4/20/2022
An intrepid band of raccoons, all with different motivations, yet a common goal, gathered together at their home, the city dump, to discuss how to achieve their aims beyond the confines of their home.
The Heist of Raccoons included:
Brisket Jack [Scott] who referred to himself intermittently in the third person. Gray and grizzled his mask was slowly blending into his other fur. Brisket had only four fingers on one hand, having lost one fighting a pit bull [allegedly] who had cornered some foraging kits. Per Brisket, “Brisket chased that junk yard dog completely out of the junk yard. Now he’s just a dog.” Brisket seeks glory and adventure, an example for other raccoons to follow.
Vibrissa the inventor [Aeryn, they/them], who had only two legs, their back legs replaced with uneven wheels, one rubbered, one only a rim, from a lawnmower and kid’s tricycle, and a small cart, the result of a wheeled invention not going right when coupled with a jet pack and molotov cocktails. Vibrissa once aided Kit in overcoming dump night terrors where Kit would awake to be terrified of the looming shadow of the mounds of the dump, by variously blowing up mounds in the dump.
Kit [Hank, they/them], the littlest raccoon, although more appropriately the shortest raccoon, almost a ball in stature. “I’m shortest on two legs, but not the littlest.” Kit as a growing raccoon, is excited to find and wash some new food, even to the point of eating it right on the spot. Kit is more relaxed around Vibrissa as they have learned to associate inventive explosions with food.
Rabies Eddie [Kyle, me/mine] the untamable beast. Eddie is grizzled and has seen to much and been in too many places, and often lives inside mes own head, staring off into the distance. Maria Triple XL takes care of him but has to be careful, as there was an incident where Maria got between Eddie and some possums and bit Maria. As Eddie says, “Things got kind of hairy.” There’s a bit of ill will between them over the bites, despite the protective nature of their relationship.
Maria Triple XL [Chris, Bad Ass Motherfucker], the colossus, strong, deft, and brave. And a bit stout and square. A protective relationship with Rabies Eddie that resulting in the “biting incident”, many of which are still healing, although no rabies resulted. Maria loves food. Loves to swim and has a secret the BAM shares with Brisket about a lost treasure outside the dump as they were litter mates.
The Heist begins to design a ship that can carry them all to adventure and treasure. Several ideas are bandied about including using Legos [how many, each raccoon’s weight in legos?], a bathtub, a cracked hot tub, trash cans, dirty dump water, helium, and milk crates Initial experiments involve trying to loft Kit skyward using a milk crate, a rope, a bag, and helium. The helium works much better than expected nearly dragging the whole party off the ground. Vibrissa eventually reads the canisters and realizes they’re not full of helium, but are full of Fizzy Lifting Gas. Several panels of scrap wood, half a dozen beat up trash cans, two rear propellers, two side propellers, an engine/motor, and a couple of super soakers are all lashed together under a large balloon, with a beach ball used to control the amount of gas.
Brisket Jack’s artistic drawing of the TinCANic [figure 1] , the sturdiest of Raccoon Flying vessels ever constructed, naming heavily indebted to Torch Key the Raccoon who was absent this adventure. Maria Triple XL dumps the dump water Brisket collected for the BAM, declaring at the end of the adventure, a giant expanse of warm clean water awaits. Vibrissa adds some railings for safety purposes.
With the release of fizzy lifting glass, the Heist is away, floating roughly above fence height, then higher until they can survey what lies before them. Maria can smell a mix of chocolate and the same scent in fizzy lifting gas to the northeast where trucks carry something from the chemical plant to a factory.
The initial journey is particularly smooth as a lightly moonlit night begins to fall and Maria guides the TinCANic onto the factory roof, landing deftly on an A/C unit to protect the props while repairing a malfunctioning rotor, following the mantra gained through a lifetime of experience, “If it doesn’t fit, force it.” It is noted by Eddie that Maria is deft at releasing gas.
The factory reeks of chocolate and the Heist heads down the side of the building and enters a hallway via the loading docks. Maria XL almost gets stuck between a truck and the door, but Kit assists and the Heist is in, examining a hallway full of doors. The first room seems to be nothing more than random supplies: 150’ of bungee cord, a fire extinguisher, a ten gallon bucket of soap, some lawn chairs, and more. A second room is nothing but Halloween decorations and hard candy. Maria XL feels a BAM can blend in more appropriately with glasses and a fake mustache from the Halloween supplies.
Photo courtesy of Vibrissa:
Following the signs, the Heist gets to the chocolate floor entrance and forms a raccoon pyramid, with Kit on top pushing up the door handle with a broom from the supply room. Inside the room is glorious with the smell of chocolate and a giant bucket that seems to be full of 1000 gallons of liquid deliciousness. Both Maria Triple XL and Kit head to the top of the bucket, climbing scaffolding and walkways. Brisket heads up after them with a bit of a completely unnecessary acrobatic flourish.
The level of the chocolate is a bit too far for a raccoon to reach and Kit suggests a raccoon chain. Maria agrees and dunks Kit, but proceeds to fall in, both of them floating in the giant bucket of chocolate. Kit calls for help, but Maria is content to float and bask in chocolate. Brisket heads to find the broom and 150’ bungee cord to pull them out.
All of the ruckus attracts the attention of a human factory worker and a dog in a little office overlooking the floor. The dog comes bounding down to attack and Brisket gets in its face, asking, “Do you remember me?” while waving four fingers at it. The dog recognizes Brisket and whimpers and barks, but backs off. Meanwhile the human is pulling an alarm, screaming “There are raccoons in the chocolate” and coming down the stairs to intercede. Rabies Eddie starts chasing the human up the stairs and the human hides in his office, obviously concerned about Eddie’s potential for actual rabies.
Meanwhile, Vibrissa whacks a big red hanging button with the broom, triggering a chocolate dump and gently spilling 1000 gallons of chocolate, and chocolate covered Kit and Maria XL onto the factory floor.
A not quite exact reenactment of 1000 gallons of chocolate spilling on the factory floor. Note that the factory was a bit more gentle in its dump.
Maria heads up the stairs to fetch Eddie, who’s in his zone, while small orange humanoids coming rushing into the factory floor from the other direction, slipping in all the spilled chocolate. The party decides it’s time to make a hasty retreat and heads back down the hallway to the docks, leaving behind chocolate footprints and long chocolate smears, like someone dragged a dirty diaper down the hall.
In the docks, most of the humans are lining up and heading out the doors while the alarm sounds and Vibrissa takes a moment to chew through a break line in case anyone tries to follow.
The Heist rushes back to the roof and the TinCANic, but several humans see them, and a man in a large tophat and suit rushes out to shake his fist at them before disappearing back inside. The Heist feels safer aloft, but realizes the man in the top hat is chasing them in a semi. Hopefully the semi with the bad brakes. But then they realize the brakes do not matter as the little orange workers scurry around the truck into the back and the whole thing begins to lift of the ground heading toward them in a straight line. The truck is attacked with the super soakers, but the attempt is foiled by the simple invention of windshield wipers.
The stress of the escape is having an impact on the TinCANic, and in the chaos, Brisket messes up the steering, interfering with the ability to simply turn and get away from the man and the floating semi. But with some inventive spiraling, the Heist manages to angle themselves away at a ninety degree angle while the truck goes floating in a straight line, the factory owner shaking his fist at them, and the rear of the truck full of a few little orange men and a bladder that is probably full of fizzy lifting gas.
With the broken helm, the Heist continues on, attempting to get to the “thousand raccoon tall” buildings nearby as light slowly starts to appear on the horizon and humans begin to mill about. But before the sun can rise, a small blinking light appears in the distance, seemingly drawn by temporary noise from the motor that Kit manages to quiet, but not soon enough. As the TinCANic moves up and down to evade it, it matches their fences height precisely.
[General flying pattern of the TinCANic post helm issues]
As it gets closer, it becomes obvious the light, which starts to flash red and blue, is a police drone. Brisket yells to get to the super soakers, and a well aimed squirt causes the drone to start to spark and wobble toward the ground. But alas, more police drones are on the way and the Heist feels it’s time to head to ground, in more ways than one.
Maria tries to take the TinCANic in for her signature landing, but slams it into the ground hard, breaking apart moldy wood, and throwing rivets and connecting bits left and right [and up and down]. Vibrissa cuts the engine and despite the desire to investigate the tall buildings, the Heist heads for possum woods, home of Squinty Pete the possum, to lay low for the day while the humans are at their busiest and the drones continue their search.
So while the houses were never reached and Maria failed to find a giant pool or tub full of warm, soothing water, a giant pool of chocolate was a delicious, temporary substitute, Brisket Jack got to relive his days a a tamer of junk yard dogs, Vibrissa was able to test many new inventions or at least reuse of existing inventions and learned where to find lots of dizzying lifting gas, Rabies Eddie got to take on overwhelming odds against both a dog and human, a reason to go beserk on someone other than Maria XL, and Kit, though not able to find some new food to wash and eat on the spot, did allow the Heist to explore areas of the chocolate factory and was washed in edible chocolate.
