Kona and Julius save the world

To recap, our hero Kona is staying at his girlfriend Terra’s place while mom recuperates from surgery, and is having a grand ol’ time, even as he suffers through a life of extreme deprivation. No petite scones, no bones to gnaw on, no rawhide. I know, the mind reels - Jennifer and Bo run a tight ship. This is why their dogs look like, well, dogs, as opposed to sausages, like my chunky Kone. Imagine that. But he has Terra the Exalted to play with, their Italian greyhound Dash, spry and adorable, and Julius, the foster Dobie, sweet as can be.

Last night at home:

(phone rings)

Me: Hello?
Jennifer: Hey, how’s it going? I wanted to see how you were doing…

(chit-chat)

Jennifer: So….I hope you weren’t too attached to Kona’s red collar?
Me: The Mickey one? Umm, no, not really it was just a collar that I got for him at Disney, just for fun. Why, did he break it?
Jennifer: Well, you could kind of say that. The only part left of it is the buckle.
Me, laughing: What? Oh my god, how’d he manage that?
Jennifer: We’re not sure if it was him or Julius who totally chewed it up. Tags too. We’re waiting to see who poops red leather.
Me: Do you think Terra and Dash got into the fun?
Jennifer: No, we can rule them out, they were at obedience class so only Kona and Julius were home.
Me: Hmm…..I sense a bit of collusion here….

* * * * * * * *
(Friday night at the Kona’s girlfriend residence. All is quiet, with just Kona and Julius left to their own devices, sleeping like the little angels they are.)

Kona, waking up: *Yawn* - hey Jules, did you see my spiffy new collar? Huh, huh, did you? My mom got it for me from someplace cold. With a lot of old people. And she said something about Grumpy. So Russia maybe.

Julius: Yeah, I know, you keep pointing it out to me. Sniff - yeah, it's nice enough. I was thinki.....wait. WAIT a minute. Did you see what's actually ON that collar?

Kona: Huh? What do you mean?

Julius: It's got those dreaded LITTLE SQUIRRELS on it! The little squirrels with the round ears and long skinny tails! But they're still evil, since they're all just different forms of SQUIRRELS!!!

Kona, horrified: WHAT?? Not the SQUIRRELS! Quick, get it off me! Now, hurry!!

(Julius manages to help Kona tug the collar off. They both look at it in horror.)

Kona: Now, help me KILL IT!! Quick, tear it to shreds, evil evil evil!! Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, my mom probably somehow got suckered into buying this by....an EVIL SQUIRREL! Yeah, that's it. They're like the Borg! She'll be soooo happy we saved her from the SQUIRRELS!!

Julius: Whew, close call! Wait, there's a few inches left! (Pounces, destroys.) Okay, now I think the household is safe. Maybe. What do you think of these silver things?

Kona: Hmm, good question. They *were* attached to the evil squirrel thing, so just to be on the safe side…..(tags are chewed to nubs)

Julius: Good work there. (gets a worried frown on his little Dobie forehead) Say – you don’t think our people will think we did that just for fun, do you? I mean, they’ll figure out that we were just trying to save mankind from the evil squirrels, right?

Kona: Don’t worry, my mom is too smart – she’ll figure it out and see us as the heroes we really are. Otherwise it would be like that Lady and the Tramp movie, where Tramp saves the baby from the evil squirrel and at first the stupid mother-in-law who’s obviously crazy because she doesn’t like dogs takes Tramp to the Bad Place until the smart owners come and rescue him. So my mom is like the smart owners, not the crazy mother-in-law. They’ll be very proud of us. I’m sure of it.

Julius: Okay then. I just worry about being sent to the Bad Place, where no one ever leaves…

Kona: Ha, that’ll never happen. You’re with IDR now, Jules. That means you’re in like Lassie. My mom always tells me she’s going to take me to the glue factory, and I just give her the “yes I’m guilty but boy aren’t I cute” look and she melts and gives me a biscuit. And I’ve told you how I conned her into keeping me in the first place – “foster” indeed! Ha! That was some of my best work, hard as it was. (Kona looks off into the distance, reminiscing fondly over those early days when he was on his perfect, no-chasing-squirrels behavior, just until the adoption papers were signed, ink not even dry.) So you’re definitely safe.

Julius: Whew, okay, that’s good to know. I’m glad our people are so smart.

Kona: Me too.

Julius: Boy, I'm exhausted from all that hard work. Nap time.

Kona: Nap time. (Dreams of mom, and ridding the world of evil, one squirrel at a time…….)