Chapter 12: The Emporium

The Emporium was packed when Daisy got there; they were having a huge clearance sale to make way for the 'next season' merchandise. A few other shops were having the same sale, but anyone in the Kingdom with a sense of fashion would be either here or at DowntownD. In fact, it was so busy that the shop had hired some teens in need of extra cash.

"Too bad Donald isn't here to carry my stuff" Daisy said, as she looked at another dress. Then she added "good thing your is here to take his place!"

She threw the dress she was looking at onto the massive pile of merchandise that poor Malina was lugging throughout the small shop.

Malina sighed and blew a strand of black hair out of her pretty face. She had never been a fan of shopping, but she was big on lending a hand. When she saw a flyer at her school asking for extra assistance at the Main Street Emporium, she signed up right away. Now she was carrying just about everything the store had to offer for this snooty duck (at this point, she wasn't sure who was worse: Daisy or Kuzco) She might have been able to handle her costumer just fine, but some of her coworkers were less than desirable.

Wendy Corduroy and Vanessa Doofenshmirtz, who both worked the cash registers, read magazines or played with knickknacks, but not much else. Melody Seamen tried to help out, but she didn't really know where anything was and ended up chitchatting with the customers. The 'good guys' Kim Possible, Monty Monogram, and Jake Long were all in the back room doing inventory.

Daisy looked over at clothing rack which had Hawaiian outfits. She looked through the green and orange shirts. Disappointed, she turned to Malina.

"Do you have any in lavender? Or perhaps a lint shad of pink?" She asked.

"Mo mi aff oo loo om ee offr si" Malina mumbled from the other side of Daisy's mountain of clothes.

"What?" Daisy asked, somewhat annoyed at the 'lack of costumer service' (in her opinion)

"I said," Malina responded from around the mighty pile. "You might have to look on the other side."

"Oh. Why didn't you say that he first time?" Daisy called over her shoulder as she walked to the other side of the Hawaiian rack. With a sigh, Malina followed.

They got to the other side and stepped into one of the oddest debates ever held in the Emporium (and that was saying something!). Jumba stood off to the side, holding a dozen bags from DowntownD with an impatient expression on his face. Pumbaa stood in front of the clothing rack, looking up at Timon, who stood on his head and modeled the last (and very large) lavender Hawaiian shirt. Pleakley stood over the two, closely examining the shirt on Timon.

"I dare you to say that this shirt isn't flattering on him!" Pleakley said, turning to Jumba.

"It isn't." Jumba responded in a bored voice.

"It looks wonderful!" Pleakley exclaimed, ignoring Jumba.

"Hmm... I don't know, Timon," Pumbaa interrupted "I think you'd look better in that green one." He pointed to a forest green shirt hung up on the rack.

"Pumbaa, don't be ridiculous! Green?" Timon scoffed. He looked at the lavender shirt, then back up to the green one. He snapped his fingers "Hay! I'll bet that green one looks better on me!"

"Is that not what smelly African pig just said?" Jumba asked.

"Please!" Timon scoffed again "If anyone is the 'brains' of this outfit, it's me."

He took off the lavender Hawaiian shirt and tossed it to Pleakley, who cought it clumsily. Timon slid into the perfectly fitting green shirt and looked it over.

"Yeah, that looks much better." Timon said, satisfied.

"Hmm, I agree." Pleakley approved. He turned to Jumba again "Now tell me that that's not flattering!"

"Okay. Is not flattering on tiny African rodent." Jumba stated simply.

"Fashion hater!" As Timon and Pumbaa walked away, Pleakley took his black wig off and slipped the small lavender shirt onto his antenna.

"How about this! A new head piece that will be all the rage back home!"

Jumba simply rolled his eyes and walked away. Pleakley sighed and pulled the shirt off, tossing it over his shoulder (where it landed on Daisy's face)

"Everyone's a critic." Pleakley sighed. He looked around "Jumba? Jumba! Wait for me!"

Daisy pinched the shirt off of her face. She looked at it, disgusted.

"I think I'll check out now." She held the shirt out and dropped it in the ground. "Oh, and, you might want to wash that."

She cringed, thinking that if she had come latter and bought it. She made her way through the Emporium towards the cash registers quickly. As she waited in the long line to check out, she saw two kids working behind a nearby shelf set that sold Mickey Ear Hats. The boy had a vest and blue baseball cap and the girl had longer hair, a blue hairband and a large teal sweater with the name 'Mabel' in rainbow letters and a pinecone under it. Other than that, the two were identical. The girl heaved a big sigh as she put several misplaced hats on their correct rack. She smiled and put the last one on on her head. She tapped her partner on the shoulder.

"Hay, Dipper," she giggled "dose his hat make my ears look big?"

"Mabel, knock it off!" He swiped the hat off her head, making her frown "We promised Wendy that we'd help out."

"No," Mabel stole the hat back "You promised her! Hay!"

He grabbed the hat again, but she held on. The twins tugged the hat back and fourth between them. Suddenly, the hat slipped from their hands. It tumbled through the air and hit Daisy in the face. Slowly, Daisy's face reddened and a low rumble came from her through.

"If one...more...thing...goes wrong, I'm going to-" Her tense rant was cut off by a huge rumbling and a loud BOOM!

It rattled the very structure of the Emporium and vibrated everyone's bones. Everyone from on the street rushed into the stores to hide. Daisy was crammed into the corner as they all squeezed in. She watched in horror as Malina dropped her clothes and both the pile and the girl got trampled. Everyone was running around in a panic, but Daisy stood still. Finally, she gathered all of her anger into the one word.

"ENOUGH!"

She stamped her foot and made her way forward through the shocked crowd. Reaching the door, she shoved it open and marched outside. She took three steps before a hand on her shoulder stopped her. Daisy whipped around and did a double take. It was a toon about her size with black fur, white face and very tall ears. A tight-fitting red dress revealed the new toon's womanly curves.

"What is it?" Daisy snapped grumpily.

"You can't go out there." The rabbit said. She had a velvety soft voice and a very faint southern accent.

"Fine," Daisy said simply "You stay inside. I'm going to teach whoever messed up my shopping trip a lesson!"

She turned around and started to walk off again, the the other toon ran in front of her, stopping her again. Daisy folded her arms impatiently.

"I'm serious. You really shouldn't go out there." She said earnestly.

"And who are you to be telling me what to do?" Daisy snapped.

"Just a side character." The other muttered bitterly. She cleared her throat and spoke louder. "My name is Francine Cottontail. Everyone calls me Fanny."

"Well, Fanny," Daisy said stiffly "tell me why I can't find out what happened out here?"

"Because I know who did this." Daisy waved her hand for Fanny to continue. She gulped "It was...Maleficent."

That seamed to put Daisy's rage on hold for a moment. But she quickly recovered.

"How do you know?" She asked simply

"I, uh..." It was Fanny's turn to get caught off guard. "I...heard it? Yeah, some people were talking about a black-robed lady with a green face. I can put two and two together."

"How do you know about Maleficent?" Daisy grilled further.

"That's not important!" Fanny snapped "You shouldn't interfere!" Realizing what she just said, Fanny cleared her throat and hurried on. "I mean, whatever is going on over there, you don't want to get stuck in the crossfire, do you?"

"Uh-huh..." Daisy nodded skeptically.

She peered over Fanny's shoulder and gasped, pointing to the Hub... Or lack of Hub, as the case was. Maleficent was gone, but she had definitely left a mark. Even from their point, you could see the crater and the debris left behind. Then, a rare thing occurred: Daisy Duck was at a loss for words. Fanny's face was expressionless and hard to read. The two stood in silence for a while before the jingle of the Emporium's door knocked them out of their stupor.

"Mrs. Duck?" A timid Malina poked her head around the door. "I got all of your clothes, and they seam alright... What do you want done with them?"

Daisy narrowed her eyes, remembering why she had left the store in the first place.

"Tell Miss Dinglehopper at the cash retested to ring it all up and sent it to my house. Right now, I'm busy." She marched off to the crater that was once the Hub, Fanny following close behind.

"Wait! Who's Miss Dinglehopper?!" Malina called after them, but neither duck nor rabbit turned back. "Do you mean Doofenshmirtz? And where is your house?"

With a sigh, she gave up and returned to the overcrowded store. She pushed her way through to the registers where she had piled all of the clothes. As Malina waited for either Vanessa or Wendy to show up and help her, she couldn't help but listen in on the conversation behind her. Nanny Cook and Lady Kluck were speaking in low, worried voices.

"Oh dear," Nanny muttered "I was getting more food for the puppies when that horrible... Thing happened! Do you know what that shaking was?"

"Oh, I do" Lady Kluck leaned in closer "I heard from that black rabbit- the one in the scandalous red dress- she said that she saw the whole thing. It was that Wicked Fairy who did it." She clicked her tongue "How she saw that whole thing and came here so fast is beyond me!"

Black rabbit? Red dress? The one walking away with Daisy? But didn't she tell Daisy that she heard about the explosion... From someone else? Maybe Malina had heard that wrong... And it wasn't really her business anyway...

But that mysterious rabbit still got under her skin...

A/N: I am EXTREMELY sorry for the wait! Anyway, special shout out to My Mexican (you know who you are) for creating the Timon/Pleakley shopping scene. Plus my little sister made the Dipper/Mabel cameo which helped cure my writer's block! Thanks sis! Character time (I think you will notice a pattern)...
-Malina is Emperor Kuzco's crush from the TV series Emperor's New School
-Wendy Corduroy, Mabel and Dipper Pines are from TV show Gravity Falls
-Vanessa Doofenshmirtz and Monty Monogram are from the TV show Phineas and Ferb
-Melody Seamen is Arial's daughter from Little Mermaid: Return to the Sea
-Kim Possible, from the TV show of the same name
-Jake Long, from American Dragon: Jake Long, another TV show
-There were TV show spinoffs of Lilo and Stitch (Pleakley and Jumba) and The Lion King (Timon and Pumbaa)
-Fanny Cottontail was Oswald's first girlfriend in he 1920's shorts, but the real love between the two faded out and Fanny was replaced by Sadie. Fanny was less 'sweet' and more 'sexy' using her looks to get Oswald's attention
-Nanny Cook is the nanny in 101 Dalmatians
-Lady Kluck is Maid Marion's lady-in-waiting from Robin Hood
*PS.* 'Seamen' is not Melody's last name. I could not find their last names anywhere, so I made it up.