Dog

Field record

Dog is the region's best tracker and most reliable guide, based in the Engine's rail-and-elevator network where every route needs someone who can read more than a map. Service corridors, transfer platforms, freight timings, scent trails through metal tunnels — Dog has personally walked every path between the village and every other zone at least a dozen times.

Dog's loyalty is legendary and occasionally inconvenient: they cannot leave anyone behind, so expeditions tend to acquire unplanned passengers, and interesting scents lead to both incredible discoveries and spectacular detours. When the schedules collapsed and the rails began routing travelers into dead loops, Dog kept guiding people out by scent, sound, and route memory.

The Leash is Dog's first companion — the travel partner who taught Dog the service lines and went into the hub alone during an early collapse. Dog searched for years, following a scent trail that moved between rails and sealed gates as if the hub itself was walking. It was. The Leash marks routes with the companion's old trail signs, and Dog's nose confirms what Dog's heart already suspected.

Known associations

• Cat — Known each other since puppyhood and kittenhood; Cat finds Dog exhausting, Dog finds Cat inspiring, and in a crisis they are inseparable.
• Volt — Dog considers Volt a permanent member of the pack, which Volt finds touching and slightly overwhelming.
• Llama — Trail partners with a wordless rhythm — Dog ranges ahead and marks the route, Llama follows at their own pace.
• Bear — Dog visits after every long route carrying injuries they didn't notice, and talks nonstop while Bear patches them up.