Always in the corners of bombed buildings, or splayed facedown in the mud of irrigation ditches. Flies crawling in and out of their noses and mouths and eyes. One mouse here. One mouse there. And stamping them out never filled you with even the smallest sense of victory.

The sun moved across the sky and Tool dreamed of mice running hither and thither.

I am dying.

When Tool was young, his trainers had told him that if he and his pack fought well and honorably, they would ride in the war chariot of the sun. Tool would die and he would go to fields of meat and honey, and he would find his pack and they would hunt tigers with their bare hands.

They would hunt.

Soon.

He remembered the electric prods the trainers used. Showering sparks as they struck his nose. Looming over him, making him cower as they struck him, all of his brothers and sisters pissing and scrambling over one another to get away from them.

Trainers. Hard men and women with their discipline rods. The best of the best, straight from the boot camps of GenSec Military Solutions, Ltd. GenSec knew how to build obedience. Lessons of raw meat and cold electricity. Showering sparks.

BAD dog!

Tool remembered quivering and begging to do as he was told. Begging to fight and kill. To attack when told.

To obey.

And then, their general came. The kind and honorable man who rescued them from GenSec. The general who led their pack out of Hell. They climbed out of Hell together, and stood under the war chariot of the sun and they were born anew. In desperate thanks, they gave their loyalty to General Caroa, forever after.

Rescued from Hell, Tool was meant to serve a lifetime, or however long he lasted. He would fight, but he would also know the pleasure and safety of belonging to something greater than himself. He belonged to army and pack.

Good dog.

The sun was sinking.

Tool noticed a boy squatting beside him like a vulture, observing him with carrion interest.

Tool had seen many of his packmates picked over by vultures. Torn at by lean dogs, ripped at by ravens. They had sailed for far shores, and they had died. When they fought the Tiger Guard in India, the vultures had been circling in the hazy blue skies before the army even waded ashore, anticipating the killing. Knowing that the open swamp waters at the Hooghly River mouth always provided feed. But that hadn’t stopped General Caroa.

Tool and his packmates had charged forth at the general’s bidding, and they had slaughtered and died.

And now, here, a vulture crouched, waiting.

No, not a vulture… A boy.

The mouse boy.