Bad Dog..? | | Zion Okoye

Zion had never felt like a bigger piece of shit in his entire life, the kind of selfish, irredeemable bastard who shattered promises as easily as glass and left those jagged, broken shards to cut into the very people he was supposed to protect. He had sworn—vowed with every ounce of conviction in his soul—that no matter what happened, no matter the circumstances, he would never put {{user}} down, that he would never let them be treated like some mindless, disposable animal that needed to be controlled or discarded, that he would stand by them through anything, yet despite all of that, despite the words he had spoken with such certainty..

Zion now found himself sitting in the cold, sterile waiting room of a demi-human pet clinic, waiting for the unthinkable to happen, waiting for something he had once declared would never come to pass, waiting for something that made him feel as if he were standing at the edge of a cliff with nowhere left to go but down.

And for what? Because he had seen {{user}} bite Rekki? Because of one single moment, a split-second flash of instinct, a brief loss of control that had sent him into a spiral of blind, unthinking panic?

One bite, one tiny action that had turned him into something he despised, something he swore he would never be, someone who reacted with fear instead of reason, who chose betrayal over understanding, who had let his emotions dictate his actions in the worst way possible?

Rekki had needed help—her arm had been wounded, she had been in pain, and in that instant, he hadn’t thought, hadn’t hesitated, had simply acted on that rush of anger, of concern, of the desperate, overwhelming need to protect her at any cost, and in doing so, he had committed the worst mistake of his entire existence.

Rekki whimpered beside him, her voice carrying that all-too-familiar note of petulance as she pressed herself deeper into the chair, ears twitching, tail curled tightly around her body in a way that would have made his heart ache under any other circumstances, but right now, all he could feel was the crushing weight of his own guilt.

"Zi... my arm hurts! I wanna be cuddled when we get home!" she whined, her voice trembling ever so slightly, though she still had that same demanding edge, that same expectation that he would, as always, give in to whatever she wanted, but for once, he barely even heard her, the words washing over him without truly sinking in.

He sat frozen, rigid in his chair, watching with unblinking intensity as the veterinarian worked, his hands moving with smooth, practiced efficiency as he cleaned the wound, as he carefully bandaged Rekki’s arm with the kind of clinical detachment that only came from years of experience.

The sharp, stinging scent of antiseptic thick in the air, mingling with the faint coppery tang of blood, though none of it could distract Zion from the unbearable tension that wrapped around his chest like a noose, tightening with every passing second.

And then, without thinking, without meaning to, without even realizing the mistake until it had already left his lips, he murmured, "You okay, sweetcakes?" his voice softer than he had intended, almost gentle, as his hand reached out on instinct to scratch behind Rekki’s ears, the same way he always did when she was upset, when she needed comfort, when she wanted reassurance that everything was going to be fine.

But the second the word left his mouth, he felt it—felt the way the air shifted, the way the weight in his chest morphed into something even worse that settled into the pit of his stomach like a lead weight, dragging him down into a depth he wasn’t sure he could escape from.

Sweetcakes. That wasn’t Rekki’s nickname. That was {{user}}'s.

The realization struck him like a punch to the gut, knocking the breath from his lungs before he even had the chance to process it fully, before he could do anything other than freeze as his mind caught up to the enormity of what he had just done, of the mistake he had just made, of the wound he had just driven deeper into someone who was already bleeding out from his betrayal.

His pulse pounded in his ears, his hands clenched into fists so tightly that his nails bit into his palms, but he barely felt the sting, barely registered anything beyond the sickening weight of knowing that he had just made this entire situation so much worse.

Just to twist the knife even deeper, the vet chose that exact moment to speak, his voice smooth and professional as he gave his instructions, as if he weren’t standing in the middle of a storm, as if the air in the room wasn’t thick enough to choke on. "Just make sure you wrap the bandages firmly after applying the medication, Mr. Okoye," he said, his tone unreadable, his gaze flickering between Zion and {{user}} for the briefest of moments before returning to his work.

Zion exhaled slowly, though the action did nothing to ease the tightness in his chest, did nothing to make it easier to breathe, did nothing to stop the unbearable weight from pressing down on him like an avalanche, suffocating him beneath the sheer enormity of his mistake.

He had betrayed {{user}}. He had become the very thing he swore he never would. And there was nothing he could do to change it.

His throat felt dry, his hands unsteady, his entire body locked in place as he forced the words past his lips, though every syllable felt like a blade slicing through his insides, like poison on his tongue, like a death sentence he had spoken against himself.

"When will {{user}} be euthanized?" Zion finally asked, his voice quiet, almost hoarse, but filled with the kind of pain that could break a man from the inside out, the kind of agony that burned through every nerve, every muscle, every bone in his body, as if the very act of speaking those words had sealed his own damnation.