I have lots of options.
It's not about humans and animals anymore. It's about places, and places to live, and things you can't touch.
I was in the park trying to make up my mind when some guy's dog attacked some girl's dog. She tried to stop it and that goddamn dog bit her on the arm just above the elbow and a thin line of blood leaked out.
She was crying and yelling.
I shouted from across the park, "Hey, asshole! Fetch your wretch!" but nobody listened. There was nothing to be done.
You can't kill someone's dog in the middle of a park on a warm summer evening, not even in this place where the police are a joke and people wear their backpacks on the front. It just isn't done. There is still a fine, refined, throughline of decency and hospitality in this place.
That's why I waited to follow the guy home instead.
It wasn't easy. I already made myself when I called him out. He knew the whites of my eyes, so I had to take my time and follow him along the Cañada just below. I took the form of a shitty little slug--a fast-mover though, and a spell any child could learn--lubricated myself with that filthy sheen and slid downhill.
He passed my friends on his way and his dog nearly had their ankles. My friends are the most kind, terrifying-looking people you'll ever meet. They abhor violence, but they have their bike chains ready when given no choice. They have more face tattoos than facial hair, especially the girls. My friends settled only for shouting curses at the man and seeing him off. I was giddy as I passed so near and so unnoticed, like a spy. If they knew how much time I liked to spend as a slug, they might not be my friends anymore.
Once the man turned off into the city, I followed him by taste and smell to his apartment. I was careful not to be crushed underfoot, but the city is tranquil at night, especially for slugs on the weekday, so there was little trouble. In this state it's the pigeons that worry me more.
I reached his small patio. I shrugged slime off my shoulders and then shrugged off my shoulders themselves until I was standing tall. I pushed my eye stalks back into my head. I stood barefoot at the door to his apartment and tasted/smelled blood as I came back to myself. Considering what I was about to do, I realized I was wrong.
It was still about animals.
I opened the door with a spell your average youth could muster, but a gifted one on a fast-track to a scholarship at a private school. I opened the door as quietly as I could with my human hands and looked around.
I thought I had tasted blood on my slug feet.
The blood was a winding, scattered, efferent trail up the steps towards what I assumed was the bedroom. I have an eye for the finer details, so I could see the matted fur and the more solid pieces in the blood. It didn't taste like human blood, and yes, this time I had to be sure with a sample on my human finger pressed against my human tongue.
As I climbed the stairs, I wondered, did he beat me to it? Did the smell of that girl's blood reach his senses and wake him from his complacency the way it had reached me? Sometimes open-air blood is all it takes to get to the heart of things, even for a moment--this is something people have known for a long time. Was I climbing the steps of a stone temple? Was I following a trail of blood because he had already done what needed doing?
I pushed the door to his bedroom open and saw I was following a trail of blood because I probably needed therapy.
The dog was shivering in the corner in its little bed. The dog was him, I could see that now, a spell only for someone grown, perhaps only a master of the craft. The man was slumped against the wall--empty in disuse like a doll. The tail had been something else, now removed and lying chewed and ruined in a spit puddle of pink froth in the middle of the room. The tail was the root of all evil, and the dog--the man--had seen to it.
That explained the blood.
That explained everything.
I had stumbled upon a faulty work of pure genius.
That meant there was still hope.
I knelt at eye level for a quick word and stared into his eyes (which isn't recommended when working with animals, mind you, especially dangerous animals).
"This is a good start. Soon enough you'll have spells only an elder might cast. Till then, consider spending more time as a slug--your ego is out of control, my friend."
He shivered. His eyes rolled back and forth. I hope he got the message.
I left to go find my friends and something to eat.