Leave The Monster Alone

At such a late hour, the streets were almost deserted which had to be a given. Nights really got spooky here in these parts and pretty fast at that. As such, it was rare to see people outside their houses after it struck 8:00 pm.

That made travelling at such an hour so convenient for Mark. He opted not to take the car since the tagged location was marked close enough to reach by the foot. And once he was near enough, he saw the gate to the place.

It was the local public school, not a place Mark has a pleasure to visit since his parents had set up a trusted fun to have him home tutored with heavy instructions. He loved them for that all the same too.

"chief, what is it?" Mark asked, his eyes vigilantly taking in his surroundings. The police force was covering the whole of the circumference of the school building which seemed too much in the eyes of Mark, but he would not be the one to actually go forward and burst the police's bubble.

Their part of the town was too quiet and serene with hardly anything for the police to participate in. So, these people could get a little spirited when the time came to showcase their skills.

It was something that Mark could understand very well. In fact, he had been the same when he had first started his own professional career. He had since mellowed down a lot with time and he reckoned it would be the same for most people here.

Besides, most of these looked like good people and not the pranking type Mark had been or still was.

"Nice to see you actually be on time and WHY ARE YOU NOT IN THE PROPER GETUP?" the yelling caused some of the people nearby to cover their ears at its loudness. Even Mark winched at the loud volume before he adjusted.

To be fair, he did not think he had enough time to change and to still be here on time, but he was not going to tell chief this was the reason he was in shorts and not the recommended track pants inside the field.

"Hey, nothing wrong with looking dashing, is there? Maybe you should invest in fashion too so that you're not so grumpy all the time" Mark could see that his comment was not appreciated at all. The other looked like he was ready to burst their cover at any time which almost drew a chuckle out of Mark.

Really, the chief was much too easy to tease and much too angry to not have any fun while doing it. He had a feeling that someone else was supposed to be here as well.

"W-what should we do now?" The newcomer asked, his eyes shifting from side to side as if looking for an escape. But escape from what exactly Mark was not sure.

Currently, they were on the outside of the fence with their target inside the fence. They were as safe as they could ever be.

"Right, can you get me caught up with this situation here? I'm afraid I don't know too much here" Mark turned his attention toward the newcomer on his side. The person went red due to all the unwanted attention but still somehow managed to pull himself together to give out the report.

"We are not sure how to proceed to actually keep that thing down" one of them confessed and the other agreed with the first.

Why would these people not follow instructions? It was not that tough.

"What? Are you afraid now? If what? It's just a dog. Fine then, let me be the one to throw the net down while you assist" Mark knew that people wanted to protest because he was essentially a civilian case here.

But most of the people in the force were cowards who were there just to get enough money to live a good enough life and not seriously to improve other's lives. Of course, they would sit back and let others handle the problem if they could.

Mark took the net out of his bag and made his way toward the fence toward the guard who hopefully knew where their target was headed.

"Do you know where the target is?" Mark asked an older guard who saluted the vet as soon as he was in visual range. There was a clear confusion at the net in his hand, but the person just marked it up as a personal whim of the vet, did not ask many questions.

"We have a tracker on him which tracks its location. It's headed this way and will be here in five minutes" that was good news for Mark's plan. If he was successful this time, then that would mean having an early night for once.

That would be a miracle with all the animals he had to deal with day in and day out. Mark could not wait for this all to be over.

"Good, keep me posted on all the progress" the guard shook his head as Mark climbed the nearest tree to the fence with a thick enough branch to support his weight over the fence's other side.

There was a gunshot and then barking steps followed toward his direction fast. Mark knew those sounds. They sounded like a terrified and defensive dog. The gunshot had scared it enough to get it moving.

He could make out the shape in the distance and as soon as the shadow was near enough, the net left his hand.

It landed on the shadow but there was a moment inside the net that made it seem as if the shadow would dialogue the net at any time.

"Don't let it escape. Keep it down, fast" Mark muttered loud enough for people in the vicinity to hear him loud and clear. It snapped people out of their trance as they hurried up and secured the net.

The dog was still barking viciously, the huffs clear inside Mark's ears. They were rough and had enough gruff to them to make Mark winch at the tone being used. The dog was clearly angry at being restrained and under no circumstances did it look to be calming down.

"Down now, you're safe" Mark tried to calm down the terrified dog, but his soft and warm words were having no effect. In fact, it seemed to be agitating the dog a lot as there was a terrifying moment inside the net.

"Don't let go" the net shook as the dog's body pulsed with every jolt. Mark fought to keep his calm in the situation, his mind moving a mile per minute. The dog was obviously terrified and quite possibly hurt too.

He needed to have a look at it but not like this. If he forced it, then the dog might hurt someone in its haste.

"Someone, get me my bag. Hurry" Mark called out to the nearest person who irked and nodded before leaving to retrieve his bag from the back. Meanwhile, Mark took in deep breaths to calm his nerves down.

He had been in this situation too many times and he knew what it called for. For calm nerves and steady hands to work their wonder at the situation.

"Here doctor" Mark took the bag with a grateful smile. He could see that almost everyone present on the site was nervous and it made him tense too. It wasn't a good atmosphere to be in and for a second Mark thought to pull a joke on everyone.

But then thought better in this situation. Somehow, the atmosphere looked too delicate to joke around in.

The gloves were the first thing he took out and did along with the surgery mask. Taking the injection out of the bag along with the right syringe, he dipped a cloth into the sterilizer before wiping the tip of the syringe with the cloth.

Pulling the syringe's bottom, he filled it up carefully and checked the filling for any air gap by pressing the backside of it. Once everything looked to be in order, he carefully removed the side of the net to get access to the dog's leg.

With a cotton applying pressure at the junction, Mark quickly pulled the syringe out of the leg. The dog howled at the small pain and it seemed to agitate him again with the thrashing.

But the injection's effect seemed to be visible as the dog lost more and more vitality fast. Soon it was asleep.

"You can let the net go now. What are you going to do with it anyway? It's too feral for human settlement?" Mark was at least sure they were not going to kill the dog. They won't have gone through this much problem if that was the case.

"W-we don't know. The higher-ups will decide" Mark had no idea why they were to involve higher-ups in a rabid dog case but he would not question their customs. He had his own problems to deal with after all and no time to indulge in their small trifles.

"Ok, just make sure you proceed with the right paperwork for it with me.. Also, deliver my working fees to me tomorrow alright?" the scene going back seemed nostalgic and Mark suddenly felt afraid of reaching his home.