"Haha!"
"What was that," asked the blue Reko-do.
"That was my tablet, the Mickee Mouse Ranch app sent me a notification," replied the grey-eyed female.
"What kind of app is that? Is it a virtual farm one," he further enquired.
"Yeah," she answered. "Do you want me to show you," she asked as she felt that's what she's supposed to do, afterwards feeling awkward mixed with some shame and anxiety.
"Yeah," responded the male.
She lead him to her device, the control panel was situated on the floor, the screen in a frame-like holder on the wall.
"That's the app, right there," she said looking at the schematic poultry rearing installation-type building possessing a simplified 2-D black and white Mickey Mouse head emblem. "Every time I open the app I hear the "Haha" Mickey Mouse laughs. The number of laughs is the same as the number of mice I have in the facility. I have 35 mice so we are going to hear 35 laughs one after another," she expounded then, tapped on the game.
"Haha" noises filled the air, at the twentieth one DJ asked, "Is there any way we can skip this?"
"Yeah, after I tap "Return"", she replied.
Having pressed down the key, a front view of Yoana's Mickee Mouse rearing facility became visible accompanied by an instrumental version of the Teletubbies theme. After zooming in on the building, it began basking in the faint golden light spread by rays emitted from behind it. Tiny, colorful, flying, merrily chirping birds glided across the sky above it. The front end of a familiar blue Reko-do peered out of the bush growing next to the installation, giving the viewers a smirking grin whilst looking into their eyes maliciously.
"What the," exclaimed the DRH member widening his windscreen noticing the character, who now retracted into the green shrub making it rustle.
"Oh, I forgot to mention. You're in the game," said the lady vehicle.
"Why," questioned the male loudly. "And why do I look evil?"
"You look evil because of what you do in the game," she replied then, added, "I don't know why they put you in the app. By the way, no one knows who made this game, they just couldn't find the developers. When you look at the data of the app it seems normal until you check the release date: It seems to have been released about a hundred years ago. Do you want to see how the game works?"
"I guess so," answered the gang member out of politeness but unenthusiastically.
The tricolor vehicle, taking his words into account, translating them as a "yes", but missing his tone of voice replied, "Oky-doky."
She tapped the "Return" key on the control panel. The view changed to the interior of the facility, the tuners witnessed the Mickey Mouse-like creatures crawling around, some "coming closer to them" and greeting them with the usual "Haha," sound.
"So, these are the Mickee mice. They are not Mickey Mouse they just look like him and give the "Haha" noise as communication, that's why they are called Mickee mice. Unlike him they walk on fours and have non-personified animal-level intelligence. The males and females look the same and their little ones look like smaller versions of their parents," explained the weather-themed tuner.
A deep, masculine "Haha" became audible.
"One of my Mickees caught Ebola and has turned into an Ugandan Mickee. An Ugandan knuckles had infiltrated the rearing installation, I don't see it anywhere right now, and infected that Mickee with Ebola by spitting on him," informed the female, as she neared the diseased mouse in the game whose shape resembled that of the famous meme's.
She made her unseen virtual self put on boxing gloves. She began to beat the sickness out of the infected specimen, typical noises of impact heard in fight scenes in older movies joined the action. The critter regained its health after about 10 seconds and turned back to its original form then, gave a happy "Haha" signaling the positive changes. "Haha" calls speedily increased and escalated in volume.
"Why did they get so loud all of the sudden," questioned the blue Reko-do.
"They're hungry," answered the violet, blue and parakeet green lady car. "I must feed them. They eat something called Mysteree Mousegestool. There used to be only one kind of that, but ever since the app was upgraded there are also immunity boosting ones called Special Mysteree Mousegestool. There are three levels of the latter based on boosting capability. I bought an intermediate level one. When they receive any kind of special Mousegestool, they do something before eating it," she said.
"What do they do," asked the music geek.
"You'll see," replied the lady tuner as she selected the food item. The ceiling of the building opened and a large, green box decked with white question marks dropped out of the hole. The game switched to unplayable video mode. The screen turned dark, disco lights turned on as a spinning disco ball was lowered from the ceiling and Peanut Vendor by the Ritchie Family began playing. Some of the Mickee mice started dancing along to the music, one even wore a white, 70's style disco outfit and did the disco finger. Others cheered. Red shorts with two white spots on their front flew across the screen then, a few Mickees from one side of the screen to the other in a single file line somehow slid on the floor whilst standing still, spinning around their vertical axis. As the tune continued the app showed snippets of individual animals and small groups of them performing their unique moves then, from time to time allowed the whole group to be seen at once from different angles.
"Would you like me to move forward to the part where they eat," the female enquired her guest.
"Yes," answered the blue male.
Now, the game portrayed the mice emitting excited "Haha" noises whilst gradually crawling up the box, coating it in a mostly black layer. When the first specimens reached the top of the object, its flaps opened and they began filtering through between them, entering the inside of the box in four quickly pouring streams. By the time the camera angle shifted to top view, enough mice had filled the box to completely conceal the food, only a mass of large round ears, heads, bodies and wiggling tails could be seen gradually descending to the bottom of it as one entity. After the creatures resembling Mickey Mouse had stopped eating the box disappeared. A message popped up stating how much the immunity of Yoana's virtual pets was raised then, vanished after a few seconds.
"So, the mice will be more immune to Ebola, right," asked the gang member.
Yoana, shifting her attention to him, did not notice his blue icon floating from one side of the screen to the other.
"Yeah, but also to…" she began, but the sound of a known engine caused her to halt. "Oh, shoot," she exclaimed, recognizing what was about to come.
"That's me with an evil, grinning face," commented DJ. "Now is it revealed what I do in the game," he asked.
"Yeah," replied the Audystic one in a slightly gloomy tone.
The digital variant of him sped on the road leading to her rearing facility, open gates awaited him, and without any hesitation he entered into the building then, parked himself in the center. The fearful mouse herd faced him, keeping their distance, a few brave ones motivated by mere curiosity reluctantly crept closer wiggling their tails. He announced, "Let's get the party started," maintaining his mischievous expression. The app showed him switching his disks up close then, he played an intermittent, loud, low-pitched tuba-noise. A cluster of panicky "Haha" shouts interrupted that blaring. From the bottom to the top the screen turned brown then, completely black. Next, a sped up, instrumental video game music style version of Leva's Polka began playing as virtual DJ bolted out of the installation with a worrisome, frowning face, all brown, pluming out green, smoke-like stink clouds.
The colorful tuner gathered her courage to check the real DJ. He remained speechless for a few seconds then, glanced at her and said, "So, I make the players' Mickee mice soil themselves with the brown note."
"Yes," said the female, as the game switched back to playable mode and the screen showed the interior of the installation now covered in mouse turds in several places. The fresh piles were emitting the same kind of malodor clouds as the previously escaping digital DRH member. "I'm going to save and leave the game right here, I don't want to clean up poo right now," she added then, did as said.
"Well, I had thought I do more evil things than this in the game," he replied. "It's a relief and it's actually kind of funny that I make them crap themselves with the brown note… You said that according to the issue version date the app is about a hundred years old. How did they know what I am like when I didn't even exist," he loudly questioned.
"I don't know," she answered. "Not even Teletubbies, nor the Ritchie family existed back then. Several other things in the app also didn't either. That reminds me: There weren't even any devices containing apps, nor were there apps, nor video games, there weren't even screens yet," she added. "Moreover the app became available about a month ago."
"Yoana, may I ask you something," said the male abruptly changing the topic.
"What is it," she replied looking tense.
"Calm down, I'm not going to ask you anything that would be too steep for you in our relationship," he started. "Would you like to visit my parents with me?"
The violet, blue and parakeet green Reko-do did not know what to answer suddenly. After a few seconds she replied, "I don't know. When do you plan to see them?"
"I'm visiting them two weeks from now. By the way, if you feel you have to stim, we can bring your stimming cushion with us and if you get sensory overload or you shut down we can get out of the mansion and go into the garden," he responded, hoping to get her to come.
"Do they know I'm Audystic," she enquired.
"Yeah," he answered. "Would you tell me within a week whether you want to come or not," he asked.
"Yes," she replied. "Wait, did you say mansion," she questioned with emphasis, whether she heard correctly.
"Yeah," he said, looking to the side.
"You said, that you have a wealthy family but I didn't know your family is that rich," she commented.
"I didn't want to let you into the details until I got convinced that you are friends with me and want to be with me for who I am, so I waited with this, until I felt and thought we got there. You know, some cars are attracted to rich ones because of their money," he answered.
"I understand you," responded the grey-eyed female.
The two spent hours talking then, went out to eat at the Wheel Well.