Chapter 1: How the Cookie Crumbled
"GOOD MORNING MY SCRUMMY-WUMMY CHOCOLATE DISCIES!" Professor Crumbleworth shrieked, rolling herself face-first into the classroom whiteboard. Being a biscuit with no arms was, admittedly, a constant challenge in the teaching profession. "Oh bother, I've gone and stuck myself again. Would someone be a dear and peel me off?"
Muschensmuckle watched his teacher slowly slide down the whiteboard, leaving a trail of cream filling behind. As the only Jewish Oreo in Ms. Crumbleworth's history class, he was used to being different - his family's special kosher filling was notably less sticky than the regular kind, which made rock climbing particularly treacherous.
"RIGHT THEN!" Professor Crumbleworth finally freed herself, though her filling was now thoroughly lopsided. "Today we're learning about how we brilliant biscuits took over from those strange flesh-wagons called humans! Isn't that absolutely SMASHING?"
The class responded in a chorus of exaggerated British accents, because for some inexplicable reason, every Oreo on Earth had developed a posh London dialect after the takeover.
"Rather!" squeaked Reginald von Creamington III.
"Quite right, gov'nor!" shouted Duchess Double-Stuff.
"Oy vey," muttered Muschensmuckle, immediately covering his chocolate wafer in embarrassment. His Bubbe had always told him his Yiddish would slip out at the worst moments.
"Now then," Professor Crumbleworth continued, somehow managing to hold a piece of chalk between her cream filling, "can anyone tell me how we defeated the humans?"
Little Twisterton-upon-Thames raised his upper cookie. "We refused to let them figure out if we were milk's favorite cookie or not, and it drove them mad!"
"WRONG!" bellowed Professor Crumbleworth affectionately. "We simply waited until they were all in the middle of that strange debate about whether to twist, lick, or dunk. While they were distracted, we mobilized Operation Double Stuff - though if you ask me, it was rather more of a waddle than a mobilization, what with our circular shape and all."
Muschensmuckle's family had their own version of the story. His Zayde always insisted that the real victory came when the Oreos introduced a gefilte fish flavor that was so horrifying, the humans simply gave up and handed over the planet.
Life as an Oreo wasn't easy. They had to install splash guards around every swimming pool to prevent tragic milk-related disasters. Rainstorms required the entire population to hide under giant umbrellas or risk becoming a soggy mess. And don't even get him started on the summer months - the Great Melting of 2163 was still too painful to discuss in polite company.
"Sir," Muschensmuckle raised his cookie carefully, "what about the conspiracy theory that we're actually just regular cookies and this is all a bizarre sugar-induced hallucination?"
The classroom went silent. Professor Crumbleworth's cream filling visibly curdled.
"My dear boy," she said in her warmest, most patronizing British accent, "that's absolutely preposterous. Next you'll be suggesting that we don't actually need these tiny top hats and monocles we all inexplicably wear! Now then, who's ready to practice our mandatory daily curtsy?"
Just then, the milk bell rang, signaling snack time. The entire class began rolling themselves toward the door, creating what looked like a bizarre cookie avalanche.
"Remember your cream-filling protection protocols!" Professor Crumbleworth called after them. "We don't want another incident like last Tuesday when poor Pickwicket got dunked for too long and turned into cookie soup!"
Muschensmuckle adjusted his miniature yarmulke, carefully secured with a dab of cream filling, and rolled himself toward the milk station. He passed the school's motto emblazoned on the wall: "TWIST DESTINY, LICK ADVERSITY, DUNK WITH DIVERSITY."
Being an Oreo in a human-sized world was absurd, but at least they were all absurd together. Except for the Hydrox cookies - nobody talked about them. They lived on the wrong side of the cookie jar, still bitter about the whole "we were actually invented first" thing.
As he joined his friends for milk break, Muschensmuckle couldn't help but smile. Tomorrow was Shabbat, and he was looking forward to his family's weekly tradition of gathering around the electric candles (real ones being a obvious hazard to a civilization made entirely of cookies) and singing "Twist Peace Upon You" in perfect British accents.
Just another normal day in the United Cookies of Oreomerica.
