shadowy depths... or at least nearly extinguished... There was always the surface, sparkling and welcoming above him with those human creatures he was inexplicably drawn towards despite their inevitably villainous roles in the Rat's stories... but if even the rare shafts of light that were able to penetrate through the sewers from above hurt his eyes, unfortunately well adjusted to their omnipresent conditions, with a stinging foreignness... that world wasn't for him, surely.
The world of the Rats wasn't fully for him either, with his delusions of something outside of the sewers and the other obvious differences between their species... their generations went by far too quickly for him to form true connections with any of them or to ever truly be a part of this quickly overturning yet strangely constant society, with the rapid overturning of individuals almost proving and strengthening this constancy, this eternality, this inevitability... but he stuck out less and fit in more here than he no doubt would up there after growing up among them. Even if he had grown up far more and far slower than any of them ever would... was he even done? It was so hard to tell when the only models he had developed in such a different way... Suddenly but not surprisingly, he was surrounded by a sea of some of the Rats. They had managed to approach and envelop him, moving far more smoothly and quietly than he could when moving among them despite his best efforts.
He had gathered after many repetitions of this ritual, sometimes multiple in a day, that they weren't even really trying to sneak up on him when they did this, moving as one stealthy entity, one with the collective and the sewers that hosted it, just came that naturally to them. "Dog. Another dog! This way." He could hardly believe what the skillfully synchronized voice of the group was saying; another of his kind, one who was of the light, seeing fit to even temporarily lower themselves into the dark?! The dog... not the only dog down there now, apparently, not that the Rats were ever mistaken about something like this... raced alongside them, his cautious and embarrassed excitement only slightly decreased by the guilt that always came with their expert dodging of his comparatively clumsy pawsteps.
And then it was all replaced with a clashing and confusing mix of horror and... love? love as he saw her, brutally forced to the ground by a mass of those he had for some reason saw fit to think of as almost brethren until this moment, her sleek diluted sunlight fur stained by the wretched filth of the sewers and... was that a cut marring her perfect lanky muzzle?! Those vermin had dared to do that to her?! He became aware of her suddenly being a lot closer to him, dazzlingly, tantalizingly close... before he realized that this was because he had charged towards her and her brutish attackers and started throwing them off of her, taking advantage of the strength difference between him and them that he had hardly been aware of until now. The dog calmed down slightly as this new dog shakily stood up, completely dwarfing him with her impressive height; he was barely half the size of her long, elegant legs... "Thank you, I-I'm sorry, I didn't mean to cause any trouble, I-I'll leave and stop coming down here, I didn't know I was disturbing anyone..." Before he could begin to formulate a response, the Rats, now regrouped and seemingly, frustratedly no worse for the wear he had put them through, pressed in closer to them.
"Housepet! Spoiled! Human stench! Leave." She looked around at them confusedly with her mesmerizing brown eyes, catching his breath in his throat as her gaze landed on him for a moment before moving in the direction of the entrance she had presumably used to get in here. "...I'm not a housepet... anymore, I'll leave, though... sorry." As she gracefully turned around despite the mass of the Rats and the lack of light down here, the dog felt himself moving to her side. "I'll come with you!" More anxiety than he had ever experienced... well, until he had seen her in danger... shot through him as she looked at him confusedly and was just as quickly replaced with euphoria as her confusion was replaced by warmth, her gaze only remaining locked with his for a moment longer before she looked away from him and at the ground. "Sure." For the first time in his life, he practically floated through the sewers, with her by his side... until the reality that his next first time would be going onto the surface rather than with her rudely crashed through his awareness.
The dog watched in awe and dreading anticipation as she seemingly effortlessly climbed up the ladder that led to one of the sewer's uncovered manholes, the encouragement and belief in him in her eyes motivating him to attempt to copy this feat... until he embarrassingly fell back to the ground after barely making it up one rung. He quickly stood up, trying to play this off by shaking himself off, and froze in sheer adoring shock as he suddenly felt her, back down in the sewers with him and lifting him by the scruff with seriously impressive strength... although it was entirely possible that the diet that worked so well for the Rats had left him a scrappy, frail weakling that she would never care about... why would she, even without that? The light of the surface temporarily blinded him, but he was able to recover from this faster than he had thought he would due to his recent experience of being blinded by this new dog's beauty. The dog recovered his footing as she unfortunately placed him down after a pause, not caring much about this new and unfamiliar world of the surface in comparison to her.
"...So... you said you were a housepet..." The alarm in her eyes and his sudden alarmed remembrance of basic social decorum motivated him to come up with a less loaded question than the one he had been about to ask. "...So they gave you a name? Can I ask what it is?" Relieved, much to his relief, she sat down. "Duchess. And you?" He copied this gesture, trying to figure out how to answer her question while the beauty of her name reverberated through him and made this task difficult. "...I don't have one, really, the Rats... they just call me Dog, since I am one... not that it's easy to tell when I've been living with them in the sewers for so long..." Sympathetically, she moved closer to him, her fur brushing up against his slightly and absolutely wowing him. "I'm sorry, you deserve a name. I'll call you Dog unless you ever come up with one for yourself, okay? It'll be good for your self image if you do."
The idea of giving himself a name had never occurred to him, not when the Rats didn't and didn't believe in individuals having their own separate identities and existences distinct from the group like that... but he had always been something of an outsider anyway, so maybe taking her advice wouldn't make that worse. Or maybe, if he managed to keep this good thing with her going despite his lack of experience with other dogs... which were so much more intriguing than humans had ever been to him now, or at least this one was... he wouldn't have to worry about fitting in with the Rats. He could just fit in with her... The sound of something hitting a metal pipe in the distance was fairly innocuous to him until it caused Duchess to jolt upwards fearfully. "I-I have to go, right now..." Panic flared within him as she raced towards what seemed to be the alley exit and was partially replaced by relief as she paused there at his admittedly frantic voice calling out to her. "Can I see you again? Here, same time tomorrow?"
And hopefully after tomorrow as well... She dipped her head to him with extremely gratifying and relieving happiness. "Sure. I'll see you tomorrow, Dog." With that, she was gone. The dog hung back for a little while, basking in her lingering scent and memory and resisting the urge to follow her, before regretfully starting to head back down into the sewers so that this urge that was probably stupid and unlikely to end well wouldn't overcome him. His journey down the ladder was much longer than the one up it and less dramatic despite the likely threat to his life if he fell down again; not even mortal peril was as exhilarating as her... but he eventually arrived at the floor of the sewers unharmed, thinking only of her, Duchess, to the complete exclusion of his previous hunt for food that had been interrupted by the announcement of her arrival and the traitorous Rats that shared this space with him.