Best Science Fiction of the Year

by Neil Clarke

  This wouldn’t do. It was Saturday, sunny and bright outside.

  “Say, Benji, whaddaya think about going to the park?” He wagged his tail a little weakly. “C’mon boy, let’s go ask Jen, then,” I said, and we got up and walked to the top of the stairs.

  “Jen, wanna go for a picnic?” I shouted down the stairs, and she called up to me that she thought it was a great idea, and only needed a few minutes to finish up her work. I went to get Marty ready.

  Half an hour later, we had a simple lunch packed and were on our way, Marty and Benji in the backseat of the microvan and Jen and I in the front, driving across town to Volunteer Park. We played kids’ music all the way, songs about bananas and monkeys and chickens dancing and some guy named Pickles O’Sullivan. Marty talked to Benji about a book he was read-ing—about a group of kid spies who were constantly saving the world from scheming corporations and politicians—and Jen smiled at me. This was a great idea, I thought to myself.

  When we got there, I took Benji off his leash and let him run around for a while and told him to come and find me near the benches when he’d had enough. Jen and Marty and I sat on a blanket, ate some tuna salad sandwiches and some fresh fruit we’d bought from an organic produce stand along the way. Then I kicked a ball around with Marty for a while—he was too small to kick it back properly, but he wasn’t too small to intercept it, if I kicked softly enough.

  When the sun had started to go down, though, Benji still hadn’t returned. Usually when we picnicked, he stayed around, or came back soon, but this time, there was no sign of him for hours.

  “Where do you think he is?” Jen asked.

  “I don’t know, maybe he found some girl dogs or something?” I grinned.

  “That’s not funny. You know, I read that someone’s been kidnapping sentient dogs. They’ve been disappearing from all over. It’s terrible.”

  “Don’t worry,” I said, “I’ll go find him. He’s gotta be around somewhere.” And with that, I left the two of them sitting on the picnic blanket.

  I wandered around the park, calling out his name and looking in any place I could think of where he might be. He wasn’t by the old bandstand with the faded paint, or the new jungle gyms; I couldn’t find him anywhere near the mini-museum or the tennis courts; and he wasn’t out by the viewpoint overlooking Puget Sound. I asked everyone I ran across, and nobody had seen him, though even if they had, would they have noticed him?

  Finally, on the opposite end of the park from where Jen and Marty were waiting, I followed a trail that ran right between a couple of lazy old pine trees and over a small rise. When I got to the top, I could hear a loud voice—a dog’s voice—accompanied by murmurs. I came down the hill, and in the dimming light, I saw a pack of dogs all sitting together in a circle, gathered around a big white husky that seemed to be orating to them. Every once in a while, they responded in unison, with a jolting yelp or bark. It was too dim to see the dogs in the pack clearly, but Benji had to be there somewhere. Ignoring a faint sense that I was trespassing, I moved down the hill.

  As I got closer, the oration got clearer: “And besides, the issue is, humans do not think of us as people. How many of you have ever shit indoors?”

  The dogs muttered among themselves, and then most of them replied, one by one, “I have.”

  “And what happened? Your master rubbed your nose in it, and threw you outside. Do they do that to babies who crap in their diapers?”

  The consensus, quickly reached, was a resounding No.

  “The thing to remember, to understand, is that humans will never, ever see us as we see ourselves. They think they love us, but . . . ” The dogs yelped affirmatively in response.

  “Benji?” I interrupted, after the howls had died off and before the husky could continue. I guess I must have been downwind or something, or maybe talking and listening took so much of their brainpower that they paid less attention to scent, because they suddenly all turned and looked at me in what felt like surprise. Having all those eyes on me was nerve-wracking. Some dogs bared their teeth, growling softly, and I half-expected to become an example in the husky’s diatribe, or for him to order them to attack me.

  But they all just stood there, looking at me angrily until Benji turned and trotted from the pack of them over toward me. “Come on, Benji,” I said. “Let’s go.”

  He said nothing but followed me quietly, and I only looked over my shoulder once. They didn’t follow us but instead just sat there, silently watching us go.

  Laws or no laws, I didn’t leash him. I didn’t even dare try.

  He ran away a week later.

  It was the Fourth of July—Independence Day, of all days—and it was our turn to play host among enough of our circles of friends that we decided to just invite them all at once.

  The scent of grilling meat and smoke wafted through the backyard. One of the coolers of beer sat open, bottles nestled in the ice and left in the glaring sun. Random groups of friends and strangers chatted with one another in small clusters, sitting on lawn chairs or leaning on the railing of the deck. I could hear Jen laughing about something, and Marty was with the other kids in the sandbox, steering little matchbox cars along hastily constructed little sandy race courses.

  At some point, I heard a crash from inside the house. I looked up from the grill, where I was tending to the burgers, and called to Jen, but she couldn’t hear me over the music. I handed the spatula to Deke and went inside to check it out.

  I found Benji sitting miserably in the bathroom. The now-smashed sink, which had never been properly attached to the wall, had been knocked down and cracked the tile floor, and the naked water pipes were broken off and dripping water. The small vase of flowers that sat on the toilet tank had fallen down, and the flowers floated here and there on the water that covered the floor. The vase had smashed into a million shards, too, I realized as I looked carefully. There were dog turds on the toilet seat, and floating in the water flooding the floor. Thank goodness the smart house system registered that the flow was too high on the pipe and shut the water valve access for the sink, but it was still going to be a pain to clean up the room, let alone fix everything. So I did the thing parents sometimes do and regret forever.

  “What the hell, Benji?” I shouted. But wouldn’t anyone have yelled? A new sink, fixing the plumbing, retiling the floor: none of that would be free. “You’re not supposed to use the toilet, dammit! You’re a dog!” I grabbed a rolled-up newspaper from the bathroom magazine rack and whacked him on the nose with it.

  “But . . . there’s too many people now… .” he said, sadly.

  “No, Benji. No. You’re a dog, okay? You’re supposed to do it outside . . . .”

  He didn’t say anything but just stalked out of the room with baleful eyes, to the back door, watching solemnly as I went and got the wet’n’dry vac and sucked up most of the mess. Quickly, I wrote up a sign to use the bathroom upstairs and then locked the bathroom door so nobody would walk into the disaster zone by accident.

  When I got to the back door, I realized that the poor dog had been stuck inside for hours. Even if nobody had been around, we hadn’t let him out anyway. A sudden sinking guilt set in. “Okay, Benji, I’ll let you out. Sorry, I forgot to. Just do your business outside next time, okay? Bark or shout and I’ll come let you out.”

  He mumbled something low, something I couldn’t make out as I opened the door, and he went out into the backyard. I hoped the crowd would cheer him up, maybe. He took off toward the yard, not waiting for me. I wondered, Is this what teenagers are like?

  Outside, Lorna was saying, “Well, now, Benji, you’re much better behaved than the last time I saw you. I almost wish I’d brought my Spot to come play with you.”

  “Play?” Benji yelped. “I’m not a baby dog! You think I’m stupid?”

  “Pardon me?” Lorna said, and I could hear Jen’s shocked response: “Benji!”

  Goddammit, I swear that was what I thought. Not, “Hey, Lorna, Benji’s
a little different from Spot,” or, “Wait, everyone, let’s talk about this.” Just, Goddammit.

  “No, it’s alright,” Lorna said, adjusting her sunhat. “I’m not sure I understand, Benji. Are you telling me you don’t like to play? That if, say, I throw this rubber ball over there, you won’t go and get it? Every dog loves to play fetch, right?” She picked up a rubber ball from the grass and threw it over toward the back fence.

  Benji sat on his haunches, watching the ball roll away. Then, without another word, he stood and walked over toward her, like he was going to graze her leg with his side.

  As she said, “Good boy,” and reached down with her free hand to pat him on the head, he raised one leg and sprayed piss onto her white leather shoes.

  Lorna jumped back, dropping her plate on the ground, its contents tumbling onto the grass. Everyone was quiet, the music a paradoxically cheerful background to the concerned, shocked faces. Even Marty and his friends had stopped playing racecars to look over at the scene.

  Ever the first to respond, Jen rushed up with paper towels, apologizing as she wiped Lorna’s shoes and pushed Benji away. Lorna slipped her shoes off as Jen wiped them and said loudly, “Well, if that’s his attitude, I don’t see why you keep him. He must be bad for Marty.” She shrugged. “You oughtta just have him put down and save yourselves the trouble—”

  At that, Benji started snarling at her, showing his teeth, and Jen searched the crowd for me, made eye contact. I realized I’d just been standing there watching this and suddenly realized this was my dog who was acting out. I hurried over and said, “Okay, Benji, time to go inside,” and reached down to hook my fingers under his collar.

  “No!” he barked, his speech half snarl and his hackles on end. I yanked my hand back as he snapped at it. The crowd gasped in shock. Each word that followed was like that first word, a sharp snap of noise, some frightening amalgam of barking and speech and growl: “I . . . won’t . . . go . . . in . . . ” It was just like how Marty threw tantrums: “I . . . won’t . . . eat . . . it!”

  But I didn’t respond the way I did to Marty. No cajoling, no encouraging, no teasing. “Benji!” I yelled. “Don’t you talk to me that way!”

  His response was a snarl, and he lunged at me again, snapped his teeth at me. I jumped back, suddenly much more angry than before. “Benji, you get inside now, or else.”

  “Or else what?” he snarled.

  I stood there, my mind blank, my mouth wide.

  Then, suddenly, he stopped snarling. He just sniffed, once. There was an expression I’d never seen before on his face, something new, something I couldn’t read. Then he broke into a run toward the gate that opened out on the front walk. I couldn’t understand why he went there, unless to go indoors, since he’d never been able to get the latch open with his mouth.

  But then, around the corner, I heard human voices call out, “Hey!” and “Oh my God!” at the same time. Rounding the corner, I found the gate wide open, and Chad and Anoo on the other side of it, bowled over, potato salad and smoked sausages spilled all around them on the ground. He’d heard them open the gate. He’d seen his chance.

  Chad glanced over his shoulder after the dog, saying, “What’s with Benji?”

  He was gone.

  I drove through the streets that night, searching all over the city. I checked all the pounds, went everywhere I’d ever taken him—downtown, to the beach, everywhere. I even went to that spot in Volunteer Park where I’d found him with those other dogs—the spot came to mind immediately when he ran away—but it was deserted. I imagined Benj out on the streets, running alone while fireworks bloomed above him in the dark, roaring sky. It terrified me, but even so, I didn’t find him.

  I waited a week or so, figuring hunger or fear or loneliness might bring him back to us. Every time I left the house, I looked up and down the street, hoping he might be watching from some neighbor’s yard, but if he was, he hid well. I didn’t see him.

  When I tried to figure out who to report it to, nobody wanted to listen. The cops didn’t handle missing animals, not even sentientized ones, and the pound told me sentientized dogs were inevitably caught on first inspection and sent home. They said there were like three ways of identifying the sentientized dog’s home, just in case, and I’d have been contacted within forty-eight hours if he’d ended up at a pound. Finally, I was left with nobody to report it to.

  But one Saturday afternoon about a month later, the cops did show up. Of course, when I answered the door, I was confused at first: they were sitting on the doorstep in slightly tattered uniforms, miserable in the damp summer heat. Their custom scooter sat parked in the driveway. Across the street, Lorna Anderson sat on her stoop, fascinated, and I couldn’t blame her.

  After all, one of the cops was a big black Doberman, and his partner was a squat, muscular bulldog. Both had shoulder cams on, which I supposed streamed directly to a human supervisor.

  “Good morning,” said the Doberman, before I had time to really think about the fact of who I was talking to. It had a voice so deep and rumbling it could’ve given Barry White a run for his money. “Are you Mr. Stevens?”

  “Uh, yeah?” I nodded.

  The Doberman stopped panting long enough to say, “My name is Officer Duke Smith. My partner is Officer Cindy. Just Cindy, no family name.”

  “Okay . . . ”

  “Can we come in please?”

  “Uh . . . is this about Benji?” I said and found myself adjusting my position. I was blocking the doorway a little more. I don’t know why, except maybe this sense of . . . of shame, I guess. Like if they came in the house, they might, what, know why Benji had run away? They might smell something wrong with us? That it was our fault?

  “Yes, sir, and it’s rather serious. We need some information from you,” Cindy said, half-growling.

  “Okay,” I said, stepping aside. They hurried in, sniffing the air, and I led them into the living room. “So, do you know where Benj is?” Suddenly I felt even more nervous.

  “No, sir,” said Duke. “Has he contacted you since the day he went missing?” As he asked this, Duke thumped his tail emphatically. Cindy stopped panting, as if she was trying to look businesslike.

  I look from one to the other, wishing I was better at reading dogs’ eyes. I wasn’t around Benj long enough to really get good at that. I’ve heard they can sniff out a lie, literally scent it on you. Not that I had anything to lie about, really.

  “No, er, officers. No, I haven’t. I’m worried about him, to be honest.” That much was true.

  “And, did Benji ever express any opinions you’d call political?”

  “Political?”

  “Yes, sir. Animal rights, or animal liberation ideology? Anything radical?”

  I laughed softly, before I caught myself. Duke’s eyes narrowed, the brow of his doggie face furrowing like he was getting ready to fetch a stick. Surely he was just mouthing some human cop’s questions, delivered by earphone or implant. Surely a dog couldn’t actually be questioning me? I found myself wondering whether they were paid to do this work, and whether it was in dollars, or biscuits?

  Cindy sniffed the air between us, as if searching me for some clue, and she said, “Mr. Stevens, we’re concerned that Benji’s mixed up with a dangerous organization . . . .”

  “Dangerous? What, like . . . dog fights?”

  Duke cocked his head as Cindy said, “No, sir. May we show you?”

  I nodded, and she turned her head. With a practiced movement, she yanked a mouth remote free from her shoulder holster and positioned it between her teeth. She growled softly, turning it with her tongue, and the TV flickered to life.

  It was a black and white video, night vision, of some kind of security guard post, with an older man in a uniform seated before a bunch of screens, drinking coffee. The resolution was too blurry to see what he was looking at, but good enough to see he was bored out of his skull.

  Then the door burst inward, like it was kicked in, and someone
entered. There was audio of him shouting at the top of his lungs. He was some kind of . . . a hippie, I guess: dreadlocks, a muscle shirt and tattoos all over his body, in sandals. He was holding a rifle, but he didn’t shoot it: He only pointed it at the man, shouting orders. Drop your gun. Hands behind your head.

  The man obeyed. Then a pack of dogs poured into the room and mobbed the poor man, crowding around him, tearing him apart. The man’s screams were terrifying, and blood pooled at their feet, spread across the floor as he fell to the ground, and still they tore at him, until the snarling and howling drowned out his weakening screams. As he went silent, they began to howl, bark-shouting curses and clawing at him.

  “This was at an animal pound in San Diego last night,” said Duke flatly.

  “God,” I said.

  “Some of these dogs are on file: sentientized runaways. Others look like they’re probably strays that were sentientized recently, later in life. The treatment is less effective that way, but it’s still possible. Now, this . . . ”

  Then the perspective changed, as Cindy moved the mouth remote slightly with a click. The video paused and then zoomed in on one of the dogs.

  There he was, on the screen. My little terrier, my Benji, his furry little face covered in blood, mid-bark-curse, his tail wagging furiously.

  “Is that Benji?” asked Duke the Doberman.

  I couldn’t tell. It was so strange, not knowing. “Uh, maybe? I’d have to hear his voice.” Duke nodded, self-consciously using human body language for my benefit I suppose, and the video jumped forward, scanning through the footage until the terrier was in frame again, and speaking.

  “Jesus!” said some dog offscreen. “Did we have to kill him?”

  “They kill hundreds of us every day, for much less,” said the terrier. Said Benji, for I knew it was him now.

  Cindy muted the video but let it run as a crew of young people, women and men in black and wearing balaclavas, quickly unlocked all the cages in the shelter. When they left, they stepped over the mauled security guard without a moment’s hesitation.