• “Woof”, he said. “He” being Norman, the sad-faced Pug dog sitting on the parlor floor. There he is, gazing around the room with wet, melancholy brown eyes. He wonders why his humans insist upon decorating their parlor with shades Norman had only ever seen in his vomit. Norman did not dwell on this too long, however. Norman knows well what he needs to do, and he has very pressing issues to contemplate.
    You see, his humans, Nat and Jeff Inkless, recovered Norman from the shelter around two years ago. Nat and Jeff, of course, being the simple humans they were, had not even the slightest of clues that their beloved Norman might be anything more the meets the eye. Now, that isn’t to say that Jeff and Nat were inherently clueless or dull. In fact, Nat and Jeff were a rather brilliant for a pair of humans. Nat was a writer whose prose could make a grown man weep with its beauty and sweeping grandeur. Jeff was a researcher for a pharmaceuticals lab, sacrificing the better part of his life in order to make life just a bit easier for humans. Norman felt that it was almost a tragedy, really. He often found himself thinking what a profound shame it was, that Jeff and Nat could not be higher life forms than they were. Forever they were relegated to their human state, at least until that old staple of humanity -mortality- kicked in.