Mal sat down with a plop on the floor of the barn loft, the other girls changing into their nightclothes around her. However, Uma was nowhere to be seen.

Audrey was rushing through the process, grumbling resentfully the entire time as she reached for a container of lotion in her luggage and furiously rubbed her hands together. Mal didn't know what was up with that, but she couldn't bring herself to care.

Finally, to Mal's surprise, there was a white, fuzzy face that popped up at the top of the ladder. She furrowed her brow as she watched a puppy materialize in the loft. Shortly following the puppy, Uma came up, her face in an ear-splitting grin as she eyed the runt of the litter that she had found.

Mal raised an eyebrow at the pirate as Uma picked up the puppy and rested on her sleeping bag, the roly poly pup resting next to her comfortably. Uma seemed happier than Mal had ever seen her openly display. It was also for purer reasons than Mal had ever seen.

Uma finally felt Mal looking at her as she buried her nose in the fluff covering the puppy's head. Uma pulled away just enough to give Mal a slightly sheepish look.

"She found me," Uma informed Mal in an attempt to think of an excuse for her bringing the puppy up with them.

"And?"

"And she wouldn't let me climb the ladder," Uma lamely finished before averting her eyes and focusing on the puppy before her instead of Mal.

Mal just rolled her eyes, entirely too tired and her hands entirely too sore to worry about Uma's silly puppy business.

Evie ambled over to Mal, sliding down and plopping down next to her as she rested her head heavily on Mal's shoulder.

Mal looked at Evie with a slight chuckle.

"So you're back, huh?"

"You were right. I am not a strong and independent woman."

"It's okay, E, you are a strong and independent woman everywhere else in life," Mal placatingly reassured the slightly older girl as she leaned her head against Evie's lovingly. Evie just sighed, her sweet chocolate eyes moving up to meet Mal's emerald ones.

"Don't patronize me," Evie pouted, and Mal reached her hand up, patting Evie's cheek that was opposite to Mal as she tried to make the poor girl feel better.

"I would never dream of it," Mal told her playfully seriously, and Evie smiled slightly as Mal reached out and took her hand. As soon as Mal's hand met Evie's, Evie winced in pain, trying to hide it the best that she could. However, Mal quickly noticed.

"Wait, what's going on with your hands? They're not as soft as usual," Mal mentioned, taking Evie's hand and turning it over. To her surprise, Evie's hands were swollen horrendously with blisters on the heels of her palms and on her fingers and upper hands.

"Evie, what happened?"

"The shovel," Evie admitted, and Audrey immediately stared at the bluenette.

"You weren't supposed to tell them!" Audrey cried in a loud whisper, and Evie offered her a slightly apologetic glance, but mostly centered her attention upon the girl sitting next to her.

"It's okay, E, look at my hands," Mal extended her palm to Evie and Evie immediately furrowed her brow at the sight of Mal's sore-covered hand.

"M! What happened?!"

"The barbed wire," Mal simply replied, echoing the form that Evie had used with her answer just a moment ago.

"How?!" Evie questioned, focusing every inch of worry on Mal as she used both hands to grab Mal's one hand.

"The barbs on the barbed wire," Mal told her. "Some moron didn't want to take the gloves that were offered to us." Mal offered a slightly resentful glance to Uma, but Uma wasn't paying any attention as she rubbed the puppy's belly, fully enthralled with the dog.

"Wait… Gloves?!" Audrey cried, and Mal raised an eyebrow, nodding to the princess. Audrey's mouth fell open wide as she considered what the faerie had said.

"Yeah, so what?" Mal questioned, letting her words string together a bit in the midst of her exhaustion. Audrey resisted the urge to growl in pure frustration as she looked at her hands.

"I could've prevented this from happening?!" Audrey screeched, and Uma finally looked up, getting in on the conversation finally as Audrey outstretched her hands to everyone, showing just how bad they looked. They were indeed worse than Evie's, because somehow or another, Evie's hands were incrementally tougher than Audrey's.

"I put a fortune into the upkeep of these hands!"

"That's a real shame, you know," Uma replied, mostly just to get the other girl riled up. However, the puppy licked her chin, demanding her full attention. Uma giggled- actually giggled- before petting the puppy and running her fingers through her soft white hair.

"It is not! I am a princess, and my hands should be treated like they're attached to a princess's body!" Audrey announced, and Mal resisted the urge to laugh at Audrey's ridiculousness.

"I also fell in horse poop today," Evie informed the purple-haired girl. Mal lost all semblances of seriousness at that point, and she couldn't help but snort in response to that.

"Good grief, E!"

"Yeah…

"So, I was right, huh, about the clothes?" Mal asked, enjoying the justification of her statement to Evie.

"Yeah… Regretfully so," Evie affirmed begrudgingly.

"I rode a sheep today," Jane piped up suddenly, and Evie shifted her gaze to the girl.

"Really?"

"Yeah. It didn't go so well," Jane informed her, reaching for her phone, which reminded Mal of what they hadn't done that day.

"Crap, we've got to call one of the boys," Mal brought to attention with a deep sigh, dreading the call already. After all, they didn't send pictures with all of them in it at the same time. Instead, they had sent selfies of certain groups that had been together that day.

"Let's hit Carlos. He's not so judgmental," Evie suggested, and Mal nodded willingly, honestly too exhausted to argue.

Mal started to call him on video chat, and before long, he picked up.

"Hey, how was your first day?" Carlos immediately questioned, a slightly mischievous grin on his face as he asked them about their fun.

"Well, I thought I'd tell you to explain to everybody that we're not able to take pictures together always. We've managed to get selfies of people in separate groups, but that's all we've got for you," Mal told him shortly.

"I saw them already. Is Jane okay?" Carlos asked worriedly.

"Don't worry, I'm okay! A little scraped on my knees, but I'm okay!" Jane told him loud enough so that he heard her from the distance that she was sitting.

"That's good. And Evie," Carlos trailed off as he smiled at Evie wickedly. Evie looked at Mal with dread.

"I see that you've slipped right into farm life," Carlos told her before laughing wholeheartedly. Evie just sighed, closing her eyes as she took in the horrible pun.

"E told me to call you because you'd be less judgmental, but I don't think she really knew what she was talking about," Mal told him with a roll of her eyes, knowing that the horse poop thing had to have embarrassed Evie terribly.

"Nah, I'm not judging. I've done some dumb stuff, too. So, show me some proof that you're still at the farm, and I'll let you off. You look awfully exhausted," Carlos commented, glancing pointedly at Evie. Mal nodded her head, and she suddenly realized that Evie was almost asleep on her shoulder.

Mal glanced around the room and looked at Uma with the puppy that seemed to have adopted her. Mal resisted the urge to laugh at the goofy look on Uma's face as she played with the silly-looking pup.

"Will this work?" Mal questioned and angled the phone so that Carlos could see Uma and the visitor. Carlos laughed happily, marveling at the sight of Uma of all people falling in love with a dog.

"That is bewildering and adorable at the same time," Carlos said with a chuckle, and Mal shook her head tiredly.

"Well, I'll go ahead and let you guys get to sleep. I love you, guys," Carlos expressed sweetly, and Evie and Mal replied tiredly yet lovingly before getting off the phone.

Mal crawled over to her sleeping bag, Evie close behind her, and they both collapsed on their respective sleeping bags. Uma quickly realized that she wouldn't be able to keep the puppy up in the loft with her in case she fell down the ladder hole while Uma was asleep. So Uma very regretfully picked up the puppy, starting for the ladder as she descended it carefully.

She placed it on the ground unhappily, and the puppy was looking at her so confusedly and adorably that she couldn't resist leaning down and taking its face in her hands before kissing its nose.

"You be a good girl. You can't stay with me tonight. Go be with your family, okay?" Uma softly commanded, and the pup gazed at her with wide, sad eyes. Uma offered her one last pet before climbing back up the ladder. Despite her desire to do so, Uma didn't look back down for fear of falling weak.

Mal watched as Uma climbed back up and headed for the sleeping bag next to Audrey's. Audrey was already snuggled in and well on her way to being asleep. Jane was in her bag softly snoring.

Mal allowed her eyelids to slide closed. It had been a very hard day, and it was only the first one. She couldn't help but really worry about how tomorrow was going to go. However, she was so tired that she really couldn't bring herself to care that much.

She was just starting to lose all semblances of consciousness, dwelling upon that last thought of worry, when Evie suddenly jerked, bumping into her hard. Mal jumped in surprise, thrown off guard as she was yanked from sleep's merciful hold.

"Wha? E? What's going on?" Mal asked, turning over to look at the bluenette. Evie was completely frozen as she lay there not too far from Mal.

"I heard something," Evie informed the faerie, immensely worried as she glanced about in the darkness. Mal sluggishly raked her gaze about the room but didn't spot anything outside of the ordinary.

All was quiet for a few moments more, but then Mal heard the definitive sound of small pitter-pattering feet across the floor. She opened her eyes just barely and easily saw the whites of Evie's eyes shining in the moonlight.

"Uma, you don't think the puppy's up here with us, do you?" Evie questioned, and Uma huffed as she shifted in her sleeping bag.

"That dog would have to dadgum sprout wings and fly to make it all the way up here," Uma spoke mid-groan as she settled back down.

They returned to the comforts of silence. That is, until the skittering sound returned for yet another round.

"Okay, seriously, what is that?!" Evie cried, completely bewildered as her voice shook. Uma cleared her throat quietly and Mal heard her rustling a bit in her sleeping bag.

"If you want to know my honest opinion, I'm pretty sure it's rats," Uma expressed, and Mal immediately dreaded what was to come after that statement.

"Rats?! M, there's rats! They might eat me!" Evie cried, scooting ever closer to Mal. The green-eyed girl sighed deeply, internally cursing Uma for suggesting that idea despite its trueness.

"Don't worry, the most that it might do is crawl across your legs," Uma reassured the bluenette and Mal could hear the smile in the pirate captain's voice.

"Mal, I don't want them to crawl across my legs! They carry diseases, you know!" Evie whined, growing increasingly hysterical and was almost pressed against Mal at this point.

"However, if there's a lot of them and they're hungry, they could take a nibble or two," Uma continued thoughtfully, and Evie gasped immediately. Mal resisted the urge to growl as Uma kept stirring the pot.

"But it's okay still. They don't bite just any part of your body, so if you keep certain parts protected, you should be okay," Uma informed Evie, and Mal felt Evie loosen ever so slightly. Evie raised her head up a bit, looking in Uma's direction.

"So where should I watch?"

"Well, your calves, your cheeks, pretty much any part of your body that's kind of fat," Uma explained, and Evie gasped in pure horror, her body tucked snugly against Mal's.

"If I were you, though, I'd watch my butt. The goose has already bitten it and tenderized it. It's all downhill from here," Uma recommended, and there was a definitive scream building in Evie's throat as she wrapped her arms around Mal in a constricting grasp.

"E, she's just trying to scare you," Mal reassured her best friend as well as she could considering how ridiculously exhausted that she was right then.

"It's working!" Evie's voice wavered as she started to tremble. Mal sighed, closing her eyes and figuring that they all could worry with this in the morning.

The tiny footsteps sounded off a little nearer and Evie squeaked, trying to hold back an actual scream as she jumped. Mal sighed, never opening her eyes. However, she did open her eyes when another body slid into her sleeping bag with her.

"What are you doing?!" Mal asked, bewildered as she tried to understand what was going on. She looked to the side where Evie had just been and she pulled back a bit upon realizing that Evie was much closer, her nose almost touching Mal's own.

Evie grinned widely, showing those perfect rows of glittering white teeth as she adoringly eyed Mal.

"Hi," Evie simply greeted.

"Hello. Is there some reason you're in my sleeping bag?" Mal replied, her eyes almost hurting to keep them open any longer. Evie's warmth was permeating all of her body and making it very difficult to resist sleep.

"I need you to protect me."

"You're bigger than I am and older than I am. How am I supposed to protect you?" Mal questioned but allowed Evie to wrap her arms around her tightly as Mal turned her back to the girl.

"Easy. You're meaner than I am and more magical than I am," Evie answered her.

"Wow. You think of me so highly," Mal remarked dryly, and Evie snuggled closer against her.

"I do. I really do," Evie sincerely spoke, and Mal smiled slightly, enjoying Evie's closeness.

"Don't worry. Nothing's going to happen to you right here," Mal reassuringly spoke, starting to drift off in the midst of her comfort as a result of the heat pouring off of Evie in waves.

Mal felt Evie's muscles relaxing as she rested against her, and Mal was relieved that she had finally gotten her sister to calm down.

However, Uma just had to open her mouth.

"Hey, Evie?" Uma piped up suddenly after a moment.

"Yeah?" Evie questioned.

"If the rats are hungry, there's no stopping them…"

"Mal!" Evie cried, completely freaked out.

"Uma…"

A/N: Welp, they made it through day one. Hopefully tomorrow will be better for them. But I wouldn't count on it…