Chapter 5

Boing, Boing, Boing. The checks made a loud noise as they bounced towards me. The sparkles grouped in a circle flew toward me in ominous silence. I tried to scream, but my throat choked in panic, my eyes wide. Sweat poured down my face, and I stood there, completely frozen. One of the checks made contact with my skin, and immediately I felt a cold dread creep down my spine. My mood immediately plummeted, and I felt a new rush of panic, but also a bit of… sadness? Something like that, it was a very similar sensation that creeped up from deep in my gut, that sensation you get when you want to cry.       Stunned by the blow, I couldn’t dodge or move out of the way of the next two checks, and they hit me again, which further caused my mood to plummet and my panic and feelings of sadness to rise. The white sparkles grouped in a circle made contact with my back, and I gasped. Panic creeped up from deep in my gut and I fell to the floor as despair started to overtake me.

     “G—get away!” I wailed. The four Cogs, of course, ignored me. The three blue-suited Cogs each took out another check while the purple-headed one took out a container that held small white index cards. I cringed.

“N—no!” I cried.  Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh! SPLAT! SPLAT! SPLAT! SPLAT! Four different cream pies came from behind the Cogs and splatted them from the back, the impact knocking them forward. They fell to the floor, two of them narrowly missing me, with a heavy THUD. They stood up, wiped themselves off and did their usual torso bending down and spinning out of control dance as they exploded. The stuff they were holding in their hands promptly vanished into thin air. I breathed a sigh of relief.

“That was too close! Are you okay?!” Jenny cried, running over to me, and helping me to my feet. She’d been the one who’d thrown the pies, apparently, since there was no one else behind her, other than Dr. Surlee, who did finally turn to look at us. However, he didn’t make a move to help us or see if we were OK, just stared at us silently. Behind Jenny, chaos ensued as a fourth wave of Cogs had come down and were attacking Toons left and right.

“Off-handedly, I’d say you’re in trouble,” said one of the newly descended Cogs, a large round-shaped one, with a huge smile and large hands as it squeezed a fountain pen and ink came out of it. Two toons, a tall yellow monkey and a short red mouse dodged out of the way and promptly took it down.

“Careful, guys, the higher leveled ones like to talk more, don’t listen to them for too long or they’ll bore you. Take them down before they talk too much and lower our morale!” Dr. Surlee commanded, having turned back to watch the chaos. Not even an “Are you okay?” to me? Really?!

“I’ll take care of you in no time,” a really tiny cog with a brown suit said as it threw some white particles at a medium yellow dog, who promptly ducked, then he pied the tiny Cog and it went down. Two more tiny brown-suited Cogs approached the dog and he pied them both quickly.

“Are you okay?” Jenny asked me again. At least someone cares enough to ask, I thought bitterly. I looked her and shook my head.

“They… they hit me. They threw some checks at me and some sparkles, things that are actually pretty trivial but for some reason made me feel as if depression was starting to overtake me,” I blurted out quickly without taking a breath. Jenny’s head tilted to the right a bit and she looked me and up down.

“Gosh, that sounds awful, Kit. What kind of power do these Cogs have to make such things happen?”

“I—I don’t know. But it’s scary. And I can’t shake away the feeling of depression that’s threatening to take over.” Jenny smiled at that.

“There is a cure for that, here,” she said, took out a cream pie and splatted me in the face.

“Hey—!” I cried, but amazingly my mood immediately improved. That utter wave of crushing depression that was starting to form from deep in my gut lowered and I had a sudden urge to laugh, which was weak enough for me ignore.

“What was that?” I asked as I wiped the cream filling from my face. Jenny raised an eyebrow.

“What, there are no gags where you come from or something?” She asked with a laugh.

“Gags?” I asked, bewildered. Jenny’s face turned incredulous. “Wait, seriously?” I shifted my feet uncomfortably.

“Um, yeah…,” I replied sheepishly, dreading what questions she’d ask next. Instead, Jenny gave me a lopsided smile. “Gags… you know, pies and cakes to the face, anvils and pianos to the head?”

“Oh… um, I think they were outlawed years ago,” I mumbled mostly to myself, remembering the history lessons I took back home; stuff like that hadn’t been mentioned in the last century, and certainly no one ever used such things as far I’d seen. I know, because that kind of behavior would have been frowned upon.

“Whaaaat? What kind of crazy place do you come from? Gags are what defines us Toons, and they’re what snaps us out of sad moods everytime. It is our way of life here in Toontown, can’t go very long without some form of Gag War going on.”

“And that’s why that pie to the face cheered me up?” I asked in wonder.

“Yep, works everytime! Here!” Jenny threw another pie at my face, and again my mood lifted immediately. I liked the sudden rush of joy that it gave me, and I wanted more.

“That feels great!” I said, and Jenny threw another pie at my face. Then another. Then another, and this time my emotional rush was so high, I fell to the floor and burst out laughing uncontrollably. I laughed like a lunatic and I couldn’t stop, my hands on my sides as they started to hurt from all the laughing. The feeling faded after about thirty seconds or so and I was able to stop laughing. Tears of joy dripped down my face, and I was breathing heavily, trying to catch my breath. I looked up at Jenny and she was grinning.

”That is a sign of someone going back to 100% happiness,” she said. She raised an eyebrow. “Though, judging by your rather extreme reaction, you haven’t been at 100% happiness for quite a while…” She was right; I felt completely ecstatic, joyful and extremely optimistic, all feelings I haven’t felt in years. I stood up and wiped all of the pie off, a big grin from ear to ear on my face. The grin quickly faded when I saw that more Cogs were coming down from the sky, this time a larger handful. So much more so that some even came down behind the stage, landing right on each side. AKA, right behind where Jenny and I were standing. I took a step back, stepping over the fibrous rope as they started to walk over to us. There were four of them, and these Cogs were taller, skinnier and all had a brown suit, a green-ish head and small little black hats on their heads.

“You’re going down!” one of them cried

“I might have to make a few cutbacks,” said another

“Things are looking down for you,” said a third.

“Goodness, do these things ever stop talking?” I said with a laugh, my good mood still shining, so much so I basically danced away from the Cogs as they stepped closer to Jenny and me. She stepped in front of me protectively and raised two pies. Two more types of Cogs flew down from the sky, landing right next to Toon HQ and immediately adjacent to Jenny and me. These ones were green-suited and had a face with numbers scribbled all over it. Jenny turned to the newcomers, aiming the pies at them, but the previous four Cogs were advancing on us and indecision made her pause. Finally, she decided to pie two of the four Cogs that had arrived first, but they didn’t go down right away.

“What the—?” Jenny cried. The Cogs kept coming and we both took a step back. I looked behind me and saw a massive wave of Cogs coming down from the sky, which seemed to have gotten darker, most of them more of the brown-suited ones with the green heads and the black hats. Others were blue-suited with purple pointy heads. Jenny threw two more pies, and this time the Cogs went down. Two more of the green-suited Cogs, with the numbers on their faces, came down to replace them and stepped toward us. We took three steps back, with Jenny protecting me from the Cogs with her body. She threw two more pies again, but again the Cogs didn’t go down. They just continue walking toward us.

“Kit! Do you have any pies?” Jenny asked me.

“Nope. Never got some,” I said matter-of-factly. “Don’t even have a Gag Pouch with me, either.”

“What?! Holy crud, why not? You could really use one right now so you could help me with these guys!” she cried, and threw two more pies, hitting the same two Cogs right in the face. They started to explode, and Jenny immediately moved on to the other Cogs, both of us stepping back as they closed in. I hesitated, and looked behind me. My eyes went wide and I gasped. More Cogs had come down, avoiding all of the commotion going on at the middle of the playground, bypassing all of the Toons with pies. They quickly marched up the steps, almost reaching the pie stand.

“Uh oh,” I breathed. No way Jenny could handle all of these guys on her own; there were now two different flanks, one in front of and one behind and she was the only one armed.

“Kit, here! Quickly! Take my extra gag pouch!” Jenny cried, and handed me a small brown bag. The Gag Pouch.

“What, you carry an extra one with you?” I asked incredulously. She gave me a side glance and smirked, never stopping with the pie throwing.

“My old one’s in tatters, and due for a replacement soon. So, I carry the new one around in case my old one dies on me while I’m out and about. Always good to be prepared,” she said as the pies kept flying. She handed one to me and stuck it into the empty Gag Pouch. Almost immediately, more pies came from the wheelbarrow, shrunk down, and entered the gag pouch. I felt it grow a bit heaver as they entered.

“Now, quickly, help me out here!” Jenny cried frantically as the Cogs inched ever closer. I pressed a blue button that was on the bottom side of the Gag Pouch, which Rosie had shown me during her tutorial. This button is what causes the Gag Pouch to shrink down to a really small size. After it shrunk, I stuck it on my ripped skirt’s waistline, and it stuck on neatly.

Taking a deep breath, I thought of a cream pie, and sure enough, it materialized in my hand like magic.  I looked up and aimed, then threw the pie with all of my might at one of the Cogs that were inches away from us now.

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