Dogs of Orninica Read online

  I just started a new diet I heard about online, where you get to eat nothing but little vanilla puddings for two weeks. I think it's starting to work, I already feel like my thighs are chaffing less than usual. It's a really great diet because you can eat as much pudding as you want, and you don't even need to exercise. You should go on it too and we can be diet-buddies. I tried to convince Bib to go on it with me, but he just can't give up his corn chips and sour dip. Munches on them all day. He doesn't really have a sweet tooth like me. If this diet doesn't work out, there's an all-cupcake diet I'm dying to give a try. Actually, I really don't like vanilla puddings very much, so I might just switch to the cupcake diet anyway.

  The pups should probably go on a diet or something too, they're getting as big as Bib. I keep trying to talk them into eating healthier, but they get all embarrassed the moment I bring it up and leave the room. If I had more time, I'd make them packed lunches to take to school instead of letting them eat all those deep fried school lunches they serve them everyday. It wouldn't be so bad if they didn't snack all day. I'm tempted to stop buying them all those snacks, but I know I'd never hear the end of it. No, the best thing to do is just to keep up my cupcake diet and lose some weight to set a good example for them to hopefully follow.

  It looks like the neighbors next door have a cat infestation in their yard, I'm really hoping it doesn't spread to our yard, I don't know how we'd be able to afford an exterminator.

  Life is hard, but at least we have our health.

  Love, Hatty.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Radio Personality

  Would you believe that liberal know it all, Harvey Fidelbrook on that talk show last night, droning on and on about giving aid to a bunch of wild Nureongi beasts? The only thing you can do with a wild beast that won't be tamed, other than shooting at it anyway, is put it in a cage in a nice little zoo and let our pups throw kibble at it.

  Oh sure, so they have their own 'language', if you can call the wacky noises they make a language. So I guess we can't cage up something smart enough to communicate verbally? Hooey. For all we know, carrots and lettuces can communicate verbally in some high pitched frequency our ears can't pick up. Can you disprove it? I didn't think so. Throw the Nureongi in cages and take their land, and then we won't have to keep hearing from liberals about how hungry the yellow bastards are and how much the precious little things need our help. The zoos will feed them everyday, they'd have a great quality of life. That land they’re squatting on has been going to waste for long enough.

  I'm still really freaking pissed off at that liberal bobble-head we call a president. How is it that, in all the time he's been running the country, he hasn't started a new war? Not even one measly little war. What does it take to push this guy's buttons? Can't he see all the crap going down all over the world? The disrespect being flung at honest hard working Orninicans by the hordes of foreign socialist trash buckets?

  Just the other day, the president of Beanland was on an official visit to our great capital, no doubt paid for by Orninican taxpayers, and he gave a nauseating interview saying that Orninica is losing its international influence. That Orninica's day in the sun, policing the rest of the world, is reaching its end. How are we standing for this guy's blatant threats against our great nation? In the old days when a real president was calling the shots, everyone in Beanland would be waking up to the sound of millions of missiles raining down on them. Wake up, Orninica!

  There's a conspiracy against Orninica that reaches far and wide, to besmirch our great name and to keep us down. These foreign and domestic conspirators want us to be afraid to take action against evil forces, they want us afraid to exercise our god-given right to dominate the rest of the planet. We are the strongest, most powerful force the world has ever seen, there is no shame in that. It's survival of the fittest, pure and simple, and we are clearly bigger and fitter than anyone. We can't let these little backwards foreign countries with their short, disgusting socialist leaders get out of line like that, we need to school them already. Show them we mean business. Diplomatic immunity be damned.

  Someone ought to nab that Beanie bastard right out of his hotel room and take him for a ride into the country where some real Orninicans can give him a lesson on civility and respect.

  No Orninican should stand for that kind of abuse. We're the biggest, baddest force in the whole damned world and if we keep acting like giant pussies instead, our pups are gonna grow up thinking we're weak, and then they'll end up acting weak too, and then where will we be? We'll have turned into a nation of jelly-livered liberal socialist tree-huggers that would rather 'talk things over' than take any real action. We'll sit around all day, holding hands, forming a big multi-racial, omni-sexual, all-inclusive circle of love and acceptance, chanting peacefully, touching each other and sharing our dreams. Is that the pathetic world you want to live in, Orninicans? I didn't think so.

  The Nureongi don't have enough to eat? Then there's too damn many of them. Open up a safari over there and me and my big-game hunting buddies will go on over and take care of the problem real quick.

  I tell you, there's way too many emotional liberal crybabies making our decisions for us nowadays. How the hell do these dogs get elected to office anyway? What dumb asses keep casting their votes for these lib-tard buffoons? Seriously, if you're one of the raving lunatics that voted for the president, give us a call. I want to yell at you for being so bucktoothed stupid. The lines are open.

  I really need to run for president already. Someone's got to steer this faltering country back in the right direction. If only I weren't so damned busy with this radio show all the time. But the fans demand it. I can't just up and leave, leaving all of you to listen to white noise every morning just so I can go and start a political career. It would be selfish of me.

  God knows there's nothing else on the damn radio worth listening to, just a bunch of liberal media brainwashing and thug music. I've gotta stay right where I am and keep on informing the good dogs of Orninica of the way things really are. Only I can sort through the bullshit to bring you the real news, listeners. I don't know what the country would do without my voice to wake up to every weekday morning. I really don't.

  But we have to get someone to run for office that can be trusted to do the right thing. We've had enough of the Progressive party stinking up the joint for everyone. The president clearly hates Orninica. He's raping us dry, it's clear for all to see if they'll just take off their liberal-loving blinders.

  Did you see? He just appointed a new face to the Supreme Court. You'd think he'd choose someone really imposing and strong, someone we can all have faith in to do the right thing, right? Well, think again, Bobo. As usual he picked a freaking minority, and a female minority at that. Big surprise! Yet another point for 'diversity', and yet another strike against decent, hard-working Orninicans everywhere.

  Next up on his liberal agenda, our big push-over of a president is dropping hints that he wants to legalize gay marriage. What the hell? Why not let us marry our hamsters while you're at it? Or our vacuum cleaners even? Hey, if they're going to let the gays get hitched, then what's stopping them from letting ticks marry each other? Same freaking difference really.

  And let's not even get started with his demands that we eat like a bunch of hippies, trying to change the school lunches on us to add more salad. What gives him the right to tell us how to eat? Orninicans eat whatever the hell they feel like eating. He'd better keep the hell out of our kitchens if he knows what's good for him.

  Where would Orninica be without its staple foods? Its deep fried caramel and cheese sandwiches washed down with a nice lard and corn syrup milkshake? What is he trying to do to this country? Is he even Orninican? Seems to me he's acting a hell of a lot like a foreign socialist saboteur. Why else would he be trying to destroy everything that makes us Orninican? Think about it, listeners. Think long and hard, and next time you see him on TV, look right into his eyes, those dead beady eyes of his, and I kn
ow you'll see what I see; a great force of cunning evil trying to pass as an Orninican right under our noses. I don't know what he is exactly, but he aint one of us, that much I'm sure of. He might not even be a canine for all we know.

  It's not easy to fool me, I'm a pretty savvy guy. Just yesterday my wife, Dotty, pointed out how I always know when an immigrant is trying to shortchange me at the car wash. I can always tell which ones are the really sneaky ones, and I count every penny of that change, and if there's even one penny missing, I report the little sneak thief to his manager and demand a full refund. I tell my wife every time, how I bet that shifty-looking one shortchanged me, and every time I'm right. Every time, no lie. We can get her on the phone and she'll back me up.

  So when I tell you I have a bad feeling about the president, that I think he might be some kind of mutant alien impostor, you're going to want to open your ears and pay attention.

  It's time to retake our place in the world. All the evidence we need to justify our domination of the earth is our manifest destiny. We've been expanding far and wide for hundreds of years, and it's our god-given birthright to continue, until every inch of the planet is under our control. It's Orninican tradition. How can we be ashamed to follow in our ancestors footsteps? To continue their great work? Our founding fathers would be rolling in their graves if they saw the state of the country today.

  We need to stop letting sly hate groups control our government and our our media. These groups want to see Orninica destroyed from within, chewed up and spat out by their socialist propaganda machine.

  The Green Party, the Civil Liberties Advocates, the Organic Food Movement, the Free and Open Source Software Group, the Natural Healers Association, the Permaculturists, the Small Farmers Union, the Free Speech Legal Fund, the Compassionate Association for Animal Rights, the Patent Reform Lobby, the Free Information Guild, the Pirate Party, the Immigrant Rights Project, the Fair Traders Group, the Sweatshop Awareness Society, the Whistle Blower Advocacy Movement, the Free Clinic and the Wildlife Protection Group. Every one of these socialist or anarchist extremist infiltrators needs to be stamped out for the good of all the country. The conspiracy has to stop. If the president were a real Orninican, if he had any balls, he'd ban all those groups I just listed right now and stop their evil agenda in its tracks once and for all.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Banker

  Rupulfort, old dog. Things have gotten very tight. Revenues are down across the board, and something needs to be done. We have to save the economy at all costs. The economy is the lifeblood of our civilization, and if it continues to falter, we're all as good as dead. We've risen inflation as far as we can and hiked up the interest on loans to the point where dogs have stopped buying things they can't afford. What kind of future do we have if everyone is suddenly cautious with their debt? I know your bank is suffering as badly as my own. We need to take somber action.

  I have a plan that can fix all of our woes, but I need access to your resources to pull it off, old boy. When the economy falters like this, the only medicine is a good old blow-them-all-to-hell war. Sure, we have drones taking out anyone that so much as looks up at the sky, but that's not enough, we need troops on the ground, warships, jets, missiles, kill-bots, things that will rope in the big dividends for us. Of course, virtually all our traditional sparring partners have been absorbed into the Orninican One World Directive, or wiped out, leaving only the half-wit Nureongi to war with.

  I have thought long and hard and I am convinced an all out invasion of Nureongi is the only way we can get our heads back above water. And it has to happen as soon as possible. Do you know my bank's growth this year is barely at 3%? Outrageous!

  How do we go about justifying this invasion against a horde of naked stone age nomads I hear you ask? As you know, I am a great scholar of human history. When the humans needed reason to start a lucrative new war, they committed acts of terror on their own soil and blamed it on their defenseless neighbors. As the blood poured from their feeble enemy, the profits flowed mightily. Truly, the military industrial complex of their leading nations had no equal, and when the war machine was in full throttle, the economy of the major powers was unstoppable.

  I submit to you that we continue to follow the sage example of our dear departed masters, and turn a couple of inner-city schools into rubble. The populace will be so angered and out for blood that they'll believe anyone we point the finger at was responsible, regardless of evidence or common sense. We won't need any more incentive to invade Nureongi than that.

  Now, what will I need from you? The use of your private army, for one thing. Your soldiers should be more than capable of carrying out a small clandestine operation in a couple of inner-city schools once we switch off the security drones in the area. Your connections in the senate and the presidency will also be much appreciated. Combined with my fellows, we'll have enough to order the war minutes after the false flag operation is completed.

  And once the war is started, your private army will finally come back into profit. Let's face it, all that spy-game and black ops hooey barely pays the bills. You need the real thing to make serious money again. Secret wars just don't have the budget of a proper ground war fully stocked with tanks and bombers and nuclear submarines.

  Do you see what I see, Rupulfort? The history in the making? The taps of unchecked debt flowing once again? This is more ambitious than anything our fathers could have dreamed up. If you join me, this will be an alliance remembered for generations. We will be unstoppable in our accruement of wealth. Never again will we need to slow down our plans of unchecked expansion, awaiting a refill of the old piggy bank.

  There is something we need to address, however. With all our advanced weaponry, and their pathetically primitive spears and rocks, the war would be over far, far too quickly. So we will of course need to properly arm the savages before we invade. Since they have no currency to pay for weaponry, we'll need to have the government earmark funds to pay for it and airdrop it into their village squares as soon as possible, before we implement my strategy. They'll have to be almost as well-armed as we are if we're going to stretch this war out long enough to truly rescue the economy.

  The media can sell it as do-gooder aid. Missiles, tanks and radar detectors for them to better track and hunt the repulsive, diseased fowl they eat. Submarines to collect seashells, starfish and sponges or whatever sea-garbage they collect. Maybe throw in some hogwash about improving relations and showing goodwill towards our feral cousins. Then, after the attack, the working dogs of the nation will be even more outraged at the Nureongi since we came bearing gifts and the damn honor-less cowards used our own gifts against us in an act of brutal unprovoked violence!

  In the unlikely event that there's any kind of resistance against the push for war, we can always find some loudmouthed celebrities to rally the commoners behind us. After all, we all know the common folk are only capable of embarking on a train of thought when their meretricious movie stars and popular musicians tell them when to begin thinking.

  As for how we'll split the proceeds of this undertaking, I'm a reasonable man, Rupulfort. Ask any dog at the society, Fitzie is a an honorable and just dog, so when I say a fifty/fifty cut right down the middle is all I'll ask for, you know I mean it. Completely equal partners. Obviously this kind of thing can't be backed up with signed contracts or any kind of legal documentation, but I will of course arrange for a ceremonial converge at the Arcanum Society to seal the coalition. A modest blood sacrifice from each of us will certainly need to be provided for the ceremony, maybe a grand-niece or equivalent. Just a formality, you understand.

  It's long past time our two great houses were joined again and I know you'll be in full agreement. Here's hoping we can keep this war going for generations. We should at least be able to create a whole generation of raging guerrilla fighters to fuel our money bins.

  I'd also like to congratulate you on your purchase of the Boltech University. That surreptitious research tea
m was getting dangerously close to finalizing yet another perpetual motion generator. Those damn things are popping up everywhere lately, it's costing a fortune to keep them all under wraps. It would have done untold damage to the market if it had gotten out. I trust you will now follow usual procedure and bury the dangerous device with great haste.

  I myself have had to spend millions funding universities and labs over the years, to keep their blasted research from going public. You wouldn't believe some of the breakthroughs I've had to quash. There was one team a decade ago that actually came up with a way to transfer the canine brain into a robot body; prolonging life for centuries. I managed to sweep the project under the carpet to keep it from the plebeians, but now that I'm getting older, I'm thinking it's time to bring the project out of mothballs to make a few sturdy new bodies for myself and my closest friends. You're welcome to a couple of them, if you like, but I'm sure you have a similar project of your own on the cards.

  My own grandfather of course took custody of the first free-energy project from a pesky scientist almost eighty years ago now, at the dawn of the electric age. The uncouth instigator had devised a way of harvesting infinite energy using ionization in the upper atmosphere to create electrical vibrations out of thin air, and he could beam this energy to every home, business and vehicle in the world at absolutely no cost.

  Just think of where we'd be today if my grandfather hadn't had the brilliant foresight to fell that terrifying invention before it went public. Why, we'd all be living in abject poverty, and the plebs would be running amuck with no barriers to keep them down. Debt would be unheard of. It would be anarchy! I shudder at the very thought of such a dystopian nightmare world.

  There have been a few occasions where brazen inventors of dangerous technologies have refused to sell their patents to me, and I've had to resort to, shall we say, less civilized methods to suppress their designs. I'm sure you've dealt with your fair share of fools like that in your time, your army certainly would prove useful in those sticky situations.