CC Round Two Part One

Clouds gathered overhead. A storm was approaching; any dog with half a brain would be able to tell that. But as he stood there, alone as any dog had ever been, Marx did not feel a sense of foreboding because of the weather. Rather, he felt thankful for the cover in the sky, as though the clouds were shielding him from judging eyes.

He began to walk through the field around him, which looked like nothing but an empty sea of gray grass, with the sky gray and ominous above. The further he walked, the less safe and peaceful he began to feel. The winds shrieked like angry, howling dogs, and the clouds seemed to form the shapes of vengeful faces.

There seemed to be no purpose to this walk, save perhaps time to think. Tearing his eyes away from the clouds, Marx indeed began to think. So much had happened yesterday. He had won his first round. And he had killed his first opponent. Was there a way for it to have happened differently? He knew not whether he should hope so. Guilt was gnawing at his being, as well as a paralyzing fear that he had stepped onto the wrong path.

What would Father think?

That was the most pressing question in Marx's mind. His father had set a code of rather strict examples and guidelines for Marx to live by. Violating even one of them seemed a sin, but killing someone who was unable to fight back broke so many rules. And even if it broke none of them, the killing still reminded Marx far too much of his father's own death.

The bright glare of lightning interrupted Marx's thoughts. Instead of thunder, however, a howl filled the air: his father's death howl. As the dazzling flash passed, Marx saw something appear on the plain before him. A dog was sitting there, its black back turned as its ruff of white neck fur blew in the wind. Marx knew it at once to be his father. He ran toward him, relief and happiness and fear of disapproval all spilling out in a tumbling, incomprehensible tangle of words.

"Father! Oh, Father! I've wanted to see you for so long! I'm so sorry… I've tried to be everything you taught me to be but it's just so hard, when you were so kind and compassionate to everyone but no one respects me like they did you, so I have to fight for everything in these alleys, and with Orthros I was just… It was instinct, Father, you have to believe I never meant anyone any harm! I had to fight to feed Piba and Trin, I had – Father?"

Marx had reached his father's side, but the older dog gave no impression of hearing his son's words. Marx's blood froze and his heart dropped like a rock into his guts. "Father?"

Slowly, Marx's father turned, and as he did Marx began to recoil. The old dog, Sergei, looked very much like he had looked when he died: his throat ripped open, with blood falling from the wound and painting the gray grass red. His eyes, however, rather than being glazed but otherwise normal, were nothing but slits of gold. Disapproval was obvious in every centimeter on Sergei's face, from his narrow gaze to his curled lip. Slowly he opened his mouth, sending globs of crimson spit dripping out onto the ground. Not a speck of blood stained the white on his fur, even at his torn throat. With every drop that fell, Marx's own paws began to grow redder and his mouth began to taste of Orthros's lifeblood.

From Sergei's open mouth came one word. It was only one word, in the same voice with which he had spoken of violence and of sin, of immorality and of evil. It was the word that Marx could never, ever bear to be called.

"Murderer," was what his father called him.

Another howl rent the wind and this time it was Marx's own.