Mickey searched his hand, looking for a move, any move to give him any sort of leverage over his opponents.
"Nine of Spades," Oswald announced proudly, laying down said card.
Felix glanced at him, then a second later, laid down an even better card. Oswald looked down on Felix's card gaping.
"Your turn," Minnie said, nudging Mickey sweetly. He laid down his card, hoping for the best. He wasn't sure how the cat had bamboozled them into a game like this, but he was determined to give it his best hand.
"My turn," Minnie said, laying down a card.
The three of them looked at it a moment, then Felix looked up at her, "Not bad," he said.
Minnie looked proud.
As they continued their game, Felix finally got down to business, "What you have is a rodent problem," he said, "but fortunately, you came to the right place." Felix looked up, staring straight at Mickey, "And there is no one better to deal with a rodent than a cat." Felix licked his lips.
Mickey backed up a step, bumping into the chair behind him, uncomfortable under the cat's gaze, "This does have to do with other Mickey, right?"
Mickey could see Felix creeping up, almost crawling up onto the table, "There needn't be an other Mickey if we take the problem at the source."
Mickey turned to flee, just as Felix pounced!
The two of them went tumbling forward, straight into Mickey's deck of cards.
Mickey regathered himself quickly, as Felix came rushing at him, Mickey panicked and took a two of spades, digging a hole for himself just as Felix dived over him.
Mickey tunneled his way out behind Felix, and threw the two spades at the cat, costing him a couple of his Nine Lives.
Felix turned around to look at Mickey, impressed, and then he grabbed a 9 of Hearts and restored his HP.
Mickey's eyes popped out of his head, Felix was dashing at him again. Mickey grabbed an Ace of Clubs and Clubbed that cat over the head.
Felix went skidding, and turned his head back to Mickey. This mouse was showing promise.
But it was time to wrap this up. Felix grabbed a Four of Diamonds and hurled them at Mickey like Shurikens. In seconds, Mickey was pinned to the walls of the Tavern, a diamond holding out each limb. He struggled to pull free, but he was stuck hard and tight.
Felix stepped toward Mickey hungerly, Mickey trembled in his Mouse body in horror.
"HELP!" Mickey cried, trying to pull away, "HELP!" But in this tavern, it was just another one of those businesses.
Felix stood in front of Mickey, face to face by only inches, looking at him intently, an understanding seemed to pass between them, but an understanding of what, Mickey did not know.
"Like my trap?" Felix asked.
Mickey shook his head profusely.
And then Felix started laughing.
Felix flicked his card, and the Four of Diamonds jumped back into place, leaving Mickey crumpling down to the floor.
"Hey, no take backs!" Oswald said indignantly as Mickey quietly slunk away. Minnie gave the rabbit a startled look, "Okay, this time we can make an exception," Oswald receded quickly.
Felix offered Mickey a hand to help him up, which Mickey should not have taken, but if we're questioning the judgment of cartoon characters here, we'd as well be here all day.
"Let's get back to the game," he said, leading the way back to the table.
…
"So, as you can see from our little demonstration there…" Felix said, looking over his card briefly, then looking up over them at the others, "What we need here is a trap."
"Ah, like a mouse trap!" Minnie replied, catching on quick.
Mickey looked over at her, she was a bit too enthused over the fact that he'd nearly been eaten by this cat.
"Something of the like," Felix confirmed, "If what you say is true, this 'Other Mickey' character sounds at least somethin' better written than Pooh out there, so he oughta be somewhat harder to stop. If weaker Mickey here is anything to go off of…"
"Hey!" Mickey declared woundedly.
"...Then if we play our hands just right, we should be able to take him down without-avoid a problem." Felix laid down a card and the others fell silent. It was a good move.
But Oswald's heart was just bursting that the cat had just used his typo-phrase. (Though technically, it was first Embryo's typo-phrase, Oswald was just borrowing it; remember your place rabbit.)
Mickey, Minnie, and Oswald looked at eachother.
"Now, because we only have access to what is already in the Public Domain," Felix continued, "we have less to draw on than we might have if we were able to look back at some of our experiences - say - 94 years ago, but looking back at your histories, perhaps one of us remembers an experience from 1928 or before in which they found themselves in a particularly effective trap?"
Mickey opened his mouth.
"Besides that, I just sent in the patents." He slipped an envelope over to a waiter who disappeared a moment later between two swinging doors.
Mickey closed his mouth and they all went quiet as they thought for a moment.
"It could be anything, a hydraulic press, a tree that likes to pluck too fondly at your ears."
Mickey looked at Felix the Cat in shock.
"I just met a tree like that on the road to town back in the countryside."
"Yeah, that tree,"Felix replied, "So you've ran into it as well."
"It's a tumbleweed now," Mickey said vindictively.
The two looked at eachother as if remembering some deep shared experience.
"Wait," Oswald interrupted, "you said you haven't been around much since you've been here, since when did you have a story where you ran into a particular tree since you've been in the public domain that wasn't copyrighten in some other derivative work?"
"Since now," said Felix, "It became part of my backstory the moment we talked about it."
Oswald furrowed his brows in confusion, "Wait, is all this not a derivative work?"
Felix looked at Oswald funny. "Why should I care if someone writes about the time I got into a fight with a sentient tree or makes a cartoon about it. At the very least, a mention of an event like that surely should be able to qualify for Creative Commons." Felix broke the fourth wall with his gaze, essentially guilting the author of this work into conceding that tree fight into the Public Domain.
Mickey looked back down at his cards and put down a three of spades, "Well, that tree is not going to be much help to us now rolling around freely in the wind."
Suddenly, Minnie looked uncomfortable, "I might know a place," she squeaked.
The three of them looked at her.
Minnie made herself go on, "Remember that time we were in Argentina?" She looked at Mickey for recollection, "and Pete came along and kidnapped me to eat me?"
Mickey looked at her and nodded.
"Well, if that trap worked on me, then maybe it can work on you."
Mickey made a face.
"I mean not you you," Minnie clarified, "The evil version of you."
Mickey looked down, considering.
"Still not sure how I feel hearing that," he mused.
"But how do we get to Argentina," Oswald said, "You two busted up my plane, and Argentina has got to be millions of miles away, maybe more given that some Public Domain maps make no sense."
Felix's eye's lit up, "Don't worry, I know all the shortcuts," he said knowledgeably.
As Felix prepared to get up, Mickey held up a card, "No, hold on a minute, I got a move here you got to see. Four of Diamonds is gonna look like a joke."
Mickey prepared to lay down his card.
"Oh, no need, I've already won," Felix threw down his cards revealing a perfect winning hand, "I was just having too much fun leading you three on."
Mickey gaped.
Felix proceeded to laugh.
Felix led them over to a painting on the wall, and the moment they looked at it, Mickey and Minnie went still, a rush of memories flooding them.
"Pretty nifty, ain't it?" Felix said.
Depicted in the painting, situated deep within the canyons of Argentina, was none other than the-
"Cantino Argentina..." Minnie breathed.
"Follow me," Felix said.
Then without further ado, he crouched down as any cat would, gave his hindquarters a little wiggle, and leaped, landing within the painting, easily. The shift in weight though caused the painting to rock a little on it's hook, but the cat quickly recovering his footing and turned to look at the others, gesturing for them to follow.
The three of them looked at eachother, then Oswald gave a shrug, Felix's eyes went wide as he saw what was about to happen.
"Not all at on-"
But it was too late, they had all already leaped up after Felix, into the painting.
Well, the painting wasn't ready for all that movement at once. The painting gave a big jerk, wobbled; everybody cried as they stumbled about in the image - and the painting fell off the wall, crashing face down on the floor of the tavern.
"Well, I hope we don't need to go back that way," Minnie observed.
But Mickey wasn't listening, he was taking in the the Argentinian air, the wind blowing against him filled with a life he had once known, the life of freedom and going wherever the wind may take you; the life of an outlaw. He took a step toward the Cantina, and turned to look back at the others.
"Are you ready?" He asked.
So with that, the four of them made their way forward, entering the Cantino Argentina.