He was there, really there —standing on his four feet and carrying the same demeanor that demanded respect. His form created a long shadow on the ground. Light reflected stupendously over his brown-black coat, even though it should have been covered in dirt.

But how could it be? I was there when he was buried, carried over a long warm blanket and lowered into the hole, three feet under the ground; his body was sprinkled with salt and properly covered. He hadn’t been breathing. Although Rusty was the one to see him lying there on the road in a pool of red-cold blood, it was I who had reached out to him when others had stood at the side in shock. I had listened for his heartbeat, for his breath. He had been still as a stone, silent as the trees. He was gone; he had been.

Still, I barked, happily, believing in the impossible, my tail swinging without my order. It was a call of confusion, of thoughtlessness. Luckily for me, Cob wasn’t looking at me as I had assumed; if it was Cob that is. He was actually standing over someone else, another dog. They were playing, cuddling.

I barked again. This time there was much aggressive wonder in my tone than confusion and disbelief. But he ignored me like he didn’t know me. How could that be? I asked myself again and found no solace within my mind. So I ran for him: calling and hoping to get his attention.

It was only when I had run far too close and within his reach that I heard the yelps. They were cries for help, of pain and helplessness. It had been too late by then. The howl had already grown soft, very much so. They were the last breaths of the dog Cob was strangling. As for why he was killing it? I had no idea. All I knew was that a dog was dying and Cob was doing it.

Cob did it. Dimple had told us, laid to us as plainly as he could have. That it was Cob, our friend, our leader, our dear Cob who had given his best friend and mate, the worst injuries and wounds of his life. What would Ginger say if I told her what I was seeing?

I could smell the stench of rot and death wafting from him. It was overpowering, gut-wrenching even. My stomach churned and I almost barfed out my breakfast. I did sneeze, however, which put tears in my eyes. I wanted the normal days back. This was as far from normal as it could get.

Then he saw me.

The dog had gone stiff under him. He had gone silent a while ago, but now he was truly, in the most proper sense of the word, silent. He was dead.

Cob raised his head. He didn’t let go of the cadaver that he was holding from the neck and comfortably managed to lift him up from the ground without any struggle. It was a strength not fitting for him, for any street dog. The blood that dripped from the body appeared like drops of golden fire, ignited by the setting sun. He looked beautiful in a dangerously predatory way, standing with the red sky and setting sun to his back. He growled. His lips rose up to show his fangs. He was unfamiliar to me. There was no sense in his tone, only hunger, and irrational anger.

It’s me, Cob? Don’t you remember me? I barked to him, but the only thing it did was to make him growl louder. He scared me.

Cob did it. Dimple’s words echoed in my mind again.

My tail had stopped spinning and was standing straight up. My ears were similarly up and attentive. I was tense with anxiety —my muscles pulsating with warm blood. Every fiber of my being was ready to bail at his smallest action. I didn’t care if it was Cob or not. I knew one thing: he was dangerous.

His Jaw opened, the fangs flared and the body dropped. I bailed. He rushed after me. He growled louder, chasing me. He was close, far too close for my comfort. The sight of his floundering prey was still etched in my mind. I did not want to end up like that.

It should have been impossible for him to even walk, much less run. The accident he died of had not only shattered three of his ribs, but also broken his hind legs and neck. The broken ribs had ruptured his skin and also punctured his lungs. It had been a quick painless death. But he showed no sign of such damage. His chest was patched, legs mended and neck straight. No one would think he had been dead just a night ago.

I didn’t even manage to make it to the edge of the park before he caught me. He was bigger, stronger, and faster. I had never managed to outrun him before, this time was no different.

He lunged for me roaring angrily. His claw swiped my back, gorging flesh and drawing blood. I yelped as the pain shot through my body. His strike was heavy. It made me stumble and falter to the ground. He went for my spine. His fangs dug into my back, just slightly off. They grated against my ribs and I whelped loudly. I panicked and tried to run again, but he got me to the ground. Dirt rose around us. I rolled to my back and showed him my belly, a sign of submission as he had taught me. He didn’t care and came forward to bite open my stomach, to hurt me. One of my kicks connected with his nose, so he didn’t manage to take flesh. But he drew blood. And it hurt. His jaw open and lips trembling, he came for my throat next.

His muzzle was covered in a red sludge, his saliva red. He frightened me. I had never seen him look like that; so scary. There was nothing in him that reminded me of Cob. He looked like a beast. He acted like a beast. He was a beast —a rabid, unrelenting force that wanted me dead, just like the dog on the other side of the park.

I was wincing, yelping in pain. He got on me. He was much heavier and bulkier than I remembered. His whole body was throbbing with swollen veins. His eyes were scarlet.

When his jaw closed it wasn’t my neck that he had caught but my paw. His fangs easily pierced through the flesh and bone. He centered himself and started shaking his head to tear my leg apart. There was no recognition in his eyes. I don’t think he could even see me for who I was. He wanted blood. I howled, loudly, kicking at his chest all the while trying to roll on my back so I could get up. I was cycling with my hind legs, scratching his belly. Then my paw dislocated. The pain woke something primal in me. I fought back. I managed to get a solid grip on the side of his neck. His flesh tasted foul. So close to him, the smell of death and rot was even stronger.

He thrashed and tried to bite me still, even though I was latched onto him. He felt no pain. He clawed when he couldn’t bite, tearing my chest open. Blood flowed freely from the wound. Then I felt a sharp pain from my neck and the world started spinning. I felt cold. He had managed to get a grip. A few minutes and I would be dead, too.

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I don’t know what happened next, but I heard a bark and his grip around my neck relaxed. Cob fell away from me and I lay lifelessly on the ground. My eyes were closing, conscious leaving. There were sounds of angry barking and fighting, and then there was the all too familiar sound of a homeowner’s thing speeding up on the road. There was a crash, an ear-piercing screech. There was an angry, guttural growl, a howl, and a mournful whine. Then there was nothing.

I lost consciousness.

I floated in darkness for a long while before waking up in a haze. Everything was dreamy around me. I was floating.

In the darkness, there had been nothing, but the haze shifted and moved like a living being. In it I could hear voices and sounds, though they were all echoes of whispers too soft to make out. It wasn’t long before I saw a shape growing dark at a distance. The form turned darker and more defined the closer it got. Then the fog parted and Ginger appeared from it, hurrying to me.

I called her but she didn’t hear me. She stopped at my feet and nuzzled my… my face. I was lying on the ground in a pool of dark-red blood, motionlessly… lifelessly. It was a familiar sight, and her face showed familiar emotions. She licked the face that belonged to me. It was shredded up bad and bleeding. She was sad. She whimpered, asked me to wake up. And I tried. I tried to wake up, but I couldn’t. It was a nightmare. I howled, but she didn’t hear me. I wanted to rub her face and lick her belly; I wanted to tell her I was alert, but I couldn’t.

Then there were rasping guttural growls and barking, and she looked scared of them. There were echoes. Then another figure grew dark in the haze and turned solid around me. It was Rusty. He also looked at me in hurt, with pain in his eyes. He was hurt, too. His tail had been chomped off his back and he was limping, though mildly. He pushed Ginger and they ran away when a familiar voice barked at them from the haze. Dimple was also alive and up. It was good news.

There was an explosion nearby. The haze shivered and rippled like the surface of a puddle. I sensed the tremors travel up my feet. My vision trembled along with it. Then there were barks: angry, pitiful, worried, howls, and yelps. I heard paws, at least four sets running toward me. They were in a hurry. Dark shapes grew in the haze in the direction they were coming from. A little while later the shapes pierced through the haze transforming into stray dogs. They were from the industrial area. One of them I even knew by name. Bread, he was called, because he had grown up feeding on bread.

They were after Rusty and Ginger. It made me angry. I knew cobs death had brought change, but this? I tried to stand up. I couldn’t. I had no form, no strength. My body was lying in a pool of my blood, right under my astral feet.

The dogs passed by without looking at me. But I was wrong about them. They weren’t after Rusty and the others. They were also running, running away from the blackness, from the cloud of darkness that smelled vile and dangerous, from the madness that belonged to the dead. It was loud and angry, alive, and menacing, and it ate the haze around me.

That scared me even more. A little while later I was engulfed completely. It tried to convert me. It promised me power and strength, and happiness, and pack, and revenge and chaos and eternity. I fought the darkness, but it was everywhere. I had nowhere to go, nowhere to hide. Cob though strong, at least had a physical form. It marveled at my tenacity at first then got angry at my unwillingness to become a part of its design. I was ground down to dust inside the storm of malicious madness.

But just as I thought I wouldn’t survive, I heard a familiar ringing somewhere. I focused on it. In the screaming pandemonium, it was the only other sound. I stopped fighting against the flow and actively started searching for the anomaly. The drum beat louder the harder I searched. And when its rhythm became absolute, a constant hymn, I saw light. It was but a flicker in the darkness, yet it was there. A warm fulfilling light, a way out, to life again. When I was close enough I finally noticed. It wasn’t fire, but my body and the drumming was the sound of my heartbeat. My body wasn’t dead yet, but it was dying.

The light was coming from my body, from inside me. And though my heart was still beating, it was but a small ripple in an aggressive leaking flow of life. I was weak. Voraciously, I fought the bind of darkness and dived toward my all too familiar form. My body accepted me graciously. It vigorously absorbed me. I woke up gasping on a crying breath of air, even before I opened my eyes. My lungs burned when the air circulated through them. My heart lurched in pain. My throat was all clogged up like I hadn’t breathed in a very long time. The numbness only helped me in the starting few moments, after which the warmness of my blood woke my nerves and I was swimming in pain.

It hurt so much that I couldn’t even make a sound. I was cold.

I tried standing up when the pain settled, but it proved to be an impossible feat. At last, my legs moved and I deflated to the ground in relief. Nothing was broken except my paw, which was swollen and motionless. However, I had bled tremendously. The result of which was my swimming vision, my splitting headache, and my hunger. I was famished.

Everything was blurred to my eyes. How was I to find anything to eat? Then I smelt it. Whatever it was it instantly made my mouth water. The scent was a hundred times more powerful in comparison to the treats and the roti’s. My nostrils flared. I took a deep inhale, filling my body with the scent, and felt joyful. The scent was empowering.

My eyes opened wide. I frantically tried to get up midst the pains and the hurts to find that something that was making me delirious. I had to crawl. Its source wasn’t far thankfully, but it was hidden deep inside something soft and bitter and altogether awful. I had to really get into the wet squelching thing, scrape it with my one good paw and tear through it to get to the source of the scent.

It wasn’t what I was expecting. It was a small thing, the size of my nail, and equally hard. I ate it, engulfed it really because there was nothing to eat. I felt it travel down my throat. It was warm. Not hurting warm like fire, but energetic warm, like blood, but with some sweetness to it. It reminded me of the warmth of Ginger's embrace, of the comfort I felt from Kanti's fingers. It was like that.

My body exploded with energy the moment it reached my stomach. The warmth was exploding. My eyes opened, my vision returning with a rush of joy. The pains all disappeared. The world stopped rocking. I found my feet again. Then I saw what I had been digging into and barfed.

My stomach turned on itself. The gastric juices burned my throat as they came up.

I stumbled back, trembling. I had been eating Cob. He was squished and splattered all over the road. The Truck, I thought and fell on the grass. Remorse and anger rose inside me, but then a pain assaulted my stomach, a burning searing pain much stronger than anything I had gone through before it. It was too strong. I couldn’t breathe, or howl. My limbs stiffened, my jaw locked, my ears rang like a hum-an had hit me square in the head, and I went into shock. I thought I was going to die. Then my vision cut-off and I involuntarily lost consciousness.