Ron’s Collection

Frankie almost slipped, sliding into the museum on her damaged flip-flops.

The pictures of Ron Racoon framed on the walls all looked the same to her. At this time, not many people were interested in visiting the display of old Kidney animation from a millennia ago. Still, it was a big enough collection that finding Katie was proving difficult. She quickly had to quit running as people gave her looks. The last thing she wanted was more guard attention. But if she wasn’t quick about this, she thought somebody might come here in the process of looking for her, and that’d be the end of it. Frankie wasn’t especially confident she could outrun fate that many times in a row.

She took off her hat in hopes that her sister would recognize her if she spotted her first. Weaving through each exhibition and the few people admiring each one, she started to get an understanding of the gold-on-brown interior, the lay of the land becoming simple when one didn’t pay attention to all the animation relics to stop and stare at.

The place was so flat on the first floor that she could still see the front door, as far away from it as she was. Every now and then she'd peek up from a display piece to see someone enter, but none of them seemed like Flicks. Glancing over at the stairs behind her, she prayed Katie wasn’t all the way up on the second floor.

Still, as she finished creeping through the east end, Frankie still hadn’t found her, and she was getting eyed by security whenever she crouched. In her desperation, she turned to go up the shiny wooden stairwell, and-

Two heavy, rubbery footsteps.

Frankie dashed behind a Ron statue and peeked out at the entrance. Coaster Bozo looked like he was thinking through a hunch- and indeed, he’d been right to check inside the museum. After the crowd passed him by, he flew to see what was going on, worried that girl had gotten away- sure enough, though he couldn’t see it clearly- when they all piled up on each other, a shadow slipped out of the crowd. And though he didn’t see where it went, while patrolling the skyline he did see one thing: a hurried silhouette, sprinting into Ron’s Collection.

Now why would anyone run so fast into a place like that?

It was just a guess, but Bozo had hit the bullseye. Sternly marching past the exhibits, he stalked his prey.

Frankie couldn’t afford to go up the stairs. She hunched down below a glass case of old production materials, trying not to make a sound.

Her eyes drifted from left to right, praying there weren’t any guards in sight- but as her head turned towards the south wall, she saw him looking right at her.

Just an employee- but the way he looked at her she knew she was in for it.

He stepped forward, Kidney uniform rippling with each deathly step as he came closer and closer…

…Before out of nowhere, she appeared, grabbing onto his leg like a small child.

“Katie…!” Frankie tried to whisper in her awe, still shaking from fear.

“Come over here!” She said, motioning to her sister as the guard stood doing nothing.

Frankie could only afford to hug her for a second, but it was something of a reunion.

“Did you win?” Katie asked. The two ducked down, the guard acting just like nothing had happened. “Did you beat him?”

“You have no idea what I’ve just… Yeah. I won. I won.” She held up her now massive supply of tokens.

“That’s great! You’re the best, Frankie.”

“Um… thanks. Why’s… this guy acting like this?”

“I paid him off!”

“You what? You don’t have our money!”

“I just promised him you’d pay him!”

Frankie’s eyes slowly crawled up his black pant leg. He wasn’t much older than them.

“They’re really easy here, aren’t they?”

“Must be how Bozo’s team’s been getting them in his corner. If just the promise of a reward is enough for them to follow orders, imagine what you could do with their level of cash.”

“Okay. So… how much did you say we’d pay him?”

“40,000.”

She wanted to claw her own face off.

“Forty thou-“ Frankie’s eyes bulged as she hissed. She dug through their bag to check the wallet. “No can do! I spent most of our stuff on this Flicker merch!”

“Why’d you go and do that?”

“Forget it! Did we even have that much before I went and- Ah, shit- Katie, we’ve gotta get out of here! We can’t afford to talk like this!”

The security guard still stood tall, ignoring them as he feigned a routine check.

“Just toss him what you’ve got on the way out, we’ll make it!”

“On the way out?” Frankie stuttered. “Katie, we can’t just go through the front door! There is no way out! Bozo, he- he followed me here! He knows my face!”

Katie wasn’t afraid.

“There’s one more thing I have to show you.”

Katie tugged on the guard’s leg again.

“Pssst. Can we see the tunnel? My sister doesn’t believe me.”

“Sure.” He started to lead the sneaking sisters past exhibits and into the corner of the room. “Also… did I hear something about you… not having the money?”

“No, no! Don’t worry, it’s right here. Right Frankie?”

She jiggled the wallet in the air like a treat. The guard nodded.

“Okay. Look here.”

He stood on a panel of wood on the edge of the room, just in front of the corner.

In an inexplicable movement, he knocked a code with his feet:

Three on the left.

Twenty-seven on the right.

A staggering fifty-four in the center.

By the time he was done knocking, Frankie felt like she had gone insane. Why that many? Most people in the museum were looking over at him now, Bozo included, but that problem solved itself quite quickly when the ground itself slid open in a trapdoor, revealing a concrete stairway.

Frankie looked down at it.

Frankie looked up at Katie.

Frankie looked up at the guard.

“Shhh.” He motioned, before holding out his hand for her wallet. She somewhat impolitely tossed it to him and bolted down the stairs without hesitation, followed by her sister as the door closed above them.

“Hahaha!” Katie cheered, marveling at the brand-new hidden world they’d discovered. “We did it! So this is how all those jerks were making it around so fast!” Her smile spread as she hurried forward. “Ah, this is great… But… what are you going to do without our wallet?”

“Keep running.”

Above them, an angry Kidney employee cried out in anguish at the useless, empty pocketbook in his hands.