Hey! I'm back, sorry for the mini-hiatus. It was a mix of writers block and general business. Thank you to Carlie De Vil, for your PM asking me to get into gear again.
Thank you to my reviewers, favourites and followers.
See chapter 1 for the disclaimer.
Jafar was observing his shop with a vulture's eye. Like all the shops on the Isle, with the exception of Prince John's, it was quite small, allowing five guests in easily, but making fitting ten cramped. His keen eyes filtered over the five 'guests' in his shop, 'Jafar's Brilliant Bargains'. The two Wicked-Stepmothers daughters where cramped in one corner looking his clothes section, which consisted of two whole rails of clothes and a couple of scarfs and hat's, draped artistically around a hat-stand. Gaston was also looking at clothes, occasionally disappearing into the 'changing rooms' [A row of showers, with their curtains still attached]. The Red Queen was yelling something about finding a new croquet pelican [might not had been her exact words, Jafar wasn't paying attention] Hades was standing in the middle of the store, complaining he couldn't find anything that was heat-proof for him.
"I am the lord of the underworld! I need something heat-proof for crying out loud!" Hades snapped, grabbing at a scarf that immediately disintegrated.
Jafar rolled his eyes before putting on a fake smile and walking up to Hades. "I am afraid I'm going to have to charge you for that." He stated.
Hades snarled. "I don't care. Get me something heat-proof, and get it for me, now." His tone left no room for discussion, so Jafar disappeared behind the counter and finding an old holey coat muttered a few words and made it heat-proof.
"Here you are, sir." The now con-artist said popping back up again. "Fire-proof obviously, only the best for my favourite customer." Or the one most likely to kill me if he doesn't get his way, Jafar thought holding the coat up so Hades could get a better view.
Hades looked at in curiosity before shooting some fire at it, when the coat didn't disintegrate he smiled. "Great! What do you want for it?"
"A favour from you at any time I choose." Jafar said, coolly. He didn't really need anything materialistic, he had Jay to steel for him for that, but what he did need was protection from…unsatisfied customers.
Hades grinned. "You got yourself a deal, Jaf!" And walked out.
Jafar got a full minute of peace until. "HEY!" one of the ugly stepsisters, Jafar could never remember which was which, grabbed a scarf of the stand and marched over to his desk with it. "THIS is MINE."
"Well my dear, it's in my store, so I think you'll find it's actually mine." Jafar said, snarkliy. "However if you wish to have it I'd be happy to trade it for you…for that pretty pearl necklace you're wearing…"
The step-sister fingered the pearls before snapping. "Don't be ridiculous, these pearls are with thousands of pounds, I got this scarf from Prince John's store in exchange for a hair bow. The point is it's mine, it went missing last week and now it turns up in your store."
"Well, my dear, I have no idea how that happened…" The man in black lied. "But if you wish to trade…"
The stepsister threw the scarf in his face as a response and stormed out.
Jafar pulled the scarf of his nose, sighing. "Well, you win some, you lose some. Oh! Jay! C'mere, c'mere son…" He'd caught sight of his six-year old son hovering around the back entrance. "What have you got for me?"
The child smiled mischievously before handing over a couple of rings and a fancy hat. Jafar ticked them of, muttering under his breath. "So the hat's clearly Captain Hook's…these two rings are clearly Lady Tramins….who's is this one?" He asked in confusion holding up a red rock.
"Cruellas DeVilles." Jay said.
His father burst out laughing and clapped his son on the back. "Brilliant, my son. But remember, the lamps! We need lamps; they might have genies in them. Oh, also there's' some pearls I want you to steel, I'll tell you more tomorrow. Anyway, go to bed now, you look shattered."
Jay gave a grateful smile before running back to his 'bed' which was actually an old mattress and a mouldy pillow with a thick blanket on it, lying on the bottom shelf of the television cabinet. The top was full of televisions. Jafar knew he should probably move the boy to the top shelf, but the child was so small at the minute he couldn't reach the top shelf! And Jafar certainly wasn't going to lift him up each night…
The sorcerer looked up from arranging stuff behind his desk only because he heard a crash. The crash came from the hat stand which had fallen over; it had fallen over because a little black-and-white boy was attached to it. Now the child was picking up a scarf and running away with it. Wait a minute…
"JAY!" Said child was rudely awoken from his mini-nap by his father's yell. "JAY! GET OUT HERE! JAY! WE'RE BEING ROBBED! GET OUT HERE YOU LITTLE….!"
Scrambling up Jay raced out to his father's side, just in time to see a black-and-white blur disappear. He looked up at his father who seemed to be on the verge of a panic-attack. "That black-and-white child just stole some of our hard-earned wares! Get after him!"
As Jay shot of, Jafar grabbed the other step-sisters fan and started fanning himself with it. Sadly he wasn't as young as he was and there was no way he could go running after that blasted child.
His son thankfully could. Jay was racing down the street after this weird child. The kid was quite fast actually, ducking and diving around the various parts of other people's 'houses' and leaping onto a few garbage cans, sending a couple spilling over in the desperate hope to stop Jay. That didn't happen, having been training himself as a thief for pretty much all his life Jay was fairly certain he knew all the tricks. He first stole something for his father when he was two or three, he'd been board and it was there. His father had been slightly shocked at first and the delighted. He'd already set up his stall then, but was having trouble finding something to sell. He soon put his son to work, steeling all the things he could get his small grubby hands on.
Anyway. Jay had good stamina through this and it was quite clear the child in front of him didn't. He was slowing down already, having only been running for about two or three minutes, Jay sped up ad throwing himself at the other boy caught his legs and sent them both crashing down to the ground.
"I'll have that." Jay said, claiming the scarf and wrapping it around himself.
"Dammit…" The other child whispered to himself.
Jay put his head on one side, regarding the other by with interest. "What's your name?"
"C-carlos."
"I'm Jay. You know that was quite good, for a beginner."
Carlos's eyes gained a bit of sparkle. "It was!?"
Jay nodded. "Yeah, b-but you need to be cleverer. My dad caught you because you kicked the stand over. That's just…STUPID!"
"Oh…"
"First rule of stealing." Jay said, sitting next to Carlos. "Never draw any 'ttention to you. Thieves need to be clever, quick and af…af…sporty."
"They do?" Carlos's head was swimming a bit. He's started stealing after noticing it was what most of the older boys were doing. He hadn't realised there were so many rules to follow though…
"Mmm-hmm." Jay nodded, resting his head in his hands. "Want me to teach you?"
"You'd do that!?" Carlos said excitedly. He could scarcely believe his luck! None of the other kids wanted to hand out with him, and now here was another boy, an older one at that, basically offering to be his friend! "So we're like friends?"
Jay crinkled his nose up. "No way! My dad, he's Jafar, always says there's no team in I. It's all for one or none for you." Seeing the younger boys shoulders droop however, Jay took pity on him.
"But we can be allies."
"What's allies?"
"Allies are finds but with a different name." Jay explained as best he could. "So want to be allies's?"
"Yeah!"
"Great, I'll meet you outside my store tomorrow. I start steeling at 2:30. Can you tell time?"
Carlos shook his head. Jay rolled his eyes. "Just come after lunch. Now…scram!" Jay flicked an arm out casing Carlos to duck and run away.
Jay took the scarf back to Jafar. "Oh you have it! That's good, was he difficult to catch? You were a long time…"
"Nah, he was easy. But I made a new ally! That kids called Carlos; I'm going to teach him to steel."
Jafar's face broke into a smile. "That's my boy! But, Jay, remember…there's no team in I."
"No team in I." Jay echoed.
Jafar grin got wider and he patted Jay on the head. "Brilliant, now get to bed. Tea's in a little while. We have rotting chips."
Jafar watched his son go and with a soft smile turned his attention back to his shop.
