"OUT OUT OUT!!! GRIFF!! OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT!!!"
I walked over the rise and crouched down to peek through a fern at the next cage. It looked large enough to hold your average pony, and it's occupant was in a panic. Monosyllabic panic, in one teensy word.... dog....
I was quite prepared to turn tail and set off swinging like a brand-new doggie door, when out of the corner of my eye, I saw him. He came around to the front of the cage door and stuck his paw inside. He must have struck gold, for all I heard was a sharp yip, then silence as he slid the latch on the cage.
"THANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOU!!" the big dumb pony howled as he shot from the cage and tumbled his saviour into the wet needles. The cat arched slightly and hissed at him, but the idiot paid no mind as he galloped around the ravine. I was watching this exhibition of supreme lack of intelligence instead of watching the cat, and he was sitting by my fern before you could say meow-mix.
"Ya see something ya like there, Toots?" he gave a snaggletooth grin down into the fern.
I hissed back, "It's not Toots, it's MARLENE!"
"Okay okay," he shrugged, "Don't get your whiskers in a knot...jeezMarlene...I'm Griffon, and that waste of good fur urinating on that tree over there? That's Bear."
"What? As in Bearly able to remember to breathe?" I replied, but the cat only nodded as he watched the dog.
"Yeah, he's a little light in the litterpan, if ya know what I mean....but he's okay for a dog."

With this obvious observation, the dog skidded to a halt in front of us and wildly sniffed the air, "Oh, Griff! Squirrel!!!"
Griffon perked his rather shredded ears for a second, but then walked to where the mutt stood, and took a swipe at him. "NO!"
"But Griff, wouldn't it be fun Griff??
"Yeah, and weren't you the one who also ate a pin-cushion? Remind me the motivation for that stroke of creative genius again??"
The big dog laid down and looked up at Griffon sheepishly and muttered, "'Coz poodles taste like chicken..."

"Now," started Griffon "You are all welcome to hang out in the wilds as long as you like, but I'm going to find my person. She's the first easy gig I've had in my whole life, and I'm not letting up that quickly." I shot him a withering glare, but he continued. "No, really, it's a whole different life when you choose them, instead of them choosing you. I got to choose my own name too. Beats the hell out of being a 'Fluffy'-(me cringing)- or whatever. She reads a lot, and I lay on her books...no more freezing my ass off in the alleys and dumping garbage cans for a living. Besides, I'm neutered now, it gives ya lots of time to think..."
"And what about him?" I nodded towards the great canine mistake that was rolling in a slime patch
"Bear? I dunno...He came with the man. I really didn't want either of them around, but there's just no talking sense. I mean, I pissed in the guy's shoes I don't know how many times and he just didn't get it....He and that dog are about equivalent in their thought processes...oh ye of little brains..." With that, he was gone. A flurry of fur in the brush, and then he returned, holding a small mouse in his teeth which he tossed up in the air and batted towards me with one 6-toed paw.