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We never fail to do what's right.
―Rescue Aid Society by Euripides-Mouse, 405 B.C.


Rescue Aid Society is an organization consisting of United Nations delegates who answer calls of help from distressed children all over the world. It was featured in the 1977 Disney animated film The Rescuers and its 1990 sequel, The Rescuers Down Under.

History[]

The Rescue Aid Society was first established by Euripedes Mouse in 405 B.C. after he aided an injured lion in Ancient Greece. Not much of its early history is known, other than it carried out missions to help those in distress. It would in time become a world organization when it made its establishment within the United Nations Headquarters in New York City, and delegates from each worldly nation gather during an emergency meeting to answer calls for help, usually traveling to RAS HQ via the bags and suitcases of their respective human U.N. ambassadors and their delegations, both in the U.N. Security Council (UNSC), and the U.N. General Assembly (UNGA), along with any other U.N. organizations that have their main office at the U.N. Headquarters in NYC, rather than at the other United Nations main offices, such as in Geneva, Switzerland.

Any delegate may choose to volunteer for an assignment in a mission to rescue a child in trouble, along with a co-agent to assist him or her. If needed to travel to a different part of the world, the Albatross Airlines service assists them in chartering a flight to any necessary location. Once at the location of where the call for help was sent, the two agents do what they can to investigate, locate, and rescue the child from their kidnappers.

In The Rescuers Down Under, it is revealed that the society has a tight network of communications around the world allowing any call for distress to be relayed to its New York headquarters at the U.N., even from remote locations like the RAS Telegraph Office in the forest of the Australian Outback and the Marshall Islands. In the Marshall Islands, they used an antenna within the wreckage of an old WWII fighter aircraft, as a RAS field agent received it and powered up the old plane's engine before sending the message from Australia. The RAS field agents use human technology to send their messages, sometimes under the humans' very noses. The RAS has even hacked the computers at a US military base in Hawaii, on the island of Molokai, allowing them to receive and send messages while the human operatives are distracted and don't see what they are up to or investigate the messages themselves, as they type "Relay to New York", and before it gets to New York City, the communication stops in U.S. cities one by one: Los Angeles, California, Denver, Colorado, St. Louis, Missouri, Chicago, Illinois, and Washington, D.C..

Song[]

The Chairmouse leads the delegates in this song of pledge during the beginning of an emergency meeting.

Members[]

*Note: Former or dissolved nations.

Notable Missions[]

Penny - Devil's Bayou: Hungarian representative, Miss Bianca, volunteers to accept the case and chooses the janitor Bernard as her co-agent. It starts to rain at night when the bus stops and pulls over. Bernard and Bianca get off the bus and walk on the sidewalk to hide in the post box. When the mice are walking to the zoo, Bernard becomes scared of lions and wants to get out of there. The two visit Morningside Orphanage, where Penny lived, and meet an old cat named Rufus, who tells them about a wicked woman named Madame Medusa who once tried to lure Penny into her car and may have abducted Penny this time.

Meanwhile, the mice travel to Medusa's pawn shop, where they discover that she and her business partner Mr. Snoops are on a quest to find the world's largest diamond, the Devil's Eye. As the mice talk to the Pan Am Tower, they head to the Fly Albatross Air Service. With the help of an albatross named Orville, and a dragonfly named Evinrude, the mice follow Medusa and Snoops to the bayou, where they learn that Penny was indeed captured and made to enter a hole that leads down into the pirates' cave where the Devil's Eye is located.

Thanks to Bianca's perfume, the mice attract the attention of Medusa's pet crocodiles, Brutus and Nero. Bernard and Bianca escape, and find Penny. The following morning, Medusa and Snoops send Penny down into the cave to find the gem, unaware that Bianca and Bernard are hiding in her skirt pocket. The three soon find the Devil's Eye within a pirate skull; as Penny pries the mouth open with a sword, the mice push it out from within, but soon the oceanic tide rises and floods the cave. Bianca, Penny, and Bernard barely manage to retrieve the diamond and escape.

The greedy Medusa steals the diamond for herself and hides it in Penny's teddy bear. When she trips over a cable, Medusa loses the teddy bear to Penny, who runs away with it. Medusa retaliates with gunfire, causing the mice to flee until they are met by Brutus and Nero, her crocodiles. Bernard and Bianca trick them into entering a cage-like elevator, trapping them.

Two of the gang set off Snoops' fireworks, making the boat sink. Penny and the gang commandeer Medusa's "swampmobile". Medusa pursues them, but is left trapped by clinging to the boat's smoke stacks with Brutus and Nero attacking below.

Meanwhile, back in New York, the Rescue Aid Society watch TV to hear that the Devil's Eye is given to the Smithsonian Institution and Penny is adopted by a new father and mother. Bernard and Bianca remain partners in the Rescue Aid Society's missions and soon after depart on Orville, accompanied by Evinrude, to a new rescue mission.

Cody - Australia: When Cody is abducted by poacher Percival C. McLeach, a message is sent to New York to the Rescue Aid Society headquarters, and Bernard and Bianca, the RAS' elite field agents, are assigned to the mission, interrupting Bernard's attempt to propose marriage to Bianca. They go to find Orville, the albatross who aided them previously, but instead find Wilbur, Orville's brother. Bernard and Bianca convince Wilbur to fly them to Australia to save Cody. Meanwhile, in Australia, they meet Jake, a kangaroo rat who is the RAS' local regional operative in the town of Mugwomp Flats. Jake later flirts with Bianca, much to Bernard's chagrin. He serves as their guide and protector in search of Cody. Wilbur is immobilized when his spinal column is bent out of its natural shape, convincing Jake to consign him to hospital.

When he refuses to undergo surgery and instead attempts to flee, Wilbur's back is unintentionally straightened by the efforts of the mouse medical staff to prevent him escaping through a window. Cured, he departs in search of his friends. At McLeach's lair, Cody gets thrown into a cage with several of the animals captured by McLeach after refusing to give up Marahute's whereabouts. Cody tries to free the animals, but is thwarted by Joanna, McLeach's pet goanna. Meanwhile, McLeach ultimately tells Cody that someone else has shot Marahute, tricking Cody into leading him to Marahute's nest.

Bernard, Bianca, and Jake, half-aware of what is happening, jump onto McLeach's Bushwacker to follow him. At Marahute's nest, the three mice try to warn Cody that he has been followed; just as they do, McLeach arrives and captures Cody, along with Marahute, Jake, and Bianca. Wilbur arrives at the nest, whereupon Bernard convinces him to sit on the eagle's eggs, which Bernard has saved from Joanna moments before. McLeach takes Cody, Marahute, Bianca and Jake to Crocodile Falls, where he ties Cody up and hangs him over the crocodiles. Bernard, riding a type of wild pig called a "razorback", which he has tamed using a horse whispering technique earlier used by Jake, follows and disables McLeach's vehicle, preventing the use of its crane to put Cody at risk just in time. McLeach then tries to shoot the rope holding Cody above the water. To save Cody, Bernard tricks Joanna into crashing into McLeach, sending them both into the water. The crocodiles chase McLeach, while behind them the damaged rope holding Cody breaks apart. Although McLeach manages to fight off the beasts, only Joanna reaches the shoreline while McLeach goes over a much larger waterfall to his death.

Bernard dives into the water to save Cody, but fails. Jake and Bianca free Marahute in time for her to retrieve Cody and Bernard. Bernard, desperate to avoid any further incidents, proposes to marry Bianca, who accepts eagerly while Jake salutes him with a newfound respect. All of them depart for Cody's home. Meanwhile, Wilbur, whom they have neglected to relieve of his task, incubates the eggs until they hatch, much to his dismay.

Trivia[]

  • The character Euripides Mouse and the lion he saved are references to the famous Ancient Greek poet Euripides and the Aesop's fable "The Lion and the Mouse".
  • In the films, the Rescue Aid Society has had three missions we are shown (or mentioned): the mission to save Penny, the mission to save Cody, and one mentioned at the end of the first film.
  • In Frank Angones' unproduced Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers reboot, the Rescue Aid Society would have been founded by Olivia Flaversham, and would have been somewhat of a predecessor to the Rescue Rangers.

Gallery[]


v - e - d
The rescuers logo
Media
The Rescuers (Soundtrack/Video) • The Rescuers Down Under (Soundtrack/Video) • House of MouseThe Lost Chords: The Rescuers
Disney Parks
Parades: Disney's Party Express
Minnie's Tiara of Dreams

Fireworks: Wondrous Journeys

Characters
The Rescuers: BernardMiss BiancaChairmouseRufusPennyMadame MedusaMr. SnoopsOrvilleBrutus and NeroEllie MaeLukeEvinrudeSwamp Folk

The Rescuers Down Under: JakeCodyCody's MotherFalooMarahutePercival C. McLeachJoannaSparkyWilburDr. MouseFrankKrebbsRedBaitmouseCrocodiles
Deleted characters:LouisCruella De Vil

Objects
Penny's Teddy BearDevil's EyeMcLeach's Bushwacker
Locations
New OrleansDevil's BayouNew York CityMorningside OrphanageMedusa's Pawn ShopThe Cave of Devil's BayouAustraliaAbandoned Opal MineRescue Aid SocietyColorado
Songs
The JourneyRescue Aid SocietyTomorrow Is Another DaySomeone's Waiting for YouFor Penny's a Jolly Good Fellow
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