---chapter 3
The loud beeping of the alarm clock pierced in his ears. Shortly following that was the pain in his tail. He reached behind and grabbed his bushy tail and pulled it out from under him.
In a groggy state, he started smacking his bedside table to silence the alarm clock. Why had he set it? An eye opened and scoped the room. The clock read eight o’clock. The date he had set up with Feiyra suddenly registered in his head.
“Ah shit.” He said jumping up out of the bed. He was still very tired, but it was night time again and a second wind was coming to him.
He opened his drawers on his dresser and started rummaging through till he found a pair of grey camouflage shorts. He quickly slid these on and grabbed a black t shirt with the word “Raccool” in large letters on the front.
He pulled on his shoes and rubbed his face, trying to get the feeling back in it from the lack of rest. He drug his backpack over and dug around in the inner pockets, pulling out one of the wads of hundred dollar bills. He pulled three of them and tucked them into his wallet.
He stood up, and went into the bathroom, quickly did a quick comb of his fur, brushed his teeth and was out the door. He got into his car and started it, backed out of the garage and driveway and was rolling down the road to go pick up his date for the night.
It was about eight twenty when Feirya saw Cymaenie’s car roll up outside of her house. She grabbed her purse off of the entry table and hurried out to meet him. She opened the door and jumped in.
“Hello Cymaenie!”
“Sorry I’m late. Over slept.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that. I understand with you working these insane shifts.”
He nodded and pulled back onto the street on his way to the movie theater. They arrived ten minutes later, and walked up to the glowing neon theater and inside to find a movie worth watching.
Cymaenie stepped back, being the gentleman and let her pick something that she wanted to see as it was her date after all. He pretended to be interested as she selected a cheesy looking romantic comedy.
He pulled out one of his hundred dollar bills and slid it to the attendant. Feirya curiously looked at Cymaenie. He always seemed to have hundred dollar bills. She looked no further than this as he counted his change and took the tickets.
They entered the theater doors and she drug him to the concession stand. “It’s not a movie without popcorn!”
He handed her a twenty. “Go right ahead. I’m going to go find some seats in the theater.”
He broke from her clutch and headed to the appropriate theater, and entered. The lighting was dimmed as usual, and the screen was showing advertisements and useless knowledge while soft rock quietly played.
The theater was almost void of furs. A quick count by him came up with roughly twenty others, scattered about the massive room. He went up a few rows so that the screen was close to eye level. On his way up the stairs, as he was looking over to find a good level, he collided with a rottweiler.
There was a pause from the two as they caught their balance. Cymaenie’s head filled with the thought that the dog was rather cute. He cleared his throat, as he gave a quick look over at his solid build frame covered in smooth black fur. “Sorry man. Pardon me.” He said, shaking the thought out of his head and stepping aside.
“No worries mate.” The rott said with a rather thick German accent. Cymaenie allowed him to pass before going up a few more steps to an appropriate row. He turned and then walked his way down to the center and sat in the plush theater seat.
He sat here for a moment, staring ahead at the dry cleaning ad on the screen and thought deeply. ‘Did I just think a male was cute?’. He was almost certain that he did as images of the dog flashed through his mind. Maybe the lack of proper sleep was indeed finally getting to him.
He rubbed his eyes, and cleared his mind of thoughts. When he opened them again, he saw Feirya walking in the theater with a bucket of popcorn, a box of gummy worms, two sodas, a candy bar, and a box of peanuts. She had apparently spent the whole twenty.
He waved to her, although futile as his black paws wouldn’t be noticed in the darkness of the theater. She looked around, and finally spotted Cymaenie and hurried her way up to meet him.
She scurried down the row and handed him the things, plopping into the chair next to him. She stuffed the bucket of soda into the cup holder and began fighting with the box of peanuts.
Cymaenie watched her for a moment, but his attention was drawn away as he saw the rottweiler walking back in around the corner and coming up the stairs. He was at a slight advantage as his eyes were quite keen in the dark and he could see the dog quite well.
He snapped his stare and forced his mind on other things. “Are you alright?” Feirya asked noticing Cymaenie’s peculiar behavior.
“Hmm? Yes. I’m fine. I just thought… never mind.” He sat back in the chair and stared ahead at the screen.
Feirya raised an eyebrow, but continued her plight for peanuts.
The lights dimmed slowly and Cymaenie got comfortable. The screen went black, and shortly there after the previews started. He intently watched as the new movies soon to come out showed listening to the frustration of Feirya’s growls at the peanut box.
He got bumped with her elbow hard in his neck. He took away the slightly mangled box from her, bit into the corner and using his sharp teeth, ripped open the end. He handed it back to her and sipped his soda.
“I could’ve done that had I wanted to be barbaric.” She mused.
The movie started and played without further incident. It was a very boring movie consisting of two rabbits in a wild relationship. They had met as co-workers and were constantly involved in bad dates and crazy parents. Cymaenie found the back of the peanut box more entertaining.
Apparently Feirya had picked it as what it was intended for. Women. She thought the story charming and very romantic as she had snuggled against Cymaenie halfway through.
As the credits began to roll, she grabbed his paw and squeezed it. “What did you think?”
He looked around, and grunted.
“It reminds me of our relationship. Although without the crazy parents.”
Cymaenie looked at her. “I think you need to meet your own parents.” He had been to her folks. They were crazy.
“What on earth do you mean?” She sat up and cleaned up her junk food carnage.
“Your father came after me with a shovel when I visited!” he exclaimed. “Do you find that normal?”
“He did no such thing. You are being ridiculous.”
“The man had a shovel! He ran at me calling me the devil!”
“He’s just nervous of new people.”
“No. I think he hates me, and all raccoons for that matter.”
“My father is not a racist. Stop being silly and lets go.”
“He personally told me that all raccoons are oily creatures, with no…”
“Are you quite finished?” he was interrupted.
“Yes. I should think so.” He would never win against an argument concerning her family. It was best to just let it go. She smiled, nodded and started heading out of the theater.
They threw out their garbage and exited the lobby and headed through the parking lot to his car. He drove her back to her house and parked the car on the street.
“Well, that was a fun change of the typical monotony.” She said. The car fell silent for a moment. Cymaenie’s dating 101 kicked in and he rubbed her arm and leaned over the center console. She smiled and did the same.
Their snouts met in a kiss. As his lips touched Feirya’s something in his brain snapped and his thoughts whirled to the rottweiler at the movie theater. He snapped back from the kiss, surprising Feirya.
“Are you alright? You have been acting very strange all night. It’s not something I did or…”
He shook his head. “No. I just thought of… something. It’s nothing.”
She sighed looking him over. “Its probably the lack of sleep Cymaenie. You work two long jobs and get practically no sleep. You’ll kill yourself at this rate. Why don’t you give up the milk job?”
He almost asked ‘What milk job?’ But caught himself before he did. “It’s not for long. Just till I can get my house paid off… look, I’m going to be honest. I’ve got a lot on my mind and I can’t really get into an intimate mood tonight.”
She looked saddened.
“It’s nothing with you. I’m just exhausted Feirya. I haven’t slept more than a couple of hours here and there over the last week. I’m really all messed up. You’ll have to forgive me.”
She smiled warmly. “I understand.” Apparently she bought his excuse as well. He smiled back and gave her a goodbye kiss. She climbed out of the car and waved as she headed up to the house.
He watched to make sure that she got inside alright, then headed off down the street again. He made his way through the city towards his hideout and parked a few blocks away.
He got out of the car, closed and locked the doors, after grabbing his duffle. He needed to think and sleeping at night was difficult. He walked quietly down the deserted city streets, his mind wandering.
He had had attraction to other males in his past. However, he had always just pushed them off as random jealousy. Something felt different now. Never before had such an interest in another male hit him so quickly before.
He entered his garage safe house, changed into his gear and was behind the wheel of the Monte Carlo inside of ten mintues. He started it and pulled out into the streets, and roared away.
As he rolled on the miles driving through the quiet city streets, he pondered more. When he first had started working at the office, a scarce three years ago, he had an attraction in Feirya. However, as time went by things seemed to change and he found less and less interest in her as a girl friend.
“What the fuck?” he exclaimed to himself. He needed to get his mind off of it. He quickly turned the wheel, and with a slight squeal of tires, pulled into an alley. He killed the lights and climbed out of the car, closing the door quietly.
He ran down the alley towards a fire escape. He jumped, and hoisted himself on top of a dumpster below, jumped again and grabbed a hold of the bottom rung of the retracted ladder. He pulled himself up and onto the metal platform.
He stooped at the second story window and grabbed one of his tools. He stopped and looked at the glass window curiously. He tucked away the metal shimmy and stuck his claws under the window pane. He lifted and the window slid open easily enough.
He rolled his eyes, and cautiously stepped inside. He sniffed the air, and looked around the hallway. There was a security system in place.
“Floor lasers. How silly.” He said noticing the sensors on the wall. He smiled and walked in, stepping over the invisible beam, keeping his tail raised. There were three in total in the hall, and he took care to avoid each of them.
He stopped at a wooden door at the end of the hall that had a name plate on it reading, “Professor Borer Head Curator.” He had broken into the Herdnan Armory Museum, and lifting something of intrinsic value was looking far too easy.
He smiled as he passed through the door, taking a deep breath of the room that smelled of gun oil, and metal polish. He looked around, his tail gently wagging with excitement.
Shelves upon shelves were packed with pieces of armor, weapons, and other old battle equipment. He padded across the room looking for anything complete and expensive looking. His eyes had become trained at scoping rooms quickly for anything worth pilfering.
He turned and stopped when his eyes fell on a table littered with items. He quickly headed over to this and gazed over them. His bag slid off of his shoulder and he opened it. He snatched up a few of the old muskets lying around, a few of the old golden daggers and stuffed them into his bag. Once this was full, he tossed the bag back on and got ready to leave.
He stopped when hanging over a desk in a glass case was a giant claymore. It was at least seven feet in length, made of gold and silver forged together with rubies and diamonds inlaid in the hilt.
He was instantly sold. He jumped onto the wooden chair, and looked over the case. It was rigged into the security system as well by the wall hooks. He grabbed a multipurpose tool from one of his shoulder pouches and extended a small saw. He stood on top of the desk and quickly started sawing at the wood frame of the case end.
He sawed fast, cutting through the pine frame with no effort. He repeated the process on the other corner of the top end of the wood frame. He removed the piece of loose pine and tossed it aside. Using care, he lifted the pane of glass from it’s wooden slot in the case. He set this on the desk and reached in the open end of the case and lifted the sword from it’s mooring.
It was a great deal heavier than he was counting on. He slowly pulled it from the box, and looked over it’s great length. He grinned and stepped off the desk and headed for the door. Now minding the sword, his legs and tail carefully made his way past the lasers and to the open window.
He set the claymore on the fire escape and crawled out. He kicked the ratchet on the ladder and slowly let it down to the ground. He started on his way down, grabbing the sword and carrying it down with him.
Once on the surface, he ran to the car, lay the sword on the back seat, climbed in and was gone within a minute.
As happy as he was with his fine steals and ease of the job, his thoughts still turned back with his apparent identity crisis. It was apparent that not even thieving was going to help this situation. He needed a true friend to talk to.
