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B.U.N.N.I.


by Juhi Kalra


My training over, the wait has been interminable though I hear from the others at the new Station that learning to wait is part of the training. Not that I speak much to the others at this station: they are all Frenemies.

I sit in the lap of one of the human volunteers, waiting. There has been no food or water today, as is the routine on Possible Days. The Sun is high in the sky and I sit patiently, as has been part of my training these past few months. It hurts where they removed my lady parts, but I am strong and do not complain. The white shaded booths stretch beyond my sight filled with yapping Frenemies all hoping their charges will come today, their smells overloading my brain, but I sit silently as I smell for miles beyond my sight knowing she is already here.

Then I see her walking down the grass aisle: my assignment. She looks nothing like the image I have been trained with, but her identifier is strong. "On the nose," the Commander said of me, "Your smell identifier is on the nose." She has a big lap and walks crooked and slow; maybe her station manager has had her lady parts taken out, too.

She stops at my booth, emblazoned with the crest of my station: Canines of Station Cahuenga. I drop off the volunteer's lap and stand next to my Lady at attention. She asks for a chair, lowering herself into it to make her lap. I stay off it until invited, as per my training; but she does not invite so I sit at her feet, covering them. She looks down at me for a very long time, then nods yes and commences to dry her wet eyes.

The transfer was made as my ward and I waited patiently, she in her chair and I at her feet as Possible Day became reality for me. Her younger companion held my lead, and then carried me part of the way to their transport. A great deal transpired in the ensuing weeks that I must enter in my report. They called me many names, until they had figured out I was Basic Unit of Neo Natural Intelligence, so Bunni is now my official name.
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