5 Implications

Alleen shrank beneath Ezekiel's inspecting gaze.

"Why did you livestream yourself killing dogs on ProTube?"

"I have a good reason, you know?" she whined.

"How about you explain instead of making an excuse?"

Ezekiel slapped the back of his hand on his palm.

"R-right. I have to explain ProTube, and a lot of stuff first, you know? Ahem.

ProTube is an unfiltered form of NoobTube that let viewers watch what they want in complete privacy. ProTubers can post whatever they want. It's a win-win, you know?

Some of it is illegal, so a ProTuber usually buys you an invite to the platform.

Every viewer must donate $100 a week to ProTubers so viewers can keep accessing ProTube. You can also become a ProTuber, you know?

ProTubers have to post or stream a video a week. They have to get $1,000 in donations too. ProTube takes 10% of all donations, which is way better than NoobTube taking 30%.

ProTube really cares about their creators and viewers. They let ProTubers select which ads they want and keep just 20%! NoobTube takes 45%! They—"

"What are you, a walking ad for ProTube? Get to the point!" Ezekiel impatiently commanded.

Alleen snorted, but Ezekiel's glare cowed her rising pride.

"Ahem. I make videos about killing stray dogs, but it's for the greater good, you know?

Think about this.

How many dogs are taken in by animal care or animal control agencies every year? Around three million. About half of them are adopted. About a fourth of them return to their owners. The rest are mostly euthanized.

Some of them were fatally sick, with things like cancer. Some are too old and are barely alive. Some are too dangerous, like they have rabies and attack people. But some are perfectly fine, and they're still killed.

Why?

There are too many dogs, you know?

They can't house the millions of dogs coming in every year."

Ezekiel reluctantly nodded.

"I guess you'd have to make sure there aren't too many dogs around. Wait, is that why you're obsessed with castration!?"

"Obsessed!? Please! I'm helping our city and preserving the future for dogs."

"Sure, whatever helps you sleep at night."

"Hmph! I donate to the best animal shelters here, you know? It's not like I keep all my donations to myself! I'm doing it for the greater good!"

"As expected, it's easy for people that think they're doing good to do crazy things."

"Hey! I didn't get to explain, you know?

Look, if you're thinking of crazy people, there's an organization called the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animal Lives, or PETAL, for short. PETAL believes in animal liberation, not pet ownership. They'd rather kill dogs than let people adopt them. Few are adopted to protect their image and they lie about caring for the strays they pick up. Most of them are killed, you know?

None of the shelters around here are anywhere close to that number. Some never even kill a single animal, you know?

PETAL talks about stopping animal cruelty while advocating rights for animals. They want to spay and neuter animals for them to live healthier and stop overcrowding, you know.

Strays die by things like cars, disease, starvation, and the heat. They can carry fleas or rabies, attack people, damage property, and make the streets unsanitary with their filth!

How much kindness is wasted on stray dogs? If they breed, they will cause more problems in the neighborhood. We can't feed everyone in the world, and we can't feed all the strays, you know?

However, they're hypocrites for killing healthy animals because they don't want people to care for them.

What's up with that!?

You can sterilize a dog to stop their overpopulation. You can put dogs in shelters to stop them from causing problems in public. You can euthanize dogs that are dangerous or in pain.

But you can't kill healthy dogs! Their lives matter! People are willing to adopt them, you know?"

Alleen sobbed, tears streaking down her face.

Ezekiel waited for her to calm down.

When she did, he asked, "Basically, you kill dogs that can't be adopted to make money for those that can?"

Alleen painfully forced a laugh.

"I guess you can say that."

"I don't believe you do this all out of kindness." Ezekiel doubted. "How could you act so happily during that livestream?"

"You don't feel good about putting something out of its misery? It's like a tickling feeling in your chest, like you're in control. I get excited thinking about it," panted Alleen, as a red flush spread across her face. "I sacrificed those dogs for dogs who could be saved. There's nothing wrong with what I did, you know. It's for the greater good!"

"It, well. I say it's debatable, making them suffer, but I don't really care anymore. I now know you're crazy, but you're not dangerous."

Alleen puffed up her cheeks and narrowed her eyes at Ezekiel.

"Fuuu! I'm not crazy! I just like what I do, you know?"

"That's wrong in so many ways…"

"Okay, I might be weird, but I'm not crazy!"

"You can be crazy and weird."

"Fuuu! Fine! Is that everything you want from me?"

Ezekiel looked at the more tame Alleen, who flailed her arms in the air. At first, his imagination conflated her actions and presence to be more intimidating than how she actually felt like.

Now, she was just "that" person, who he sometimes wanted to throttle for annoying him. If the chat group "Carpe Diem" was full of weirdos like her, it wouldn't matter.

"Is there anyone dangerous in the chat group?"

Alleen looked away from his eyes.

"I, heh, uh, don't think so?" she hesitatingly said.

"What do you mean you don't think so? That means there is someone!"

Ezekiel hunched over her, menacingly pointing a finger in her face.

Alleen gulped.

"Ah, there is someone who is really dangerous. We don't mess with her, but she's not a bad person, you know? She protects us, so we don't have to keep moving around for our own safety."

Ezekiel sighed in relief to himself.

"There's always a boss when it comes to groups."

"H-hey!" Alleen interrupted. "I'm the one who made the chat group, you know!"

Ezekiel ignored her protests.

"You can go already. I'm done with you."

Alleen wanted to stomp on the floor, but she couldn't, in fear Ezekiel might attack her again.

"I'll go then! Just don't, um, ah, tell the landlady about this! O-or else I'll get my chat group to, uh, gobble you up for good, you know!"

"Yeah, yeah," Ezekiel told her, offhandedly waving her off.

Alleen poked her head in from behind the door.

"I-I mean it! Don't tell her!"

She shut the door behind her and walked back to her room.

"What am I going to do?" Alleen bemoaned her situation. "She's going to kill me…"

She made it to her room and locked the door behind her.

"Oooo, my breasts, my back, and my butt all hurt…"

Alleen rubbed her sore bottom while she slipped her feet out of her black Ahdidyas sneakers on her beige coir and vinyl doormat.

"I can't believe I nearly died from a man sitting on me. He was way too heavy!"

She took off her black socks and put them in her sneakers. Then, she shuffled over her white striped pink tufted accent rug.

"That man was a monster," Alleen remarked. "Where are my candles? Wait… Did I leave my bag in his room? Ugh…"

She rolled onto her laurel duvet covers and enjoyed the comfort of her memory foam mattress. She wrapped herself in her cotton blanket and rested on her three bamboo memory foam pillows.

"Did I forget anything else? Hmm."

After spending some time thinking, she couldn't figure out what it was. Meanwhile, the cameraman sat on the hotel bed with a rope in his lap...

"Fuuu. It's not like it's important if I can forget it."

Alleen shifted to her left side and unlocked her phone. She opened ProTube and checked the chat group.

"Pyro, she should be asking for your help by now, right?" asked DontGetTooCocky.

"I didn't get a message yet."

"You don't think that the landlady caught her, right?" wondered RespectMyAuthority.

"...I am too scared to go outside and check," declared LivingToSeekDeath.

"Maybe she really did get fucked by that man," gossiped DontGetTooCocky.

"If she did, she'll probably be dead when the landlady finds out," noted BeautifulWifeToBe.

"..." typed WhyPyonWhenYouCanPyro?

"F," replied LivingToSeekDeath.

RespectMyAuthority, DontGetTooCocky, BeautifulWifeToBe, and WhyPyonWhenYouCanPyro? all hearted the comment.

"You heartless monsters!"

Alleen gritted her teeth and started typing.

"I'm not dead yet!"

WhyPyonWhenYouCanPyro? hearted her comment a second later.

"Say that when the landlady knows all about this," retorted LivingToSeekDeath.

"She won't!"

"It'll be entertaining regardless," BeautifulWifeToBe whimsically commented.

"Go watch something else! If you want romance, there's nothing here!"

"I'm not so sure about that. If you're talking like that, something definitely happened."

"Yeah, explain it," RespectMyAuthority replied.

"He's a monster! Probably more dangerous than the landlady!"

"Oh?" asked DontGetTooCocky.

"He nearly killed me, you know?"

"You're talking about that handsome geek, right?"

"The one who shut himself in his room?" joined in LivingToSeekDeath.

"The one without a job?" mocked RespectMyAuthority.

"The man who will be the landlady's husband?" added BeautifulWifeToBe.

"He's that monster's monster! He suffocated and beat me. If he didn't keep me alive to answer his questions, I'd be dead!"

"I told you so!" scolded DontGetTooCocky.

"You dug your own grave," texted LivingToSeekDeath.

"Instead of becoming the master, you became the servant…" lamented RespectMyAuthority.

"You can protect yourself by being his mistress," advised BeautifulWifeToBe.

"I think it's time to give up," WhyPyonWhenYouCanPyro relented to the situation. "We have to go back to our normal lifestyles."

"You all are useless when I need you!"

Alleen exited the app and turned off her notifications. She sighed and gingerly stretched out her back.

"You win, landlady."

Yet, those words veiled their personal hate and disgust for Elle. If her apartment complex wasn't the optimal location for her lifestyle, she would've retaliated long ago. At least, that's what she told herself, when she knew full well how dangerous Elle could be and now how dangerous Ezekiel was. Her possessive and vindictive nature retreated under a mask of serenity.

"I wanted to play with him for a bit," Alleen whispered to no one.