Gypsy's mind was still half-reliving the memory as she picked up Finn and crossed the road.

I shouldn't have bit him. It didn't accomplish anything in the end. But what else was I supposed to do?

The young pitbull heard claws clacking against pavement behind her and turned to look. North was crossing the road without even looking, her fur buffeted against her skin as the two vehicles jerked to a stop in avoidance of hitting her.

She didn't even wait! Gypsy thought with her heart in her throat, turning on her heels and speeding up into a loping run. Her dislocated leg bucked then began dragging behind her, as Finn smacked against her chest.

The path to the animal shelter wound down several rich-people neighborhoods, and then past an elementary school. A few children and parents yelled or gestured Gypsy's way, but she ignored them and continued on.

North was behind her, tossing threats every now and then that were only halfway caught by the she-dog's ears.

"Keep running- see where it gets you! I'll kill that pup slower than a snail climbs a blade of grass. I'll-" she sounded hysterical.

I've done it now. North will never forgive me for losing Lavender.

And Ghost was right.... This is the only way to protect him. Gypsy's paws stepped off of a curb and into a dirt road; which was quite sparse of cars driving along, thankfully.

She then looked down at her butterscotch-brown and white male pup. The one, single pup she had left out of two different litters.

"Finn," Gypsy said testily as she set the puppy down in another ditch beside the last road. The animal shelter was across the street, visible past the speeding cars and bustle of cityfolk. One man looked over at the two dogs from across the street, then shrugged and carried on with his phone in his hands.

"You see that building across the street? That is where you must go."

Finn turned his floppy ears and white-splashed muzzle to look up at his mother; confidence receding now that he was finally so close to separating from her.

"But Mama, I don't-"

A throaty bark from North cut him off. With a squeak of surprise, the male pup backed underneath his mother's belly while Gypsy flipped around to watch North galloping onto the road she'd just crossed.

The curly black shepherd was only a few yards away, her eyes filled with the pure hatred she'd had for Gypsy since the first moment she'd saw her.

Though the side road, made of nothing but flattened dirt, was entirely vacant of cars when North began advancing...Gypsy saw a large red one turn out onto the dirt path and speed up towards North.

The truck appeared not to notice, or care that North was in the way. As the she-dog's deep brown eyes fixated on Gypsy's with a quelling determination, Gypsy blurted out; "North, wait! Go back!"

But the she-dog was mowed over by the advancing vehicle, her head and shoulder's forced to the ground and then momentarily disappearing beneath thick black tires.

After the dust had settled, and Finn had fallen silent, the two dogs were finally able to see North's crumpled body just a few inches from where it had been struck.

North's skull was sunken in on one side, as a pool of blood slowly gathered beneath it. The she-dog's fangs were still bared and exposed, some parts of her snout even ripped off from her sustained injuries.

With a murmur of disbelief, Gypsy turned away and moved Finn behind her with a paw, shielding his eyes from the deathly scene.

"Mama, don't we have to help her?"

The sound of cars whizzing by began to unsettle her even farther, and Gypsy solemnly shook her head and clenched her jaw.

"We can't help her, honey. We can only help ourselves now. She's dead."

Finn quieted after that. He knew what dead was, after seeing all three of his siblings disappear or meet their slow-dying fates.

As Gypsy was waiting for a chance to cross, she tried to put North out of her mind. It was hard. Am I happy that North is no longer a threat to Finn?

Finally, after muttering about it to herself, she realized that it wasn't true.

Even just the thought of North's slowly rotting body on the road sent her stomach into a rolling calamity of nausea. Dawn had lit up a small portion of the distant sky; but the rest of the world was still chilly and damp.

After I save Finn, I'll go back for North. I'll move her body from the road and bury her. I'll see if she might still be alive... even though I know she isn't.

North hadn't lifted her head, or even twitched an ear. And on top of that; the black dog's head had been crushed beneath at least two of the truck's wheels.

If I don't bury her, she will attract flies and vermin. Gypsy's eyes began to sting with re-surfacing grief. Oh, North I'm so sorry. I never wanted to hurt you or your pup.

As the rising sun began lavishing the land in a golden-brown hue, Gypsy thought she had a chance to cross. However, it was too small of a gap, and she chose to step back and wait rather than taking such a dangerous chance.

The cars were becoming more frequent and thronging closer-together. However, they all slowed down in their mad dashes to who-knew-where. And a few of them even took parking spots beside the opposite curb, unloading humans and their children onto the sidewalk.

Gypsy and Finn watched, but they both turned their heads as they heard the clicking of heels behind them.

There was a woman with her child walking on a sidewalk that was closer to the road. At first, Gypsy took no notice. But then; the woman drew closer. Just a few feet away from Gypsy and her pup.

The woman made no move towards them, but instead spoke with a voice full of emotion into a rectangular box beside her ear.

The flat box was being held by one hand, and her little boy was grasped in the other.

The little boy turned an inquisitive look on the two dogs, and Finn's tail wagged. Finn looked as if he wanted to go over and say hello, but held back.

As Gypsy tried to keep her eye on both the human, and Finn, and the road, she began to grow annoyed. They had been waiting on a chance to safely cross forever, and she felt that they would never get one now that dawn had surpassed.

"We can't just sit here on the side of a road all day," she said as her anxiety began to climb, and even more people began exiting their cars or walking in and out of business establishments.

"Mama, look. That mother-dog isn't watching her pup."

Gypsy nearly snapped at her puppy to stop distracting her, but when she gave a feeble glance over at them she noticed that Finn was onto something.

The blonde-haired woman had let her hand fall from her son's, and was still looking upward as she chatted away on her phone with wet eyes.

And yet, the little boy had fallen forward, off of the curb, and partway into the road. The boy was getting up now- but instead of walking back towards his mother, he began to cross the road by himself.

Without thinking, Gypsy sprinted from her spot in the grass and left Finn where he was. He protested, saying "Mama, don't leave me!" But she was already stepping off the curb, then threw a frantic bark over her shoulder.

"I'll be right back, my pup. I can't let this mother make the same mistake I did."

Nerves spiking, the white dog watched a huge truck roll straight toward the little boy, at high enough speeds to squash the kid flat. Just like North.

Without further thought, she jumped into the path of the oncoming car, blocking it from hitting the little boy.

The car struck her hindquarters instead, even as it squealed to a grinding halt, and blared it's rattling horn. At hearing the awful ear-scraping noise, the blonde-haired mother finally looked up and screamed.

Gypsy was flying through the air, yelping at the explosion of pain against her back legs, flicking them out wildly as they flung above and then behind her head.

Within the span of less than a second she hit the pavement, sliding across it with such force that her shoulder-skin was ripped off.

Her slide did not stop until her skull hit the pavement in an explosion of white light and searing, blinding agony.

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Visualization of the scene