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Chapter Text

"Ugh, just put them back together."

Bapawmet paused. The vast creature stood upright with strange, creaky movements as if the being was uncomfortable.

"As you wish."

The baseball field shook. The dogs and cats could hear the windows of Hachiko High rattle as a dull red light engulfed their vision. When it subsided, the entity was nowhere to be seen.

Holly was the first to shriek, pausing as she felt her arms leaping back alongside the rest of her body in surprise. "Huh? W-Was it all a dream?" she said, looking at her paws and arms, confused.

"My battle scar! It's gone!" Rover exclaimed, as excited as ever. He touched his face with incredible vigour, parting the fur in an attempt to find out where the stitches had run off to.

Patches watched with unknowing worry as Olive stared them down with starry eyes. For the second time in his life, he felt that overwhelming aura of warmth clinging to his body, as if the sun itself was beating against his chest from the inside. It was an alien sensation, one he didn't have time to ponder on as the mutt rushed up for a hug.

"Patchie!!" the short red dog yelled out with joy. Before Patches knew it, they were hugging the living daylights out of him, as if he would slip through their paws at any moment.

Patches could only smile, putting aside thoughts of abandonment and doubt. He pat the dog on the back.

"I was so afraid you w-were going to..."

"Do what?" The words came naturally. "Hurt my best friend?"

"... I'm your best f-f-furiend?" Olive muttered in disbelief.

Patches felt his cheeks glowing red. "I am not saying it again."

Patches' smile faded as he was the first to see the bloodied body of Angel rushing down the field, out of breath. He could barely stand the sight of the cat, but the warmth of the hug battered back his old instincts.

Coco brought her paws to her mouth in disbelief. "Angel?! You're alright!" She moved to hug her younger brother, but stopped the moment they saw the contrasting red streaking down his chest and the cuts in the center of his uniform.

"I am NOT alright..." Angel took a moment longer to catch his breath. The cat was enraged, but his tone was as low as ever. His bloodshot eyes stared down the dalmatian with piercing fury as each exhausted breath was coated in a deep malice.

Patches searched for the right words as Olive let go of him to stare at the new arrival. The hate he felt for the cat washed away with Olive's kindness, and he wanted nothing more than to stop Angel's hurt, to see him happy. Patches would change; he would finally change.

"Patches stole his body back..." the cat paused, drawing in air through his teeth, "and he murdered me afterward..."

Coco was the first to turn their gaze, levelling their disguised wand. To most, seeing the cat raise her oversized 'spoon' threateningly would probably seem funny were it not for the tense situation unravelling before them.

Soon every single dog and cat trained their eyes on Patches. He could hear whispers, murmurs, people saying his name, and he could feel something crawling up his throat as his eyes widened in worry.

"P-Patches..." Olive began. He looked at the pup, his eyes softening and the whispers fading into noise as he stared at their teary eyes. "Did you do this?" they softly spoke.

Patches narrowed his eyes, averting them from Olive. He tried to open his mouth, to apologize- or say anything, but nothing came out.

"B-B-B-But, you promised you'd be g-good today!"

Patches nearly scoffed. "I mean, I healed everyone! What's the issu-"

"NO!" Olive cried out as the corners of their eyes filled with tears.

The word shook him to his core.

"You lied, Patches!"

"Olive," Coco spat, "you tried to help him, and I'm proud of you for it..." Coco's voice began to simmer. "But Patches is a hazard, he can't change."

Patches tried to interject, "Now wait a-"

Coco didn't let him speak. "We all gave him a chance because of you, Olive!" she yelled, her voice shaking with barely contained anger.

The pup burst into tears. "I'm s-s-sorry."

Patches watched as Olive curled their arms against their body, quickly walking backwards and away from the dalmatian.

"I guess not every dog is a good d-dog."

Coco said something, but he couldn't make sense of it; his mind focused on Olive's words and actions. What did they mean by that? Were they referring to him? Why did they look like that? What was happening?

Olive took two more steps from him, then turned away from Patches, tears streaming down their face.

He didn't understand what was happening. They were just next to him; they were just hugging him! Why were they over there? What were they saying?

"Wait... Olive?" Patches asked, incredulous. His eyes went wide, and the dull warmth in his chest shattered, breaking into a million shards that cut up his insides.

"Hrrk-k!" Patches gurgled out. The dalmatian felt something wrap around his neck and lift him off of the ground. Coco was pointing her wand at him, and with each passing moment the constricting sensation got worse and worse. He couldn't breathe, and it was grinding up against his spine painfully. His paw instinctively trailed down towards his pocket while his other tried to grasp at the invisible force around his neck.

"This is how things should have gone the day I came to Hachiko," Coco spat, her calm demeanour hiding a deep, powerful spite.

Just as he felt the wire starting to force his windpipe to give in, Patches lashed his right arm out in a wide arc. He wasn't focusing on what spell to cast and only hoped the wand was able to hit Coco with something hard enough to kill the cat or at least disable her.

"Agh!" Coco screamed, raising her arms to protect against the barely visible grey distortion dancing through the air. The spell smacked into Coco, who was just able to summon her defences in time. The wild magic dissipated but still sent her flying backward, causing her wand to topple out of her grip as she tumbled into the fencing of the baseball field.

Patches' feet and right paw smacked against the floor with an anti-climatic shifting sound as the baseball field's sand dug into his pads. He gripped his fluffy throat with his left paw, coughing out and gasping for air as he raised himself up off of his arm, and back onto his feet. What he saw next did more than hurt him- it was something from a nightmare.

Mitt scrambled to draw their wand, standing protectively in front of their brother, Whisk, as most of the other cats flocked to them for protection, especially Felix.

While Holly ran immediately alongside the other students looking to flee the yard, Rover took a moment to stare at Sparky and shout something. Soon after, the terrier lost his nerve and ran for it like much of the others.

Tigger protectively positioned themselves between the dalmatian and some of the dogs that were too frightened to move, including Luna.

Doug stared at Patches in alarm, then continued to hold his dumbfounded facade, too afraid to try anything else, it seemed.

Brownie and Sparky hesitated for a long while, but eventually ran towards Patches in an attempt to tackle him, fear and anger on their faces.

Ginger was glowing with rage; her hair floated as she began extending a paw, revealing both her eyes as they began to flare with a passionate hatred.

Then, there was Olive, who stood shell-shocked not too far from Patches. The world seemed to stop as they stared at him with fear in their eyes. For once, it appeared the dog knew no amount of begging or niceties would help them.

Every single dog and cat was looking at him.

A scream broke his trance, and Patches instinctively waved his wand into the air, jumping back as he began to reflexively cast a spell. When he turned to the source of the sound he was met with Angel's bloodshot eyes, bulging as he soared towards the dalmatian with his claws outstretched and teeth bared.

Patches twirled the wand, flicking its green head towards the forest as a brilliant grey light began to engulf his form, just as the cat lept for his throat.

Then, Angel passed through thin air.

Chapter Text

His heart was pounding in his ears, drumming with the footfalls, barely etching out the sound of confused pursuers yelling behind him.

"I d-don't know why you're doing this,"

He hadn't quit running, not since he got away from the school, and didn't have plans on stopping anytime soon, or really, any plans at all.

"But we can talk. I promise I'll listen f-fur as long as it takes!"

His pace slowed as the adrenaline ceased its pumping. He wasn't sure how long he had been on the move for or where he was going. The trees became barren, and the soil turned to dust as he ran.

"Did you do this?!"

He told his legs to move to the left just a second too late; crashing against a tree he couldn't summon up the strength to dodge.

"I guess not every dog is a good d-dog."

'Idiot,' he thought to himself, barely able to register his legs giving out and the back of his head smacking against the coarse dirt as he fell to the ground.

Patches' head hurt; he could feel warmth beginning to radiate from his forehead, then his right leg.

The scent and feeling of wet, squelchy blood was almost refreshing for his tired, numb body. The fluid stained his uniform pants and mottled white and black fur, running down slowly as it matted anything it touched.

Patches shut his eyes, taking deep breaths as his body slowly came back under his control. After a few minutes, he felt his old thoughts returning to him and prayed he would fall unconscious; anything was better than the humiliation of his current solitude.

The dalmatian's grey eyes fluttered for a moment as he let them open again. The bright sun was staring down at him, being the needle-like sensation urging him to get up. Patches put a wavering paw on the floor, slowly righting himself.

His mind spun as he raised himself off the dirt, thinking the feeling must be similar to coming down from a catnip-induced hangover. Blood began to drip from his brow and onto his right eyelid, forcing him to shut it before the ichor pooled on top of the iris.

As he straightened himself and his clothing out, his thoughts finally jumped to the scenario he had just escaped; Hachiko High's 'communal school day.'

"They turned their back on me..." he said to himself, muttering, as his eyes drifted towards the floor and began to water, "I should've known. I should've known they w-would... I-" his body choked up. The air started to smell of saline as loose, slow rivulets of tears flowed down his fluffy cheeks.

He hadn't even realized he was crying until the first droplet ran down his muzzle and dripped onto his vest. He grimaced intensely, trying to squeeze shut his tear-ducts and reject the feelings that were welling up in his heart.

He stood there, facing the tree for a moment before his head lightly smacked into it, and his nose scrunched up against the bark. His mewling noises were pathetic; they were sounds he had made before and had silently swore never to make again, yet here he was.

Patches tried to speak spite-laden insults, but could hardly let loose a gasp of breath before his throat contracted, and his face tightened once more. His legs quivered, then gave out as he sunk to his knees.

The day's events flooded back into his mind; he had made it through the first period without managing to kill anyone, but then Coco took the damn collar off, giving his worst parts free rein to plot and scheme.

When it came to second period, he was already brewing his plan to use Bapawmet to kill everyone attending the event. Smug glee consumed his mind at the prospect of ridding himself of all the dogs and cats who had tortured him for so many years, finally.

Patches remembered when that mindset changed; Olive was there in the library, giving him attention and genuinely being nice to him. With their high-pitched voice and overeager demeanour, Patches always thought Olive was nothing but a pain in the neck.

However, the past few days of sleeping at their house gave Patches a calm, warm feeling he couldn't stand. Each positive emotion the dog inflicted onto him ebbed away the truth that they were his enemy, much like everyone else was.

In a moment of weakness, he allowed himself to be swept up with the sensations; ignoring the truth that Olive only kept Patches around because of how good it felt to taunt and mock him.

It was divine anointment that Angel so happened to be in the same class as Olive. Patches couldn't stop staring at the body-swapped cat, wanting so desperately to use this warmth he felt to say something.

Patches wanted to fix what he had done, and settle the thoughts of abandonment that had consumed him. Every time Angel turned towards him, Patches averted his gaze, running from the idea of confronting the cat that he just couldn't stop thinking of.

When Patches had followed Angel out of literature, he didn't quite know why. The warmth and happiness in his chest began to dull and fade as fear of repercussions started to grip him, but he kept going.

When he finally found Angel staring out of a window in the middle of the school's hall, he paused; he had no idea why he was doing this; for closure? Why would he care?

It was a grace that a piece of stray bone had been there to snap both of them out of their sulk-induced trance. The surprised exclamations of the cat rang through Patches' mind; they were etched into his skull:

"P-Patches?!" Angel yelled, a cry of surprise that would fall upon deaf ears this deep into the school. Patches turned his eyes in shame; he didn't deserve to speak to the cat. "What are you doing here?! Why are you following me?!"

He remembered the face of Angel; it was mad more than anything else. He was enraged that Olive had kept the dalmatian alive, doubly so that he was here now. He wanted to tell Angel so many things, but the words didn't form in his mouth.

"... I don't really know," Patches had said, "I just wanted to talk."

Angel's face went from fear to anger; he was far more fearsome as a dog than he was a cat. "I don't owe you anything... You should leave, right now."

Patches inhaled sharply, exasperated at remembering his own mistakes. "Look, I know I've been a little... unstable around you, but I-"

"LEAVE."

He wouldn't forget those bloodshot eyes or the bared teeth. They made Patches shrivel up inside.

"You killed me, stole my body, then tried to kill all my friends... And when they forgave you and let you come here you were snarky and ungrateful! I just want to escape you, but I can't... Every time I look into a mirror I see you; I'm so sick of it!!" the cat screamed, squeezing his eyes shut and shaking his balled paw in fury. He shook his broken arm about as much as he could without it hurting, so consumed in his thoughts.

The words stung. Patches regretted everything he had done to hurt the poor cat. He wanted him back, but if he couldn't have that, then he would want all the suffering between them to stop. More than anything, he wanted the aching pain in his gut to go away.

"You hate me that much, huh?" he had mumbled, his eyes drifting downward, and his body weighed with shame.

"Yes," Angel said with a sneer.

Patches felt the warmth crack, allowing him a moment to put back on his usual confident face. "Then, when I get my body back I'll leave you alone forever. How's that?"

"...You? Get your body back?" Angel laughed as sinister as he ever had, and Patches was reminded that this was a creature who tore apart countless dogs in his quest for revenge. He killed hundreds, all so he could do the same to Patches.

"That's not going to happen."

The words shook Patches from his thoughts, going wide-eyed, surprised by the quiet bookworm's sudden confident tone. It reminded Patches of just how alike both of them were; it reminded him of the first time they met.

"You're much easier to keep in check with the body you have now, and if you miss your old body as much as I miss mine... I'm glad to keep you from it... I think everyone agrees that I make a better Patches anyway." He said, wagging merrily the whole time, smiling.

Patches was dead silent as he narrowed his brow. Angel wasn't wrong. Luna had known Patches for nine years now, ever since elementary, making her the closest thing to a friend he had.

Despite that, she had started praising "Patches" the moment someone else was behind the wheel, judging his behaviour relentlessly otherwise. He didn't understand why she still kept him around, and she had always been the one part of his life he had any amount of pride in, yet, he now saw it was only so she could mock him.

He hated it, he hated her, and he was reminded as to why he hated this stupid cat. It wasn't the anger, nor was it the words alone; instead, it was the truth behind them: no one cared for the real Patches, and nobody ever would, not even Olive. To them, to everyone, he would always just be a murderer, an other, a villain to stack blame onto.

"... Is that so," he finally responded, losing his quippy attitude for a moment.

Patches clenched his fist against the tree. He cursed himself for being so short-sighted, for not realizing Angel's intention before he acted on impulse. So shortly after he had felt regret over hurting Angel, he did it again.

There was no going back this time, no third chances, but Patches had still believed his friends could forgive him back then, and it was only now he realized how stupid he was. The air was thin and biting as he turned his thoughts around to the cat.

It only took a moment longer for the knife to pop out from behind Patches' back, stabbing Angel in the arm. Angel, of course, turned to flee after they exchanged a few token words.

Patches felt so much better than he had just a few minutes ago; all that guilt and shame was gone. Although he felt like jamming the knife into Angel's foot to taunt him, he knew he needed his body back and relented.

The knife swiped through the air and hit Angel in his shoulder blade, tearing the uniform and knocking him down. Patches ran his paw along that cut now, feeling the rip in his uniform's blue knitted vest. As petty as it was, it felt good knowing Angel had hurt.

"Hah... my eyes feel like they're on fire," he said to himself, wiping the wet from his face with his old clothes. Despite his body being larger and more robust than the one he had inhabited hours earlier, it was still unpracticed, and the toll of skipping PE more than a few times was catching up to him.

He felt exhausted as his body began de-stressing; Patches knew he would have to stop and regain his strength eventually, but not before he made it somewhere safer. "Where am I even going to go?"

Chapter Text

"Eh, hey! You look familiar." a peppy, lightly accented voice shouted from behind Patches, giving him a few precious moments to collect his thoughts and appear presentable. With a sniffle and wiping his grey eyes of their tears, Patches turned about and began to look over the spry golden retriever in front of him. "Are you alright?" the golden retriever asked.

The dog had been attacked in the gym, as he wore an appropriate bloodstained blue and white athletic uniform, which was similar to what Sparky wore, albeit fitted for a shorter breed. The retriever's eyes were wide with excitement, and his tail was wagging like mad.

The dog looked like he was ready to start running laps, and he had clearly never trimmed his fur- Patches could hear the woosh of his tail meters away. Beyond his stupidly large tail, his ears almost reached down to his shoulders, leading down to a dirtied red bandana adorning his neck, splattered with blood.

Patches instinctively reached for his maroon tie, gripping the golden star clip at the knot and adjusting it. "Hmm! Yes? One of... oh, that's right." The golden retriever was one of the many dogs raised by Patches' actions and had been putrefying in the forest alongside other zombies unable to fit the cut for the communal day. Now, of course, the dog was healed entirely by Bapawmet and seemed to remember nothing of the days prior.

"Boy," the golden began, placing his paws at his hips and smiling, "I thought for a good while I wasn't gonna find anyone in these woods I'm just- really glad that's not the case! Hehe," the dog exhaled, his smile only growing smaller when he noticed just how unhappy patches was.

Patches shook his head, smiling weakly. "Honestly? I'm surprised I'm only finding one of you now."

"One of- Hachiko's students?" the dog queried, tilting his head in confusion and letting one of his colossal ears flop past his shoulders and onto his chest.

Patches tried to give off a confident smile, but the events just a few minutes prior had shredded his usual debonair. He shrugged and casually started dusting the dirt from his pants, keeping a frown all the while. "Am I not familiar at all?" he asked.

"Um..." The dog squinted, looking to the side to avoid Patches' unsettlingly calm gaze. The dog stuttered for a moment, sweat beading on his forehead as he tried to keep his smile up. "Eh- em- you... well, as I said, you do seem familiar, but now that you mention it, I don't really know when we've met or much about the past few days at all."

Patches shrugged. "And do you remember why you're in this forest?"

"Uh..." The golden looked confounded by Patches' question. It seemed like the long-eared insufferable couldn't even begin to speculate an answer. "I think I was running from a ghost?" but the dog still tried to supply one.

"Well, you were one of many of the undead brought back to life by-" Patches hesitated, not knowing if it was to his benefit to tell the dog who had made him a zombie, then decided that it couldn't hurt, "... By what I did, so you could have closure after someone killed all the dogs at school. It just so happens, I'm also the one who fixed your body as well."

When Patches looked at the dog's face, he seemed to be perturbed at the explanation. "Undead?" he chittered out with a cocked eyebrow.

"A 'thank you' would be nice," the dalmatian scoffed.

Patches sighed, then looked to the floor as the golden spoke, pretending to study a rock as he checked to confirm Felix's wand was still in his pocket. He found the bloodstained knife, but the wand was nowhere to be found.

He hissed, "Shit! Where the hell did-"

The golden retriever barked aloud, "Hey, are you listening?"

"Oh my lord, that's right! I had it in my paw, and-"

"Hey!?"

Patches turned his attention back to the interrupting dog. "Not one of you is going to let me go without hounding me with questions, are you?" he said, frowning.

"Mate, I don't want any trouble," the dog said, putting up his paws in surrender, "I'm just really confused, I can't remember how I got here..." the dog huffed, "and I don't even know what you just said. I just- I just need to go home, talk to my parents or something." The dog shook his head curtly, placing a paw on it to express how overwhelmed he felt.

"Oh of course you're going to go back to your damned parents. Listen to me;" Patches closed in on the slightly shorter but far fluffier dog, who took a step back in surprise. "You're going to go back to Hachiko, find a red dog named Olive, and tell them..." he wanted the message to be an empty threat but contemplated the good it would do. "And tell them that..." he couldn't say it; it was too uncharacteristically kind coming from him.

Surprisingly the dog didn't budge; he stared down the dalmatian, drawing Patches from his stupor.

"Tell them that I just want to talk."

"... Sure, I can do that for you, but let's just get back to the school first, okay? You and me," the dog said, gesturing towards Patches and then himself. His gaze was one of unsubtle cautiousness- like Patches was about to attack him at any moment.

Patches closed both of his eyes now; one of them was welded shut from the trickle of blood earlier and hurt slightly as he opened it back up again. "Agh. You know what? Forget it. I don't think they'd bother to listen to you anyways."

"Nonono, I can do that for you. I just want to know if you're alright first; you're bleeding and... I'm not sure if you hurt your head or not, but we can head to the nurse's office and help get that taken care of. I wouldn't want to get lost, and I certainly don't want you getting lost either," the golden said, making a 'simmer down' gesture with his paws and eyeing the dalmatian weirdly.

Patches furrowed his brow. "Why would you care about me being lost or not?" The dog looked like he was about to answer, but Patches cut him off, "Look, just get out of here. Forget what I said about going to the school, enjoy the rest of your day," Patches sassed.

The dog looked at him disapprovingly, then shook his head and gestured with a paw. "Are you sure you're fine? I don't want to end up leaving you here if it might get you hurt." The dog's body language betrayed his words- letting Patches know just how nervous and awkward the dog felt around him.

Patches smiled eerily at him. "Yes, I'm just fine. Now leave me alone before you regret it, mutt." He didn't wait for a response, turning on his heel and walking deeper into the woods. It took a moment before he heard the crunching of leaves underfoot the golden retriever, letting Patches know the dog was walking away from the situation.

It didn't take long for Patches to see the next set of dogs, or the next. With each passing soul that spotted him, Patches felt the weight of their glares pressing onto his shoulders more and more. He could hear their voices whispering about how strange the dalmatian looked, with blood dripping off of his forehead and seeping from his pants.

With each passing comment, Patches could more and more easily imagine them tattling on him, telling the people searching for him where exactly he was, and getting him killed.

His fits of anger quickly coalesced, and minutes after meeting the golden, another small group of students saw him walking in the opposite direction they were, this time a set of 13-year-olds with a single junior to wrangle them together.

The students looked at him, and he could hear their mutterings.

"Is he okay?"

"Maybe we should ask for directions..."

"He looks mad,"

"Just leave that guy be."

Patches growled to himself, then turned towards the group of far younger students just a couple dozen meters away. "What? Have something to tell me, you little pricks?!" he shouted.

The junior stepped forward, a Bernese from the looks of it, with an imposing stature that was befitting of a role model. "Hey, lay off! They're, like, grade 9's!"

"And if they want to get to grade 10, they had better keep their yaps shut!" he yelled back, eyes twitching with unfurling rage.

Before another word could be spoken, both the parties broke away from one another. Patches cursed himself for losing his temper so quickly, but it felt as if nothing mattered at the moment. He was just so damned angry at the world, to the point where he would randomly scream at a bunch of freshmen scared out of their wits in the middle of cat territory.

'What is wrong with me?' was his singular thought as exhaustion began to hit him again. He could barely think straight, and each tree he passed seemed like it was the same one over and over again. He was approaching the dead trees of Kemono Woods and knew he couldn't walk for much longer as the sun flew past its apex, deeper into the evening.

Chapter Text

Patches was able to put on a smile again, however fake it was. He sat under one of the last clusters of flourishing trees in the forest. The scenery reminded him of a simpler time when all he had to worry about was motivating himself to study boorish, non-bloody topics like maths or science.

He briefly wished he would've had the opportunity to grab a book from the library or his locker; it was going to be a long while before Coco and the others stopped looking for him, and he'd have plenty of time to waste between now and then. He turned his mind away from his worries and stared up at the dull blue sky, only somewhat visible from beyond the canopy of oak leaves.

A light chatter stirred him from his peace, twitching his ears and eyelids before he opened them in recognition at how close the sounds were. Although sluggishness kept it down, Patches was able to move his sore body with some coaxing, adopting a crouch behind the tree. Immediately, his heart began to beat with the irregularity of seeing more of the ex-zombies, and he observed them with the hope they weren't cast into the forest with the hope of finding him.

"Why did I have to drop that *stupid* wand," he cursed at himself. He continued circling the tree, keeping himself out of sight while the thoughts of gutting and flaying all of the group bubbled up, leaving a smug sensation that made the corners of his vision feel fuzzy with glee.

"Uh... sorry, I-"

Patches' fur nearly lept off his body. He quickly spun around, trying to draw his knife but failing to: he had taken it out and left it on the ground so it didn't jab into his side while he was sitting.

He quickly spun around, trying to draw his knife but failing to: he had taken it out and left it on the ground so it didn't jab into his side while he was sitting
He quickly sized up the dog, tired eyes scanning the thing for weapons, before calming down somewhat. "Yes?" he asked, sass bleeding through his voice, "What do you want?"

"I- Sorry I was just lost, and I was wondering if you were too? I- I don't know where I am, and you- are you okay? You look like you're h-hiding from..." the dog trailed off.

It was just now that Patches saw the pup in full; it was some rat terrier, brownish fur bleeding from the black splotches that surrounded her yellow eyes, streaming down her overgrown hair and down to her muddied paws. Her coat was a dirtied white from the tip of her muzzle down to her neck and likely down to her stomach.

The dog folded one of her ears forward and the other one backward in apprehension, both painted in the same brown that adorned her cheeks, trickling down to the light brown bob that curled up in front of her face. She had a brown-white paw raised to her cheek in worry and another one idly at her side.

Her clothes were still torn, ragged from the week the dog had spent as a corpse. Aside from the typical pants and shirt uniform combo, she wore a filthy purple zip-up hoodie adorned with an enamel canid skull pin near her left shoulder. "I'm sorry... you just seem familiar," she added.

Patches wanted to taunt the dog further, but held restraint. He wasn't feeling like entertaining a dog with his kinder demeanour, but his habits demanded he do it anyways. He frowned, blowing air out of his nose as he rolled his eyes. "Well, I'm sure I'm not the only dalmatian in this school, but I'm afraid I don't recall you. What's your name?"

"O-Oh, it's uh, but," the dog paused, looking Patches up and down, staring at his face for an uncomfortable amount of time, "are you sure we haven't met? Maybe when you were- well- you know?"

Patches cocked an eyebrow and folded his paws behind his back. "Dead?"

The terrier looked down at the floor, seemingly in shame, and began to fiddle with the strings on their hoodie.

The dalmatian widely shrugged in response. "I don't know why you're shy about dying; everyone does it sooner or later." He gestured with his paw, trying to see if he could edge towards his knife without the dog noticing it. "You should be happy! Some incredibly charitable and attractive person thought to put us back together; it's not often people get a second chance at life."

The dog furrowed her brow, seemingly conflicted.

"And speaking of people. You wouldn't happen to be with anyone else, would you?"

The dog shifted her eyes to the ground, uncertain of something. "I... No, I didn't know if-" the dog cut herself off, shaking her head, "no, it's just me."

Patches chuckled, "Well, you shouldn't be alone out here. The woods are dangerous, who knows what kind of creature might take advantage of a little terrier such as yourself."

The dog grumbled absentmindedly in response, staring at his pants and letting her eyes trail up to his chest in a rather unsettling manner.

Patches coughed in an attempt to catch the dog's attention properly. "Ehem, oh, but where are my manners? I'm Patches, and you are?" he put a paw on his chest to punctuate the sentence.

The terrier didn't flinch, still staring at the floor in deep contemplation.

Patches smirked. Taking a chance, he very obviously kneeled down, keeping his eyes trained on the terrier while his paw fumbled about to grasp the knife, touching it blade-first and then creeping down to its handle. He grasped the thing, using his body to conceal his motions, and picked it up out of the dirt. By hiding it with his sleeve, then stowing it in his vest pocket, the terrier had no chance to see the glimmer of the dirtied murder weapon.

"Well, I can see this conversation is going nowhere- the school is that way," Patches gestured in a southward direction, entirely away from the place he had run from. "I'll be heading there soon myself, but I need to relax for a while first; why don't you join me for a nice long nap?" he asked, gripping the knife's handle from within his vest.

The terrier didn't immediately respond and still stared at the floor as her eyes widened. "Ghost- you were the ghost," they said calmly, "I remember you were the one that was with that bloodhound." She looked Patches in the eyes, "You- You made me a zombie." Most of her features were still slack, but her eyes held a great combination of interest and surprise.

Patches took a step towards the dog, eyes narrowing as he gripped the knife harder, raising his eyebrows. "Whoops," he smirked. "You going to scream and run, then?"

Chapter Text

"Scream and r-" the terrier was about to ask in disbelief, but cut herself off. "No, why would I do that? You helped us- you let us... do something important." She looked Patches in the eyes, still displaying a neutral expression. "Thank you."

Patches suddenly looked supremely uncomfortable, frowning while averting his eyes from the dog.

"Or- I- I'm sorry!" she stuttered out quickly, slowing down afterward. "I'm just... stressed." The dog shut her eyes, starting to hyperventilate. "I just don't know what to do and-"

The dog's eyes opened, meeting Patches' dagger-like gaze, as he took another step towards her, his tuft of black and white hair bobbing in the wind.

The dog suddenly clutched her chest as a sudden pain contorted her face. She looked down to her heart as if it were a sucking wound. She quickly darted for something at her hip that wasn't there. "Where-" she said, beginning to frantically search her hoodie and uniform, her words growing breathy.

"What's wrong? Cat got your tongue?" Patches smirked, taking another step towards the dog.

The dog began to wheeze as she tried to search her pockets frantically. Dear lord, this dog was so useless- unable to find its way out of the woods and apparently having an asthma attack from the nervousness of a single conversation? She was a mess, and Patches took immense satisfaction from watching the display.

"H-Help-p," the thing sputtered out forcefully as it gave up on searching its pockets. Immediately afterward, it gripped its neck and making faint choking sounds, The dog was so pathetic with its stuttering, almost reminding him of-

"You know, it's really not a good idea to startle people like you did; if I did it to you, you'd- well, have what you're having right now." Patches looked up at the sky, contemplating something while tapping a claw against his muzzle. "And, well, you saw me. I was hiding from everyone, why would you think it would be a good idea to speak to someone who's hiding?" he said, smiling and gesturing as if he was the most intelligent dog on earth.

The dog tried wheezing out some form of begging, but nothing was coming out. They cried out, and not even the group of pups that had just passed by had heard her. She was dead, and it seemed like they both knew it.

She tried to wheeze out protest, and Patches responded by grabbing the 3rd year by the collar and looking at her full of false pity, smugly staring her down with addled eyes. All of the frustration was coming out now, and it felt oh so sinfully good.

"... This really just isn't your day, is it?" Something was deeply wrong; he had his victim right where he wanted them. No one would find them for a good long time, and no one would hear this pathetic thing yelp out in terror as it died, but still, something was wrong. Patches could feel a metaphorical paw holding his wrist, keeping the knife pinned in his vest, unable to move it.

'What is wrong with me,' Patches thought to himself, grip loosening on the dog as his weapon felt heavier and heavier by the moment, his own body becoming tired as the adrenaline wore off. He let go of her, taking a step back and letting go of his knife. The dog wheezed as Patches kept his eyes on her and returned to the adjacent tree, sitting down at its roots.

Minutes passed as both dogs calmed down, and Patches rested his arm on a knee while staring up at the birds fluttering through the trees thoughtfully. "You know. I used to sit down with a friend just like this. We read books until it got dark. Those were such fun times..." he lamented.

A smile curled up the side of the dalmatian's face as the nostalgia hit. It felt nice to relax in the presence of the warm afternoon sun on an autumn day. "You wouldn't happen to have any literature, would you?" he asked wistfully.

"I-I'm sorry-"

"Ugh, stop stuttering," he demanded, "It's incredibly annoying; take a moment and fix yourself."

The pup held her breath for a moment, coughed, let loose another pained tear, then spoke again and slowly, so she wouldn't make any mistakes. "I'm sorry... It's really hard to speak properly r-right now..." there was a moment of silence, "what were y-you doing to my collar?"

"I thought it was what was choking you, or something," he mumbled, exhaustion returning to his body as the excitement of the situation faded.

"Oh... that's... good?"

Patches hummed in agreement.

"Sorry... I never- my n-name is Dellanor," she said after a moment of pause. "Well... I guess it's more of my middle name? I mean, I don't-" she wheezed out a word, covering her mouth with a paw as it turned into a squeaky cough and then relaxed, "S-Sorry. But- my friends call me Dell, and stuff, s-so..."

"Oh? Am I your friend all of a sudden? How precious." Talking to the dog was exhausting; they were clearly out of their right mind; perhaps they were just too happy to be alive.

The dog paused, unsure how to process the remark. "So, you like r-reading?"

Patches didn't answer, looking down at the grass and beginning to nod off with a fake grin plastered on his face.

"I-I like reading drawing books," she paused, waiting for the dalmatian to say something. When it was clear the dog would remain silent, the terrier picked up where they had left off. "I want to become a proper artist some day," the dog nervously declared, "b-but, I didn't start too long ago, I kinda suck..."

Patches simply ignored them at this point, tilting his head away from her and trying to distract himself with plans of what he would do when the time came to confront the students of Hachiko High once more.

"Sorry... I'm awful at this," the rat terrier kept talking after huge pauses, and Patches turned his head towards the dog, away from the sparse leaves in the tree above.

Dell brought a paw to her muzzle, warming her face by blowing hot air into it and failing to throw the hood of her hoodie over her paper-thin half-upright, half-floppy ears. The thing wasn't really fitting; the hood might as well have been a decoration for how uselessly it covered the dog, especially as her messy frizzled hair bunched up inside of it comically.

Patches' light shivering reminded him of the awful weather. However, Angel's lack of keeping his fur short meant that the dog felt relatively insulated in some places. Ultimately, there were more important things to worry about than catching a cold or fever.

"... Sorry. I just- could I talk to you about what happened? When we were all zombies, I mean."

Patches smiled, remembering how powerful he felt commanding a legion of the undead as if it were nothing. He would have never imagined he'd 'convince' a thousand students to follow his will, under any circumstance.

"Again, thank you. I felt a lot better when I got out of... wherever I was. Being d-dead sucks, you know?"

Patches felt his eyes growing heavy. He was forgetting about the potential danger of Coco finding him as Dell's droning lulled him closer to sleep.

"I tried talking to a few people, about an hour ago. None of them realized what happened... I feel like I'm so alone, like nobody remembers they were killed..." Her paws quivered as they clenched with building frustration. "Like- I can remember them coming into the classroom and just-" she flippantly waved her right paw about, mocking the motions of a wand. "Dead. Everyone was dead. She put my eye out, and broke every bit of my body. She went through each classroom, with her- her ghosts and-"

"Sorry, I haven't the slightest idea what you're talking about." Patches calmly interjected, lying through his teeth without a second thought. He was hardly interested in hearing anything more; it was just a painful reminder of his failures.

"... B-But she hurt so many of us- you were there, you had to have been."

"Well what do you want to do, kill her?" Patches said sarcastically.

Dell looked a bit shocked, blinking away sleep as she stared at Patches. "You- You do remember then? She-"

"Shush. Just get out of here," he said sternly. He didn't need to think; he was just tired of processing her words. The run had left Patches exhausted, and he was beating away sleep at every moment now.

"I..." Dellanor leaned her head on the tree she was next to, curling up and shutting her eyes. It was clear she was tired as well. Patches tried to think of a plan, something to keep himself safe, but all he could think of was his warm bed and an accompanying shower. His house wasn't too far; maybe he could get up after resting his eyes for a bit and then walk home.

Chapter Text

Patches finally rose from his nap with a shiver. The sunlight, which had provided a nice blanket of warmth for the dog, was gone at dusk's passing.

He had hardly intended to fall asleep since that terrier hadn't left, but, thankfully, she was in the same place as before with her eyes shut and head nodded down. Although her hoodie covered her head at one point, her excessively long hair meant her hair had to run down her shoulders and over her chest so that the hood could be raised up properly.

A quick gust of frigid wind ran through the dalmatian's short fur, making him clutch himself and jolt wide awake. Patches spent no time waiting and immediately grabbed his things as he contemplated his next move.

As he stood there deep in thought, he looked back down to the captive he currently held. "Dell" was her name, and he wondered if he could use her; if she was aware of who he truly was. Patches was sure she had a bone to pick with Coco, but she didn't seem willing to kill the cat.

He knelt down next to the terrier and remembered her mentioning she was an aspiring artist. He fit his paw into her thick hoodie, finding a small notepad filled with bad doodles and illegible journal entries.

He clicked the pen it had stuffed in it's spiral binding, then chewed on it's rear for a moment before scribbling down his first goal on a fresh page; "Get a wand."

Suddenly, Patches heard someone loudly shushing someone else just within earshot, and his face went pale.

The dalmatian looked around, trying to find the source, and heard just beyond a few trees, "There's someone... over there." in a monotone, calm voice; Ginger. It was far enough away, only barely audible to the dalmatian's keen senses.

"Honestly, if we want to find him, we'd probably be better off with me just sniffing him out. I could tell he was bad from the moment I saw him, not to mention he actually smells awful; I don't think he even showered before Angel-"

"AAUGH! Brownie, can you just shut up for half a second? You haven't stopped talking since we got into the forest, and you were the one that begged to come along. C-Can you just be quiet until we figure out who this is, please?"

He could just barely hear Coco's voice, loudly and angrily whispering, not more than a hundred feet or so away from him. Oh no.

"Oh come on, don't act like you didn't want me here. Besides, I knew something was up with Sparky back on Halloween, remember? What if Patches possesses someone, you'll need me to know what's up!" He could actually hear Brownie sticking her tongue out.

"That's a lie and you know it," Coco said.

Patches scrambled to think of something to do; he knew running might help, but it would just take a single stray branch, and they'd hear him or sense someone running away, and that'd be it for him.

'I need to hide!' Patches thought to himself, terrified of the group coming his way and amazed at his past self's horrible foresight. He couldn't believe he hadn't been more careful; he should've left hours ago before any of this could happen.

Patches looked around and finally decided on his hiding spot. The tree Dell was lying next to was just low hanging enough to crawl up. He wasted no time and silently clambered the thing, hoping that Ginger was tired enough not to notice him hiding in the canopy with her magic.

"Wuh..?" Dell said, finally waking up as Ginger's glowing body came into sight. Patches got as high as he could, knife at the ready, and hoped no-one would see him past the leaves and branches.

The bloodhound had her eyes shut as she waved her paw back and forth, scanning the area for life, much how one might with a metal detector. Somewhat uncomfortably, her orange puffer jacket seemed to impede her movements with its bulk, but patches would've killed for something like that to wear at the moment.

"Hey, you!" Brownie shouted, as menacingly as the hyper-spastic corgi could, "Are you a murderer?!" She dramatically pointed at the terrier, letting her loosely fitted uniform flutter about alongside her pink windbreaker.

Coco, looking exasperated, stepped in front of Brownie, putting her paw in front of the corgi's face to shut her up. "S-Sorry about that! We're helping students head back to school. Are you doing alright?" Coco seemed genuinely concerned, and she raised a wand-wielding paw up to her muzzle in worry, her black sleeves furling about in the wind.

"Uh..." Dell looked around, confused. "Yeah, I guess. There was just another dog that-" As soon as her eyes met with Coco's similarity coloured irises, the terrier froze in shock and began to tremble.

The bombay could barely stand the unusually calm voice. She was tired and clearly wanted to head to sleep before she tore Brownie's head off.

"... I think it's just her..." Ginger said in her matter-of-fact voice that Patches once found endearing. Her brown hair whipped about in the wind, the singular fringe over her left eye flopping about wildly as she braced against the howling cold.

He stared down at them, silently judging their awful treatment of him, regretting not killing them all when he had the chance. His mind twisted and contorted with anger; he had yet to digest what had happened in the schoolyard fully. He could already feel some awful regret coming as his pursuers glanced around, looking for him. 'They want to kill me,' he reminded himself.

"Did you see any other dogs?" Coco asked, growing exhausted with the demeanour of everyone around her. "No dalmatians, right?"

Dell kept on staring at the bombay with unflinching terror. She was a deer caught in headlights, although an insistent eyebrow raise on Coco's part made the terrier alert again. "O-OH- I..." with a voice like they were being interrogated, Dell stumbled out an answer, "Y-Yes, I saw a dalmatian, or-" her face went wild with panic, "no, wait! I didn't!"

Ginger turned her head towards the terrier, her maroon eye dully piercing through the small crowd that had formed and giving Dell pause. After regarding her, the bloodhound shut her eyes again.

"Did you?" Brownie said enthusiastically, "If you did, then that'd be a huge help!"

The bombay sighed. "Yes, it would be."

Seemingly fearing for her life, Dell let sweat bead down her head and slowed her trembling until she could formulate a sentence- largely by looking away from Coco and breathing raspily with her mouth agape. "Yeah he was... uh... here, but that was hours ago... I think."

Ginger let her magic fade, rubbing her paws together for heat as her eyes sagged from exhaustion. "I don't think he's here."

"We don't know that." Coco sighed before turning her attention back to Dell. "You saw him, right? Can you tell us what happened?" she asked, no longer looking quite so exhausted.

"I... Nothing. I saw him, fell asleep, and now he's gone." Dell looked away from Coco, trying not to make her fear so obvious.

Coco didn't seem to believe the dog entirely, grumbling before going back to speaking in an exhausted tone, "Well, I'm just glad you're okay; he's a dangerous dog. Do you know where he went?"

Dell looked at Coco with confidence. "You're not going to... Are you guys friends? Or... are you going to kill him?" Coco immediately reddened as she filled with shame, and Brownie stared at her with a smug expression. Despite Dellanor's fear, she didn't seem to understand how poor of a choice of words she had just spoke.

"I- no... well, maybe, but-" Coco didn't seem to know how to respond to the question, but Patches knew the answer well enough.

Patches knew she would revel in killing him, but it seemed her self-image of a "good cat" was still wavering since Home Ec. Brownie couldn't help but suppress a giggle that betrayed the seriousness of the situation, coming to Coco's aid and speaking to the girl.

"Hey look, the guy you spoke to is called Patches, and he's a deranged idiot. If you've seen him, we need to know, or he might end up killing someone!" Brownie said, trying to excite or scare the terrier, but failing.

Patches heard Ginger comment to Coco about how strange it was that 'Patches left her alive,' to which Coco simply waved off, telling her there's no way a hazard like him would spare anyone for selfless reasons. "But then why didn't he kill her?" was the next set of words coming from Coco's mouth. Dell, for her part, stared witlessly at Coco, earning a few weird glances.

"Uh, hello? Earth to major tomcat?" Brownie waved her paw in front of Dell, getting her attention. "So you gonna help us or what?".

"Oh. S-sorry I... I don't know where he went. I kinda fell asleep when he was just... sitting there, so..." her eyes constantly swivelled to Coco as she spoke with incredible sluggishness.

It was Brownie's turn to look defeated as she asked the girl, "Do you need any help getting back to town? We're arranging for everyone's parents to pick them up back at school."

"Umm... No, I'd really rather just go back on my own."

Coco looked at the dog with wide eyes, realizing just how bad of an idea it was. "Okay, that was a rhetorical question. We can't let you run off on your own; the dog you saw to is probably still nearby. If you went alone he'd probably try something..."

Ginger agreed, "Patches is really dangerous. If you went alone, I'm not sure if he would find you or not... but it's better to be safe than sorry."

"Ginger, you're right. We should just go; there's still his house to check out..." Coco said. Dell still stared at Coco in some creepy fearful fashion. "... Would you stop looking at me like that?!" the cat said, raising her glowing wand from under her witches' robes as she gestured somewhat threateningly. Dell turned away, eyes wide with terror, seemingly recognizing the instrument's uses.

'They found my house?!' Patches thought to himself. Sweat poured down his head as he realized he'd probably not be able to sleep in his bed tonight... but it was still worth it to try; anything to get out of the cold and take a shower.

Brownie interjected the present awkwardness, "C'mon whoever you are, we've gotta get a move on and be back by dinner," Brownie told Dell. However, she looked indecisive, only following them when Ginger gave her an exhausted smile and grabbed the rat terrier by the sleeve, tugging her along with the rest of the group.

For a moment, he thought he saw Dell looking back at the tree, right at him, before she frowned and turned away.

Chapter Text

Patches counted the seconds as they passed by. He slowed any breathing, calmed his heartbeat, and told his shuddering brain that all was well. Minutes felt like seconds as he stared off into the thickets of distant trees.

When, finally, he was sure everyone was gone, he started peeling himself from the branch he was atop. As he moved his arm, he could feel warm blood pool into the squished appendage, making it tingle unbearably.

Patches dug his claws into the bark with his numb digits and opted to simply drop down rather than climb. The forest was not safe, and he wouldn't have a contrived asthmatic weirdo to bail him out of the next near-death experience.

It had been around thirty minutes since the dogs left, but Patches had no idea which direction was which anymore. He needed a plan.

"Shit!" he yelped, losing his grip on the bark as it ran cuts along where he jammed his claws into it. In short order, he fell a good five feet until his legs hit the floor, crumpling under his exhausted body's weight. He landed on his rear, crushing his tail and bending it at a weird angle, then lastly bumping his back and head against the rough ground.

"Owwww..."

He took a moment to rub the new bruise on the back of his head, then groggily got up. He felt exhausted after all the shit that had happened to him; it was comedy, pure and simple.

"Ugh... I'm hungry, thirsty, cold, bruised, bleeding, and I can't feel half of my body."

He smiled to himself, still trying to remain confident for his own sake.

"Well, I suppose it's nothing I haven't dealt with before, though the knowledge I can't have my life taken from me by a dozen people at any moment is a marked improvement!"

He raised a paw to his muzzle, wiping away the smirk that rested on it as his mind briefly drifted to the days he had spent in that rotting corpse. Then, he got moving in the direction of the search party, minding to avoid their tracks, and hoped they were going towards the school.

The long walk gave Patches time to ponder, allowing one of his first thoughts to be of his ultimate goal. Somehow, he would have to get his hands on Bapawmet again. The chill of cold dirt against his paw pads soothed his aching as he continued on through the forest.

Patches wondered why the skeletal god hadn't appeared from nowhere and slaughtered him at Mitt's behest. It couldn't be that they didn't have a skull- how were they going to summon them at the school gathering if that were the case?

"Wait, then... does that mean Mitt had a skull in their backpack the whole time?" He deduced they likely had stolen that skull from one of the zombie dogs, and after they were put back together, the bone left to find its original owner. Patches was reminded of the sacrificial skull he himself had used, and realized that it certainly wasn't going to return to its owner anytime soon.

Patches stumbled over an exposed root, cursing the gnarled state of the woods and their dead trees. The ashen smell never quite faded even as the colour returned to the canopy, and he found himself closing in on Kemonotown's outskirts.

"Come to think of it, wasn't Mitt going to let all the dogs rot anyways?" He quickly remembered their chat in Home Ec, where both siblings had told him their intentions. It was only by Patches unintentional actions in giving Ginger the grimoire that the duo had resigned their superiority complexes and decided to fix all the students of Hachiko High.

As he stewed, the occasional chirping of birds, tickling of soft grass, and cold breeze let him know he was minutes away from his destination. Sucking in the fresh air felt good, and he looked forward to the feeling of asphalt on his paw pads, but dreaded everything else.

Maybe in a kinder world, Patches' actions would have been recognized, and the bloodthirsty mutts at the school would believe he was trying to save everyone. That wouldn't happen, though; they would ignore the good he did in favour of damning him for being imperfect.

The dalmatian stopped his pacing as he finally arrived at the edge of the forest. The sounds of laughter and joyous crying hit his keen ears before the scent of week-old unwashed fur came right after. He snuck into some bushes, observing from there as he saw yet another sleight against him; there were several dogs still gathered in the yard.

Some of the dogs appeared distinctly older than the few students he recognized. Amongst the dogs, his eyes were caught by the brightly-furred Rover excitedly tossing a ball towards a far taller dog with pointy ears.

"Sparky," Patches spat out, wondering why the two were playing fetch so late in the evening. Patches couldn't stand the sight and moved on, creeping past the yard and past the windows that lead into the deepest parts of the hall, which were a lot cleaner than Coco had left them earlier.

As Patches made his way around the school, looking for a way to cross onto the main road and start heading home, he noticed one of the rooms closer to the entrance had its blinds drawn and lights on.

Patches couldn't help but stare at the glow, almost as if it were the dramatic glimmering of gold. He simply sat there until curiosity started to dig and gnaw at his mind. His body wanted him to know what was happening in there, though from the sounds alone, he could tell he would only find something awful buried deep in that classroom.

Who was even still in the school in the pitch black of midnight? Were they bored? Didn't they have families to run back to and hug or some other nonsense? His heart was beating as fast as it was when he was running away from Coco. It kept beating in anticipation of the thing he knew he was going to look at.

Finally, Patches took a deep breath and slid his white and black bangs into frame, letting his eye carefully peer through the slits in the blinds and look at the scene in front of him:

It was precisely what he thought it would be like. A number of the students had opted to stay behind and joke, giggle, or plot. A handful were arrayed out on the floor, fast asleep on top of gym mats and backpacks.

Others had fallen asleep on their desks; Ginger had her head laid down alongside... the cat who had ruined everything. These were likely the things that were going to spend the next week looking for him, trying to kill him, in addition to Coco and all the other cats who lived in the woods.

For a moment, Patches felt happy, though he couldn't understand why. The thought of being in that room, lying down next to a friend after they had fixed the whole world... Patches imagined the warmth of the dying lightbulbs in the classroom hitting his coat.

He imagined wrapping his arms around someone with a beating heart, both of them falling asleep from cramming their faces with celebratory foods and drink- it was a daydream he had hundreds of times before he fell asleep. But he knew it was just that: a daydream.

As a breeze drew his mind from the fantasy, Patches felt the faux warmth surrounding his chest fade, only to be replaced by the feeling of his broken joke of a body involuntarily quivering in the cold. His heart went from toasty with imagination to pained and torn as he stared at Angel, much like he had dozens of times before, with only one thing to his mind.

'Why only me, why nobody else?'

The wind moaned, and he swayed as if he were going to be picked up by it at any moment. He shut his eyes and imagined entering the room, shrouded by guilt, then somehow being forgiven by his 'friends' and living a better life onward. Once he opened them again, he reminded himself that Angel or Ginger would cleave him in half without a second thought.

It was the only thing he could do; sit there and ask the same question, wordlessly, too meek to demand a response, and too scared to answer it himself.

"Traitor," Patches finally choked out aloud. No one heard him, of course, but the word still rang in the air for a moment before the wind swept it up.

Patches then noticed that just in front of Coco was a rather large map stitched together from half a dozen pieces of construction paper; on it was a 'detailed' view of the town and the forest surrounding it, red and blue lines drawn with crayon marking the areas that had already been searched, alongside erasers being used to represent themselves- placed largely alongside the edge of the forest, caging the dalmatian in. She described the plan with growing irritation, gesturing to keep the attention of those that would spare it.

It was the sort of plan a bunch of dysfunctional high schoolers would think up on no sleep and hearts full of blind hatred. Regardless, the whole of the town knew of him, and he wouldn't be surprised if Kemonotown brought in reinforcements from all around to help catch him, as they likely thought he was the one responsible for the massacre.

Patches looked to the other side of the tall window, and when he was sure no one was looking, he quickly slid past it. A moment after, he stuck his eyes back into the room, giving himself a parting glance.

The door leading into the room suddenly swung open, revealing a mutt in their uniform shorts and shirt, rubbing at their enormous eyes, which looked far more tired than usual. They moved over to the table close to the corner of the room, which had Ginger and many of the others sitting at it.

The red-furred mutt looked positively broken, mirroring Patches himself in many ways. As Patches watched them, he flicked a paw pad over the edge of his knife, testing its sharpness while fantasizing what he would have to do to sneak into the school in order to use it.

"Olive..." he said to himself, eyes darkening with purpose as his fantasies filled his mind with a fit of soothing anger; it was where he was comfortable. The mutt sat down at the table, smiling as they checked in on Angel, then frowned and laid their head down. "... Don't look so sad puppy, this is what you wanted after all." Olive had a right to be unhappy, to be scared, to be worried; Patches wouldn't run, he wouldn't grant mercy, and he wouldn't stop until they were dead.

He muttered a curse under his breath as Olive tilted their head to stare out the window, almost just catching the sneak. Patches once again vowed revenge, then continued past the school's rear and onto its yard opposite the baseball field. Patches quickly dashed past the street as innocuously as he could.

He couldn't help but note a number of parents seemed to be still waiting for their kids, and a number of kids were still waiting for their parents. It seemed every minute or so, another duo would pop out of a car or run up from another street and pick up their runts, twirling them around as if they were born yesterday. It sickened him.

Chapter Text

Patches continued to weave past streetlights and into alleyways through the small town, trying to keep a ways away from anyone who might be able to recognize him and tell the others where he was.

It took some time, but when Patches was finally a reasonable distance into the wilderness surrounding the rural town, he relaxed and allowed himself to calmly march further northward.

Soon enough, Patches found his home just as he had left it, at least for the most part. Because of his roundabout method, the trip took twice as long as it would have otherwise, not to mention the occasional dog he opted to hide from that was walking the streets adjacent to the wilderness for one reason or another.

If Coco's group had visited his house, it had been hours ago. He contemplated how late it was as he looked up into the sky, watching the crescent moon reach its apex. He briefly repressed the very slight urge to howl.

As he was approaching his house from the back 'yard', he couldn't help but appreciate it, thinking of how great it would be to raid his fridge, jump into his bed, and sleep for days. Throughout his time at Olive's place, he avoided talking about himself as much as he could in-between trying to pry Coco's enchanted collar off.

There was never a point he had told anyone about his house, despite Olive's occasional prodding. Despite that, they had still somehow found out where he lived- he was lucky Ginger didn't burn the place to the ground.

After finally reaching his oaken back door, Patches tried peering in past the stained glass window embedded into it and saw nothing out of the ordinary. Patches confidently wrapped a paw around the old bronze handle, and- it was locked, of course.

He was sure he didn't care to lock the back door on the fateful day of Coco visiting his school, but it was no matter; he always kept his key in his back pocket...

"Ah... right," he said aloud, quickly remembering the odd fact that it wasn't his body just a few hours earlier. If his keys still existed, they were probably sitting inside of a desk drawer somewhere Angel had left them after coming home from murdering everyone at school.

Sparing a glance around, he noticed all three of the downstairs windows were latched shut, and for as old as they were, they were nothing if not sturdy; he wasn't going to be able to finesse his way through them.

"I'd rather not have to break into my own house, but then that means..." He looked up to the second floor, noticing the master bedroom windows seemed to be still caked with dust and untouched "... I'm going to need to find a ladder, I suppose." Patches scoffed at the labour he had to go through to enter his own home.

Easier said than done. The Ito's had never had a shed, and the fact it was one of the more wilderness-adjacent homes meant that it was going to be a short walk before he would find someone else's ladder to steal. His body groaned at the idea of doing more walking, but keen to not lose his momentum, Patches started moving again.

Patches made his way down the road, remembering a little white cottage owned by a carpenter he could nick stuff from. The walking gave him more time to think of exactly what he would be doing once he got back into his house. He only hoped Coco wasn't able to booby-trap the place while he was gone.

"... Nothing more than a petty murderer. I'm sure you conveniently skipped the part where you killed all but four dogs looking for your precious brother's murderer, hm Coco?" He smiled to himself. "I hope a few dumb dogs were smart enough to realize who you were when you had me by the throat."

He added in a curse, finding it barely alleviated anything, but talking to himself was an unhealthy habit he never had quite kicked. He thought of the talk as practice for when he would eventually speak to another living soul. While he enjoyed talking with other people, he had regretted nearly every conversation he had with another living being aside from chats with the literature club members before they up and died.

"But, hey, silver lining; at least you weren't smart enough to camp out at my place. I bet you're at home, nice and snug." He hoped his presence in Kemonotown made her lose sleep.

Patches quickly found a ladder and picked it up from his neighbour's shed. It felt good thinking of everyone else's demise, but it was soured still by the knowledge he had been played to the point where Coco had her magic wrapped around his neck.

Were it not for the fact Patches switched bodies earlier, taking Felix's wand from Angel's corpse, the chokehold would have indeed been lethal. The world always seemed to want to string Patches along, though, never quite allowing him peace and never quite allowing him to grow comfortable in his misery.

He was almost used to this sort of thing by now, but Patches never quite forgot each mistake, lost chance, and broken promise he had made. His past gnawed at him, making him cringe in embarrassment whenever he remembered being chained up, being forced to inhabit a rotting corpse, or being kind to the ones who abandoned him.

"... What an idiot," he said to himself, pausing as he set up the ladder against his wall, "but no more! I swear, by the end of the week, the world will be at my mercy, and I'll listen to them beg for forgiveness before I snuff them out like a candle.

I'll do it as many times as I please until there's no more dogkind or catkind, just Patches!" His monologue was like a shot of caffeine, keeping him just barely awake as he clambered up the ladder, slid his claws under the rigid oaken window frame, and slid in under the cover of midnight.

Chapter Text

He slid comfortably into the master bedroom, laughing maniacally at his success in getting around Angel's attempts at locking him out of his own house, then at the fact he hadn't instantly been turned into mincemeat by some horrible demon Coco had summoned.

He was safe; he was at home. Each raspy laugh was punctuated with the blowing up of dust from the floor, which swirled around before hitting Patches in the nose. He sputtered as he tried to breathe in an atmosphere made mostly of filth and bad memories.

He got up, resting his paw against his sore neck and coughing out dirt. When his eyes were clear, he didn't stop to take stock of the room and simply ignored his surroundings.

He felt the moans of the creaking wood underfoot and stumbled forward, moving across the room and toward the door out into the 2nd-floor hall. When his plush paws wrapped around the contours of the wood, he smiled and let them find their way to the cold handle.

The door had been locked ever since Patches was 11. He distinctly remembered the grief he had felt whenever he would enter the room not too long ago.

Seeing the half-made queen-sized bed now empty and riddled with mounds of dust. The dresser drawers filled with his mother's clothes, so old and petrified the moths couldn't even eat it anymore.

He snickered, embarrassment reaching his cheeks as he remembered the one time he was caught wearing his mother's shirt over his school clothes. It was out of curiosity and innocence, but it was a time when things were better, and he was more ignorant. Despite the bittersweet memories, he only felt partially perturbed, free from lamenting his late parents but not the warmth he felt from that period of his life.

Indeed, Patches' thoughts quickly shifted to that of the parents of Kemonotown, and if it would be better served that they die before or after their kin. He grinned, imagining the things he would inflict upon them.

He re-focused, wiggling the knob and tugging it taut, trying to test the century-old lock for weaknesses. Dust kicked up from the sudden motion, swirling in front of his face and blinding him. Patches wanted to curse at how ridiculous the amount of filth was, but only coughed as he tried speaking.

He cracked open an eye, the one which still had a streak of dried blood running from top to bottom, and looked at what he was dealing with. The lock was jammed in place and falling apart from so many years of disuse. The door itself was off by an angle of three or four degrees after the hinges wiggled their nails out of the frame and got lodged in place.

The handle wouldn't turn, but another stiff tug and the screws holding in the lock gave just a little bit. It was stuck now, and pulling it harder probably wouldn't do much to help. If the door didn't open inward, he would've kicked the thing down by now.

Patches groaned in discomfort, hoping he wouldn't have to spend too long trying to figure out how to pick a lock. The door was initially intended to have a key inside the lock at all times, so one could easily lock it from the inside, but that was gone, long gone.

He knew bobby pins were sitting around the room and quickly grabbed a half dozen off of the nightstand, trying not to look at the old photos right next to the ornate glass thimble which contained them. The dalmatian started bending a pin into a small 'L' shape, finding the metal was so old it nearly broke like plastic in his paws.

"Please don't break..." Patches muttered, looking around next for something to apply torsion. Looking around revealed no results, and so he put his mind towards what might be able to be vaguely screwdriver shaped, then realized the bedside lamp had a plug, and that plug's prongs would be small enough to work for his purposes.

Patches quickly moved over to the nightstand, stopping to examine an old photo of his younger self, smiling in the yard, covered in mud from head to toe. He ignored the picture with a frown and unplugged the decrepit lamp from its socket, yanking the plug from its 6-year-old hiding spot. He twisted and bent one of the prongs, then brought it to the door just a few feet away and rested the lamp on the nearby dresser.

Patches lodged the bobby pin in first, then the prong, and started feeling around for the pins he'd need to depress in order to get the lock moving again. He had spent hours looking at that key, and the cold contours of the brass in his paw came to his mind quickly.

It was old, one you might see in a western movie or cartoon, and it only had three pins to account for. Patches felt the first pin click into place as he remembered the last time he had used the hunk of metal, locking the door and heading outside.

There was another click as he recalled squeezing the key so hard his little paw bled from clutching the rectangular teeth, and a final click as he was reminded of chucking it as far into the lake as he could, watching it skip once across the surface before plopping into the water and rusting away for the rest of time.

As the door swung open, Patches tossed the prong aside, opting to keep the bobby pins in case they'd come in handy breaking into a bad dog's house... or cat's, he didn't discriminate.

He shut the door behind him, noting how the lock barely stuck to the door, and the thing took extra coaxing to fully close. Dust from the room wafted around like ghosts in the 2nd-floor foyer. His old desk was placed just adjacent to the stairs leading down, and next to it was his impressive bookshelf full of novels he had gotten bored of.

"Non-fiction really is just far more interesting," Patches took a second to look over the books on the shelves; "A Tale of Two Kitties," "Brave New Whoodle," and "Heart of Barkness" were among the first few works that caught his eye. He hadn't opened most of these things in years, and the whole house stunk of old book smell.

Patches briefly wondered if he smelt of books or blood if you considered his hobbies, which reminded him that he desperately needed a shower. He took one look at his desk, admiring the bevy of small, stabby pencils he kept honed to a razor's edge.

However, as Patches looked over the thick oak furnishing, he felt something was missing from its surface. He cast his glance back to the perfectly sharpened pencils to distract himself from the feeling of something being off. The writing implements made him remember he still had the rat terrier's drawing booklet.

"Perhaps that's what I was thinking of," he said to himself.

Out of curiosity, he took it out from his pockets, setting aside his messy knife and the pins. He started preparing for a shower while reading through the booklet; it had very... engaging illustrations in it, not all of which were anatomically correct or even very good, but most of which contained either landscape drawings or somewhat disturbingly accurate depictions of bones, flesh, ghosts, crying dogs, and the like. Well, she was a resident of Infurno before he had convinced Ginger to let the dogs re-inhabit their old bodies.

Patches thoughts instinctively drifted back to the landscape of pulped flesh and bone. It was supposed to be intimidating, but it wasn't anything Patches hadn't vividly imagined before when he was bored and alone.

Honestly, he got a kick out of poking apart a pile of flesh and telling the bits of muscle apart from one another from memory. Patches entered the adjacent bathroom with its French door and began fiddling with the knobs on the shower.

He recalled finding Ginger amongst the hundreds of dogs crying for help, in mental and physical anguish from the magical fires and millennia-old corpses rotting underfoot, though most of them were far more confused than they were suffering.

The bloodhound wasn't crying much at all; it was the sound of a portal being summoned that had drawn his attention to the dog. Being ghosts, none of the dogs had gotten a good grasp on their new abilities, and many of the pups had let Infurno's grasp torment them with their lack of understanding.

The dogs had been torn and twisted into hellish versions of themselves. Everyone had seemed convinced of their fate, yet there she stood, her school uniform on after hours of squatting mid-air over a pile of burning arms and legs.

He forced himself to think about something else as the thoughts drifted closer to her betrayal of him and the words exchanged between the two in Hachiko's gym.

Chapter Text

He took a step into the shower, letting the water pang against his fur and slide down before he brought some shampoo up to his head and started scrubbing the blood and dirt out.

Patches knew, back in Infurno, there was an eternity to spend kicking around the place. While finding ways to taunt and torture his peers was a great way to pass the time, the lack of any real physical contact was boring.

He knew it wouldn't take an eternity for him to start being eaten up by the knowledge Angel was running around in his old body, content and happy with his life.

The water was getting colder, and constant adjustments were needed to keep it in check. The house's decrepit heater had been busted for years now, but Patches had gotten used to cold water and no baths. He found himself longing for a shower like Olive's; the comfiness of their house reminded him of the joys of luxury.

He fondly remembered Olive standing around in their bathroom with him, the mutt seemingly not grasping the concept of Patches' privacy after days of keeping a 'close' eye on him. He had to rudely point out that Olive needed to leave the room before they realized how awkward they were being. Remembering the uncomfortable situation almost made Patches smile.

Patches winced in pain as he started going over the wounds on his body with soap. He had a paw scrubbing away at a large lump on his forehead, peeling back his fur to watch the purple flesh pulse red as he poked at it. The blood came out of his coat in small clumps, and he frustratedly tried to get the red stains out of his perfectly blanche hair.

"Out, damned spot!" he softly yelled, the wound on his head opening as he scrubbed away the dirt and blood. He ran his head under the cool water, keeping it there until the blood stopped flowing and his face was clean enough to use conditioner on, then he started scrubbing.

The soap stung against each bruise; were he in a bath, the whole thing would've been filled with stray hair, blood, and dirt, as there was a full two paws worth of mud on and under the dalmatian's fur. Patches winced as he slowly and carefully scrubbed away at the injury over his leg, noting its depth and judging it as nothing more than a particularly deep scratch.

Once out of the shower, Patches grabbed a small first aid kit overrun with age to the point of its label being completely worn off which was just underneath the sink. He placed the thing onto the porcelain, then looked forward, sighing.

As grey eyes met his own in the mirror, he paused, staring at the creature before him. He looked at his dull orbs and narrowed them, giving off a fierce smile in practice for the ones he'd show off to his future victims. He couldn't help but tug at his jowls, using his blunt claws to stretch back his cheek and observe the row of sharp incisors, jutting canines, thick premolars and molars, all of which he had built up over a lifetime of meticulous dental hygiene and the occasional rawhide treat for himself to gnaw on. He took comfort in his elongated muzzle and pronounced teeth, far more fit for sinking into a blood-fraught jugular than Angel's were- should such an opportunity present itself.

Speaking of the cat... Patches took his claw from his mouth and let his jowls cover his pearly whites once more before running those same claws through the fur on his cheek. He noted the depth of the fur, just as he had felt it in the shower. His face went soft as he observed how pliable the thin strands of cream-coloured fur were after they were scrubbed and washed.

His eyes narrowed, and his lips curled in frustration. He hated how soft and malleable his fur was- both results of how long his fur has gotten, both reminders of why it was long. "As much as I'd love to, I have more pressing things to do than spend an hour giving myself a trim- no matter how desperately needed," he said, taking a towel from the nearby rack and beginning to dry himself.

There was an alien weight bouncing around just behind his head, only now noticeable due to the extra heft it possessed now that it was soaked. Patches paused his towelling to look back into the mirror, grabbing the base of his newfound ponytail and tilting his head to the side so he could look at it from the corner of his vision. His cold grey eyes followed the extra length of hair like a stone floating across a pond, blinking only when he was done cursing the cat for his awful obsession with long fur.

"He's just an unsanitary shedding mess," he spat, wringing the ponytail with a paw and letting the droplets of water fall onto the floor. Immediately, he thought of slicing the excess hair away, but something about that felt improper. "I should really do it when I'm not drowsy," he said, "I don't want to botch it, not if I'm going to be showing it off." He smiled, lightly brushing his bangs into place with his claws. "I need to look nice and charming for my next victim after all!"

He picked through the contents of the plastic first aid kit once he was done drying off, looking for a band-aid to keep his cuts from opening again overnight. Patches suffered knowing the only ones he owned had been from his earlier years, adorned with cute patterns of hearts, stars, and a character from a certain cartoon.

Patches blushed and narrowed his eyes. "I'll take it off in the morning," he said before putting on two large colourful band-aids over the cut to his leg and head, parting the fur and grumbling in frustration trying to get it to stick to his skin. He dumped the band-aids out from the first aid kit and into the sink, then looked over the rest of the contents.

He found a few bandages, wipes, medical tape, ointment, painkillers, small sterile sutures, and two lightly used bottles of medical ethanol. The last thing he found amongst the contents was a tranquillizer needle he had stole long before he stole the one intended for Sparky; the drug was necessary for use in live dissections.

He popped each of the medical bits and bobs aside from the medical alcohol into a smaller bag that would just barely fit in one of his uniform's pockets and tossed it onto his desk alongside the knife.

Patches tossed his old clothes into his laundry basket after drying off, noting it was getting full, which annoyed him. "I've got to clean this place up; there's dust all over now," Patches said, grimacing.

He walked to his room, teeth clattering lightly from the cold as he grabbed a uniform and started getting dressed. Once that was done, he straightened his outfit and started tidying his room.

He hadn't got the chance to clean in a couple of days now, and the monotonous actions gave him a bit to think about what exactly his plan was going forward.

After dressing, Patches returned to the bathroom and got ready to head downstairs by emptying the cup he used to store his myriad of toothbrushes and filling it with water. "Just in case Coco left any gifts for me downstairs..." he said, taking his first few steps down the ever-creaky wooden staircase.

After confirming no ghosts were waiting for him by flicking water about the room, he picked up the small pile of mail sat in front of his door and sat down on his old faux-fur couch, taking a moment to appreciate being back home.

The old box TV, the stand which the TV rested on, the chipped beige paint of the walls and ceiling, the embroidered wood covering the corners of the room, and the spotless coffee table in the middle of it all, just right of the couch all made him feel nostalgic.

He put the cold cup of water onto the table, sipping from it occasionally as he went through the chore of checking his mail happily. "Spam, spam, book club, spam..."

He went silent as he noted the following two letters were very distinct; a simple hand-written note about the size of a paw and a letter of which the sender's name he immediately recognized. "... Olive..." he whispered, putting aside each message aside except for the two.

Patches looked at the bulky letter before him. He took a moment to look at the "From: Olive," then at the huge, rainbow-coloured "Patchie" with a big red heart next to it. He swallowed, worried about what he would find, and closed his eyes gently, tossing open the envelope with a rip from a claw.

Patches took a look at the contents: a single piece of blue folded construction paper, illustrating wide-eyed versions of himself, Olive, Sparky, Coco, Angel, Ginger, and Brownie sharing drinks of some kind. The colours were vibrant, and any empty space was filled with smiling faces and hearts. The drawing was something he might've expected from an 11-year-old, though this was Olive.

"Damn it," he sighed, looking over the paper once more before folding it back up and placing it in in his back pocket. He knew he needed to do something with the letter but wasn't sure exactly what in the moment. After slicking back some stray fur, he got up, taking a brief look at the other letter with a depressed sigh.

"To: Patches

Hey, your friends told me about what happened. They went to your place, so I wanted to follow and give you this. I know we just met and I know you don't want me bothering you but if you want to talk I think I would like that I mean no issue if you don't but as long as you don't kill me 4 real then I'm good with meeting up just head to the Basset-Robbins near the school tomorrow before/after school if thats okay no pressure. I know what you're after and I want to help.

PS: Also can I have my notepad back pls ಥ_ಥ

~ Dellanor"

"... What?" The note floored Patches for a moment. He was more weirded out than anything as he read over the memo again, double-checking he hadn't just had a stroke. The letters swirled around on the page, their meaning eluding him for a moment. When the absurdity of what he read finally stopped hurting him, he started to giggle, then laugh gently.

"How sad! Does the little terrier have a crush on me?" He thought a little more on it. "Well, maybe I can find a use for her, if this isn't just another trap, that is." He shook his head. "... What a weird dog."

Patches chucked the paper aside after crumpling it, remembering the time and place they'd meet. He picked up the half-full glass, then walked over to the door leading to the kitchen, wetting his paw and flicking water around the room to double-check for any traps.

Satisfied, Patches smiled and walked to the sink, taking out his precious knife and deliberating cleaning it for a moment over the sound of running water. He shook his head and grabbed a paper towel to wrap it up with, then deposited it back in his pocket; the stains were a reminder not to make the same mistake twice.

Chapter Text

Patches rooted around the fridge for lettuce, ham, tomatoes, cheese, mayo, and onions, then grabbed a clean knife and started cutting with practiced strokes much in the same way he imagined a gourmet chef might.

Once done, he neatly divided each component into its own pile and grabbed a slice or pawful of each ingredient, placing it neatly on the white bread after cutting the crust off. Once he had his meal, he poured some water and went to his living room, sitting on the couch and sinking into it before starting to gnaw on his bevy of sandwiches.

Patches could still taste the birthday cake only a few days prior, the flavour of ham reminding him of the small piece of bacon-flavoured desert he reluctantly ate at Olive's behest. He took a swig of water, remembering the faces of everyone, smiling at him as he blushed, turning the cake fork towards Olive and getting a swift shock at trying to stab at their paw while they took a bite out of their piece.

It always had amazed him how Olive seemed genuinely kind and willing to give Patches a chance, even after he tried to kill them again and again, even after taunting everyone relentlessly, and even after blowing out their birthday candles 'accidentally.' He smiled, remembering the slight warmth he held in the care he felt for Olive.

Thoughts of kindness and love turned quickly to the way the mutt had so suddenly given up on Patches in the schoolyard. He could've killed them, and he SHOULD have, but didn't, and it seemed that didn't matter to the pup.

Patches took another bite, finishing up his food while still lost in his head, though now his thoughts became about the formulation of a plan. Patches knew how his plot would end: the death of each and every dog at Hachiko High, and perhaps even the rest of the world, if he managed to get his paws on Bapawmet's power. With everyone in Infurno, he would master magic, and summon forth whoever he wanted, then do what they had done to him for the rest of time. He smiled at the thought; it made him happy.

Dusting his mitts off, Patches took the plate back into the kitchen and started cleaning up. It was all fine and dandy to fantasize about killing everyone, as he did, but he couldn't help but notice the fantasizing didn't get him anywhere closer to actually getting his paws on anyone. He held his paw to his face, scratching a cheek as he began to think up ways to not only get his mitts on a few cats and dogs but also keep himself out of the way of Coco, Ginger, Mitt, and Whisk, or even Felix, if the cat had found his wand.

"Oh, right, well, maybe not Whisk," he said, bringing a paw up to his chin, "he ought to be as weak as a kitten." Though, Patches knew the cat would absolutely accompany his twin, speaking of which...

Patches popped out the drawing booklet, flipping to a mostly fresh page and beginning to jot down his thoughts for what to do next. He knew Mitt was practically going to be impenetrable- not only did they have the power of a god behind themselves, but the cat was also cautious and cunning; there was no way he was going to get close to them without a wand.

"I bet there's some reason why Bapawmet hasn't killed me yet; Mitt must be unable to use their power too frequently, or the god has some fickleness behind them. Aside from that, I know Ginger is the only one able to cast without a wand, but the two are at least somewhat related, so I shouldn't absolutely rely on Mitt needing one..."

He continued to deliberate, writing his thoughts as he said them onto the paper. He looked at the singular drawing of a skull and crossbones adorning the page while his mind swirled with ideas.

"Ugh, speaking of Ginger..." Patches still had reserved feelings for the dog; he wanted her dead, of course, but her betrayal of him put in perspective just how decisive and dangerous she could be.

Indeed, Ginger was going to be a tougher nut to crack than Mitt. "As for her, she doesn't need a wand, can come back from the dead, and I'm certain is going to doggedly work on killing me- no reasoning with her. If anyone dies last, it should be her."

He pondered on what exactly Ginger's weakness might be over the last few sips of his drink, absentmindedly flicking his sandwich plate and putting it on the drying rack.

"Maybe that's it-? If I can make sure she keeps exhausting herself, I can make her as vulnerable as she was in the gym," he remembered the heart to heart they had and cringed at admitting she was right about him, only to have the situation outside to sour it. Ginger reminded Patches of himself in some ways, and he was a little scared of that part.

Patches took a break, looking up with baggy eyes towards his old microwave- finding it read "3:34 AM". "Damn." Each minute he spent awake, he lost a bit more of his intellect and will to fight. Although he had taken a nap prior, the unforgiving autumn winds and rough tree bark were hardly sleep-appropriate, even with fur.

Patches ran up the creaky stairs and past his bookcase into his room, closing the door behind him, locking it, and then jumped in bed. It bugged him to be wearing his uniform to sleep, but if someone tried checking if he was there, he needed to be ready to act in an instant.

He quickly got to closing his eyes and shifting around the light blue blanket to his liking before peacefully falling asleep.

---

First, it was the tweeting of small birds, then the crackling of an unmuffled car engine, then the ring of his alarm.

"7:30"

Patches was already awake, of course, and slipped his paw gently over the old-timey bell clock, halting the ringer and loudly yawning. He slipped a finger over a button, shutting it off, and got out of his wooden-framed bed to stretch. The dalmatian rubbed at his eyes; he had only gotten four hours of sleep and only had twenty minutes to make it to the Basset-Robbins before that weird dog started making their way to school.

He quickly straightened out his things and ran to the bathroom, spraying an age-old 'Eau De Toilette' he had gotten himself last Christmas but never bothered using since it literally smelt like toilet water. Patches sniffed the tip, reeling at the light scent of bathroom cleaner, soap, and tap water.

"Who the hell actually likes this stuff?" he said, placing it back in the medicine cabinet, then closed it and took a look at himself in the resultant mirror.

Patches actually looked pretty presentable, considering he had been taking a literal dirt nap and was constantly around dogs taking the more metaphorical ones all day yesterday. He tugged at an eyelid, noticing the dark bags underneath, but thought nothing of it.

The sink was suddenly on, and some vaguely meat-flavoured toothpaste was dotted onto Patches' toothbrush before he got to cleaning his teeth, gargling and spitting.

He stuck his head into his room from the doorway of the bathroom, reading his alarm clock's "7:38". The stairs creaked, and Patches put an eye towards his door, checking to see if it had been tampered with, and finding nothing, as he ran down to the kitchen.

Patches opened the fridge immediately, grabbing the carton of orange juice and downing the last fourth of it. A sideways glance to the microwave revealed "7:42" in glowing green letters. Shaking the container and deeming it empty, Patches tossed the empty carton into the kitchen recycling, then deliberated on what could be eaten in three minutes.

Taking the milk, Patches spun about and closed the fridge with his tail, reaching for the pantry door and popping it open, grabbing the box of 'Bacon Bites' and dumping the remnants of it into a bowl, only after ensuring the milk had been poured first, letting the processed cereal float at the top- just how he liked it. "7:44".

He forgot a spoon and sat over the sink, greedily gulping down the crisp bacon-flavoured cereal and grimacing. He dropped the bowl into the basin, hearing it clatter, before checking his pockets to ensure everything was there.

Once Patches was sure he had everything with him, he ran to his destination through the back-roads and treelines he was used to touring through in the morning so as to avoid the awkwardness of walking alongside the other pups that had friends to chat with on their way to school, though this time he had a far better reason to do so.

Chapter Text

The Basset-Robbins was only five or so minutes away from her house, but it was deeper in the town, along its commercial strip. While easy for Dell to appear there, she knew it'd be a different story for Patches, as he was away from the suburban parts of town.

Dell worried if the dalmatian would even show as she passed by the small parlour. Patches wasn't in there, but the reason for that was made very apparent; she had only now just realized an ice-cream shop might not be open at 8 AM and groaned in frustration at her own incompetence; she genuinely wanted something frozen at this hour.

"Aghh why am I so dumb?!" she exasperatedly whispered at herself. "He's not gonna sh-" Dell felt someone tapping her shoulder and froze up, surprise clutching her heart for a moment, before she spun around into the welcoming gaze of the dalmatian she had met last night.

"Hello puppy!" he said in an excited tone. She was speechless for a moment, trying to grasp the concept of what words were, before finally speaking.

"He-Hello!" Dell had sweat pouring down her face from the sudden surprise, and her mouth was wide open, with the sides of her lips pursed into an awkward smile as she searched for more things to say to the taller dog.

He waited for a moment, smile sustaining but fading as they both stood there waiting for the other to say something.

Patches broke the silence. "Riveting." He rolled his eyes. "Class starts in ten minutes, so you had better hurry up and tell me what you wanted me out here for." Patches took up a spot in the doorway of the parlour, finding the solid sides to the entrance proving a good enough cover just in case anyone coming down the street might spot him.

"Well... I... uh..." She had a lot to say, but he was right; there was barely any time to do it before she had to be in homeroom. "Okay, okay, so, your.. uh... friends? They told me what happened and... even if what they said is true, I don't think I can forgive them. Or, I mean, her."

Dell watched as the dalmatian maintained his jovial demeanour, leaning against the door while looking at a nonexistent watch.

"I mean, I don't think most people at the school remember that the black cat killed them, and I don't think they remember you were the one that brought them back, but I do."

Dell closed her eyes, body shaking, as her thoughts went back to the fateful day where the school's halls were filled with screams and splatters, remembering Mrs. Aussiepom scrambling for the door's lock as a ghostly paw cut through the door, slicing her head clean in two, and terrifying the room.

As it floated past her corpse, its disfigured face stared down the nearest student, screaming in gibberish as it cleanly clawed through their attempt at retaliation with a desk chair. Many of the students thought to flee or hide, but there was nowhere to go in the small, cramped room, and Dellanor simply watched wide-eyed as all the classmates she had known were cut into pieces. She barely registered a paw grabbing her by the arm and tugging her out of the way of one of the ghosts.

"Of course, I died in a classroom, but... one of... my only friend, Cujo, grabbed me and ran behind the teacher's desk, he told me to stay still, and then..."

Patches was still listening, mostly, but was counting the seconds leading down to the ten-minute mark. This dog was exceedingly slow at telling her story and glanced off towards nowhere occasionally. He could only grin as she told her story.

"The ghosts slashed through everyone in the room. Some of them tried running for the door, but something was holding it shut from the outside. I- I remember crying, I was terrified- a ghost barreled past the door, it was so fast- I-" The dog frowned, lifting up her right arm and clutching her chest with the paw. "Cujo pushed me out of the way of it. He was just-" She was shaking now, and she brought her left paw up to her chest as well, clutching her heart as her arms shook. "The ghost collided with the desk we were hiding under, and it... the desk exploded into bits and pieces, all over me. I couldn't move, and I was buried for... I don't know how long. It took such a long time, and I couldn't even scream. Once everyone was dead... the door opened, and that- that thing, that cat-"

Patches interjected. "Her name is Coco." He gestured so as to get Dell to speak quicker. "Not to be unsympathetic, but could you hurry this up, please?"

Dell frowned and nodded at Patches with fear-filled eyes. "C-Coco held the... bodies, of everyone up for the ghost to see. She held his and... everyone else's. One of the ghosts came up beside her, it looked different, and I think they spoke... they couldn't see me under all the rubble, but I saw Coco's face. I can't forget it."

She remembered the charging ghost that tore through her classmates and blew apart the desk she was hiding under. Cujo shoved her out of the way of the spirit an instant before it bashed into him, blasting his right arm off of his body at the socket from the sheer force of the impact.

The rest of him landed somewhere in the center of the room, screeching in agony before the golden fell limp, his face frozen in shock as he passed. Wedges of wood slammed into Dell's eye but failed to penetrate through her clothing as she was sent crashing into a cabinet behind the desk.

Dell was overwhelmed with awful sensations all over her body as her bones cracked and snapped this way and that. Blood and viscera coated her liberally, hiding her from the ghosts of the room.

She didn't remember the pain at first, but the weight of ten dog's limbs crashing down on her soon after caused her to silently yelp out in agony as she felt blood rush to her neck, slowly bleeding her out from the cut in one of her veins.

She couldn't feel her right leg, and her left was in so much pain; it was unbearable. It felt like the weight had bashed her arms backward, and the arrow-sized splinter in her left eye was the crown jewel above the rest- ruining her nerves and confusing her as she tried to see out of it, wiggling it around, allowing more wood to penetrate the flimsy thing.

"She killed Cujo, killed him like it was nothing... I think it took all day for me to die, and all I had to look at was my only friend's corpse, and all I could feel was... awful..." Dell gritted her teeth and clenched her paws tight, shaking lightly. "And... then when I tell people what happened, nobody remembers her. She did something to everyone's memory, I know she had to have."

Patches considered the dog's words for a moment. She was full of fear and incapable of stringing together a sentence without nearly devolving into tears. He tilted his head down and shut his eyes, primarily out of sleepiness, but also so he could focus more on processing the vengeance-fueled words.

Much like Angel, the dog had remembered just the barest hint of her killer's identity. It seemed that the events on Halloween and the night prior had jumpstarted her memory, allowing her to recall everything that had happened to her.

"... Uh, what's that on your head?" Dell asked, pointing.

Patches' eyes went wide, and he quickly had one of his paws reach up to rip off the child's band-aid from his forehead that he had forgotten the night before. He hadn't moved so dexterously in his whole life. Immediately, blood welled up around the ripped scab, but it didn't bleed for more than a second.

Patches kept his frown, opting not to mention the pastel-coloured thing at all and merely blushing a bit through his fur before he coughed to break the sudden tension. "Well, here I had thought you were going to ask me for a date," he brought a paw up to his face to hide the growing smirk. "I didn't know my stalker wanted revenge! And so keen too- I'm not exactly sure how you remember who Coco is, but if the rest of the school did, they'd be thanking you for taking care of her."

"Hey, this is serious! She t-traumatized me! My dad nearly hung himself when I didn't come back home from the massacre, and she hurt me- hurt me a lot... I don't know if we can really trust one another, but I know you were the person who brought me back, and you fixed me when you could've easily not. Please... just cut the jokes."

She was on the verge of tears, but before they could fall, the dalmatian had lightly grabbed her by the arm and started calmly walking them both down the road to Hachiko High. To her, it was a sign of decisive empathy.

"What- where are we going?!"

"Where do you think? You've got a class to catch." Patches said, nearly chuckling at the ease of which this dog fell into his lap. She was unaware of his true nature, unaware of his ultimate plot, and far too trusting. "If you listen to me, I'll make sure you get what you're looking for."

Chapter Text

Dellanor shuffled into the school, squeezing past the heavy doors so she didn't exhaust herself shoving the things open. She was a little bit late now, but that didn't seem to matter as two tarrying dogs were sitting next to an open locker just across from the doorway instead of attending the assembly.

They watched her with contempt before continuing their conversation. She walked past them, further down the hallway, and noted just how empty everything was; there wasn't a single soul in the corridor or the adjacent classrooms.

She thought about turning around to ask the pair where everyone was but decided against speaking to anyone, instead going over the plan in her head again.

Dellanor brushed past a lingering piece of warning tape hanging off the ceiling and turned to the right, heading for the gym now. She figured if the school's population was hidden anywhere, it was in the only room big enough to host the occasional school announcement.

Dell opened the door to the gym, hoping her hoodie or backpack wouldn't get her in trouble for uniform violation. She peeked her head in first, trying to see who was there and finding the masses of cross-legged students, but no sign of her friend.

Thinking she had just missed him, she went over the crowd again, looking for the golden retriever amongst the group of students raptly listening to the principal announcing something about the schedule for the week being altered.

"Dell?" She heard a voice behind her from as far down the hall as one could be; and turned on her heel to see the face of her friend, lovely and lively.

"Cujo!" she breathlessly whispered, moving towards him with a dash. The lightly coloured golden retriever seemed to pause with indifference while Dell ran over. She grabbed him with a hug, her cheeks warming in glee as she nearly ripped his blue and white uniform; his stoic eyes looked down at the junior.

"Oh! Sorry." Dell backed up sooner than she would've liked, bringing a paw to her cheek and looking around, nervous at having gotten so close to him.

Cujo suddenly appeared a bit nervous, instantly telling Dell that the hug was a step too far
Cujo suddenly appeared a bit nervous, instantly telling Dell that the hug was a step too far. "... Don't worry about it. Let's just head into the assembly, yeah?" the golden replied. "We can catch up later; I'm just really glad to see you're alright." His voice was as calm as ever, with a tiny spark of jubilation that only she could detect.

"Sorry- I..." She thought about asking if she could hug him again, but she knew how something like that might turn out.

"Hey, I said it's fine, alright? We just survived some..." he chuckled, "some, just, complete nonsense! You're allowed a hug."

"Sorry, I'm just really, really glad you're okay," Dell said, fiddling with the strings on her hoodie and staring at the ground, half-smiling at the residual warmth of his body.

"Yeah, likewise; I've had a lot of friends to worry about, some haven't even come back from the forest yet, and I'm kinda worried about them." He paused to scratch at his coal-black nose, letting his paw rake through the fur on his happy face before he went back to gesturing with it.

"Actually, some of the seniors and their parents are planning on searching for the lost students. You should come with us; you'd really get to help someone."

"Oh!" Dell went from being happy and proud to ashamed in an instant. Her eyes curled towards the floor, and her joyful blush faded. "I'm... I joined a club, so I might not be able to do that today, sorry."

"Art club?" Cujo asked nonchalantly. He actually seemed to perk up at the news, smiling more genuinely and looking Dell in the eyes.

Dell didn't seem to recognize either word for a moment as her thoughts drifted to what Patches had suggested she do. She simply nodded at the golden retriever, who seemed to pick up her suddenly dour mood.

Cujo cocked an eye, "What's wrong?"

"Oh- um- I..." Dell stuttered out, trying to think up another lie she could protect him with. "I'm just nervous my drawings won't be... good, I guess."

Cujo looked at her with puppy dog eyes, making a pouty face as he stared her down. He looked like he was about to start crying, almost. "Dell, I've said for years that you should get into something like that." He made his face less cute and more dejected as he shrugged. "I mean, not to offend you, but, if you're going to doodle instead of study, you should make it something you can turn into a career, right?"

Dell's chest panged with guilt. Not only did she feel awful about lying to him, but knowing she had wasted so much of her time playing games and making shitty 'drawings' crumpled up her heart. She hated how he reminded her of that, but it was the truth, and he was wise enough to state what Dell tried to ignore for as long as she could. She rubbed at her shoulder, looking to the floor in silence.

"Hey?" Cujo said, waving his hand in front of Dell's face to bring her gaze back to his. "Remember what I always say?"

The question sounded rhetorical, and Dell felt ashamed as she thought of the proverb he had suggested she follow dozens of times before.

"Hey?" he prodded.

"Something about... trying being more important. I know."

"Trying and failing is more important than not trying at all, but, I know you'll be able to make both of us proud with the stuff you'll make, so there's no need to worry about that, yeah?"

"I guess."

Cujo simply stared at the terrier as she turned her head to the side again, avoiding eye contact at all costs. Anxiety was welling up in her chest as she thought about what she was doing, which only doubled as she imagined what it might be like to actually join an art club, just to get embarrassed and ridiculed. Cujo was the only one who believed it had any worth at all- he saw potential where there was none; that's what she loved about him.

Cujo sighed. "Well, I don't know what to tell you then. Just please make sure to actually go to it, okay?"

Dell nodded.

"Alright, let's just head in. We can talk at lunch," Cujo said, turning to face the open gymnasium and walking in ahead of Dell.

Dell shot her arm out, not entirely summoning up the courage to grab Cujo by his sleeve; instead, she stopped it an inch away from his arm, stopping him before he could fully pass by her. "Wait- you heard what happened, right?"

The golden looked up at the ceiling, placing either paw on his hips and sighing. "I don't really know what you mean by that."

Dell grit her teeth. "The massacre?!"

"Yeah, of course. Dell, let's just-"

Dell clutched at the air, angling her arms and raising her voice to a harsh whisper. "So then why aren't you mad?! A cat came into our school, killed everyone here, and got away with it."

Cujo groaned. "Look, Dell, the rest of the school is fine with getting along with the cats that helped us. I know you're really not comfortable with that, but everyone else is just fine with them, so just please calm down."

Dell decided to get to the point. She couldn't bear the thought of Cujo not knowing what had happened. Even if he didn't believe her now, once she had Coco captured, she could admit to all of her misdeeds, and everyone would know her as the monster she was. "There's a cat named Coco who was just at the school yesterday, she's the one who killed everyone here. If you just believe me, I can prove it- we can do this together!"

Cujo looked at Dell like she was crazy, eyebrow cocked, leaving an uncomfortable silence between the two. A single bead of sweat formed on Cujo's forehead, and he grumbled something under his breath.

"... Are you sure you're remembering properly? I spoke to Coco myself last night; I'd be really surprised if she's responsible. There's a dalmatian running around killing people. I bet he's the one who caused this whole mess, yaknow?"

"How do you know that?! Do you not remember what she did to you?"

Cujo closed his eyes, exhaled, and responded. "No, I don't. She's one of the nicer people I've spoken to. Besides, why would she be trying to help people find their way out of the woods if she wanted to kill all of us?"

"Why? Why believe her and not me?"

"It's not that, Dell, its- Just what gives you the idea she's a murderer? Sure, it's a bit weird a cat is helping out dogs, but we know she's done good for us, and everyone's mostly cool with it now. Just because she's a cat doesn't mean-"

"It's not about cats! You don't get it- that... Coco, she killed all of us. It takes longer than a week for a genocidal maniac to change; I don't trust her at all." She wildly gestured for the dog's attention. "I can prove it- I can prove she did all that!"

Cujo crossed his arms, "Okay, where's your proof?"

"Well... I can't- there's no hard evidence yet, but- if you just trust me, we can both expose her, we'll be heroes for saving the school from her. Please-"

Cujo sighed, trying to move past Dell, who stopped him with a wave of her paw.

"Why aren't you listening to me? I'm serious!" Dell demanded.

Cujo's voice portrayed his total dismissal of the topic, "I know you are Dell, but this sounds like a big conversation, and I don't want to be anymore late than I already am. We'll talk at lunch, alright?"

Cujo was clearly getting annoyed, and his particular word choice shut Dell up. She simply went back to sulking for a moment, then let him pass by wordlessly.

She felt like tearing up and reached for her booklet to vent her feelings, only to remember Patches still had it. Speaking of the dalmatian, she needed to head to the library and hope it was still open.

As she turned around, Dellanor only then just noticed the splotches of dried blood sitting atop the space between the lockers and ceiling. She wondered if she was the only one to see the marks of blood lying about the place or if she was just the only one who couldn't pretend they weren't there.

Heading back to the main hall, she saw the two dogs from earlier keeping an eye outside as a peppy orange-haired dog emerged from the library, smiling as he fumbled around with a set of keys and locked the door behind him.

Dell ran towards her peer, trying to get their attention. "Hey! Wait!"

"Huh?" The wide-eyed third year looked at Dell with mild surprise. "What do you want? I'm on guard duty, I can't be talking!" in a light, non-threatening voice. The jack russel was sporting a letterman's jacket, complete with long sleeves and Hachiko's pallet.

His wild, bright orange hair and fur contrasted greatly with the more melancholic black which adorned her face. She instinctively felt a wave of anxiety welling up in her chest at talking to the dog, but the anger she had felt earlier burnt it to ashes before it could manifest as another mistake.

"I'm- I'm sorry, I just need to get into the library; could you unlock it?" Dell bit her lip, starting to think up an excuse as to why she needed in. The dog looked to be a jack russell, and if his stained letterman jacket was anything to run by, he was a sporty type.

She didn't like to stereotype; after all, Cujo was both intelligent and ran track, but the dog before her seemed to fit the stereotype jack Russel terriers had. She thought it couldn't be too hard to trick him; she just had to be confident in her lie.

"Uh, sorry! No can do. I'm supposed to make sure everyone's in the gym right now; just because you're a girl doesn't mean I'll let you break the rules!"

For a moment, Dell stared at him, processing his words and figuring out a retort of her own. "Oh, I know, but I left a bag in there last night. I just need to go in for a quick second."

The dog didn't seem very convinced and crossed his arms while beginning to growl in a way that was indeed supposed to come off as intimidating. Still, even for Dell, it was clear this dog was all bark, no bite.

She took a deep breath, then put on her puppy eyes, trying to appeal to the russell's instinctual sense of dogmanity. "Please? I left my baseball cards in there! What if someone steals them?"

Dell saw she had piqued the russell's attention. "Your baseball cards? That's- who of?"

Dell paused to think of the name of a baseball player. "Uhhh... Babe Ruf?"

"Woa?! Is it a vintage?"

"Uh... sure?"

The russell squeezed his eyes shut and clenched his crossed arms close to his body in deliberation.

"I guess I wouldn't want to lose my collection... I'll let you in, just hurry back out before anyone notices, okay?"

Dellanor nodded, thanking the peppy dog before he unlocked and opened the door for her. She looked around the room, spotting the staircase, and just to the right of it, the supply room where the librarian stored miscellaneous junk, including ruined books and board games. It didn't seem to have a lock on it.

"Yaknow, I've been looking for a few different cards; if you wanted to trade at lunch, I could run home and grab some of mine. Just know I'm a ruthless businessdog, I won't let you cheat me out of a good deal!"

The russell never entirely stopped talking and paced around the doorway, excitedly telling Dellanor all about how glad he was to find another collector and wanting to know if she wanted to play fetch after school sometime, and if she, by chance, had any interest in cars or some such.

She tuned the dog out, instead fumbling for the lightswitch once she was in the storeroom and flicking on the dirtiest, dustiest light she had ever seen. She went through a duo of rotting bookshelves full of half-chewed books and peered outside the torso-sized window leading to the rear of the school, seeing no one.

The sheer age of the out-of-the-way room made Dell wonder just how old Hachiko High really was, and she imagined how a lonely dog like Patches could wile his days away reading the old hardcovers here. She unclasped the frame's curved, steel latch and tried lifting the old thing, only to find the decrepit wood jammed the thing shut.

Chapter Text

Dell smooshed her face up against the dusty window, trying to figure out where in the world Patches was. She knocked on the pane a few times, then knocked harder. She successfully spotted a white and black paw poking out from behind a bush not more than twenty meters from the school, waving wildly.

"Hey, are you banging on something in there?"

"I... n-"

"If you break something, the captain isn't going to let me off the hook!"

Dellanor started searching for something to pry the window open. She saw Patches look left and right, ensuring there was nobody to see him. He then emerged from the shrubbery, creeping his way towards the school.

Rover's ears piqued up suddenly after a moment of silence. Dell was deathly afraid he had somehow figured her out by her uneven breathing and pounding heart.

"Someone's coming! Agh! I knew this was a bad idea!" The russell said, pouting in frustration.

"I'm sorr-" She began to whisper, but Rover cut her off.

"Just shush and stay in there, don't make any noise!" The jack russell whispered as loudly as he could, trying to make sure Dellanor was the only one to hear him. She felt the dust of the room compounding her difficulty breathing.

Suddenly, the jack russell spoke. "H-Hey Ginger!"

There was no audible response to the jack russell, but Dell remembered who Ginger was- she was a friend of the cat and some kind of freakish magical dog, with an equally freakish demeanour. In the brief moments Dell had heard her speak, Ginger seemed to only care about finding the dalmatian and little else.

"... Are you okay?" Ginger said, standing at the doorway to the library now.

"Haha! Yeah! Just checking around for intruders! I thought I heard something at the back of the library but it was nothing. I was just locking up."

Patches was making gestures at Dell, telling her to open the damn window so he could climb in. Dell, for her part, told him to quiet and then began to cough lightly. She felt her body going through the usual pains of her asthma. Still, She tried desperately to control her breathing for the time being. Patches, seemingly getting the message, slipped out of view below the window.

"...I'll take a look." Ginger said, asserting herself.

Dell could hear some strange humming coming from the doorway now, and although she couldn't see it, she knew Ginger was doing her life-sensing junk. It was only a matter of time now before she'd get caught.

"Wait. I can't let you in on strict orders from the captain; no one is allowed into any of the rooms without being a part of a class accompanied by an adult."

Dell peered through the crack in the door and was able to see the duo talking to one another.

Suddenly, she heard a noise from behind her and saw Patches trying to pry open the unlatched window with a hand-sized tool that she could only see the wooden handle of. "No no no! Not right now!" she whispered, right as the anxiety of the situation coalesced with the irritant-fraught environment. She felt her diaphragm slow, then begin to seize. She reflexively tried to find out what might be squeezing down on her chest, and bent down on one knee, grimacing as she grasped her hoodie and fanned it hoping to cut the pain before it intensified. She needed her inhaler, although it's use would make an awfully loud sound- definitely loud enough for Ginger to hear.

Dell could hear Ginger's smile changing the tone of her words. "Rover... I was the one who told you to guard the school."

"No, Sparky did."

"He told you to do it after you wouldn't listen to me."

"...Well anyways, you're distracting me from my guard work."

Dell could catch the whizzing sound of something supernatural and struggled to keep herself quiet. She could hear Rover yelping out in surprise. "Hey! Put me down!" Dell barely heard Ginger muttering a sorry before her footsteps into the library became audible.

Dell shut the door as quietly as the creaky thing would close, and the sounds of the two dogs became muffled. Ginger shut her eyes and put a glowing paw out, sweeping the library for life slowly. 'If I open the window, she'll hear me. If I use my inhaler, she'll hear me. If I try to hide, she'll find me. Oh dog, what do I do?' Dell thought to herself, failing to calm her body down.

The window let out a sudden wobbly sound of waterlogged wood grinding against itself as it opened. Patches was already pulling himself up to it and became face-to-face with a wheezing Dell, muffling her voice with her hoodie, holding her inhaler in her other paw.

The dalmatian frowned in sheer anger and quietly clambered the window, stepping onto the creaky floor and leaning across the room, lightly grabbing Dellanor by the sleeves and leading her towards him. When she was close enough, he grabbed her firmly by the arm.

He violently forced her out the window, muttering curses at her before she tumbled outside, landing on the side of her left leg, mostly leaving her unharmed. Patches quickly jumped out as well, landing silently on his feet, before grabbing onto the window frame and using his body weight to tug down on it, shutting it noisily but leaving the window unlocked and free to be pried open again.

Patches wrangled Dell up to her knees, whispering something inaudible to the other dog before they both heard a wobbly, wooden door creaking open and the sounds of Ginger entering into the decrepit room, despite Rover's protests.

Patches clasped Dell's mouth shut and held her arms; she lightly thrashed from the doghandling, and her lungs were freaking out from the lack of air. Still, if Ginger knew anyone was sneaking around the school, she'd probably torture them to get to Patches. Despite her new alliances, Ginger's personality was still one of honed purpose over morality.

Dell's mind swam with panic; the corners of her sight began to darken as she scraped and bit at the white and black paw holding her mouth shut. Both Patches and Dell had their posture shrunk so that they were as small as possible. Patches could only hope that if either of them made no sound, Ginger would throw her magic around the room, deem no one was there, and hopefully not check out the window.

There were murmurs from inside the room. "See? No one in here. I definitely wouldn't let anyone into the library without the captain's express orders."

The hum of magic faded, and they could hear Ginger walking to the window now. They heard a clunk and the wood grinding against wood. The long locks of straight hair poked out of the window as Ginger stuck her head out a bit, looking to see if anyone was to the school's right or left.

She didn't seem to look down, and Patches held his breath, waiting for her to go. Dell's scratching intensified, and Patches could feel blood seeping from the bite marks she left with her canines in his paw. Still, he would not allow her to alert Ginger, even if it meant her death.

She knew she was approaching her limit- a few more seconds and she felt like she'd beat her old record- not that she wanted to at the moment. A sick sense of pride slightly ebbed away the immense pain growing like a timorous blob from her diaphragm, although it did nothing to ease the anger she felt towards the dog holding her mouth shut.

After what seemed like a torturous amount of time, Ginger pulled her head back in and shut the window. Patches heard the latch on the window, making him silently cuss as he let go of Dellanor's mouth, allowing her to breathe and wheeze as Ginger left the room.

"Keep that window closed and block the door, okay Rover?"

"O-okay."

The footsteps faded, and Dell finally brought her paw up to her mouth, pressing down on the inhaler's top with the last bit of energy she had. The pressurized medicine hit her lungs, and she took the freshest, richest breath of air she felt she ever had. The hands constricting her chest were slowly pried off, and as Dell felt the discomfort fade she placed the canister back into it's pocket.

Dellanor let loose low wheezing coughs as Patches ground his teeth against one another, reflecting on the failure of a plan he had just concocted. Were he in there, Ginger and that stupid terrier would be mincemeat already.

Just as Patches was about to cuss out Dellanor, the window above both of them clicked, then shuffled open. Patches held his breath and let go of Dellanor, watching in horror as she crawled forward into the sight of whoever was at the window.

"Hey! Get back in here; Ginger's gone!" Rover whispered to her. She slowly got up to her feet, twirled around drowsily, and leaned against a wall, coughing like mad.

"Are you alright?" Rover asked, clearly concerned at how horrible the sounds coming from Dell were. Patches sat in silence, staring at Dellanor until she met his gaze, at which point he looked away with conflicted guilt in his eyes.

"Yeah-h... I'm fine. Can- Can you help me back in?"

"Sure, I'll open the front door for-"

"No. N-No, just, here please."

Rover looked confused, shrugged, then held out his paw for her. Patches gripped at his knife, stowed away in one of his pockets, ready to be lunged up the orange dog's throat at a moment's notice.

Dellanor grabbed the dog by his paw. Although Patches was able to reach the seven-foot-high windowsill, Dell would never have been capable of performing a pull-up able to get her into the window, especially in her condition. However, with the help from the sporty jack russell, she made it in, making sure to use the dog below her as a stepping stool to hop back in easier.

"Wow, you're lighter than I thought you were."

Dell smiled at first, knowing her helpful step ladder was to blame for that. "Thank you. I-" then her eyes opened and narrowed at the dog. "Wait, what do you mean by that."

"Oh, I just-" Rover scratched at the back of his head, flushed at the lose-lose situation, "you seemed like you'd be a bit heavier."

"Are you calling me fat?" Dellanor asked in a genuinely upset tone, crossing her arms and hiding her paws within the folds of her hoodie.

"What?! N-No! Just grab your stuff and get out of here, I gotta head somewhere else."

Dell paused, uncrossing her arms. "Uhh..." remembering the contingency plan, Dellanor positioned herself so that Rover was between her and the window, then quickly thought up an excuse. "Actually, I was wondering-"

"Do you know how scary Ginger is? I'm already in enough trouble with her as it is. If she comes back and sees I'm still in here, the captain is gonna take me off of guard duty for sure, then I'll never ever get another job ever, and then I'll die because I'll be homeless." The dog's tone sounded sincere. "You need to go!"

Dell stammered out the first thing that came to mind. "Could you flex just a little bit? I heard you're the strongest third year in Hachiko. I-I uh, just wanted to know if that's true."

"I- heh, uh, who said that?"

"Uhm... people?"

"..."

"..."

"Hehehe, well I guess I am pretty strong! Sure, I can-"

Dell's eyes widened as the glimmer of a knife could be seen right behind the dog. Patches, of course, had snuck up behind Rover in the time Dellanor was distracting him, as they had discussed, but no one had said anything about a knife. Rover's words were cut short as the butt of the blade was slammed into the back of his head, quietly knocking him out cold as he flopped to the floor.

Patches was behind him, frowning, as he held the knife in one paw and patted the dirt off of his head and uniform with the other.

"Why the hell do you have a knife?!" Dellanor hissed at the white and black dog, illuminated by the rays beaming through the open window just behind him.

He ignored her question. "I suppose that makes us even; me nearly choking you to death, you stepping on my head."

"You're forgetting about the time you almost choked me in the woods, ass. Now why do you have the knife?" She leaned forward, believing herself to be too great an ally to be stabbed by the maniac before her.

"Why wouldn't I? You know what's going to happen if we get caught- that dog, Ginger, will blow us apart."

Dell groaned in irritation. "Okay. We're setting ground rules right now- no hurting other dogs, I don't care what the reason, but I'm not going to stand for y-you going crazy on me."

Patches shut his eyes and folded his paws behind his back, disappointed. "Dell... you might not care to hurt any of the people here, but these people are all on the side of your enemy. They'll kill you if they get the chance."

Dell growled in her high-pitched tone, baring her teeth.

Patches stared at the dog for a couple seconds, then relented with a dismissive gesture. "Fine. No stabbing, but I don't want you getting all upset until after we're done here, understand?"

Dell didn't seem the least bit appeased. "I'm not your wife you weirdo. You DON'T get to order me around after what you just pulled."

Patches smiled. "Dell... there's no way you'd be able to get through this without me calling the shots. I'd love to see a dog who can barely breathe like you try and take on the likes of Coco or Ginger."

Dell rubbed her throat. She had felt Patches was a misunderstood loner back when they had met in the woods, and although he threatened her and held her by the collar, she could forgive it so long as he worked in her interests. This, of course, was different. She felt stupid for trusting someone she knew was some brand of sociopath, but he was the only one she knew of that would and could get her to Coco. Patches was telling the truth; she couldn't do any of this on her own, she could barely do anything on her own.

Patches sighed. Seeing the look on Dell's face reminded him of the moment with Coco; she had nearly started crying, that was when Patches apologized for calling her a soulless murderer. His body urged him to take back the words, to say something to the dog he had just choked. Still, his mind rejected the idea, claiming it would just be another mistake he would pay for when it was Dellanor's turn to betray him.

"Fine. I'll say it if you stop whining," he said.

Dell looked up at Patches. She looked sullen, hurt, and doubtful when her eyes reached his.

"I..." he sighed, "I'm sorry," he said, despite himself.

Sure, the apology was incredibly awful, but something about it rang truthful. It was the most empathic thing the dalmatian had said throughout their short time knowing one another. The genuine tone was meek, but for some reason, it was enough to ease Dellanor's doubts. She had a lesser opinion of the dog now but knew the teenager who had brought her back to life had some kind of soft side hidden by the hurt of whatever had happened at the school yesterday.

"... Alright," she said, turning around to open the door.

"Hold on," Patches said, reaching into his pocket, "I think I forgot to give you this back." He held out her small drawing booklet for her to take. Feeling a bit more validated in her beliefs about Patches, she took the notebook and nodded in thanks, then realized something had yet to be solved.

"Oh... uh, isn't he going to wake up?"

"... Oh! Right. Yes, but the last dog I did this to was about my size," Patches smirked, "and he was out for a good hour or so; we have time."

Patches stowed the knife and reached for the keychain in Rover's paw, tossing it to Dellanor.

"Go ahead and find the student files. I wrote down the names of the ones we're looking for in your booklet. If I remember right, there should be a big filing cabinet in the teacher's lounge that has all the current student files in there. They're categorized by the first letter of the last name of each student."

"I know, you don't have to remind me."

Patches smiled, then shrugged with his paws stuck in his pockets. "I'm going to put our friend somewhere he won't be a bother." Patches nudged the large wooden cabinet with removable shelves right next to him, making his intentions clear.

"... Alright."

Chapter Text

"Be careful now!" Patches said in a sarcastic tone as Dellanor shut the door to the storage room behind her. She took out her pocketbook, flipping through it until she got to the most recent page. True to his words, Patches had written a list in cursive:

"~ Brownie Pembroke

~ Ginger Claret

~ Olive Higgins

~ Patches Ito

~ Sparky Fritz

(Don't forget your own file!)"

She closed the booklet, stowing it home back in her hoodie, and pocketed the keys with a jingle. She knew the lounge wasn't too far, but she'd need to walk past the Gym to get to it. Once she had reached the files, she could stow them quickly enough. Still, the assembly would be over any minute now, and she didn't want the teachers finding her intruding into the staff room.

Dellanor looked left and right out the library; there were still two students guarding the front entrance who were barely paying attention to anything but one another, just to her left. She waited for the moment when both were distracted, then moved further down into the school. She skittered towards the end of the hall, noting it was about 8:30, and passed by several doorways on her way to the teacher's lounge. The lounge was close enough to the gymnasium to allow Dell to hear some of the announcement. It sounded like the audience was getting up, and they all seemed quite cheery doing so.

Dell checked inside the teacher's lounge, noticing it was vacant for the moment, then unlocked it and rushed in, closing the door behind herself. The room was quaint but quite lovely; a fully stocked kitchen, several lounge chairs and sofas, a gorgeous fireplace bereft of any fire, a coffee machine to the door's immediate right, and- bingo, a set of filing cabinets to the door's left, adjacent to the kitchen.

Dell quickly started flinging open the filing cabinets, trying to find the one with student files in it. After seeing more general documents, Dellanor managed to find the set of files she was looking for. She quickly took off her backpack, unzipping it and beginning to look for "Pembroke" amongst the P section.

Once Dell had gotten it, the bell outside started ringing, and Dellanor's eyes went wide. She turned her attention to the files, flipping out her notebook to double-check the first letter of each name. Once that was done, she paused for a single, poignant moment. She began leafing through the files again, flipping through the E's.

"El, Em... Ah, En." She heard movement outside the doorway and began to rake through the files. "Come on, where is it?!" Once she finally found the file she was looking for, she spared no time in tossing it onto the pile with the others.

"I know I can convince him," she said to herself, shuffling the papers to be uniform with one another, "and when I do, it's better if they don't have his address..."

Dellanor stuffed the files into her backpack and ran for the door. She got outside just as the first wave of freshmen were leaving. She innocuously started walking towards the library. Dell used the cover of the dozens of students around her to avoid the duo of guards and pop into the room, locking it behind her.

Once inside the library, Dellanor rushed for the door to the storage closet, swinging it open to find Patches was still there, staring out the window, with a large wooden cabinet turned around to face the wall, and no Rover to be seen.

Patches turned around and smiled at Dell, expectantly holding his paw out for the files. When they were placed in his mitts, he could barely keep hold of the massive things and put them on a somewhat vacant desk next to the cabinet with a scowl on his face.

"Well, I suppose getting too many files is better than not getting any at all." Patches turned his attention to the first folder, finding "Claret" with remarkable speed, then moving to the next and repeating the process. When he was done, he opened one of the desk's drawers and started tearing, then stuffing the useless folders in, finding it rather hard to do so due to their bulk.

"So... is he okay?"

Patches stopped his frantic shoving and turned to Dell. "Well, permanent brain damage occurs within 15 minutes of forceful loss of conciousness; but don't worry, I don't think he has much between that thick skull of his!" he said, bringing his paw up to his mouth again and trying to look cute.

He let loose a giggle and then corrected himself upon seeing Dellanor's eyes go wide in worry, "Eh... Learn to take a joke, Dell. He's fast asleep, mumbling about how much he loves balls and mounds and whatnot."

Dell stared at Patches, then heard "Hnnrrkk... Homerun..." from the closet and deemed the explanation to be less of an innuendo than she thought.

"Hate to be a bother, but do you mind holding onto this? My pockets are a bit full as is, and although I'd love to make it to my locker for my backpack, I'm pretty sure it's trapped."

Patches presented a plastic bag wrapping up a bunch of medical supplies common to a generic first aid kit. He rummaged around in it and withdrew a needle filled with clear fluid, labelled "TRANQ" in big red letters and pocketed it, handing the rest to Dell to stow away.

"Ah, here." The dalmatian picked up one of the files; "Brownie Pembroke. She's the one we need to ask a few questions."

"... I remember her... What's the plan then?"

The dalmatian raised his right paw, pads up in a pseudo-scholar's cradle as he began to exposit. "I'm glad you asked. We're going to lure her somewhere she'll be alone," Patches gestured around him, indicating the room they were in. "Then we knock her out and bring her back somewhere nice and cozy. We figure out Coco's number, then we use all the leverage we can to run her around in circles until she's easy pickings."

"... Uh."

Patches gestured his head towards Dell, much like a teacher noticing a student with a question.

"Well, why would she know her number?"

Patches smiled. "She has a crush on your killer!" he said, smugly smiling.

Dellanor bared her teeth, frowning intensely as the words sunk in. "Are you kidding me? How- How could anyone love a murderer like her, and a cat at that?"

Patches shrugged, folding the papers obtained and stowing them in his pockets.

"I-I'm serious! What a freak! That's just so gross!" She clenched her fists and groaned in anger.

Patches rolled his eyes dismissively. "Yes, disgusting." He drew air sharply in through his nose. "Well, we're going to need to have a stern talking to her. You'll have plenty of time to vent, if that's what you wanted to do."

Dell looked up at Patches, spite in her eyes. "No."

He shrugged smugly. "Hey, I'm just offering. You look like you'd enjoy giving that dog what she oh-so deserves."

"I told you. I'm not like that- I'm not going to *torture anyone.*"

Patches reached a paw into his pocket for emphasis, touching the handle of his kitchen knife. Sighing, Patches shook his head. "You know what they say about pacifists? They're simply people who haven't had to fight for their beliefs yet." He tilted his head to the side, still staring at Dell. "If you think Coco will let you defame her lying down, you've got another thing coming. That cat killed you, remember?"

"I guess but, just-" She shook her paws in frustration. "I don't want to talk about it. Just stop, or-"

Patches' smile turned into a frown as he drew the knife without hesitation, holding it up for Dell to see the flecks of blood staining it. "Or what? You need me more than I need you Dell."

There was absolute confidence in his eyes, and Dell felt instinctual fear. Still, she knew being stabbed wasn't what scared her- it had happened before, and by the end of this journey, it would likely happen again. Failing is what scared her; she needed to prove she wasn't weak, that she wasn't scared of doing something everyone else was.

Patches chucked at seeing the dog's face go from scared to stoic. "We're a team, right Dell? There's nothing wrong with being scared of fighting, but you can't be a coward. They will try to kill you, and they will succeed." He twirled the knife, putting it back into a pocket with a flourish. "Luckily, you have me to help you out!" He smirked. "Now, how about we get on with finding Mrs. Pembroke, eh?"

Dell was silent. Her tired eyes stared at Patches for a few seconds, before the sounds of Rover snoring cut the tension in the room. Dell memorized Brownie's schedule for the day, then left without another word.

Arriving at room 112 was easy enough. Noone would think Dell was suspicious; though her hoodie and backpack violated conduct, it wasn't as if classes were in just yet. The hardest part of reaching the room was the anxiety Dell felt when she walked the halls, weaving through the crowds of dogs like a ghost.

Something about the halls of Hachiko High freaked her out more than being threatened by Patches. She didn't linger on the thought as she kept an eye out for Brownie, trying to think of something to tell the dog that would get her alone and in the library.

She found the dog about a minute later; she was walking to her locker. As she opened it, Dell saw it was full of drawings, stickers, and bits of clothing that Dellanor hated- too many eye-searing pink and yellow colours, not enough dark blues or purples.

"Hey," Dell croaked out. The corgi was either ignoring her or didn't hear her over the incessant chatting in the halls. Dell took a deep breath, the crowds getting louder by the second as her heart began to rise up through her throat. She was right behind Brownie now.

"Hey-"

"DEAR DOG!!" Brownie spun about, practically falling over from how close Dell had said it to her ear. Other dogs chuckled, seeing her nearly fall over. The rat terrier only then realized just how awkward she was being and immediately tried apologizing.

"I'm s-sorry. Uh..."

Brownie frowned when she realized her life wasn't in imminent danger. "Yeah? What do you want?" she rudely said, rolling her eyes and trying to play off her slip.

"Oh, uh, Ginger wants you in the room..." Dell's heart was beating a million miles a minute. She instinctively reached for her inhaler, using the loud contraption before stowing it away in her fanny pack.

Brownie coughed to break the tension. "Which room? And who are you?"

'Cmon Dell, just talk to her, stop being so awkward!' she thought to herself. Sucking in air through her nose, she opened her mouth to talk.

"Oh wait, I know who you are- you're that dog we found yesterday." Brownie smiled wide, raising both paws into a heroic pose and winking. "Decided to volunteer for the winning side, eh? I'm glad to hear you wanna help us catch Patches!"

"Y-Yeah, uh, I meant the library. She's getting everyone there so we can... uh..."

"Plan?"

"Yeah! Sorry."

"Don't worry; I'm practically fluent in awkward stutter now." She smiled. "Though, why now? Class is about to start, and she needs to learn she can't just keep ordering us around."

"Oh- I guess there's just been a change of circumstance?"

Brownie stared at Dell, seemingly seeing past the lie.

Chapter Text

"Hey Brownie!" The sudden, slightly deep voice of the tallest dog in school was unmistakable to Brownie, but Dell had never met the husky, making Dell feel very self-conscious about her height all of a sudden.

"Oh, hey Sparky," she said back.

For her part, Dell stared at him, then back to Brownie, and muttered something about getting going.

"Oh, where are you guys going to?"

"The library, I think. Didn't you hear that Ginger wants to speak to us?"

Sparky looked a little confused and crossed his arms. "I... Pretty much just spoke to her about 15 minutes ago, right after the assembly. What does she want to meet over?" Sparky looked to the side, punctuating his question.

Dell stuttered, "He- I mean, she found... she sensed someone hiding in the bushes outside. I was just about to go looking for you, actually. Rover is uh... he's working on grabbing everyone else, I think."

"Didn't you say we were going to discuss a change of plans?" Brownie asked.

Sparky shook his head and chuckled, patting Brownie's shoulder.

The corgi sighed. "Well, I guess that does kinda count as a change of plans." She suddenly brought a fist to bear, emphasizing her words. "But why does she want us? I know we're her friends and all, but we'll just get in her way if they fight."

Sparky rubbed the back of his head. "I don't know... she kinda reminds me of myself back on Halloween."

"Sparky, that's because she was you."

"No- Brownie, I mean she looks stressed. I'm really glad she's asking for our help; if something bad happened, I'd want to be there so I could stop it." Sparky stopped rubbing his head, then gestured down the hall. "Let's talk about it on the way there, I don't want to keep her waiting."

Dell, for the most part, walked behind the duo silently as they spoke. She felt awful, knowing what she was leading the two into, but she knew Patches was at war with these people. Patches was the only one who would help her with getting back at Coco.

Even though her memory was foggy, she would never forget the cries and screams of Cujo, nor the sensation of her eyelids being wide open, but the pearl within squashed by a wooden chair leg. She had to be strong.

"As I was saying, I think she's pushing herself too hard, I spoke to her earlier and she said she wouldn't rest until Patches was dead."

"Jeez. I don't think she meant that literally though; maybe just tell her to go to the nurse's office and catch some Z's?"

"I don't know... I think she blames herself for bringing Patches back from the dead. I don't know, she's just been very angry since yesterday."

Something about her body still ached, a phantom pain of her bones being bent backwards out of her body and her lungs failing. She always felt the weight of dead classmates on her arms, pinning her, forcing her to die slowly and stare at the golden retriever she couldn't get over.

"Well then we just gotta make sure to catch him now! I mean, that's what this whole thing is about, isn't it?" Sparky asked, turning around to face the terrier.

There was a moment of silence. Brownie frowned and spoke up. "Helloooo?"

Suddenly, the terrier was broke from her trance, shaken by Sparky after noticing her lagging behind.

"Hey, are you alright?" the husky asked. It sounded so genuine, especially after spending so much time around Patches.

Dellanor nodded.

Sparky looked with pity at the dog. "... You're just a volunteer... If you're scared, you don't have to come with us. You can head to class, and we can capture him with Ginger, alright?"

Brownie looked to the side, unconvinced.

"Capture?" Dell asked.

"Well, yeah? Of course! We're not going to kill him," Sparky said.

"That's not what you said yesterday, Sparkster," Brownie smugly commented.

"Well, yeah, but, maybe I've had a change of heart... at least, I won't let him die unless its absolutely our only option."

The corgi scoffed. "Really? Even after what he did to Angel? I'd give him a good bite just for summoning that huge monster to try and kill us!"

Sparky didn't look so confident anymore. "I know, I know, but... he didn't kill us. I think, maybe..."

Sparky looked down, guilt washing over his eyes. Brownie just stared at him, expecting more words when none came.

"DOG, you're so depressing right now. Why is everything always gotta be so serious with you? We survived the massacre! We survived the zombie apocalypse! We saved one-thousand dogs! If Patches doesn't want to be a part of the good guys then that's his fault; he has what's coming to him."

She paused, confidently winking and letting her tongue tip stick out as they approached the door to the library. "But, I agree with you on capturing him. It'd be way more fun to see him get all flustered in that collar again, so long as Coco finally learnt her lesson and doesn't take it off of him."

"Uh... we're here," Dell said, opening the door, allowing the dogs in, and then getting in position behind the two. Dell silently locked the door to make sure no one would hear or see what was about to go down.

"So... uh, where is she?" Sparky asked, his head turning about as his eyes scanned the room.

"Oh. Just in the storage room there..." Dell pointed at the old, rickety door.

Brownie muttered something and started to fall behind Sparky, seemingly not trusting the room and staying near the doorway as he went in.

"Dog, it's cramped in here!" he said, waving away some dust, coughing.

Brownie stuck her upper body through the doorway, with Dell standing to her side, blocking her exit. Both Sparky and Brownie stared at the window, trying to figure out what was going on. There was snoring from the backwards-facing cabinet, and Sparky's ears shot up as he caught the sound. "Rover?!"

Patches sprung from next to the doorway, directly behind Brownie. He quickly stabbed her with his needle, injecting half the fluid inside.

"Brownie!" Sparky shouted, spinning on his heel and angling his arms to defend himself against any would-be attacker.

Patches drew the knife up to her throat and removed the needle of fast-acting tranquillizer out of her neck. He pressed the blade keenly against her and angled his body in such a way so that she wouldn't topple them both over.

Dell walked backwards, muttering, "I'll keep an eye out..." She shut the door, keeping inside the small room and watching out for anyone who might try to come into the library while keeping an ear out for the two dogs and their conversation.

"No yelling. No moving. And you had better be a courteous guest," Patches glinted the dirty knife in the window's rays, smiling joyously, "or she gets it."

His smile turned into a wicked grin, and he kept his head low, darkening his features while gesturing to the knife. Already, the blade was drawing droplets of blood from being pressed so keenly up against Brownie's throat.

Sparky looked at Dell in anger and disbelief. "You're working with HIM?!" Pure rage was in his eyes; Dell was horrified the dog would leap and throttle her to death at any moment.

"I'll just... wait outside," Dell said, her voice wavering at being addressed by the larger dog. The terrier took a moment to stow away the school's keyring in her backpack, hearing it lightly jingle against her pencil case made her shiver, as if the barely-audible sound would be heard from across the school.

She knew what she was doing was wrong, and she could barely stay in the room without drowning in guilt. Despite her reservations on the matter, this was a necessity for getting closer to the cat which held her ire.

She cracked the door open again, making herself thin and squeezing through the doorway in an awkward manner that had become instinctual to her.

Sparky stared daggers at Patches, who adjusted his grip on Brownie every once in a while, as holding her weight was clearly uncomfortable.

"Why?! Why did you hurt Angel? Why are you still doing this? Why can't you just leave us alone?!" Sparky was almost yelling, but a quick flick of the blade reminded him of what was on the line if he did.

"No, no, I ask the questions, Sparky. Firstly, why the hell are you here? Did she try and betray me?" The dalmatian spat, looking to the closed-door for punctuation.

"What? No! No, she just brought us here; she said there was a meeting with Ginger. Patches, please, don't do this, just let Brownie go. We're not trying to hurt you, we just want to talk!"

Chapter Text

Patches bellowed out laughter- it was fake, meant to intimidate, but Sparky really was hilarious. "Sparky you're a comic. Hehe, just want to talk? Does Coco cutting off my head count as a good conversation? If so, maybe I should have a little 'talk' with Brownie right now, hm?"

"No! Please, don't hurt her. Just tell me what you want- ask your next question." Sparky looked horrified each time the blade closed in around the unconscious corgi's neck. Blood dripped down from the various scratches the knife had inflicted, staining the typically cream-coloured fur red in little raindrop patterns as more harmless amounts of ichor fell.

Patches grinned. He felt so alive, so in control of another dog who could quickly bash his head in given the chance. He felt so giddy with excitement, like all the troubles he held washed away in one fell swoop. Sparky showing up was Dell's best mistake yet, one he would surely 'thank' her for later.

"Hm... Coco's number, do you have it?"

"I- No, nobody does. Everyone is to call me first, so I can make sure nobody tries to... do something on their own."

"Shame, but I'm sure Brownie does, I'd be hard pressed to believe otherwise." Patches winked at Sparky.

"You- why do you want Coco?!"

"Question three." Patches ignored Sparky. "What's your plan for finding me? I've already asked Rover over there, and despite how honest he is, I want to make sure he was telling the truth." Patches gestured to the cabinet for emphasis.

"I-" Sparky shivered, closing his eyes, debating on actually telling the truth or not. Of course, it was a bluff, but Patches hoped it would keep Sparky from being clever. "... We're planning on sending out a search party to look for you consisting of Mitt and Whisk, then Coco and Ginger..."

Patches started laughing, more reserved this time. "Whisk? Oh you poor fools." Sparky looked at Patches quizzically. "Oh, don't you worry, it'll just ruin the surprise if I told you now. Continue."

"... Myself, Brownie, and Rover were going to stick with Coco and Ginger, while Felix, Tigger..." Sparky paused, unsure if he should continue, "... and Angel were going with Whisk and Mitt."

"How quaint. Do you really think I still care about him?" The sadist flexed his knife, showing off its contours as he continued to grin. "I have a knife up to your friend's throat; my feelings should be the least of your concerns."

"That's exactly why I'm concerned about your feelings right now."

Patches rolled his eyes. "Hm... I suppose that's a good idea; I am known for being rather eccentric." He waved the knife about, gesturing for Sparky to get back on topic. "Is that it?"

"No, we're planning on having all the other volunteers stick to the town and keep an eye out."

Patches shook his head. "That's not what Rover told me. What about my house?"

Sparky's eyes widened. "I swear I'm telling the truth! Don't hurt her!"

"Shhh, it's a library." Patches brought the knife up to his face, using a pawpad to make a shushing gesture. "Keep your voice down. Now, what about my house?"

Sparky looked immensely pissed and equally terrified. Patches was sure he'd get squashed by the brute if he did kill Brownie, but that barely mattered to him at the moment; it was so lovely, this whole situation.

"I- We tried setting traps, but they wouldn't work without collateral damage, and Coco's magic stops working when she can't focus on it. We were going to put extra guards there just in case, but... Olive didn't think it was a good idea."

"So what about tonight? Planning on burning it down?"

"Wh- no, no. We're just going to put a few dogs there to keep an eye out and sound the alarm if they see you. I- if you let me go I'll tell them to stay away from your place, I don't want you to hurt them."

"I'm glad you realize I'd have to deal with any tresspassers in a violent matter. It's not easy being me as of late, and I think I'd rather spend the night in my bed than running around and letting out my stress on some naughty puppies."

Sparky went silent, looking totally defeated, signalling the end of the plan's description.

"Next. Why hasn't Mitt used Bapawmet?"

Sparky raised his tail in a bit of shock at the question, almost as if he hadn't thought of it himself.

"Well... because none of us want to hurt you, Patches." The husky tried to force a kind smile. "We just- want to get you to calm down and-"

Patches interrupted. "Yeah, not buying it. Hurry up Sparky boy."

He sighed. "Okay, fine, I don't know. It could be that they can't do something like that, but I'd like to think they're nice enough to not want to kill you..."

Patches didn't believe the dog. He knew what Sparky was willing to do in the past and would likely have done if he knew what the dalmatian had planned on the communal day. The sporty dog kept his composure, but he would fly into a fury should any one of his friends be in harm's way. As long as Patches navigated the conversation with finesse, all would go well.

"Huh." Patches looked contemplative as the first-period bell rang in the hallway, marking it as 9 AM. Patches stared at the floor, remembering something with a nostalgic smile.

"Hey, Sparky? I have one more question."

"You promise you'll let her go afterward?" Sparky was no longer visibly mad, but a trail of sweat let Patches know the husky was still as tense as before.

"I promise I won't kill her, Sparky." Patches answered with the remainder of his dignity.

Sparky nodded but looked unsure if to trust the hostage-taker, despite how truthful he seemed.

Patches looked to the floor, trying to figure out what to say. Words caught in his throat, buzzing like bees in his stomach.

"Do-" He tried thinking of a way to ask without it sounding like how it would sound. "How are all of you? You all seem so tired, I can't imagine Olive's able to keep high spirits after so long."

Sparky shook his head. "You hurt Olive, Patches. You hurt all of us when you killed Angel, but I don't think Olive can ever forgive you for betraying their trust."

"Betraying them? Hah. They made it out fine, I'm the one being chased down by deities and witches, escaping by the skin of my teeth. I'm barely able to relax, eat or sleep anymore, so how the hell do you lot make this about yourselves? You lost nothing after-" Patches stopped himself, putting on another fake smile. "After I fixed everyone. Did you know the Wichiens were going to let all the dogs just die until I let them know Ginger was their relative?"

Sparky looked confused and surprised, seemingly unsure if to believe the murderer or not.

"Figures. I'm not a good guy, Sparky, but at least I'm honest about it," he said in a whisper.

"I- I'm sorry. If that's true, then you really saved us there, but..." The husky paused, thinking. "... How about we just stop this? I realized back on Halloween that this is all just so... violent and unnecessary. I can't believe my life has changed so much over the course of a week, and it feels awful knowing how many dogs and cats are hurting because all of this. Why don't we just stop? Why can't we just forgive one another and forget what happened... eh?" Sparky nervously wore a tall smile at the other dog.

Sparky was hopeful, but it was misplaced childish hope like the sort Olive had. "What, you think you or your friends can really do that? Besides, what you've done to me? You don't deserve to be forgiven," Patches said coldly. Their faces both betrayed their want for the conflict to end, but they both knew it wouldn't be as simple as giving up everything they were and just getting along. Angel and Coco would never forgive Patches for what he did, and Patches would never forgive the lot of them for hurting him so badly. He wanted Olive back, but he couldn't forgive them for turning their back on him when Coco was about to kill him; he could never forgive something like that.

Chapter Text

"We're done here, get ready to leave," Patches said aloud, loud enough for the words to pierce the door.

Dell entered in through the doorway as Patches presented the tranquillizer, handing it to her and hoisting Brownie into a more comfortable position.

"Inject it into his neck," the dalmatian said indifferently.

Dell caught the needle, unsure of what to do.

"You don't have to do this, we can help you," Sparky said calmly. Patches didn't seem to care, and wasn't sure if the words were directed at him or Dell.

"Trust me Sparky, we'll have another talk soon." The words came without emotion, as if it was simple fact the two would cross paths again.

"... How can I trust you? How do I know you won't just kill both of us the moment I fall asleep?"

Patches looked sullen, adjusting his grip on the corgi. "I need her to settle a sort of debt with the terrier. If you're knocked out, I won't need to kill you, how's that?"

Sparky looked unconvinced and like he was about to try his luck at disarming Dell and going for Patches as she moved in between them. Dell seemed similarity perturbed at the dalmatian's words.

Patches sighed and frustratedly looked over to the husky. "Why do you even care if you die? Your friends can completely fix you no matter what happens. Even if I kill every single one of you, Ginger can bring you back as zombies no problem."

Dell interrupted with a pleading stare at Sparky. "I promise, I won't let Patches hurt her, or you." She seemed genuine.

"Why are you even helping him?" Sparky begged.

Dell looked at the floor, hiding her paws in her hoodie's sleeves and twiddling them, careful not to prick herself on the needle. "I... I'm sorry, but I can't forget what happened to me... I need to do this."

"But- you don't! We don't need to do any of this- you don't have to help him!"

Sparky looked at Brownie, who was still fast asleep and squeezed his eyes shut, cringing from her vulnerable state. Dell quickly inserted the needle somewhere into his neck while he was distracted, pressing down on the syringe as he winced from the pain. His eyes felt heavy in short order, and his body slowly slumped to the ground near the window. It gave Patches a sweet feeling of nostalgia.

Then, there was a click at the library door as it came unlocked.

Patches looked over to it, mumbling "Shit!" as he grabbed Brownie as best as he could, gesturing for Dell to get the window. It took the nervous dog a second, but she muttered "Okay!" and frantically spun about. She unlatched it and quickly swung it up noisily.

Patches looked at her viciously, just as the main library door swung open and in came a lieu of students, only visible through the small window in the door's center. Dell scrambled out the window, and Patches slid Brownie down after.

The corgi landed in the terrier's arms, and she heaved with pain upon carrying someone so heavy. Just as the two got through, the door behind him opened, and he heard someone's footfalls right behind him. He reached for his knife, planning to cover Dell's retreat.

Patches panicked, fight or flight kicking in. He thought to himself, 'Okay, this is going to be a longshot, but...' before beginning to turn about and softly speak. "Please, you've got to help! Another dalmatian just lept out the window, he-"

From behind him, he heard the sparking of magical energy and one fear-inducing word.

"Patches."

His eyes went wide, and he quickly spun around, chucking his knife wildly behind him, forcing Ginger to deflect it into the doorframe, where it stuck with a twanging sound. He barreled into her with enough force to send her more petite body crashing into the old cabinet just behind her.

He barely saw her glowing eyes and paw, but the rage behind them was more genuine than ever. Patches quickly grabbed his knife out of the doorframe. Immediately after, he turned towards her, looking to finish the job. Surprisingly, she was already waving her paw about, firey eyes poking through the debris of the cabinet's contents as she began to rise from it like a golem.

The dalmatian let loose a roar and jabbed with his knife, only to have the dog catch his arm. The two struggled for a brief moment, knife hovering just above Ginger's chest before she freed her right arm and began to bring it forward.

Patches quickly lept to the side and towards the dog as a lethal bolt of energy flew past him and into the library proper. Patches lunged for the dog, managing to stab her deeply near the abdomen with a wild jab. Ginger yelped at the feeling of steel scraping against her hipbone and blasted Patches outside of the storage room immediately after. Losing grip of his knife, Patches impacted into one of the old rickety chairs of the room, cracking one of the legs in half and only barely cushioning his body.

Ginger walked out into the library while Patches was still recovering, dust and splinters falling out of her ragged fur and blood from her abdomen trickling out. The class present had no recognizable faces, but the lot of them seemed to recognize Patches.

"It's him! It's the dalmatian!" the lot of them said. The dogs in the room, being the kind that didn't skip literature class, scattered amongst the room, most of them piling around one of the windows furthest from the situation, cowering in fear.

The dalmatian felt his head throb and back sear with pain. He opened his eyes right after the collision and screamed at his body to get up. He felt his paws shakily press up against the floor as he began to recover.

"RRRGH!" Patches rose up, almost instinctively going for the nearest dog, but realizing no amount of hostages would prevent Ginger from simply halting him and then killing him at her leisure. He turned to the largest group of students as she began conjuring up a spell.

With a flourish of her paw, red barbed wire sprang out of the air and tried wrapping itself around Patches, who was just able to dodge it by chucking himself forward, slipping between two of the lassoing wires, but tripping and getting one of his legs caught up in the process.

Ginger waved her paw again, dispelling the wire, and sending out a blast of lethal energy, which obliterated the overturned table Patches landed behind. Were she not so exhausted, that earlier snare would have caught him without a doubt, but it was clear she wasn't currently at her best.

Seeing the potential for collateral, Ginger rose her paw up, barely able to still stand with her wound. The bloodied knife spun wildly, raising up in the air with a clattering motion, then launched itself towards Patches, dodging any obstacles nimbly in its path at the cost of Ginger's full attention.

Patches, thinking quickly, grabbed the back of a chair and jabbed towards the knife rather than avoid it. The knife sailed towards Patches with extreme speed, impacting against the chair's bottom with a loud thunk.

The blade tried getting up but didn't seem to have the propulsion now that the seat of an oak chair weighed it down; assumedly, this was the same reason she didn't try that trick when it was still in his paws.

Ginger's eyes faded to their usual colour as she clutched her wound. Patches took the time to grab the knife by its handle and press his feet against the chair's seat, dislodging it and freeing his knife. When he looked back at Ginger, her eyes began to glow again, and with an enraged yell, she lifted both paws into the air as they lit aflame like torches.

All the objects in the room began to levitate, and the arm-sized splinters of chair and table rose like daggers, aiming right at Patches. The whole class screamed as Patches ran for the window, hoping to leap through it before the entire room slammed into him.

Throwing her paws forward, the dog slung everything near her towards Patches. Tables, chairs, carts, books, and even the shelves were knocked onto their side as the smaller objects flew at immense speed towards the dog.

The splinters roared towards him as he lept through the air. Patches spun around and raised his arms to defend himself, only managing to block a lethal shard of wood to the neck and otherwise facing the full brunt of the attack.

Slivers lodged themselves into every part of his body, and the larger pieces hit like a hammer, breaking a rib and beating the rest of his body senseless.

The sheer force of the attack sent him flying backwards into the window, crashing it to pieces as he fell a good 7 feet and landed on his back, scuffing the blue sleeveless sweater vest he wore as it slid along the fresh grass.

The pain stunned Patches, making him grit his teeth and squeeze his eyes shut. He felt warmth along his chest and arms, but everything felt like it still worked. He had no time to assess his injuries; Ginger's wound slowed her, but it was only a matter of time before her friends arrived at the scene.

Patches got up, paw pads pressing up against crunched glass before he tried sprinting to the right side of the school, but quickly discovered he couldn't move faster than a quick walking pace.

Patches turned the corner and saw Dell heaving Brownie bridal style, trying to shuffle her around while running across grass towards the nearest tree line. Patches kept moving towards her as fast as he could, limping as he heard the splattering of blood just under him.

Dell turned around, hearing footsteps, and saw the swaying body of Patches as he shuffled as fast as he could towards them, pieces of wood puncturing his arms, legs, and chest.

Most of the parts were only big enough to cause some bleeding, but a large gash across the right side of his face bled more fiercely than any other part of him. A carved bit of table, half the length and thickness of an arm, was protruding from his right leg and another from his right arm.

"Patches!?" Dell yelled, already feeling an anxiety-induced asthma attack starting to form from witnessing all the blood leaking across the dalmatian's body, staining his white and black spots with an awful red.

Patches didn't stop, yelling out gibberish to Dell as he closed in with her. Thankfully, he didn't seem to be trailing blood just yet, as his fur and uniform absorbed most of the stuff.

Dell watched in horror at the leaking mess, only snapping out of it when Patches was a few feet away. She realized a bloodied knife was in his paw and that he was frustrated with her lack of movement. Taking a moment to put Brownie down, Dell grabbed her inhaler and used it while Patches limped off without her.

She picked Brownie up and continued hoisting her towards the treeline, eventually making it and taking a break. She watched as Patches seemingly forgot about her, stumbling his way along the treeline, cutting through the forested corners of the town to make it to his house faster.

She hoisted up the corgi again, following the dalmatian with a slightly better pace than before, leaving the school behind.