Song 15: "The Great Suburban Showdown"
The nights were deathly quiet on Fagin's houseboat in years past, way before the Purebreds and the Underdogs, way before Dodger's mother re-entered his life and he quit the Company. Just a few months before Oliver fell, literally, into the Company's lives.
"Anyone know when Fagin's gonna be home?" Rita asked the group.
There were eight dogs in the gang back then. Rita the purebred Saluki had been there a few months, Dodger the mutt a little longer, and Francis the Bulldog even longer. The newer additions were Nancy the golden Spaniel mix, Charlie the black-and-white collie mutt, and Tito the Chihuahua. And Noah the Bullmastiff. The dog who'd been with Fagin the longest was, of course, jolly old Einstein. They were a sizable family.
"He left hours ago to pickpocket," Dodger answered. "He'll be back soon."
"Let's hope he brought chicken dinner!" Tito yapped. "El pollo es delicioso!"
"I would prefer a fine rare steak," Frankie huffed indignantly. Since he and Tito had first seen each other, they'd despised each other. They argued like an old married couple.
Meanwhile, Dodger's eyes were fixed on Nancy one moment and Rita the next, with a dreamy look in his eyes. His stomach growled on the spot.
Einstein sat up when he heard someone on the stairs. "He's home!"
None of them had expected Fagin o be thrown on the floor at their paws. He was beaten and bruised. His hair was torn, his clothes ripped. And behind him walked a giant of a man in a pinstripe suit. "What a dump," said the deep voice of Bill Sykes.
The Company sprang to their master's defense, but the mobster had dogs as well. Two enormous Doberman Pinschers emerged from behind their owner, one with a red collar and one in blue. "Don't even think about it, mongrels," the blue one growned.
"My name is Roscoe," said the red. "This is my brother, DeSoto. It's a pleasure."
"Your pity of a human racked up quite the debt with our master."
"Expect to see us around for the next few months. Till his debt is paid."
The Dobermans corralled the Company into a corner, like they were sheep being herded, and kept them from moving any closer to Fagin and Sykes. They had to watch helplessly as their master was beaten over and over by the mafia man.
"What a bunch of mutts," DeSoto said, laughing at the gang.
"Well, not everyone." Roscoe had spotted Rita. "Hello, beautiful."
Both Dodger and Charlie immediately growled but were shushed by Rita, who had enough common sense not to let the leering eyes of an unwanted suitor upset her. She said nothing as he looked her up and down and licked his chops. "You're a purebred Saluki, aren't ya? Now that's a pedigree to be proud of. What are you doing with these mixed breeds?"
"That goes for you too, Mister Bullmastiff," they said, addressing Noah.
"And the Bulldog, Chihuahua, and Great Dane. You look pure to me."
"Why on earth would you share your kibble with mutts?"
"Pures and mixed breeds? They don't belong together."
The Company simply whimpered and said nothing to the provocations. There was no way that they could take them in a fight, so they endured the taunts. Dodger felt his cheeks burning with shame as they insulted him, and when they insulted his mother, he nearly leapt on them. It was Noah who held him back, told him to cool it and not rise to the insult.
But something had changed in Noah's eyes. Something small and unnoticeable, but the praise to his pedigree had shifted his gaze from aggravation to adoration.
Nothing was the same after that horrible night. It was the night that the Company met Bill Sykes and his Dobermans, the night that Fagin's gambling problem became apparent, and the night that split their family apart and three of the gang — Noah first, followed by Charlie and Nancy — decided it wasn't worth staying with Fagin after all.
It was the worst night of the Company's lives.
A warm breeze blew over Yankee Stadium that night, indicating that winter was coming to an end and spring would arrive in a few weeks. The warmth against the cold gave the mutts comprising the Underdogs a flicker of hope, a bravado they needed.
They hovered just outside of the baseball stadium, waiting for orders from the lead dog, Skippy. About fifty or so dogs were there waiting for the final battle of the gang war. Dodger was there, as was his friend Charlie. She just hoped her girlfriend Rita, the spy, was safe.
"Where are those pures…" Skippy growled low, "Where are they…"
The Underdogs were getting restless. There had been a strategy to Dodger's decision to schedule the battle at Yankee Stadium, far north of Central Park and even farther north of the Purebreds' headquarters at Battery Park. The idea had been to make their rivals walk all the way from the Battery up north to the Bronx and thus exhaust them.
"Just wait," Dodger said. "They'll be so tired they can't fight." He knew it was a good strategy, but then again, the Pures were all strong and sturdy dogs.
It also meant that the Purebreds wouldn't be fighting on their home turf — the Underdogs were the home team and the Purebreds were the visiting team, to put it in baseball terms — which meant that they'd be tired, lost, and confused: easier to defeat in battle.
"We need someone to go ahead, see if they've arrived, and report back."
"I'll go, Skippy," Dodger volunteered. "I know the Bronx."
In truth, he was trembling on the inside. It was enough to have walked through the streets he'd abandoned since his puppyhood, enough to recall the memories of starving and fighting to survive on these cold Bronx avenues, but he'd done it. He did it for the cause.
Dodger wove in and out of alleys and main streets, around and behind buildings and even up and down a fire escape. It was his neighborhood, his hometown, and he'd forgotten the feel of it. It all came flooding back. "Don't change much, do ya, Bronx?"
Perhaps the Bronx was something worth defending, worth fighting for, after all.
He was on the lookout for the Purebreds when he caught a familiar scent. He tracked it, nose to the pavement, until he turned a corner and ran into Rita's bushy head of hair.
"Rita! Good to see ya," he whispered, in case others were around. "But what are ya doing here? I thought ya were spying on tha Pures."
"That's why I'm here. I know why you picked Yankee Stadium, to tire them out and confuse them — it ain't working, Dodge, they ain't tired at all." She gulped. "I had to warn you, you've got a real fight coming at you. We're half an hour away."
"Oh boy, oh boy," he muttered. "Okay, get back and don't be seen."
"See you on the other side of the war," Rita said tearfully.
"Be careful on ya streets of gold," Dodger chuckled gently.
The friends parted, Rita returning south to rejoin the Purebreds and Dodger heading north to go back to Yankee Stadium where the Underdogs waited. They both knew the final battle would be brutal, both knew their lives — and the lives of their friends — were at risk. The months of strife, months of mutts versus pures, all came down to tonight.
Rita marched in line with the rest of the Purebreds, advancing closer and closer to Yankee Stadium through the streets of the Bronx. It had been an arduous journey for the dogs, but they were strong and sturdy, and the exercise only prepared them for the fight.
"There's the stadium," Ruscoe said, nodding to the massive arena before them. They circled the baseball stadium until they found an opening in the chain-link fence. The Purebreds entered one-by-one into the arena, the final stage of the gang war.
"They won't beat us this time," Ruscoe sneered to Rita right beside him.
They wove up flights of stairs and down concrete hallways, avoiding one or two nighttime security guards, and finally snuck past the rows and rows of seats onto the grassy field.
She saw their enemy, the Underdogs, looking emboldened by their previous victory. Most of the dogs were smaller than the Purebreds, but it was obvious that the pures were outnumbered, nearly two-to-one. Ruscoe refused to admit that the schism with Noah had crippled their ranks, but he couldn't hide the truth — there were more mutts than pures.
"Every one of my dogs," Ruscoe called to Skippy on the other side of the stadium, "will beat two of yours. This gang war ends tonight, and we'll be the winners."
"You're right about this ending tonight," Skippy replied, "but you ain't winning."
Ruscoe let out a tremendous bark and began to charge. The Purebreds charged with him, and on the other side of the baseball field, the Underdogs advanced. Rita didn't want to fight them, but to keep her cover, she had no choice.
Dogs met in the middle of the diamond, claws and fangs at the ready — and then it was carnage. They leapt and tore at one another, jumped on top of each other, slammed into one another, in a fight to the finish. She saw small dogs being beaten by larger ones and it was all so senseless. All this violence just to claim new territory.
A member of the Underdogs suddenly jumped at her, and she had no choice but to fight. Her attacker was smaller, so she was able to fend him off. She slashed him with her claws and he fell to the dirt, whimpering. "Nice try. Now scram," she barked. He scrammed.
Rita licked her bleeding shoulder and gazed at the battle unfolding before her eyes. Underdogs were slashing at Purebreds, Purebreds were biting Underdogs, and there were twenty, thirty dogs lying on the dirt field, too wounded to keep fighting. Some would never fight again.
She fought off dog after dog, but Rita wasn't expecting to run into a certain someone. "Dodger?" He was just as wounded as she was, with scrapes and bites all over. His blue bandana was torn. Dodger looked relieved to see her.
"Rita… ya doing all right?" he whispered, glancing around to make sure Ruscoe wasn't watching. "Are ya keeping up okay? Keeping safe?"
"Don't worry about me. I've got everything under control."
"Don't kid yourself," Dodger huffed. "There's no control. This is anarchy."
Injured Underdogs had crawled to one side of the stadium while wounded Purebreds congregated on the other side. It looks like most dogs were nearly worn out.
Then she spotted Ruscoe in the center of the field, plowing through mutt after mutt. He was biting their necks, going for the jugular like some wild beast. Then all of a sudden, a massive Rottweiler covered in scars and wearing a spiked collar charged into him. Ruscoe was thrown to the ground. Skippy Dawg stood over him, growling.
"Leave my gang alone, Ruscoe," Skippy barked. "Or would ya rather fight me?"
"Love to. I owe you for last night." Ruscoe threw Skippy off of him and got back up. He broke into a wide grin, showing off his incredibly sharp teeth. "Time we settle this, leader to leader." He scraped his claws on the concrete menacingly.
Rita watched the fight unfold. Skippy met his charge with a slash to the face and a bite to the muzzle, while Ruscoe snarled and bit down on his leg. When it looked like Skippy had the upper hand, Ruscoe turned around and clawed him. When it seemed Ruscoe was winning, Skippy Dawg fought back bravely and bit him on the neck. Blood splattered the pavement around both of them. Rita wanted to run over and help Skippy out, but before she could, a mutt jumped at her and she was in her own fight.
Many dogs on both sides had stopped fighting to watch their leaders. Skippy Dawg was a massive brute, but so was Ruscoe. It was an even match, and no one could say who'd come out alive. "Stay down, Skippy!" Ruscoe shouted, clawing at his eyes. He managed to get his left eye, and Skippy screamed in pain. Blood trickling down his face, he snarled up at Ruscoe. "I'll never stop fighting. Not while I'm still breathing."
"I can fix that," Ruscoe barked. He didn't let up, going for Skippy's other eye, but he missed and stumbled on the pavement. Skippy took the opportunity and jumped on his back, biting Ruscoe's neck. He clawed his shoulders and bit his ears.
Rita had fought off the King that jumped him, and she wanted more than anything to run across the street and help Skippy out, but it was pointless. The battle was nearly over. Skippy was seriously wounded from his injured eye, while Ruscoe barely managed to stand with all his scrapes and gashes. Skippy made one final jump at Ruscoe. He bit Ruscoe on the jugular, blood gushing out, but Ruscoe managed to claw his underbelly. Skippy whimpered and let him go, crawling into a corner of the baseball field.
Ruscoe tried to stand, tried to appear victorious, but he swayed and collapsed to the pavement outside the field. Rita couldn't help herself. She rushed to his side.
Confused by the emotions overtaking her, Rita found herself nuzzling the dying Doberman. He was breathing heavily, in pain, barely able to lift his head. "What a fight, eh? I guess I lost." Rusco coughed up red. Rita saw his neck was badly mauled. "Do you think… Do you think my father… Roscoe… would be proud of me?"
At the mention of the name, she felt an age-old hatred and attraction in spite of herself, the feelings she never wanted to admit the older Doberman had aroused in her. She found herself thinking that if she'd been a true uptown girl instead of a downtown one, then perhaps she could have loved this dog named Ruscoe. If everything had been different.
"Yes, Ruscoe," Rita whispered, licking his muzzle and tasting blood. "I think your dad would be very proud of you."
Ruscoe gave a wheezy laugh. "Brought honor to the… family name."
Then he laid his head on the sidewalk, his chest heaving up and down. Eventually it stopped moving. He was still and lifeless. Rita didn't know why tears were welling up in her eyes. He hadn't been a good dog, hardly a nice one, and yet she was crying.
When she'd dried her tears, she walked into the center of the baseball diamond, the heart of Yankee Stadium. "The battle is over!" she cried to both sides. "The war is over!"
"Well, who won?" one of the mongrels asked.
"Skippy beat Ruscoe, so obviously the Underdogs won."
"Yeah?" a pure shouted back. "Skippy ain't in great shape either."
It was true, she saw with dismay. Skippy Dawg had crawled back among his gang, but he was hardly in winning condition. He was alive, but barely. Dodger tended to him.
"Is that what this is to you all?" Rita cried out. "A game of who won and who lost? Which is better, purebreds or mutts? Don't you see how silly that is?" She looked to the Purebreds and saw they were scattered and defeated. She looked to the Underdogs and saw they were weathered and worn. "War isn't a baseball game. Good dogs have died here tonight, and yeah, there are good dogs on both sides. Just fallen victim to a misguided ideology."
"So what are ya saying, Rita?" Dodger stepped forward. "That nobody won?"
"Yeah, that's right," she huffed. "No one won tonight. Go home, everyone, and be thankful you're walking out of here with your life. The gang war is over."
Now she turned specifically to the pures. "Listen up, boys. Your leader Ruscoe is dead. Your other leader, Noah, and his cronies Club and Razor have vanished, meaning that no one is left to take charge of the gang. So I'm hereby disbanding the Purebreds."
"Who says you're in charge of us?" one of the pures sneered.
"I say so. If you wanna fight me, then fight me. Anyone?" No one stepped up.
There were mutters and nasty looks, but mostly, the pures were exhausted. They listened to her orders; then the Purebreds went their separate ways out of the arena.
"Let tonight be the end of it," she said as the gang broke apart.
When all the pures were gone, Rita slouched back to the other side of the arena where the mutts were. At first some growled at her. "Hey, hey!" Dodger snapped at them. "Don't ya remember? She's on our side. Your scheme worked perfectly, friend."
"Thanks for believing in me, friend." They nuzzled warmly. "It's finally over."
"It's finally over," Dodger repeated.
Skippy Dawg staggered to his paws, managing to stand despite his many injuries. The three of them howled and barked with delight. The entire gang joined in, and Yankee Stadium was filled with the hoops and hollers of a triumphant dog pack.
"Will ya disband the Underdogs, too? Put an end to it?" Dodger asked.
Skippy shook his head. "It's wiser not to. I say we keep a patrol going, just to make sure no pure breeds get any wise ideas about reforming their gang."
Dodger and Rita couldn't disagree with this wisdom, but their time as members of the Underdog had come to an end. The gang war was well and truly ended.
He exited Yankee Stadium with weariness in every step. Dodger thought about the scene that would occur when the janitors discovered that stray dogs had fought each other to the death at the arena, littering the baseball field and hallways. It'd surely make the New York news.
Tomorrow they would be cleaned out, disposed of, like pieces of garbage. Dodger hated that, but there was nothing to be done. Then the people would go back to their hotdogs and baseball caps, canned beers and sports games, unaware a war had taken place.
"It's finally over," he said again. Dodger trudged through the streets of the Bronx without even looking; he knew them well enough. "Ain't so bad after all, are ya, Bronx?"
The neighborhood of his lonely puppyhood. He knew every street lamp, every food vendor, every alleyway. After all the time he'd been away, it had barely changed.
Suddenly, Dodger heard a snarling coming from a nearby alley. He was jumped by not one, not two, but three enormous dogs, all purebreds from the looks of it, who clearly hadn't gotten the message that the gang war was over. But these weren't just any dogs.
"Noah." Dodger spat on the ground. "And ya brought Club and Razor for backup."
"I couldn't let tha war end without seeing ya again, now could I?" Noah laughed. The gray Bullmastiff inched closer to him, fangs and claws out. "My old friend."
"Were we ever friends?" Dodger barked. "Or was it always a lie?"
"Don't say that. Ya know how close we were. Ya changed everything."
"Me?" he cried, surrounded. "Ya ditched us, remember?"
"It all changed…" Noah shook his head. "Everything changed." There was a break in his voice, almost a cry, and it occurred to Dodger that his old buddy's eyes were moist.
"Why did it come to this, Noah?" Dodger called out above the roar of early morning traffic. "Ya were in tha Company. Why'd ya ditch when Sykes showed?"
"Don't talk to me about tha Company!" Noah barked. He came closer and closer, almost falling into the road. A car barely missed him. He looked like a crazy dog. "Tha Company was everything to me, but Roscoe was right — pures and mutts — mutts and pures — they can't be together!" He was starting to foam at the mouth. "Breeding is everything!"
"Noah... Breeding and pedigrees… that stuff don't matter."
Finally, Noah leapt at him, claws at the ready. He was panting heavily, white foam on his muzzle, eyes looking in all directions. When he missed hitting Dodger, he whipped around and attacked his own lackeys, Club and Razor. The Pit Bull and the German Shepherd whined and backed away, disappearing into an alley. Dodger never saw them again.
Then it was just Dodger and Noah.
He looked up at the morning sky. "Weren't we friends once?"
"Once," Noah admitted. "But that was a long time. We were all so young and stupid." The Bullmastiff hung his head, coughing, sputtering up spittle.
"Noah?" Dodger asked, eyes widening. "Do ya have… rabies?"
"I… I dunno. I feel funny… sick… my head hurts," Noah whimpered.
Then all of a sudden, he ran into the road, shaking his head and screaming, white foam dripping from his mouth. "Noah, be careful!" Dodger shouted, running after him. "Look out!"
Cars swerved in the road, narrowly missing Dodger. He smelled rubber on the road, the emissions of gasoline, and heard the car horns and screams of furious New York drivers. Dodger heard the screech of tires skidding on the brakes, and for once, it wasn't in his head.
Dodger made it to the other side of the avenue. But Noah was in the middle of the road when a bus came honking down the road, moving too fast to swerve.
There was a sickening thump as Noah was struck. He was thrown under the bus, car tires breaking every bone in his body, and when the bus was gone he was left panting on the road.
He staggered to his feet and slumped onto the sidewalk beside Dodger.
"Oh, Noah… I'm so sorry," Dodger cried. "Why did ya have to quit tha Company?"
"I… I can't say… I was afraid, confused… I had a vision of what the Purebreds could be… powerful. I wanted that power and… camaraderie. So I made the gang in secret… made myself tha leader…" He coughed up blood. "But it was all for nothing."
"Ya just a bully, know that?" Dodger whimpered. "Ya just a bully."
"Takes one… to know one…" Noah said with a faint grin.
Then Noah went still, his chest stopped moving, and Dodger heard the shaky thumping of his heart come to a gradual stop. His eyes glazed over, and Noah didn't move again.
"Noah… Noah…" Dodger moaned, shedding tears for his old friend. Then he crawled into an alley, leaving his friend's body on the sidewalk. Dodger found a cardboard box to hide himself in, and exhausted, he shut his eyes and went to sleep.
He tried to forget all that had happened, but Dodger knew he never would.
