"I'll Send An S.O.S. to the World"
Night had fallen.
On the tip of Cape Cod, a large warehouse overlooked a giant cliff that dropped straight into the Atlantic Ocean. Inside the building, the dogcatcher stood behind a large glass panel in his office. Below him, a room filled with cages was illuminated by flourescent lights on the ceiling. In some of the cages, were the dogs that he'd already captured.
"Hope you enjoy your stay," laughed the dogcatcher. He turned and left the room.
Nearby, the cartoon dogs were becoming impatient inside their cages. Enrique Jr. was already asleep, but everyone else was consumed with worry. Buttons wasn't too worried, since Mindy was still tied to the tree...at least, he hoped she was. Blue was upset because he didn't leave Joe any clues as to where he was. Friskett tried biting the bars of the cage, but they were made out of some unfamiliar metal that was unpenatrable. Porkchop, Spike, and Santa's Little Helper were all equally worried as well.
They were not the only dogs that were being held in the warehouse. In other rooms, over 100 other cartoon dogs were being locked up as well. Most of them didn't have names because they only appeared once or twice on a TV show. These extras were no better off than the named canines.
It wasn't long before something began happening. An announcement was being barked from dog to dog; from one side of the building to the other. "A matter of urgency. We need help. Send out subconscious SOS."
Then, one by one, each dog closed its eyes.
Now, everyone knows that dogs have a sixth sense. They are able to detect and transmit information in a way that is not fully understood by humans. What you probably don't know is that this sense is intensified when a lot of dogs use it within close range at the same time. Using the sixth sense, all the animated canines were able to send out an SOS that could be heard from other dogs across the entire country! During the day, this message would be picked up like any of the other senses. But at night, the message could be received in a highly detailed thought, or dream.
The message, roughly translated, went something like this: "SOS. We're in trouble. Take Greyhound. Cape Cod. Save us."
It would've been easier if the dogs had been directing the message to the west, but because they were facing the Atlantic Ocean, they accidently sent the message east instead! The message traveled across the Atlantic, through Europe, Africa, and Asia. A countless number of dogs received the universal message, but they didn't do anything about it because they either couldn't understand the message or they didn't know where Cape Cod was. Besides, they received canine SOS calls all the time and, unless it was close by in their own country, they felt like it didn't involve them.
It wasn't until the message traveled over the Pacific Ocean that it finally became intercepted by U.S. canines...
******
The Warner Bros. studio was located in Hollywood, California. Here, the Animaniacs were always running around for some reason or another. Other characters from the show were also engaged in activities in the studio. Pinky and the Brain were coming back through the front gate after another failed attempt to rule the world. Slappy the squirrel was complaining about the food in the lunch building again. And, in an alley behind Studio D, Rita and Runt were scrounging around looking for something to eat.
It's not like they were malnourished all the time. Rita's singing voice always provided the two animals with something to eat on some nights. Otherwise, the cat and dog were usually looking around garbage cans for something to eat. People sometimes felt sorry for them, but they didn't mind. They were used to it. They did pretty much everything together. That is, until the night Runt received the message.
Like I said before, Rita and Runt were fast asleep behind Studio D when Runt received the SOS. In the 'dream', Runt was standing in front of a big sign that said "Cape Cod" on it. Behind it was a prison. Runt walked over to the prison, but instead of human inmates, there were dogs! Cartoon dogs wearing orange prison suits. All the dogs walked over to the gate and started calling out for Runt's help. That's when Runt woke up, slightly shaken by the vision. (Of course, the dogs aren't being held in a real prison, but dreams do have a tendency to exaggerate.) He leaned over to Rita, who was sleeping on a garbage can lid, and shook her awake.
"Rita. Rita! Wake up!" said Runt.
Rita groggily opened her eyes. "What is it, Runt?"
Runt excitedly told her the dream he just had. Rita's eyes opened wider. She just had the exact same dream! (Cats, by the way, have a sixth sense too, but it's slightly different than a dog's.) However, she had a feeling that it was more important to Runt than it was to her. She didn't want to admit that, so she said, "It was just a dream."
"No, it wasn't. It was one of those sixth sense thingys. Yeah, I felt like I was really there! I gots to go help those poor doggies."
Rita quickly accepted the fact that it was an SOS, but since it sent out by dogs, she wasn't very interested. "Alright, but Cape Cod is a long way from here."
"The dogs told me to take a greyhound," said Runt.
"How long will you be gone?" asked Rita.
"Not too long. I'll be back as soon as I can," said Runt. He turned and walked out of the alley. A second later, he came back.
"Forgot something?" asked Rita, who was trying to get back asleep.
"Yeah. Where's Cape Cod?"
Rita sighed. "In Massachusetts. Near Boston."
"Okay, thanks. Bye, now." Runt turned around and left.
"I give him five days tops," mumbled Rita as she hummed herself to sleep.
*****
Miles away, somewhere in the desert southwest, stood a town. A freaky town. A town where stuff happens that people consider...freaky.
One of the houses in this town looked rather unusual, as if it had popped up there only recently. There were a few lawn gnomes in the lawn that appeared to be spying on you if you saw them out of the corner of your eye. The house loomed over you like a cathedral facade.
In case you haven't guessed already, this is the house of Zim the alien. And right now, Zim was trying to fall asleep on his bed. Normally, Zim slept in a strange-looking container. But tonight, Zim was curious about this human activity called "sleep". He had discussed it with his robot, Gir, several hours ago.
"The only way I can take over this puny planet without everyone seeing me do it is when the inhabitants of Earth are..." Zim quickly glanced at a dictionary. "...asleep." Gir was about to say something, but Zim interrupted him. "But before I do, I must experience this 'sleepness' thing myself in order to know what I'm dealing with. Gir! I order you to acquire a..." He glanced at the dictionary again. "...bed, which is the object that these humans sleep in."
Gir zoomed out of the house. Ten seconds later, he brought back a bed. The problem was, there was a kid already in it. The boy began screaming.
"Gir! Dispose of this intruder!"
Gir grabbed the screaming kid and kicked him through a window. The boy landed half a block away and ran home, still screaming.
"O.....kay. Now then!" exclaimed Zim. "It is now time for..." (Glance at dictionary one last time.) "...bed time."
"Hooray!" cried Gir in his screechy voice.
Now, Zim was trying to fall asleep. He wasn't having much luck.
"Gir! I just remembered something! These humans do this thing called 'counting sheep' to fall asleep. I wonder if that will work."
"Why dont'cha try chickens? Or monkeys? Or..."
"Silence!" bellowed Zim. He calmed down and lay his head down on the pillow. "Now let's see...one..."*snore* Zim was asleep.
Gir sighed. He was just about to walk down to the basement to deactivate himself, when the canine SOS finally reached him.
A thought flooded his memory bank. It was similar to Runt's dream, only instead of a bunch if dogs in the prison, there was only one big red one.
That red one was Friskett. His sixth sense was slightly different than the other dogs. His was more...computerized. This allowed robots and computer animated dogs to understand the SOS. A binary code of ones and zeros contained the message, which was quickly deciphered by Gir's built-in translator.
"Ooooooh! A covert rescue operation!" Suddenly, Gir's blue eyes turned bright red. "I will carry out the mission, sir!" His eyes became blue again and he giggled.
Gir didn't waste any time. He put on his dog costume and wrote a note to Zim. It read: "Taking greyhound to cape full of cod. Be back in day or two. Promise to keep Irken goal in mind. I like saying Irken. Irken irken irken irken irken irken. That's funny. Hee-haaa!"
Gir left the message on the kitchen table. He then ran out the door (making little squeaking noises all the way) and went to look for a greyhound...whatever that was.
******
Friskett's binary version of the SOS also reached the ears of Goddard, the robot dog built by Jimmy Neutron. Goddard was in 'sleep mode', but he woke up right after the message was translated. He realized he had to get to Cape Cod to save the imprisoned canines, but the message specifically instructed him to take a greyhound. Goddard assumed the message meant a Greyhound bus. Also, Jimmy had taken out Goddard's rocket boosters due to malfunctions, so he couldn't fly to Massachusetts.
Goddard got up from his bed and walked over to Jimmy, asleep in his bed. Goddard printed out a paper explaining where he was going and when he was expected back. He placed the paper on his bed, licked Jimmy's face without waking him up, and walked out of the room.
When Goddard reached the sidewalk, his internal Global Positioning System located the nearest Greyhound bus terminal. A set of roller skate wheels popped out of his metal feet, and Goddard rolled off into the night.
******
"Cat?" said a voice in the darkness.
On the edge of a cliff overlooking a town, a very odd house stood up out of the ground. Half of it looked like a bone, the other half looked like a fish. The two-way mailbox read 'CatDog'.
The animated anomaly was in a bed in the uppermost room in the house. Dog had just woken up from the SOS dream.
"Cat!" repeated Dog, who nudged the other half of his body awake.
"...huh...wha?" grumbled Cat.
"We need to go, Cat," whispered Dog.
Cat sighed. "I told you not to drink so much water before bed, Dog."
"No, Cat," whispered Dog, excitedly. "We need to go to Cape Cod. On a Greyhound."
Cat glared at Dog on the other side of the bed. "Dog, there are three good reasons why we aren't going anywhere tonight. One, it's the middle of the night. Two, Cape Cod is on the other side of the country. And three, I had the same dream you had, and I am not interested in seeing if it's true or not."
"But it is true, Cat! I could feel it!" Dog argued. He started climbing out of bed.
"I'm sure someone else can save them...OW!" Cat's head hit the floor as Dog headed for the stairs.
"Please, Cat? A lot of the dog's on TV were there. I saw them!"
"What 'dogs on TV'?" asked Cat, who clumsily followed Dog down the stairs.
Dog pointed to the blank screen of the television. "Doggies from some of our favorite shows were being locked up, Cat! We gotta save them."
"Yeah," thought Cat to himself. "And I'll bet we'll get a hefty reward from saving them, too." He turned to Dog. "Okay, Dog. Let's go save them."
"Hooray!" yelled Dog. He quickly ran out of the house with Cat dragging behind.
"Wait, Dog!" shouted Cat. "We need to catch a Greyhound right?"
Dog stopped. "That's right, Cat. Where can we find one?"
"Well, if we're talking about the Greyhound bus, not the dog, there should be one in town someWHERE!" exclaimed Cat, who was prematurely whisked away when Dog began running again towards town.
(The Greasers also received the SOS message, but since they enjoyed it when other pets suffered, they saw no reason to help out.)
******
In the state of Kansas, in a town called Nowhere, a farmhouse sat on the outskirts of the town. Eustace, Muriel, and Courage the cowardly dog were all asleep inside the house.
Suddenly, Courage screamed himself awake. He looked around. He was on the foot of his masters' bed. Fortunately, Eustace and Muriel didn't wake up because they were in a deep sleep.
Courage was rather shaken by what had just happened. He dreamed that he was running through a wide open field in the middle of the day, laughing and frolicking around all over the place. Then, BOOM, the scenery changed. It was night, and he was suddenly looking at what must've been the most high-security animal shelter in the world. The dogs on the other side were pleading with him to set them free. Then he woke up.
Courage gulped. His sixth sense was telling him that his last dream was for real. Somewhere, those dogs were actually being held. But where? Courage thought hard. Those dogs had said something like 'greyhound' and 'Cape (what was it?)...Cod!"
Courage ran to the book shelf and pulled out an atlas. It wasn't long before he located Cape Cod on the map. Courage was shocked to discover that Cape Cod was halfway across the country! It must've been a very powerful message, Courage thought.
Courage returned the book to the shelf. He wondered if any other dogs had heard the message.
Courage made up his mind to go rescue the dogs. This message was authentic, he was sure of it. If he could rescue those dogs, maybe he wouldn't have to hear that creepy message anymore. Besides, he'd do the same for Muriel of she was in trouble. Which reminded him: How was Courage going to tell Muriel he was gone without warning?
Courage grabbed a pen and paper and wrote out a message. "Dear Muriel & Eustace. Invited on vacation. Be back very soon. Courage." It was kind of sloppy, but now his masters had no reason to worry. He left the note on the kitchen table.
Courage walked out the front door and headed towards town under the starry sky. He began whining. He hated having to leave Muriel like this. What if something happened to her? But the cries and pleas from those canines were too much for Courage to resist. He continued walking, as he began wondering if there were any travel agents in Nowhere.
******
A couple hundred miles east of Nowhere lay the great Mississippi River. A lonely road crossed the river via a metal arch bridge. Nearby, on the Missouri side of the river, a pale white light was shining. It grew brighter and brighter, until suddenly, it went ZAP!!! and disappeared. A grey dog collapsed on the ground in it's place.
The dog stood up on his two feet. His licence tag read 'Astro. Property of the Jetsons.' Astro looked around. He had no clue where he was.
He did know how he had gotten there. Several hours ago, Elroy had been working on a new time machine, after the old one zapped his family to the Flintstone's time period (and therefore creating one of the greatest cartoon crossover movies of all time. And no, Dino's not in this story.) After Astro's family was asleep, he went to look at Elroy's new time machine, but his tail must've flipped a switch or something (just like before) and before he knew it, he was here. On some planet with a river, a bridge, and a sign that said 'Mississippi River' on it!
Astro gasped. "I don't berieve it!" he whispered in Scooby-Doo talk (both dogs do sound remarkably similar.) He remembered that word 'Mississippi' from one of Elroy's history books. The time machine worked! He was still on Earth, but in a different time.
Astro looked around harder. Judging from the landscape, distant buildings, and star positions, he guessed he was somewhere around the early twenty-first century.
Astro was just about to ask himself how he would get home, when the SOS message hit him. In Astro's time, a dog's sixth sense has become greatly evolved. So when the message hit Astro, he felt as thought he was experiencing the dream first-hand! It was as if he actually was in Cape Cod, looking at the prison, hearing the howls and messages from the dogs inside. When it ended, Astro was more than a little stunned.
"Row! Ri rotta rave rem!" (Trans: "Wow! I gotta save them!")
He knew where they were and how to get there. But where was this 'greyhound' anyway?
Astro walked up the bank and onto the road heading toward the nearest town.
******
Speaking of Scooby-Doo, him and his human friends were spending the night in a spooky, old, haunted hotel in Indiana. At least, it WAS haunted before the meddling kids discovered that the person in the cheap ghost costume was none other than the manager of the hotel! He discovered an iron ore deposit on someone else's property, and decided to scare away everyone with his ghost outfit. But thanks to Scooby, Shaggy, and the gang, the oil was now being drilled by its rightful owner.
Scooby was in the hotel kitchen when the SOS message hit him. After figuring out what the message meant, he tried to tell Shaggy, Fred, Daphne, and Velma the news.
"A vision of dogs in trouble?" asked Velma with surprise. "Jinkies! That sounds important!"
"I'll say. Those poor dogs!" sympathized Daphne.
"I guess we'd better go investigate," announced Fred.
Scooby quickly objected. "Rogs roney," he mumbled.
"Dogs only?" repeated Shaggy. "Well, when are you going?"
"Roon. Rorrorow, raybe," answered Scooby.
"Tomorrow, sounds good," said Fred. "We're still getting over our last mystery."
Scooby sighed. He wanted to help those dogs, but he was so tired right now. He needed to get some sleep first.
******
By now, the sixth-sense message was beginning to fade out and lose its sense of urgency. By the time it reached Townsville, it sounded like a simple plea more than a panicked cry for help. Several dogs in Townsville heard it, including the white one who talked.
Talking Dog, or T.D. to his friends, lived in a one-room apartment in the north side of Townsville. He was just about to go to sleep when he heard the SOS. He lazily wrote down the message on a piece of paper and got into bed.
"I'll take care of it in the morning," he mumbled to himself before falling into a deep sleep.
******
At the warehouse, many of the dogs were awaken by their own message. It had circled around the globe in little over an hour! The dogs went back to sleep, hopeful that a lot of dogs heard the message.
The question was...would they respond?