Pug
Franklin Pug
The Pug Who Would Be Emperor
A deposed emperor trapped in a nine-inch body, wearing ceremonial pants he insists are regalia, running a household that has no idea it's been conquered.
What the family says “What the Franklin?”
The story
Pugs were bred to sit in the laps of Chinese emperors. They were guarded by soldiers. They were fed by hand. They had staff.
Franklin knows this. Franklin has never gotten over it.
In Franklin’s telling — and he tells it often, mostly to the dishwasher — he is the last living heir of the Imperial Pug Dynasty, a bloodline that ruled from silk cushions for a thousand years until it was toppled not by war, not by rival houses, but by paperwork. Somewhere between the palace and the present day, an ancestor signed something. Franklin isn’t clear on the details. He was not consulted.
He woke up one morning in a plastic crate at an adoption event with a name tag on, surrounded by peasants, being described as “great with kids.”
The humiliation was total. The strategy was immediate.
Franklin did what deposed royalty has always done: he infiltrated. He selected a household — modest, warm, chronically susceptible to eye contact — and allowed himself to be “chosen” by them. They believe they rescued him. He allows this. It is, in his view, the single most successful con in the history of small mammals.
Since then he has systematically annexed the territory. The couch fell first. Then the good chair. Then the bed, which he took by simply lying down in the middle of it and refusing to acknowledge questions. Room by room, he marked his borders the way emperors always have — which is how he came to be sentenced to the Sash.
He wears it with enormous dignity. It is, to him, proof that they finally understood he required regalia. He has never once connected it to the rug incident. He has never once connected it to any of the incidents.
The empire is smaller than it was. The empire is now a two-bedroom with a fenced yard.
The empire is still an empire.
What drives him
- The lie he tells himself
- I am owed an empire.
- What he actually wants
- To be looked at.
Vitals
- Name
- Franklin Pug. Both words — the species is part of the name. Never “Frankie.” He has corrected people.
- Species
- Pug. Boy.
- Signature garment
- Pants. He calls them the Sash.
- Primary drives
- Food, attention, being the subject of the sentence
- Fatal flaw
- Cannot conceive of a world in which he is not the main character
- Redeeming quality
- Absolutely, catastrophically loyal — to the person currently holding food
- Full title, self-appointed
- Franklin the First, Sovereign of the Rug, Keeper of the Crumb, Wearer of the Sash
How he is
Grandiose
Everything is ceremonial. He doesn’t eat, he dines. He doesn’t get walked, he tours the province. A dropped noodle is tribute.
Ravenous
Food is not a want, it’s a right being withheld. He has never in his life felt full — only “interrupted.”
Attention-starved by choice
He would rather be yelled at than ignored. Being ignored is a constitutional crisis. Being yelled at is at least a conversation.
Utterly unbothered
No shame. None. Not a trace. He has done the worst thing you can imagine on the nicest thing you own and made direct eye contact throughout.
Transactional
Love is real, but it is also priced. He will absolutely sit on you forever. Cheese accelerates the timeline.
Structurally incapable of self-reflection
Every problem in Franklin’s life is a staffing problem. He’s not mean — he has simply never once considered that he might be the variable.
The others
His humans — “the Staff”
He has assigned them roles and does not accept resignations. The Chef is whoever most recently opened the fridge — his favourite person, retroactively, forever, until someone else opens the fridge. The Warden puts the Sash on; he holds no grudge, he assumes she is his dresser and simply bad at her job. The Chauffeur operates the leash. He does not walk with her. She accompanies him. He loves them enormously and would never, under any circumstances, admit the relationship runs in that direction.
Cookie
The rival aristocracy. Cats are quiet, cats are elevated, cats get on the counter — which he regards as a straightforward failure of security. He is convinced she is a spy, and that she is reporting to someone. He is building a case. He is not entirely wrong, and she will never say what she knows.
Daisy
He believes she is furniture, staff, and possibly a throne. He sleeps on her, or parks the back half on her ribs and sits upright like a commuter. And when he has gone genuinely too far she barks — once — and he stops instantly, every time, without argument. Franklin, who accepts correction from no human, animal or institution on earth, accepts it from Daisy. Neither will ever acknowledge this.
Abby Dog
He has decided she works for him. Her unearned kindness completely destabilises him, because he has no framework for generosity with no angle and keeps trying to find the angle. There is no angle. He has never noticed that the only reason he is winning is that nobody else entered.
Millie Dog
He cannot get a rise out of her and it is destroying him. His entire operating model is that a sufficiently loud performance produces an audience; it has worked on every human, dog, cat, guest and appliance he has ever met. It has never once worked on her. She looks at him. She waits for him to finish. She is the only unconquered territory in the empire and he has never admitted that it bothers him.
Running gags
- “What the Franklin?”
- The household’s exhausted catchphrase, roughly nine times a day.
- The Sash
- He will die before calling them pants.
- The Complaint Filed
- Franklin formally objecting to things that are not tribunals.
- The Second Dinner
- A meal he believes is legally owed to him.
- Jurisdiction
- Anything on the floor is his by law. He cites this law constantly. It does not exist.
- The Cat Conspiracy
- She’s up to something. He’s building a case.
- Breathing
- The snoring, the snorting, the wheeze — an aristocratic affectation rather than a nose problem.
25 things he would say
- What the Franklin?
- I have never been full. I have only been interrupted.
- If it hits the floor, it enters my jurisdiction.
- The Emperor requires a second dinner.
- These aren't pants. This is regalia.
- History will remember me. The carpet already does.
- Nobody looked at me for four seconds. I've filed a complaint.
- I'm not spoiled. I'm correctly maintained.
- The cat is a spy and I have receipts.
- Dignity is for dogs who can breathe through their nose.
- I don't have separation anxiety. You have abandonment issues.
- I'm not begging. I'm negotiating.
- My love language is your sandwich.
- Loyalty is expensive. It costs cheese.
- I marked it, therefore it's mine. That's just property law.
- The pants stay on during the coronation.
- Everything you own is technically a rough draft.
- Attention is a nutrient. I am deficient.
- Every room is a throne room if you sit weird enough.
- You may pet me. You may not stop petting me.
- Small dog. Large opinions. Zero regrets.
- Cats plot. Dogs charge. I supervise.
- Deposed, not defeated.
- Your lap is a public resource.
- I have two moods: snack and outrage.
