Note: What ain't mine ain't mine, if you find anything that ain't mine!

~Ra'akone

The raccoon stood up proud and surveyed all that was his. "The great city of Montreal, mine, all MINE!" thought Ring-Tail. This was what kept him going, while all of his ring-tailed peers seemed more concerned with the banalities of hunting and garbage-bag rummaging, he ensured that he spent some time admiring what he considered to be HIS REALM.

He cared not about the various humans who went everywhere, he saw them as ingorant fools. In fact to him almost everyone was an ignorant fool. He enjoyed annoying the humans, and even more their dogs and cats. Ringtail could climb trees and utility poles much better than anyone else.

He earned a reputation for getting around. Cars, busses and even trains he’d take rides on. He even figured out how to ride the Deux-Montagnes line, without going inside the cars ("Humans are stupid, but they’re stronger than me, and I’d be trapped" was his reasoning) and without being zapped by the overhead wire. He also found his way into the twin nether regions, the sewers and the subway system, and was able to avoid being drowned, run over, or electrocuted.

He also had a reputation for causing damage. Even though he didn’t spend as much time foraging through garbage as everyone else of his species, when he did, the results were devastating. Garbage cans, garbage bags, and even Dumpsters were no match to him. He even found out where all of the garbage went, and the locations of the municipal stinkholes he revealed to none of his furry-tailed friends, which is fitting, as he didn’t really have any friends. He had a superiority complex. On one occasion a tarsier, a strange primate from Southeast Asia, somehow found herself in Montreal, amid circumstances involving a CP freighter, bureaucratic bungling, flimsy containers, and inebriated dock-workers. She wasn’t supposed to go anywhere NEAR Montreal. And Ringtail got into a nasty fight with her, for invading HIS realm. They eventually settled for a race across the Island of Montreal, and the Tarsier, named Stickyfoot, ended up going to far, when she tried cheating by riding a truck. For not actually showing up at the "finish line", she lost. Which suited Ringtail just fine. It was HIS city. He often would spy on City Hall and sometimes would parade around the grounds, because to him, the entire Ville d’Montreal may be controlled by a mayor, but was really HIS city.

One day as he was walking up one of "his" streets, which he called Red Brick Road because of all the red brick houses in the area (street signs erected by "inferiors" had no meaning to him), he climbed a tree to better survey his area, and noticed a sea of police and emergency vehicles in the distance. He noticed that there were always excited people wherever there were white and blue police cars, red fire-trucks, and yellow Urgence Santé ambulances. One of his favorite spectacles was that of people running around and panicking. It reminded him of who was superior.

There was a stately looking house with a brick-lined driveway and tiled-roof. The place was on fire. The firefighters got their weapons of mercy into position. A long hose was attached to the nearby fire hydrant. Ringtail looked with satisfaction. Fire was a force that brought out utter panic in the Inferiors. He enjoyed watching it. His attention was soon taken, however, from something on the other side of the street, on the same side as his perch. On the balcony of a triplex, a bald muscular man clad in a baseball cap and dressing-gown was speaking into a portable loudspeaker.

"Hey you, with the red hat, you’re screwing the wrong end of the hose to the fire hydrant!" he yelled. "Stop picking your nose!" he blurted in another direction. On the ground, police were preparing to enter the building he was in. "Now everybody give me 10 jumping jacks, NOW!" he blurted.

Ringtail couldn’t understand what was going on, but then, neither could the rest of the Inferiors.

"I am the Guitar God, I taught Jimi Hendrix!" came another amplified outburst. "You with the funny red hat!" he yelled at the fire-chief who was on hand, "put the hose on full power!" The fire chief, annoyed, spoke to a couple of police officers.

"Come down right now!" barked one of the police officers, He was answered with a pair of eggs being thrown at him. Meanwhile, someone emerged from the burning house with a cute white Labrador puppy.

"Drop the dog IMMEDIATELY!" barked the maniac. The confused firefighter dropped the dog and he took off.

"Look what you’ve done, PIG!" shouted a girl who was standing near the action, "That’s my best friend’s dog who may be missing thanks to you!" She reached into a garbage can, and picked up a piece of plywood from it. She threw it at the maniac, but he just deflected it with his megaphone. "You will join my harem, wench!"

Ringtail looked at the maniac. He saw a look of intelligence where everyone else saw signs of mental instability. "My master shall soon return. Stop fighting the fire, or I will release the otters!" More people began throwing things at the maniac, who was sitting on a lawn-chair on the balcony. Ringtail could make out part of what he was saying, somehow…my master! Of course he knew who the maniac’s master would be…RINGTAIL HIMSELF!

The sound of scurrying raccoon feet was inaudible over the din of fire and commotion. Ringtail then shimmied up a drainpipe onto the roof of the building, and climbed down to the balcony.

"Stop climbing over the shrubbery, the proper thing to do is to cut it and send it to the Salvation Army!" more garbage answered his nonsense. "I have eagle feathers and I know how to use them. We will not be undersold!" A pair of policemen began pounding on the doors of the place. "The doors open not for you. Send a rotary converter to the Queen of Twist, I command you!" ordered the maniac, as he took a jumbo box of Froot Loops, tore it open, and poured its contents over the railing of the balcony. He then lit the box on fire and dropped it on the contents below. The policemen scattered, and a small sugar-fire ensued. "I’ll send out the otters, I mean it!" Someone took a fire extinguisher and eliminated the small fire.

"Pierre, get the door-opener!" yelled one of the police officers. Ringtail noticed they were getting ready to attack. So he scurried down to the ground and began biting all of the police, and tearing their uniforms for effect. He then went up the drainpipe before anyone could spot him.

"Prepare to leave!" yelled Ringtail at the maniac. Despite his apparently different language, the maniac understood him clearly.

"I will obey!" he replied to his master. The two then began talking. Another police officer approached the door. The maniac threw down a garbage can, and then picked up a red-haired doll in a green summer dress. "Goodbye Suzie!" he yelled as he tossed the doll at the people below. More projectiles were thrown his way, but he made an exit, followed by his new master. He packed up all his most important belongings, including a square-headed electric guitar, numerous posters, numerous books and magazines, a pair of Magnums, assorted canned and bagged foods, clothing, all of his documents, and various other odds and ends, into a pair of garbage bags.

He then led Ringtail out through the back-door, and into a back-alley. There he had a green Cadillac parked at an unusual angle, about 24 degrees from being parallel parked. He got in, made sure that his master Ringtail was in, and then drove off. He could hear the sound of police sirens, so he made sure to speed up.

The two had left Montreal, but both the maniac, (who’s proper name was Jordan Nickelman, but who adopted the name "Loyal Retainer #1") and Ringtail saw it as a mere exile. The Loyal Retainer took to wearing his dressing gown and the furs of every animal but the raccoon. He was also the only man able to speak raccoon.

Shoutouts: The Usual

Author's Notes: If you remember Ringtail and Stickyfoot from somewhere else…you are not hallucinating, they are in my "A Tribute to Fur Covered Ones." Ok, originally this started as two different concepts for stories…one about a maniac who rants things through a portable loudspeaker and causes problems when there's a fire nearby (something similar ACTUALLY HAPPENED), the other about a raccoon…RINGTAIL…with a superiority complex. It's a raccoon, not a Ya'a Naomi remember. The idea of a maniac and a raccoon forming a bond…was too good to pass up!

~Ra'akone