Apollo has a minion!

Hank the Shank

I remember when the world was brighter, with green grass and the warm sun. I remember the bounty of fragrances that wafted through the air. I remember when kids would run in the streets, carefree as pups. I remember when I dug up a hole in the backyard for a toy I destuffed and my family thought it was “sweet” that I gave him a proper burial.

I was once a dog.

I forgot how long ago, but people did something to the world to make it gray. There were sirens, explosions, screaming, and… A lot of bad things. The sun went away for months, and everything turned black. The world smelled burnt, the world smelled sick. My family grew sick as well. The youngest, who was always wheezing, she went first. I dug a hole with my people-brother and buried her in the backyard. They talked about planting some flowers, but my people realized it would just die. A lot of things died in those days. I think my human family died too. I don’t know, because they left me. They left me to die. In a way, I did die.

I was once a dog, but now I am a loner.

My first day on the streets was terrifying. I hadn’t eaten in days, and all I could find was the remains of another animal, a “horse” I think it was. It was huge, and near a building that had big, black walls up, I guess to keep things out. The horse had been dead for some time, and already partially eaten, it tasted rotten. I thought I would never taste anything so bad again, but I was wrong.

I was once a dog, but now I am a traveler.

A long time passed while I lived on the streets, alone. I don’t know how long, I just know that it was a long time to be alone. I found other dogs in packs, but they were vicious and wanted nothing to do with a pet dog. I tried to tell them my humans left me, but they wouldn’t let me join because of my collar. I tried to remove it one night, but nearly hung myself on a fence post. I finally broke my collar one day, using a sharp piece of metal. I cut myself, too, but it was worth it I think. I traveled for a time longer before I finally found a pack that would accept me. Now we roam the woods, hunting smaller animals and eating them. I never thought a squirrel would taste so amazing. I never thought I would taste anything better than small game.

I was once a dog, but now I am a hunter.

We ran out of small animals in the woods, and we moved on. We walked for days, slowly going insane from hunger. The runt in our pack injured himself, and we spent days trying to heal him. We licked his wounds, we brought him what little things we could find, but eventually he passed. I wanted to bury him, but the others had something else in mind. I thought I would never taste anything as sweet as a squirrel, but when you’re hungry, even your brother tastes amazing.

I was once a dog, but now I am a wild animal.

Our pack grew smaller. We lost two more before the new moon. The rainbow liquid isn’t water. The green blood kills. People, they kill, too. When they see us they try not to scream, but try and beat us with their sticks. We run, it’s smarter than fighting, because humans can easily kill us. We could kill them, too, if we only had the numbers. We traveled for longer, farther than I ever imagined the world could go. We found the numbers, other packs who had been reduced to their strongest members. By now we had our own names, we had lost the ones given to us. The humans were no longer our friends, they were our prey. I never knew how sweet human flesh tastes until we took down our first kill.

I was once a dog, but now I am a killer.