(No P.O.V.)
United Talons, their friends, and the army marched on for the next several days, keeping warm against the slowly decreasing temperatures of late autumn/early winter. It was rough to keep positive when the thought of fighting goblins, orcs, and whatever else is in the fortress is having everybody on edge, even the team of United Talons is feeling the same as well.
They had found the ancient, engraved pathway from the forest to the forbidding Black Mountains, and there through glimpses of a very powerful shield laid the ancient, crumbling, terrifying fortress that is somehow still standing after decades within Maleficent's death.
Yet even with powerful magic creating the shield, there's bound to be a few weak spots, a open spot or two for someone to slip through with no concern of detection. Now, Kida may not be the best as the famed Robin Hood, but she is really good at archery, and the team discussed about sending the mice through the weak spot into the fortress to find Cinderella, and perhaps break out locks as well, knowing that there'd be a great number of prisoners.
With Prince Charles needing to know about the location of his wife as the fortress is plenty big, Adam suggested the idea of binding the magic mirror's powers to Jaq and Gus somehow through their birthmarks. The mice liked the idea, and insisted strongly that they'd do it for Cinderella despite the dangers.
With Pippa's thought that the mirror somehow contacts the Enchantress, Adam found the courage and politeness to ask the Enchantress through the mirror, and told about the plan to send the mice through the weak spot of the shield, the Enchantress didn't appear, but she gave a sign which was sending some of the white glowing aura from the mirror to the mice, absorbing into their birthmarks, glowing momentarily to make sure it worked, and it did.
In the cover of dusk, with careful observing of the weak spot and the patrols of the goblins, orcs and such, Kida then sent the fated arrow with the secured mice riding upon it, and it flew over and straight through the weak spot, diving and striking into a bridge chain pedestal upon the front arches of the courtyard. The mice quickly got off the arrow, slinking through the pedestal's crevices, heading into the fortress.
Jaq and Gus agreed that it is very big, and there's so many scents, and as they got deeper, they are surprised to smell other rodents, and having a look at each other in silent understanding, they scurried faster, and soon, they found a colony of mice and rats, surviving on scraps yet not greedy or fighting for them, having seen worse horrors than death.
There's the leaders of the colony, Remy and Basil who are mates despite being a rat and a mouse. Their fathers, Django and Dawson used to be the leaders, but as they are getting older, they gave the positions to their younger sons despite having older sons in the forms of Emile and Hiram, who has children in Toby and Olivia.
Yes, Toby used to be a basset hound in another dimension, but in this dimension, he's a rat. He has medium brown fur with mud brown ears and tail, a champagne cream blaze on the face and underbelly as well, and light gray paws. He has black eyes and nose.
Anyhow, Jaq and Gus talked with the colony inhabitants, and described the plan, the search for Cinderella, her appearance, and much to their joy, some of the inhabitants knew about Cinderella for they were given food from her, not much as she needed to feed her unborn child, but enough to help a little bit, and offered to guide the two boys to Cinderella's location.
And with Remy and Basil talking about the goblins, orcs, monsters, and humans being mostly gone from here for the battle soon enough, they realized that they can lead the colony to break out the prisoned pets and wild animals from the cages in the room of the animal fighting ring.
So, the colony headed to the room of caged pets/animals while a few others led Jaq and Gus to the cages of the inhabited humans including Cinderella and her unborn child as the different prisons are on opposite sides of the fortress.
Some of the colony including Remy and Basil had seen the conditions of the pets/animals before while others didn't, but right now, they are horrified by everything they're seeing. The cages are neither 5ft wide and 3 ft high or 7ft wide and 5ft high, and some are stacked up on top of each other while other cages stand alone side by side.
The cage floors are crudely made of plywood, caked up in piss and feces, and the smell, oh, the smell, it's like sewage, only worse and very lingering to the nose that it's hard to breathe. Why, some has died from the conditions they had been forced to live in while others are struggling through the pain like Pongo who has been repeatedly fighting against other dogs and occasionally, a wild animal, bearing scars and sprained muscles.
Pongo has been separated in a different cage from his mate and litter of 15 puppies, but he's lucky to live as he fought a rabid fox the night before, yet he's mourning the fox's life as he technically knew her...Vixey was her name. Gaston may be a bastard, but he knows when to strap a rabid animal from biting anybody and when to give mercy...
He has been hearing that he and Tramp might have to fight the mad jaguar, Sabor the incoming night, thanks to Cinderella. Pongo may be adept in fighting these days, but Tramp is a old pro, and Pongo is worried about him as Tramp has a badly sprained leg from his last fight last week, having fought against Reggie who's slightly mad.
Tramp's cramped with his mate, Lady, and litter of 5 puppies. In the Disney world of Enchantia, the puppies are different in looks. The girls look like Lady somewhat, but also took after Tramp as well. Annette has dark brown fur, a cream underbelly, Lady's red-brown ears and eyes, and the tail is slightly longer than anybody's tails in the family. Colette has Lady's light brown fur and red-brown ears, and cream underbelly yet she has light brown eyes and she has Tramp's tail. Danielle has Tramp's dark brown eyes and scruff tuft, light gray fur within her long ears like her sisters and mother while her pelt is dark gray and her underbelly is cream.
As for the last two, Scamp and Angel, they are brother and sister in this world. Anyhow, Scamp looks like Tramp yet he's very different. His pelt is medium gray while his ears are dark gray and his underbelly is light gray. He still got Tramp's eyes and scruff tuft. And for Angel, she looks like Tramp and Scamp, but she has a tan-brown pelt, a cream-tan underbelly, and red-brown for her ears. She has light brown eyes like Colette, and a light gray nose while the other puppies have black noses.
Cages may separate them from interacting with other puppies, but conversations are prone to happen between Scamp and Angel with two of the Dalmatian puppies, Patch and Lucky. There are also conversations with the kittens of Duchess and Thomas who are upon Perdita and the puppies in their cage above. In this world, Oliver is their fourth child of the litter, so, you can expect that he and the boys look different with Thomas O'Malley as their biological father. Marie still looks like her mother, beautiful and pure white.
Oliver still has his stripes and has light orange fur with a cream-orange underbelly, but he has Duchess's fluffy tail and light blue eyes. He has Thomas' dark pink nose. As for Berlioz, he has light gray fur, a cream-gray underbelly, and he has Thomas's skinny long tail & eyes, and cream paws in the back, and his nose is light pink like his mother's.
And for Toulouse, he has light orange fur, a cream white underbelly/paws in the front, and dark blue eyes. He has Thomas's skinny long tail while having his mother's light pink nose. So, yeah, some families are cramped while other families are separated.
There's also pets being forced together to breed. Why, Hen Wen and Bolt were forced to do that, and soon, they became parents to just one she-pup whom they named Hope, because everybody needs hope in this place. Hope has her mother's eyes and nose while she takes after her father in looks.
The conditions were so desolate and terrible, even with the daily meals that when in becoming mates and pregnant, it became dangerous to have such a newborn child. Oh, Hen Wen and Bolt loves their pup greatly, but one must understand that living in a cage, well, let's say it's much similar to situations back on Earth.
So, when the colony came in, telling the news about the army, the plan to attack the fortress and rescue prisoners, human and animal, the caged pets/wild animals went nuts and excited, and when the fortress alarm bells went off, the colony went to work, using their claws and tails to unlock the chain locks on the cages, wondering about what's going on out there right now.