One morning in the suburbs, Roy discovers his neighbor's genetically engineered dog off-leash in his front yard. The dog has another neighbor's dead pet pig in his mouth. Roy confronts the dog's owner, a genetically engineered eleven-year-old girl, but she scoffs at him. That afternoon, Roy comforts the dead pig's owner, Allison. Allison is a lonely woman without a partner or children. The dog's owner returns to apologize, but her dog mauls the pig's corpse once again. Roy's wife Connie returns home from work and gives Roy an ultimatum: they have a child together, or she finds a sperm donor. Roy has a strained relationship with his intense wife, exacerbated by his dislike for modern biotechnology; he retreats to Allison and sleeps with her. Roy feels guilty and agrees to have a child with Connie, but the next day he brings home a dogcat — another genetically engineered pet — and offers Connie the chance to practice parenting on an animal. She refuses the gift, so Roy brings the baby dogcat to Allison. That night he sleeps with her again. Eight months later, both Connie and Allison are pregnant. Connie insisted that they select the child's traits ahead of time; she and Roy visited a clinic where they designed a tall, green-eyed, musical daughter who would be born at around eleven pounds. Allison cherishes the natural conception of her baby. Though she assures Roy he doesn't have to be involved, he worries about his two children who will grow up in adjacent houses with different mothers. Allison and Roy chat in Roy's yard as Connie pulls into the driveway. Connie registers her husband's betrayal but says nothing. The eleven-year-old neighbor returns to leash her dog, which plays with Allison's dogcat in Roy and Connie's yard. The neighbor asks Allison about the sex of the baby, but Allison doesn't know, which shocks the girl. The dogcat kills a bird in a single leap, and Roy admires the beauty of the act.