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Chapter 18

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“How much further have you got to go?” one of the civilians attending the documentation ceremony asked us.

“I’m amazed you have time to do all this, Mr. President,” said another.  “Do you think the CNG crisis had something to do with it?  I mean, I know it was turning all these humans into animals, but it also seems your philosophy holds true: if you have time to lead a country, you have time for music.”

“I do not believe the crisis ensured that this was the truth,” Leo replied.  “I think I just got lucky by having the right choices for my administration, and for having the right people in Congress.  It might be worth knowing that one of the most recent bills I signed into law now enforces age limits on Congress, so that once you hit 70, you retire.  You get to finish the term out, of course; no use ending on an incomplete term.”

“I see; I know we should respect our elders, but these folks weren’t doing anything to earn it.”

“Maybe not, but the G-52 and C.I.D.F. Codes of Conduct both emphasize that we respect all people even if they do not respect us.  If it turns out they do not respect us, well, that’s on them.”  The civilian nodded.

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240. The numbering continued here with a white tiger wearing another military-style drum major uniform, and although he had no military experience, his father, uncles, and grandfather had all served in the U.S. Marine Corps, and had played in the U.S. Marine Band, also known as the President’s Own.  Thus, wearing a uniform identical to the red ones those people wore was his way of paying tribute to his ancestors.  His drum was another corps-style field drum.  At his requests, the bands (and any other musicians waiting to be documented who had their instruments on them) all played the “Marines’ Hymn,” a song that meant a lot to him.

His uniform didn’t come with a shako or other sort of headgear originally, so he wasn’t missing anything from the lost shipment.

241. A white tiger wearing a black and gold military-style drum major uniform, and he was missing his peaked cap from the shipment error.  He played a military field drum in the parade.

242. Another white tiger in a drum major uniform, although his was closer to the circus style design.  The jacket was teal, with silver highlights, black pants, and black cuffs on the sleeves.  He was also missing a shako from the lost shipment, and he played a football snare drum.

243. The next white tiger we came across, now retired from U.S. Army service as a combatant and a musician, was a unique twist that also illustrated how CNG made more mistakes than it can bear.  Usually, if an animal was embarrassed from being half-naked, they had the jacket and top parts of the band uniform, but no pants.  This tiger, as seen in the photos he showed us, had the pants, teal with an orange stripe going down the legs, but no jacket.  Instead, he was showing his bare chest, revealing that he was lifted weights (and subsequently gained super strength when he became a tiger), even though he had a baldric going down the chest, and golden epaulettes.  The peaked cap had a black rim, a golden stripe going across the chest, and a white plume on top, and the logo was based on the family coat of arms.  When he appeared in person, however, he had the jacket on him, and it followed the pattern of having golden stripes go across the chest.  His drum was another corps-style field drum, and like everyone else, he stood barefoot.  Attached to the belt was an orange and white banner hanging down, that also had the coat of arms on it.  He played a solo for us, “Downfall of Paris,” and then we examined the photo.

“That’s odd,” I said.  “Why did it do it backwards?”

“Maybe CNG goofed?” the tiger suggested.  “Or maybe it did it on purpose.  I’ll give you a hint: when I was a kid, I had a period where I was really into wrestling, and I wanted to be one.  A while back, you interviewed the up-and-coming superstar lion who calls himself the Ultimate Destroyer.  I don’t know what my wrestling name would have been.  I took up drumming, however, to beat some sense of discipline into myself—pun not intended—and I think it helped get me to where I am today.”

“Then I guess this would have been your wrestling costume, or something,” Super C joked.

“Probably.  I don’t know of any drumming wrestlers.  In any case, I don’t follow wrestling anymore, at least not as passionately as I used to.  I lost interest when I came to the realization it was all staged.  I joined the Army instead, although it was just to make my parents happy.  I did have issues growing up, yes, but it was also a case of them saying, ‘You’re going to the military because you cannot behave, and we don’t care if you ever come back.’  Thankfully, I did.”

“How many times have we heard that before?” Leo lamented.  “To me, that’s just as problematic as a dad saying, ‘Because I am a dentist, you will be a dentist as an adult.’  That’s another problem we had in Wildcat City, and ultimately, it was why it was the city in the U.S. with the biggest number of CNG-related deaths, ensuring the U.S. is the country with the biggest amount, and not Iraq or Pakistan.  Those two are in the top 5, though.”

“Why am I not surprised?  I don’t think I ever went to those nations; I had only been to Afghanistan.”

“I see.  Well, in any case, thank you for your service, and for showing how powerful and how life-changing music can be.”

“It was an honor, sir.”  The tiger and Leo saluted one another.

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244. The next white tiger, the younger brother (by two years) to the tiger we just spoke to, also had the unfortunate case of ending up half-naked, but in his case, it followed the pattern of having the band jacket with epaulettes, but no pants.  He had pants to wear when appearing before us in person, though.  He had no shako because he did not order one from the store at first, so he wasn’t missing one.  (“Uniforms ‘R’ Us” sells parts of the uniforms separately instead of using just one template, allowing its customers to mix and match however they desire.  This is one of the reasons everybody discovered their headgear was missing.)  The band jacket was a darker shade of blue (but brighter than navy blue), with silver stripes going across the chest, golden epaulettes, and black cuffs around the sleeves, although the top part of the jacket that went around the neck was also black.  His pants were the same blue color, with silver stripes going down the legs.  His drum was a corps-style field drum.

245. The next white tiger was first cousins with the two brothers, but he didn’t end up half-naked; he was just missing the shako.  He wore a red circus-style uniform with white stripes going across, and two other lines to connect the trapezoid, and his epaulettes and belt were white as well, while his pants were black two silver stripes going down the legs, and black cuffs around the wrists.  He, too, played a corps-style field drum.

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246. Then we across a bigger group of white tigers encompassing multiple families, which illustrated how CNG lied to itself about Kriegland being a male-dominated society, because all the men had turned into white tigers, while the women were still human, and the same was true for their offspring.  All together, there were three dads in their upper 30s, five teens in high school, five younger cubs that were just starting junior high school, and the last six had just started college, for a total of nineteen.  Each of the dads had just three sons, though, one college kid, one high school kid, and one junior high kid.  The other tigers still had humans for parents.

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247. Three white Bengal tigers wearing the formal business suits and ties, representing their time at Game Show Congress; the third one also wore a fedora.  All three usually worked in local television, however, doing the newscasts.  Two of them worked as camera operators, while the third directed from the booth.

248. A white tiger in a fancy tuxedo with bowtie, also attending Game Show Congress.  He also had experience playing both the acoustic bass and bass guitar, playing both jazz and rock music, while his father was a timpanist in the local symphony orchestra, but his day job as a personal shopper was where he made most of his income.  The game show had he appeared on before was Cripto hosted.  

“I can also confirm for you,” he said, “that I had a few ancestors who played timpani in the orchestras to some of those game shows from the 1950s.  They had no idea the shows were rigged, though.  Fortunately, they kept on finding work after those shows went off the air.  I haven’t tried that, though; I just play the bass and bass guitar.”

“That’s good,” we said.  “Do note that while it is illegal to rig a game show now, that wasn’t why all those people went to prison or got blackmailed.  They all went to prison for perjury.”

“True.”  

“Did you win, by the way?”

“I did; I won $100,000, actually.  The money’s long gone, though, so don’t ask me for a loan.”  (He had bought his own house with the cash that was left after taxes, and he had been a game show fan ever since.)

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249. Three white tigers wearing fancy black tuxedos with the bowtie to match.  They were all magicians with the same magical powers, and they demonstrated their tricks or us.  They even teamed up to do the sawing in half trick, a clearly impossible task.  Still, they did the illusion correctly, and then showed us how to create it.

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250. A white tiger wearing a circus ringmaster outfit, attending the circus convention in question.  He was cousins with another white tiger that had been documented in the previous wave, which we did in Dark Wolf’s castle.  The twist was that he also had the same magical powers the other three magicians did.

251. Three more white tigers wearing the fancy black tuxedo with bowtie, although the third one wore a fedora as well.  They were all jazz trumpeters.

252. A wildcat currently serving in the U.S. Army, but dressed in a custom military-style drum major uniform with various shades of brown and a darker shade of gold known as “antique gold.”  He had two white sashes going across the chest diagonally to form an “X,” while the drum was a military field drum.

253. Another wildcat wearing an orange and black uniform modeled after his college band uniform.  The black shako had the first letter of the name of the college on it in orange, with an orange plume to go with it.  He was another case where he, as the drum major, had undergone an unwanted transformation, but the rest of the marching band was still humans.  “That was a big relief for me,” he said.  “I don’t want to see humans go extinct.”

254. A winged lion wearing a dark blue and silver military-style drum major uniform with silver highlights, and the cuffs around the wrists were also silver.  The shako had a white plume attached to the logo that resembled a police officer badge, and the top part and rim were both blue.  He marched with a mace and whistle in the parade, although he did play the trombone.

“It’s my way of combining the two together,” he said, “because I was a military police officer.”

“Do you still work with the regular police now?”

“No, sir; that’s all behind me now.  I now work for Amazon.  If I need to fly somewhere, I don’t have to buy plane tickets!”  We had a good chuckle over it.

In addition to the other superpowers all musicians had, the lion could make his wings appear and disappear as needed.

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255. Here’s a first for us: we had a winged tiger, and his wings were orange and white.  (The lion had all white wings.)  His military-style drum major uniform, however, was turquoise with silver stripes and golden epaulettes, although he had dark green pants and cuffs around the wrists.  His shako had a turquoise plume and a silver paw print as the logo.  He experimented with playing a concert snare drum on the march, although we provided a stand for him to put it on when he played his assigned solo for us.  Tom also played his fife so the pair could play a fife-and-drum selection.

This tiger could also make his wings appear and disappear as needed.

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256. A white winged lion currently serving in the U.S. Air Force, but he opted to wear a custom military-style drum major uniform decked out in blue and gold; the cuffs around the wrists were also blue, but with golden stripes around the edges, and also a golden outline of the falcon logo that represented the Air Force.  His peaked cap had a black rim, golden stripe across the bottom, a black rim, and the blue top; the logo in gold resembled a bald eagle.  He marched with a mace in the parade, and he had experience carrying the flag and a rifle in multiple color guards in the past.

257. A gray wolf, now retired from the U.S. Navy, wearing a similar blue and gold military-style drum major uniform to the winged lion, but with a shako and gold plume instead of a peaked cap.  The cuffs were also blank, but retaining the blue color with the golden stripes on either side, and the eagle logo was identical.  He played a military field drum, with the Air Force logo in blue showing on the drum against a tan background.

258. Another gray wolf using a different design for his custom drum major uniform, although it was still military-style.  He didn’t play an instrument, however; he carried Old Glory in the parade.  The uniform had a name tag on the right side and military decorations and awards on the left.

259. Another gray wolf in a military-style drum major uniform, but the color combination he used was purple, gold, white, and silver, all intending to pay homage to his alma mater, which was also Northwestern University.  (“You can tell I appreciate the ‘Wildcat March,’” he said.)  The white sash going diagonally down across the chest had the first letter of his name (“M”) on it.  The shako had a purple rim, and the top part was half purple, half white, with a white plume.  The gold logo on the shako resembled the cat logo representing Northwestern.  He marched in the parade in one of the color guards, holding a rifle.

260. Another gray wolf in a military-style drum major uniform, using dark cyan, orange, silver and white.  The stripes going across the chest were double striped; orange on the top and silver on the bottom.  The shako had a black rim and a dark cyan top with an orange stripe going across about two-thirds of the way up.  There was a silver stripe going across the edge above the rim.  The logo in silver was a wolf’s head.  He also marched with a rifle.

261. A wolf in a purple, black, and gold military-style drum major uniform with solid black pants, and the jacket having golden stripes going across the chest, as well as golden epaulettes.  The wolf’s peaked cap had a golden bald eagle as the logo.  He marched in the parade with a corps-style field drum.

262. Another wolf in a military-style drum major uniform, but the pants were solid purple, since he was using only purple and silver (although the rim on the peaked cap was black).  He played a football snare drum in the parade, and he was also a graduate of Northwestern.  “Purple and white are their school colors,” he said, “but when I customized the design, I decided silver worked better with purple.”

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263. Last, but not least, we were finally able to complete the list and finish everybody for the year’s worth of transformations when we had five yellow Labrador retrievers all playing snare drums on the march, although the first two had military field drums, while the last three were playing corps-style snare drums.  All five also had the unfortunate case of ending up as half-naked animals, but the five also revealed that they were brothers in the same family, and they all liked watching “The Adventures of Drummer Dog.”  They subsequently ordered pants to complete the uniforms for the big parade.

Four of the five dogs wore green and gold uniforms, while the fifth one wore a purple and gold uniform, representing the fact he ended up at a different high school than his brothers due to a clerical error.  “I went ahead and kept it, though,” he said.  “It was easier than sending it back and going through the hassle to get a green one.”

“Regardless of what color uniform you wear,” Leo replied, “the purpose is marching to the beat of your own drum.  Be proud of yourself, and keep putting your talents to good use.”

“Yes, sir.”  The dogs and Leo saluted one another.

To differentiate, the first dog’s uniform was military style, being entirely emerald green and gold except for the cuff sections, which were forest green, and the pants he added later were also emerald green.  He wore a military peaked cap (with no plume), which was half green (on the top), and half black on the bottom, with the rim also black, and a golden stripe going across the bottom of the hat.  The gold logo looked like a gold circle with two wings on either side, with a flame going upwards.  (The first dog was also the oldest of the five.)

“What does the logo represent?” we asked him.

“It was meant to represent my Native American heritage,” he said, “because the phoenix is a bird that rises from its own ashes.  However, I had discovered that CNG had messed up the records on purpose as part of its efforts to destroy humanity, and I had previously called you guys in the C.I.D.F. asking how to fix it.  I’m actually Hualapai; you’ll find us somewhere in the top left half of Arizona.”

“You do learn something every day,” Super C replied.  “The places our cowboys friends call home, GVS and its neighboring sister town of Dobson Glen, are just a few miles south of Phoenix.  Any Native American tribal folks I’ve met down there who aren’t the Moon Dwellers are either part of the Gila River Indian Community, or the Ak Chin Indian Community.  Do either of those ring a bell?”

“Yes; the CNG had wrongly labeled me and my family as Ak Chin.”

“Fortunately, we got down there in time, and we got it fixed.”

“I appreciate your help.”

“You’re welcome.”

The second dog’s uniform was also entirely green and gold except for the black rim on the hat, which was a shako (but with no plume), and the gold logo was a star.  He did not have epaulettes on his uniform, but he did have military chevrons on each side, and his pants had the gold stripes going down each leg.  The chevrons represented his uncle’s rank at the time he left military service, and he was in the Army as well.  He was the second-oldest of the puppies in the litter.

The third dog, the youngest of the pups, used a different design for his uniform; the jacket was solid green except for one white bar, which went diagonally down to the left.  The further down it went, the wider it got, which we thought was interesting.  The white bar had two thin golden stripes on either side.  The cuffs around the wrists were also white with gold borders, while the pants were solid green.  The green shako had a white plume on top, and a black rim with a gold stripe above the rim.  The logo looked a patch that had been sewed on, since it had a gold edge around the semicircle it created, and inside the semicircle was a golden paw print.

When the dog showed us the photos that were taken to show that CNG made him a half-naked animal, it used a different picture for the logo.  “It looks like…puppy treats?” Super C exclaimed.  “Why would you put puppy treats on a hat like this?”

“I still have not figured that one out,” the dog replied, “but I think it has something to do with the ones who bullied me in my younger days, all of which I have forgiven.  I was the shortest one in my class as well as the youngest, and the bullies decided to use the word ‘puppy’ in an insulting manner, criticizing a bad habit I had to let go of in the end; I won’t tell you what the habit is, but it may have influenced CNG’s decision to make us all yellow Labrador retrievers.”

“Innuendo, possibly?”

“I believe so, sir.”

“I feel you; the bullies that used to taunt Cripto did the same thing to him, except with different names.”

The fourth dog, the middle puppy of the group, was the dog wearing purple instead of green; the jacket still had the epaulettes and stripes going across, but it had black going around the wrists, as well as a couple of sections going around the neck.  The pants were purple with a gold stripe going down the legs.  The shako had a black rim, a golden stripe going across the bottom, and there was a black edge on the top.  The plume was a big fluffy golden plume.

The fifth and final dog, the second-youngest, used green, gold, and silver for his uniform; the green jacket and silver dots on it, but no stripes going across.  Instead, one gold stripe went down the middle, highlighted by dots, and he had a gold stripe on each side next to the silver dots, connected to the epaulettes.  His pants were also green with a golden stripe going down the legs, and the cuff section around the wrists also were in gold.  The dog’s shako did not have a plume, but it had a black rim and a golden stripe going across the bottom, and the golden logo on the shako was an exact replica of the United Nations logo.

“Why the UN logo?” we asked.

“In my puppy days,” he replied, “I’d write stories about being the U.S. percussion ambassador to Canada, or something like that.  I had a wild imagination, but that’s normal among the youngsters.  Music had always been a passion for me, and always will be a passion, but it will suit me better just working as a composer and arranger.  I hope to join ASCAP at some point.”

“Very good,” said Leo.  “I am a member of ASCAP myself; it helps me make bank since I donate my entire Presidential salary to charity.”

The dogs then lined up at attention, facing the COTS and Zootopia bands, and did a drum solo for them that feature some impressive visuals.  Then all the musicians present played the “Hymn of the United Nations.”

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That completes the list, and we all let out a big sigh of relief when it was all over.  “Whew; that was a ton of them,” Tom commented.

“We made it, everybody,” I said, and one of the bystanders in the crowd added, “Amen, brother!”  I don’t know why he said that, but he did.  Some jokingly let out some moans and groans of disappointment in response; some were in regards to that joke, but others had said, “We’re enjoying the music, and we’re enjoying the show.  We’re enjoying see Leo on television; we don’t want it to end.”

“Well, it had to end at some point,” another one said.

The official finale consisted of the national anthem one more time, as well as Leo looking into the cameras and announcing, “The list is completed!  A big thank you once again to all of you for stopping by our fair city and letting yourselves be documented.  While it might not make sense to you, you are doing the C.I.D.F. and the G-52s a favor by doing this, because it lets us know who the targets are so we can determine who it is that is going after you.  We are sorry that there are people going after you, but you can be rest assured that they will not succeed in their goals.  You courageously did your part, and now we will do ours.”

Some other members of the administration also gave some thank-you remarks before we went off the air for the last time (or went to the next thing to be aired in the case of C-SPAN).

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There are 365 days in a year, or 366 in a leap year, but it was a total of 308 days from start to finish, including vacation breaks, for this year, when CNG did its dirty deeds.  The previous wave took only 250 days in the year.  Isn’t that wild?  Does it help you understand just how powerful CNG was in the end?  We frequently lament that the only thing that could beat it was itself, and it did beat itself, but it was our combined efforts as the forces of good that motivated it to end itself, because it finally started to see that nothing it did was worth the trouble.

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As mentioned before, all the animals that played musical instruments got the same batch of superpowers, but some got some extra ones, while others didn’t.  The ones who did not play any instruments were also scattered about; some got superpowers, but others didn’t.  The winged lions and the winged tiger we documented could fly, obviously, but only when they had the wings out and about; they could make them disappear as needed, but when the wings disappeared, their feet wouldn’t leave the ground.

All the animals who had superpowers felt they should seek some counseling on how to use them so that they don’t do anything rash, and Super C gave them instructions on whom to talk to, since the C.I.D.F has licensed counselors for those with superpowers.  Alternatively, he did some of the counseling himself.

Meanwhile, the administration took the rest of the day off to clear their minds, although Judge Marcus practiced a few more percussion solos for the musical payroll system, since they had a part-time option.  That way, he could do his duty as U.S. Attorney General and still have time to play the music.  Upon retiring, though, he would be on the payroll full-time, since he had no more desires to go back to the courtroom.

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TO BE CONTINUED