Hello from author Tom Frye. I would like to introduce young readers to a new 14-year-old author named Kody Connick. Recently, Kody met some folks who had a connection with the terrible sport of dog-fighting. Saddened by the cruelty shown to Pitbulls, Kody conducted research on the Internet and hammered out a story on his keyboard. I was so impressed by the chapters he sent me, that I saved them and before long I knew he had a book that would educate kids about the unfortunate plight of Pitbulls.
Wild Hearts is now being released this week here in Lincoln, but copies are available for libraries and schools across the nation, as well. The story is told through the eyes of a Pitbull named King and a juvenile delinquent named Charlie. Kody doesn’t know yet what he wants to do with his life, but he figures if he can change one person’s mind about the treatment of Pitbulls and the world of dog-fighting, he will have accomplished one of his goals.
Thanks,
Tom
Chapter One
There I stood in a puddle of blood, and through blurred vision I looked at the toughest opponent in my life.
My owner, Big J, shouted, “Go get him, Killer! Be the King you were meant to be tonight! Tear his heart out!”
The next thing I knew, I was head-butted by Shadow, then felt his sharp teeth graze my neck, then my shoulder, then slide down and clamp onto my left foreleg. I yelped it hurt so bad.
I was then fighting back, biting and chomping on Shadow’s neck. I got a good hold, too. I tasted blood. I tasted madness, and then I tasted sorrow as Vince used a prod stick on Shadow and forced him to back away into his corner of the ring. I then watched as some big man took the three-month-old pup Bandit by the scruff of his neck and toss him into Shadow’s corner.
Poor little Bandit didn’t stand a chance. Shadow lunged and clamped his massive jaws down hard on the pup’s neck and sent Bandit flying up and over his head.
The crowd went wild as Bandit spun head over paws, then landed in a crumpled, bloody heap in the middle of the ring.
Shadow was now prepared to take me out. His blood was up. His rage was red-hot, and he as came charging across the ring, I wondered if poor little Bandit was dead . . .
I’ll start from the beginning. My name is King. I’m a red-tip Pitbull, and my owner uses me to fight. Ever since I was a pup I fought. I even fought and killed my own brothers. In this environment, it’s win or die, and I fight to win.
Imagine this: You’re hungry, scared, and cold, walking around with 30 pounds of steel on your back. I knew when it was fight-time because Big J would starve me for days and make me fight puppies to get ready for the real challenge.
Did I want to fight?
No, but I had to.
Every fight-night, Big J would walk me into an arena to face another dog. There were people all around screaming. The smell of blood in the air. There were dark red stains of fallen dogs on the mat. The look in the others dog’s eyes was cold. The fights were quick. If you were lucky. Biting and slashing. Blood and fur flying in the air. And simply to entertain the crowd.
You had to be quick and strong to take the other dog down.
I was both, and on fight-night, I lunged up and bit the other dog’s neck, then I locked my jaws on him and swung my head around until there was no life left in the dog. Big J would walk over and pick me up by the scruff of my neck, and that’s when I knew the fight was over. I had won once again.
Big J would take me back to my kennel and drop a little food in my dish. He’d then say, “Look, you made me more money. I can’t believe a stupid mutt like you could bring in money! Glad I didn’t shoot you.”
I knew what he would do to me if I lost. He would take me out back and shoot me just like he did all the others who lost. I knew it wouldn’t be long before I lost.
Heck, I shouldn’t even be alive now, for when I was just a pup, Big J was going to use me for a “sparing” dog. He put me up against Rex, a big black Pitbull. Rex bit me once in the leg and once in the head. So I bit him back right in the neck, and that’s all it took to take down Rex. He left me two scars, one which looked like a lighting bolt down the calf of my back leg, and one on my head, which looked like a crown which is where I get the name King.
Big J had several other dogs. I never fought these dogs but I often talked to the older Doberman, Bullet. Bullet didn’t do so good in his last fight. He won but barely, and I knew Big J was going to shoot him soon.
One night, Bullet told me, “Never give up, no matter what, because soon you won’t have to fight anymore.”
I said, “There is no such thing as living without fighting.”
But Bullet said, “No, we were meant to live and run free no matter what breed of dog we are.”
That night, Bullet turned on Big J and bit him in the arm. That was the last time I ever saw Bullet. He was my only friend, and he was gone from my life just that quick.
Another day, I fought a red-tip Pitbull named Jade.
This fight, I didn’t know if I could go through with it, not because it was a girl, but because it was my daughter. When they brought us face to face what I saw before me wasn’t my daughter but a dog who was hooked up on the “juice” as Big J called it. It made normal calm dogs hyper and more aggressive. She lunged at me and bit my shoulder, and to my amazement she had no clue who I was.
I said, “Jade, do you know who I am?”
And she said, “Yeah, another opponent!”
If she saw it that way, so should I. I knew she was in pain so I grabbed her by the back of the neck and squeezed my jaws as hard as I could, and with the snap of her neck, my heart snap-ped, too.
Big J said, “You are a beast, killing your own daughter!”
The next couple of nights went by fast because watching Big J’s new dog Shadow was intriguing. I’ve never seen a dog so big and so fast. I knew if I were to fight him I would lose. Night after night, he killed dogs instantly, most of them had no clue what was going on.
One night I will never forget, is the night when Big J made Outlaw fight Shadow. This fight was the fastest fight I’ve ever seen and the most gruesome. Poor Outlaw, a German shepherd, was dead only two minutes in, and Shadow still bit and tore apart his lifeless body. I thought the sight of that couldn’t have brought anybody joy, but the monsters making us fight cheered and screamed.
While walking to the ring, I heard the low chilling voice of Shadow saying, “Go get him, Killer!”
Me a killer?
It was the painful truth, and I would show it in the match tonight. The match turned out like every other. We fought and I won. For the first time in my life, I looked at my reflection and saw what every body else saw: A bloody, scarred up beast.
For the next few days, I thought about what Bullet said, “We’re supposed to be free and we’re not meant to fight.”
What did he mean be free?
