She heard a shot behind her, and saw the dog at her feet drop lifeless to the dirt; another shot took the dog on her rifle right through the back, and he slumped over her like a hairy boulder. His eyes even with hers, the life draining out of him, he wheezed out a single word in a horrible, inhuman voice:

“Please.”

The dog died, its eyes still open barely four inches from Kira’s own. She stared back at it in terror, her mouth working soundlessly, her hands gripping the trapped rifle like a lifeline. She heard another shot, and suddenly the dogs were barking rather than growling, short, clipped sounds of communication. The pack turned and fled, the biggest pausing only to snarl “bastard” before disappearing into the trees.

Heron stepped into view, her rifle still tight against her shoulder. She nodded at Kira and kicked the dead animal off her chest.

Even when she was free, Kira couldn’t move.

“Did that dog just call me a bastard?” asked Samm.

“We need to get out before they regroup,” said Heron. “Come on.”

Kira finally managed to speak. “What?”

“We need to go now,” said Samm, reaching down with a muddy, bloody hand. “If they get the drop on us, we’re dead.”

Kira took his hand, struggling to her feet. “What on earth is going on?”

“Watchdogs,” said Heron, leading them back out around the wall of rock. “We used them in the war.”

“Hyperintelligent dogs bred for battlefield assistance,” said Samm. He retrieved his rifle and fell into line behind Kira, walking backward to keep his gun aimed at the dog pack’s path of retreat. “They’re bigger and tougher and capable of basic speech. We used them for everything over there. I should have recognized, the moment I heard it’s voice, but it’s been too long.”

“You had talking monster dogs?”

“ParaGen made them,” said Samm. “Apparently they’ve gone feral.”

Kira remembered the brochure she’d seen at the ParaGen office: It had mentioned both a Watchdog and a dragon. She looked to the sky, but nothing swooped down to tear her apart with angry talons.

She’d seen the word elsewhere as well, “Watchdog,” in some of the battlefield reports she’d read in Afa’s library. She shook her head, still numb, stumbling through the dog path. It wasn’t just the word—she remembered now another thing, a scene in her mind, one of her only memories of her father. She had been attacked by a dog, a giant one, and he had stepped in the way to save her. Had that been a Watchdog, or something else?

Worse was the realization that this thing—this inhuman, unnatural beast—had come from the same place she had. She looked more human, but her origins were closer to those Watchdogs than to any human she’d ever known.