The Playground Wars

Chapter Six

I start running as fast as I can to go deeper into the woods. I don’t care about my leg. My own playground wants me dead like Flippy does. I try to look for a safe place, but without Gary and the others, I’m hopeless. I stop to look behind me, and suddenly there's a noise. It sounds like someone stepped on a leaf. I back away in fear, worrying that it might be one of Flippy’s assassins.

“Who is it?” I say. I start shaking. If the thing or toon wants to kill me now, why isn’t he/she doing it? I turn around to see a tall, red rabbit with a green pie in his hand. He’s aiming at me. I start backing up. Kill me, I think. He’s about to release the pie when he stares at me, dead in the eye.

“Os---- Oswald? Is that- is that you?” the tall rabbit asks. He starts walking towards me, dropping the pie to the ground. I look at him closely, trying to figure out who he is. Once I stare into his brown eyes carefully, I remember who he is. Joey.

Before the war, I met Joey in a cog building. He helped me with my tasks if I helped him with his. Ever since that day, we’ve become friends. But when Minnie’s Melodyland was destroyed, we never got to see each other again. The Resistance rangers patrolled the playgrounds, not letting any toon enter or leave. The night before, he got us matching golf hats. I still have mine in my backpack, and he is wearing his.

“Joey……hi,” I say uncomfortably. It’s so weird to reunite with a past friend. We were torn away from each other. From Flippy.

“Where have you been?” Joey asks me. He looks really concerned.

“Donald’s Dreamland. I um was a troop there,” I reply to him. He
stares at my leg and covers his hand over his mouth.

“Oh my god, are you alright?” Joey asks, this time with fear in his voice.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just a little cut from training,” I say. What a huge lie. I haven’t trained for these past days, and it’s not just a “little cut.” He looks at me with a confused look. I hope he doesn’t know I’m lying.

“Oswald, I want to talk to you about the war,” Joey tells me. I can tell that it’s something serious based on the tone in his voice. I look at him, waiting for him to say something.
“There’s a safe place in Chip and Dale’s Acorn Acres,” he says, “That’s where I have been hiding for the past 4 years.” Anger starts building up inside of me. Did he leave me for dead?

“Why didn’t you come back?” I say, a little angered. He gives me a sad look.

“Look, I’ve tried to look for you. I searched the ends of the mountains for you. They just didn’t allow me into the stronger playgrounds, like Daisy’s gardens.”

“Then why didn’t you break in?”

“Because, Oswald, there were guards and they had dip.” I knew Joey wouldn’t lie to me, and he thinks the same of me. But I lied to him. I feel a pain of guilt in my heart. I lied to him.

“Chip and Dale’s Acorn Acres?” I ask. I always like to clarify things, just to make sure. I stop and look at him. He’s about to reply, but I interrupt.
“Why are you here?” I say. I hope that didn’t come out wrong. I’m glad he’s here, it’s just that if there’s a safe place in Acorn Acres, why isn’t he there? Joey tells me everything about what happened to him in the past 4 years, and I so as well during the walk in the woods. His friend Kirby told him about Acorn Acres, so he went looking for me, but gave up after 3 weeks, just before Flippy set up the force fields. The reason he’s in these woods was for hunting purposes.

Apparently, the safe area is not in Acorn Acres, but outside of it. That means in order to get to the safe area, I need to jump over the gate and climb mountains and waterfalls. I’m willing to do whatever it takes to get there.