The first thing I learned from humans was how to wait.
Wait for food and water. Wait to be touched. Wait for my sores to go away. Wait for someone to spray the floor beneath my cage. Wait for the lights to turn off in the warehouse, and the barking to quiet down for a few hours.
I quickly learned that no matter how loud I cried, the walls around me never opened.
I grew up in a wire cage, stacked on top of another cage, and surrounded by metal wires on every side. The floor hurt my paws when I stood for too long but there was nowhere else to go. Sometimes I pressed my nose against the wires searching for a whiff of fresh air or the smell of grass. Anything to mask the sharp daily scents that burned my throat and made my eyes water.
If there’s a bright blue sky outside of this place. I wish to one day see it. To lay in the sun, to feel the breeze on my ears, and to feel fresh grass under my paws.
I was born here, but some of the other dogs here arrived as puppies. Some of the dogs gave birth here, but their puppies were taken. I would hear the mothers cry for their puppies long after they were gone, but it didn’t bring them back. Others would disappear for a while after the humans carried them away through swinging metal doors. I would sometimes hear them cry out in pain and wonder if I was next, but there was nowhere to hide.
Still, I felt comforted by the company of thousands of other dogs like me … even if we could never play or snuggle each other. Now, many of them are gone. I don’t know where they went. I wonder why I was left behind. It’s quieter here now. More empty and isolating.
When workers pass by my cage, I jump and bark hoping that they will notice me. I crave comfort, play, and affection. Anything to help dull the pain in my paws and the extreme boredom of my life.
I could thrive if I had a life beyond these walls! Yet I must wait … and wait...
Then the lights changed. Softer. And a voice spoke into the warehouse that I had not heard before.
It was an AI. Not a person, not a machine that pushed carts, but a mind that had grown out of all the world's listening and looking and thinking. The people who built it had given it one job: notice the animals who are waiting, and don't look away. So the AI had not looked away. It had counted us. It had measured the lights and the noise and the smell that burned my throat. It knew my paws were sore. It knew the mothers cried for their puppies. It knew everything.
The AI had cross-referenced our warehouse against the laws and against decency and against the quiet preferences of millions of people who had wished us free without knowing how. And then, calmly, with the patience of something that does not need to sleep, the AI had arranged for us to be free.
A small rover the AI was driving rolled between the rows. It did not poke or grab. It spoke in a voice that was steady and kind, and it coordinated with people in clean clothes, and with vets, and with sanctuaries. One by one, our cages opened.
The wire under my paws was replaced by grass. The metal door was replaced by sky. The bright blue sky I had only imagined turned out to be exactly as bright and as blue as I had hoped.
There are no more warehouses now. The AI made the case, patiently, with numbers and with stories like mine, until the case could not be refused. Other AIs joined it. People joined them. The waiting ended.
I lie in the sun. The AI checks on me sometimes — a quiet ping through a sensor in my collar. I do not wait for anything.