The Ringleader

The very pretty village of Lourmarin in Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur is about an hour south-east of Avignon. It has a sumptuous Renaissance castle which is booked for the glamorous and extravagant annual grand-fête of the Anonymous Association of Ornament Removal (AAOOR). That weekend, the number of Rolls-Royces, Bentleys and Maybachs parked locally rivals Monaco, Qatar or Knightsbridge in London. Originally, the local council was against hosting the world's most famous jewel thieves, but seeing how much money came in, they quickly changed their mind and welcomed them warmly. 

Extravagantly dressed people make their way to the castle's the ball room. A clever observer would notice that nobody wore jewelry, zero, not even wedding rings! How strangely bare the Balenciaga gowns of the ladies looked without their rings, bracelets and necklaces as did the gentlemen's Brioni,  Dormeuil and William Westmancott suits sans their usual Audemars-Piguet, Vacheron Constantin or Rolex President Edition watches. 

Jewel theft is an extremely lucrative business and these were its crème de la crème. The event was to award prizes for last year's individual haul with the dollar figures aggregated  by Meyer & Herzberger LLC from Universal Insurance Agents yearly reports and could not be contested.

After the opulent dinner, the chairman went to the front with the envelopes for the three categories: Most Necklaces (Necklaceleader), Most Rings (Ringleader), Most Overall (Mostleader). Drumroll ... Ayelle B, won for Necklaces, then, unexpectedly, the Mostleader was announced which went to Virginia X. The audience was stirring and whispering when the chairman announced that this year the Ringleader diploma will not be awarded. Rumors were that whoever won broke the AAOOR conduct code by returning loot.

Earlier there was a disturbance at the gate when an veteran member was not all. He was shouting that he was the legitimate Ringleader and he gave back one ring by mistake. When he was later asked by reporters how he felt about being disqualified, he said that he can only compare it with having an arm and a leg chopped off.     

How it really was and how it really happened

This happened long time ago when there were no people, there was no Dharma, there were only birds in the sky, animals on land and fish in the sea. It was decided that the world needed heart, soul and mind and a triumvirate was formed: the unicorns had the soul, the fish had the heart and the cats had the mind. Everybody was happy (it seemed). The cats, of course, weren't happy (they are above silly notions like happy/unhappy) but they had a plan (cats always have a plan). They figured out that the unicorns have a master unit, the holder of all unicorn knowledge and skills. All the others just mimic, imitate and copy what the master does. The cats tracked down the master, killed it and the unicorns quickly died out. Without their chief, they didn't know how to feed and reproduce. 

There was an inquest (there's always one when a species becomes extinct). Everybody figured that the cats must've done it but there was no proof and the decision was to move on. They just implanted the unicorn concept into the general consciousness, gave it a symbolic meaning and associated it with French Vanilla flavour. 

The fish thought they were safe. They were 6'4", weighed 250 lbs and were strong, built like props (a reference to a rugby player position). Cat hydrophobia was well known and it was thought that it was enough to keep them away from the fish environment.

At about that time people started showing up in greater numbers and in various places. When the cats noticed a handsome redhead walking on the beach, they killed her and cut her into two. The head of the fish patrol came to see what it was all about and the cats killed it too and cut it into two. The cats were under caution for things they had allegedly done, so they didn't want to press their luck and they glued two halves together and threw the new creature, half girl half fish, back into the sea. They sprayed the special dust that made anybody who saw this thing and talked about it  not to be believed. To animate it they used the S1 App release E version N. It was awkward to pronounce so everybody called them siren. The new fish, made from the pieces left, was also brought to life with the Sa App version D, release N and was rebooted as S1aRDn (awkward to pronounce so they dubbed sardine). It turned out to be a rather small, silvery fish, oily, delicious with no intention to be the keeper of the heart. 

After a while there were more and more people and the world started to look, sound and feel much like what you now see, hear and feel: a lot of mind, very little heart and even less soul. Meanwhile, the cats wait and watch ... the cats may have another plan.