Our NPO rescues dogs scheduled to be euthanized and works to find them adoptive homes.
One day, members of our field team rescued several dogs from a shelter. They said if we’d been even a day later, those dogs would have been sent to the Dream Box.
Put simply, the "Dream Box" is a gas chamber used for euthanizing pets. When stray or abandoned dogs are captured and caged, they’re given a seven-day grace period. If an adopter appears during that time, they’re saved. If not, the cage walls move every day, gradually narrowing the space and driving them toward the Dream Box.
In the end, the dogs are guided into the gas chamber themselves, locked inside, and exposed to high concentrations of carbon dioxide for about fifteen minutes. Dogs fall into an intense drowsiness and lose consciousness within the first minute or two, and cats in about 45 seconds. Left like that for five minutes, they die of oxygen deprivation. Afterward, their bodies are cremated. Some call this method the closest thing to euthanasia, but naturally, there are counterarguments. Anyone who sees the countless paw prints stamped from the inside against the glass window of the gas chamber would feel their stomach churn.
Among the dogs rescued right on the brink of the Dream Box this time were four adult Dobermans and one mixed-breed black puppy. He couldn't have been more than six months old, looking just like a little bear cub. When I asked who could possibly abandon such a cute puppy, it turned out it was the police who had brought all five dogs to the shelter.
A man arrested for murder had been a dog breeder, and the police had taken in his dogs as evidence. Once the investigation concluded, with no one left to claim them, they were sent to be euthanized. Although rare, dogs occasionally end up scheduled for termination because of cases like this.
Criminal or not, they were raised by a breeder, so all of them were in good shape and belonged to popular breeds that should easily find new owners. Based on our experience, puppies especially get adopted in no time. After conducting thorough physical and psychological checkups, we gave them a proper grooming and set up adoption events to match them with families.
Sure enough, all five dogs quickly found new adopters and started new lives.
...If things had ended there, this would just be an ordinary story about dog rescue. But what followed took a bizarre turn.
About three months later, among the dogs brought back from the shelter by our field team, there was one I recognized. He had grown a bit and developed a tougher look, but it was definitely the black mixed-breed puppy we had rescued before. I asked one of the field team members to confirm. "Isn't this the dog we rescued a while back?"
"Are you serious? Truth is... it was the police who turned him in again."
"The police? You don't mean another criminal case? Did something happen to the adopters?"
We checked our records and tried contacting the adopters, but the phone didn't go through. When our organization investigated further, we found out that the entire adoptive family had died in an accident caused by carbon monoxide poisoning, leaving only the dog behind in police custody. The authorities investigated it as a potential crime, accident, or suicide, and ultimately ruled it an accident. Since no one was left to take the dog, he was sent back to the shelter to be put down.
This meant the dog had survived being sent to the gas chamber twice thanks to us. Or rather, considering he was the sole survivor of a gas accident that killed his owners, maybe he had cheated death three times.
A tragic sequence of events, but it wasn't the dog's fault. We matched him with new adopters and sent him off once again.
A few months after that, the police contacted us directly asking us to rescue a dog. When our team arrived, there was that black dog once again.
The adopters who had taken him in went camping in another prefecture with the dog. On a mountain pass, their car collided with a truck, plummeted off a cliff from the impact, and the entire family died in the tragic accident. The police took in the sole surviving dog, and while looking into his background, discovered our NPO was the original source and reached out to us.
"You're the first one to come back here three times..." I said, petting his head. He wasn't aggressive at all, had a healthy appetite, and wasn't at fault in any way. However, a member of our field team voiced a concern. "Every home this dog goes to suffers a tragedy. Don't you think something is wrong here?"
Sure, it was a string of bad luck, but blaming the dog for it was far too unfair. That was pure occult nonsense. Superstitious tales start from things like this. I argued back: "Put yourself in his shoes. To have family after family die in such a short time when he thought he had found a forever home—the dog is the saddest one here. If we don't save him, who will?"
"I guess you're right... Sorry for saying something strange."
After giving him medical and psychological checks, we put the dog up for adoption a third time. An adopter was found quickly, and the dog began a new life once more.
. . . . . .
A few months after that.
A member of our field team, who had been heading to the shelter, handed in his resignation letter. When I asked him why, he broke down crying and said, "I'm no longer qualified to rescue dogs."
He explained that when he went to the shelter as usual that day and checked the cages for the Dream Box, that black dog was in there once again. Handed over by the police, of course...
Hearing that, the team member admitted that even though the dog was scheduled for the gas chamber the next day, he left without saving him, leaving him there to die.
We had been working toward zero euthanasia, striving to save as many dogs as possible. Yet the moment he saw that dog, he felt, "He just has to be allowed to die"... and refused to save him, turning back empty-handed. Unable to bear the internal conflict, he felt he no longer had the right to rescue animals.
"And... take a look at this..."
He opened a magazine to a special feature article and showed it to me.
It was a written account regarding the murder case involving the breeder from whom the black puppy had first been rescued.
"...I acquired a puppy abroad that was rumored to carry the blood of a demon. He had no pedigree, and his bloodline seemed so mixed that identifying his breed was impossible, but I decided to raise him anyway. . . . . . . At night, the puppy seemed to glow blue in the moonlight. When his golden eyes gleamed, the four adult Dobermans would line up quietly as if kneeling before a king. . . . . . . Before long, a delusion welled up in my head that the puppy wanted to eat human flesh. I can't remember clearly now how it came to that. But to feed the puppy, I began luring total strangers into my home, killing them, and preparing their meat. . . . . . . So when I was caught by the police after killing my third victim, I was honestly relieved. I was finally free from that puppy... My mind was hijacked; I am innocent..."
That was the content of the account. A breeder who murdered people and fed them to a dog. Should we really take his crazy ramblings seriously? Wasn't he just acting mentally unstable in a desperate attempt to avoid the death penalty?
I tried to persuade the team member to stay, suggesting he take a break from the field team for a while.
. . . . . .
The next day, a phone call came in from the police. They wanted our help capturing a runaway stray dog. As they explained, there was an incomprehensible detail: the dog had escaped from the shelter's Dream Box. A bad feeling surged in my mind.
"Is it... a black dog...?"
"Yes, exactly. How did you know?"
"But... how could he escape from the Dream Box? Isn't that device built so nothing can escape?"
"The shelter staff pressed the button to release the gas as usual, ventilated the chamber fifteen minutes later, and opened the door. Normally, there are only corpses inside waiting to be incinerated... but one dog was still alive, and the moment the door opened, he burst out and fled. ...Unfortunately, the staff member he leaped onto hit his head hard and died..."
"That's impossible... In the first place, surviving that Dream Box..."
"That's why we're launching a search even though it's just a dog... but we'd really like to borrow the help of professionals like you."
We held a small meeting among the team members. If we helped the police, it would mean aiding in the dog's destruction. As an NPO, our founding philosophy prohibited us from agreeing to that.
But then, the member who had submitted his resignation yesterday raised his hand.
"I'm definitely quitting after all. And I will assist the police. How about that? That won't violate the NPO's principles, right?!"
We tried to stop him, but his conviction wouldn't budge. There was nothing left for us to do but see him off. We accepted his resignation and sent him to the police station.
Without realizing it, I found myself cheering for him in my heart.
. . . . . .
Since then, we haven't been able to reach him, and no report has come in that the black dog has been captured.
