Bebe by Darla Phelps

thing suddenly formed itself into a recognizable knee. It bent, pulling upward and deeper into the insulating layer of leaves and his eyes rounded in surprise. This wasn’t garbage. This was human!
    Tral swore, much louder than he should have considering how well sound carried in the Preserve. He also dropped everything he was carrying, including his government issued, on-pain-of-death-don’t-you-dare-lose-another-one (or so his uncle had told him, although he liked to think that last part might have been an exaggeration—one could never be sure with his uncle) camera. Dropping to his knees, he shoved through the layer of leaves, brushing back the snow and ice until his bit of “wind-blown garbage” was revealed.
    “Oh baby,” he groaned, his face crumpling at the cruelty of it. “Who could do this to you?”
    She was just a little thing, obviously female and just as obviously as far from ‘wild’ as any household pet could possibly be. She was well fed, and although she was also battered, dirty and bruised, someone had spent time and money to have her tiny finger- and toenails manicured into sharp little claw-like points and painted pink. Even without a stitch of clothing on her, it was easy to see that at one time this had been someone’s treasure. At one time, someone had loved her.
    And then they had dumped her out here. As far from society as any Preserve could possibly be to avoid poachers. No, there was no way a house pet became this lost without help.
    “Shit,” Tral swore again, vehemently. He looked around, as if he might still catch glimpse of the irresponsible culprit lurking in the surrounding trees. “Shit, shit, shit !”
    Shrugging out of his coat, he quickly threw it over her, scooping her up into his arms. She barely did more than crack open her eyes, unwilling or unable to drag her head around even just to look at him.
    Somewhere in the audible distance behind him, a twig snapped.
    Suddenly remembering the wild pack, Tral snapped around. The snowy landscape was utterly vacant of humans. He could see the spot where they had been. The carcass was still there. So was the fire, trailing a thin stream of smoke into the winter air. But of the humans, there wasn’t so much as a hint beyond the shadow of footprints disappearing back into the trees.
    That was not a good sign. It would be just his luck to have an armload of semi-conscious, half-frozen pet when he ran head-long into a pack of spear-wielding savages.
    He stood, listening intently, wondering if that snapping twig he’d heard had broken under the weight of last night’s snow, or if the humans were trying to circle him behind the heavy curtain of wintering trees, looking for the safest angle from which to attack. And did he really want to be standing here like a frozen idiot with one of their own in his arms when they finally caught up to him? A female at that.
    Oh no, this was not good at all.
    Trying to juggle her in his arms, Tral squatted to gather his things, saving the dart gun for last. He checked to make sure that he could see the red tufts of the tranquilizers peeking out of the barrel before turning and heading out through the crisp snow for the station house.
    He hurried as best he could, but still her little pink-painted toes were all but blue by the time he got there. Tral kicked open the door. He also just as quickly kicked it shut again and hit the locking code with the end of the dart gun. He had learned very quickly on that while most humans had no difficulty opening an unlocked door, a simple keypad could make all the difference between sleeping in safety and waking up in the middle of the night to discover a spear growing out of his gut.
    And that was providing, of course, that the temperature didn’t drop low enough to pop the lock open.
    Dropping his equipment on the floor, Tral tested the latch. Nope, the lock was working perfectly. For now, anyway.
    Shifting to the nearest window, he paused to shuffle the female in