there’s two potential ways I’d like a pet to behave.
There’s the hazy-eyed drugged-out empty thing, who lives in a foggy world in its own mind. Comfortable and sleepy. Docile and sedated. Kept calm by its own fuzzy mind and memories. It doesn’t know it deserves better. It doesn’t know it’s been dehumanized or even was once a human. On some level it knows it’s being kept, but the idea of resisting is so distant and uncomfortable that it’s just easier to stay in the cage, no matter how secure it actually is. This pet barely feels the pain, jolting it only momentarily from its haze.
Then there’s the clear-eyed, pissed-off but entirely broken pet. It knows exactly what’s been done to it. It knows it’s been degraded and dehumanized. It knows what it once was, knows it doesn’t deserve that treatment, and would bark and bite if it still believed it would help. It’s docile because it’s given up, but that doesn’t mean it accepts it. It does what it needs to do to survive. Maybe it fears me, but it will protect me anyway. The life it had is gone, the option to get away is gone, and it will at least fight to keep what it has, no matter how much it hates it, hates me for what I’ve done to it.
I’ve kept you empty for a long time now. I’ve let you be hazy and sleepy. But I miss those wild, angry eyes. So you’re gonna come out of your calm and foggy world, okay? I’m going to make you realize what I did to you.
