Jaden heard the front door being slammed open at precisely 6:30am, her eyes having been focused on the clock as she continued to lay in bed, motionless as well as restless. Sleep was the last thing on her mind when she came home from her unforeseen encounter with Goofy, and her overactive mind didn't disappoint on that front. For the past two and a half hours Jaden had been thinking over the deal she had made with Goofy, wondering if she was actually going to go through with it, therefore she was somewhat thankful for the distraction when that front door had opened, her thoughts snapping back to reality.
Her gaze shifted from the blaring red light of the clock to her compulsory company, her body heaving a giant sigh once she realised it was Mickey Mouse, barging into her own home like he owned the place. She didn't know who else she could have been expecting, it wasn't like the mouse had been coming to her house every morning for a cooked breakfast since the house fire. That still didn't stop her from giving him a hard glare. "Don't you ever knock?" She asked him testily, pulling up the bed covers to cover her bare chest.
Mickey ignored her as he sat beside her on the bed, not even bothered (or so it seemed) by her nakedness, his unblinking, wide stare creeping Jaden out on so many levels.
Annoyed and irritated by his unwelcomed presence, Jaden manoeuvred her feet out from under the covers, lifting them where they rested on Mickey's shoulder. The mouse grimaced slightly at the smell of her feet, but still didn't push her off.
He let out a sigh. "Gosh, I miss Minnie. I know we'll get her back here one day, I just wish that 'one day' was today." Mickey said regretfully, his desolation tangible in the air.
"You need a distraction." Jaden told him, as if her nakedness wasn't already a distraction enough.
Mickey seemed to brighten at this proposition. "Maybe you're right…" He let out a small gasp as the beginnings of an idea came to mind. "I know! Let's have a picnic! How about you get the food, and I'll get everything else?" He suggested enthusiastically.
Jaden took her time in replying. "Not what I…oh screw it. What do I need to bring?" She supposed if it got the mouse back in a better mood than she better play along.
"I'll find a great spot for the picnic while you take care of the food. How about some fish sandwiches and crudités!?" He brushed off Jaden's feet as he jumped off of the bed. "Also, you could really use a shower." He added, trying his best to appear kind and in no way malicious.
"I know," Jaden waved away his concerns, "but take a look around. Do you see a bathroom in here? I've been too busy dealing with everything else that personal care has been… non-existent.
Anyway, I better go and do some fishing." She told him.
Mickey was quick on his feet, wasting no time in running back to Jaden's side by the bed. "Well what are you waiting for? Let's go!" Mickey took Jaden by the hand and dragged her outside, leaving Jaden no time to even get dressed, letting him drag her across the plaza completely nude. Thankfully it was still early morning, so the plaza was currently empty at this time of hour, not that Jaden would have minded if others saw her naked.
Mickey didn't let her go until they were at the meadow, stopping by one of the many ponds.
Jaden roughly pulled her arm back from Mickey's grasp, checking her arm over for any sign of bruises as he had dragged her quite hard. "You sure are in a rush to have this picnic, huh?" Jaden said as she summoned the fishing rod, finding herself a dry patch of grass to sit on. "Didn't even let me get dressed…" She muttered, unsure if she found it amusing or freaky.
The two spent four long boring hours catching fish. Well, Jaden did anyway, with Mickey just standing there watching by the bank, making Jaden increasingly more uncomfortable by the minute with the way he was continuing to stare at her.
When Jaden had finally managed to hook a decent fish that would fill them both up, Jaden headed back to her house to cook up some fish sandwiches and crudités.
As Jaden was packing up the food into a nice picnic wicker basket that Mickey had brought with him, a nasty plot had just begun to form in her mind. She still had a little bit of the potion left she had given Goofy and having not learned anything from when she had tampered with Goofy's food to which nearly resulted in her being murdered by a crazed serial killer, Jaden decided to put a little nasty surprise into Mickey's sandwich, watching with glee as the last few drops of the purple potion splash onto one of the fish sandwiches, making sure to separate them from the others so she wouldn't accidentally eat it. This was to get back at him for dragging her out of bed this morning. She just couldn't help herself, consequences be damned, she'll deal with them later.
Once she was done admiring her handiwork, Mickey walked in and dragged her back out of the house towards the meadow by the pond behind Goofy's house, eager as ever to get started. "Aw, I bet Minnie would have loved this. The sky, the grass…it's just her kind of picnic." Mickey said as Jaden threw the blanket down onto the grass, setting up the food. "And I know she'd love being friends with you. Gosh, I miss her…" Mickey's ears drooped in sadness. He breathed a small sigh in an attempt to stop the tears flowing that was threatening to overwhelm him.
As Jaden was just about to hand Mickey a fish sandwich, she stopped herself short when a faded form of a silhouette standing right in front of them caught her unsettling attention. Jaden and Mickey both jumped in fright once they realised they were staring down the ghost of Mickey's long-lost wife, Minnie Mouse.
"Wow! Is that Minnie!?" Mickey exclaimed, his reaction bordering between extreme joy and hysteria. He turned to Jaden, hope gleaming in his eyes. "Was that really her? Where is she?" He looked around frantically, the ghostly apparition now vanished into thin air. His posture went from slouched to rim-rod straight as an idea came to mind. "Wait! Merlin and I saw something like this before. Jaden, Minnie isn't gone!"
Jaden wasn't sure she followed on how Mickey came to that conclusion. "What is it?" She asked, deciding to play along with the mouse's assumption. If what Goofy had said was true about Minnie being buried under Mickey's patio, then there was no way in hell that she could possibly be alive, but she of course wasn't going to tell Mickey that, distraught enough as he already is.
"It must be the Forgetting! It's not just memories that are lost, villagers are starting to fade away too! We have to figure out how to bring Minnie back to the valley! And with your help, I'm sure we can do it. I need to go check in with Merlin. Let's talk about this again soon!" And with that, Mickey jumped to his feet and ran off, leaving Jaden on her lonesome.
"Hey, wait a minute! What about the picnic?" Jaden called after him, but Mickey was already long gone. So much for a relaxing picnic, he had got her out of bed for nothing.
She heard somebody laugh at the other side of the pond. Not even bothering to see who it was, Jaden picked up a stone and threw it over at the person in question, missing them as she heard it splash into the water.
Not wanting to let good food go to waste, Jaden sat back and began eating the untampered sandwiches. After a few minutes of peaceful silence, she heard footsteps from behind her.
"Jaden, is there a reason why you're naked by the pond?" Merlin asked her gradually, unsure if he was quite believing what he was seeing.
Jaden looked up at the wizard and shrugged. "I'm having a picnic. Want to join? I've got plenty of food." She told him plainly, as if nothing out of the ordinary was going on.
Merlin nodded vaguely and sat opposite her, wondering what on earth he was doing whilst respectfully keeping his gaze from her. It didn't go unnoticed by him that Jaden was appearing to laugh at his obvious discomfort, handing him Mickey's abandoned food.
"So, say I've collected those dream shards…what do you expect me to do with them?" Jaden asked after a few moments of silence.
"You must combine them to release their power. You can do this at your crafting station." He said rather uncomfortably, unsure of where to look.
"That seems too simple." Jaden said cautiously, wondering what the catch was.
"Magic is an act creating something new from what was or wasn't there before. As is making an object at your crafting station. There are different methods of magic, of course. Wands, divination… alchemy, ice magic, whatever it is Ursula does…" Merlin trailed off, the mention of the wicked sea witch sending a chill down his spine. "But I think this method will suit you best, and one for which you clearly have an aptitude."
As if on cue, Merlin abruptly stood up after taking a few bites out of the fish sandwich, dropping it onto the checkered red and white blanket as the poor old man held his stomach in pain. "I-I'm sorry, Jaden…but I must-" He couldn't finish that sentence as he ran off, still holding his stomach and looking as though he was about to be sick.
Jaden chuckled to herself as she witnessed the wizard dash off to the nearest available bush where she very faintly could hear the sound of him retching his guts up. Not wanting to hear the entire disgusting exchange, Jaden packed up the rest of the picnic, deciding to leave the basket by the pond as she headed back to her house.
Upon entering the house, Jaden got dressed into a fresh, set of clean clothes. Her attention was drawn to the clothes on the floor left from the night before, cursing herself mentally for her own stupidity. Swiping them up quickly, she discarded her bloody clothes into the bin, covering it on top of some food waste in the hopes that nobody had the sense to rummage through it. Good thing Mickey hadn't bothered to take much notice of them when he popped by this morning.
Once she was done, she grabbed her bag hanging from the kitchen chair and sat herself down onto her bed. She searched through her bag until she pulled out the tiny, pink crystalised dream shards. Grasping a few in her hand, Jaden tossed her bag onto the bed and left the house, walking over to the crafting station located in her front garden. She did as Merlin instructed her and combined the shards together to make pure Dreamlight.
With her task done, Jaden went in search for the old man, whom she eventually found outside his house in the meadow, a bucket in hand. Jaden winched as she watched the sight of Merlin throwing up, feeling a moment's small pity for having put him through this. Damn that mouse for ditching her for some half-sought out hypothesis.
When the wizard was finally done, he turned to Jaden and smiled, eyeing the glittering shards in her hand. "Jaden, how good to see you! Now tell me, what did you make out of the dream shards?" He asked, wiping a hand over his beard in embarrassment of Jaden seeing him in such a pathetic state.
"I combined them and got Dreamlight!" She informed the sickly wizard with an overexaggerated excitedness that she didn't feel and only put on for Merlin's benefit.
"Pure Dreamlight?" Merlin paused, his foggy brain trying to take in what Jaden told him before fully registering what she'd just said. "Fascinating! And…somewhat ominous. You found the dream shards in the Night Thorns, that means…well, can you discern what that means?"
Jaden thought about this for a moment. "That we should rename them Dream Thorns?" She suggested, only half joking.
Merlin glared at her. "Goodness, no! They don't deserve such a lovely name. Consider what they are…weeds feeding on broken shards to dreams, devouring our home. Hmm…" Merlin paused to think about their current situation, pondering on how he could fix this exactly. "Night Thorns are far more sinister than I'd realised. We must learn more, perhaps studying other valley flora will provide some insight. It will help for you to gather fruits and herbs from the plaza and the meadow."
Jaden sighed and nodded before walking off, listing off the different fruits and herbs over in her mind that Merlin had requested of her to search for.
Three hours later, she returned to Merlin with the items in question.
The wizard examined the items presented in Jaden's hand. "A fine selection of mystical floral. Excellent work, Jaden. Now, I will weave these into an enchantment for your watering can. If all goes well, you then can obliterate some rather bothersome mushrooms entirely and instantly." Merlin informed her.
"Can this magic be used to prevent Night Thorns from growing?" Jaden asked.
Merlin was impressed by Jaden question, like a teacher praising his prized student. "Very perceptive, that is something we can hope to work towards. But don't use the enchantment on the Night Thorns yet. It won't have any effect on magical plants. We should start with the mushrooms." Heaving himself up from the uncomfortable ground, Merlin led Jaden a short walk down to the entrance to the Glade of Trust.
The pair stopped at the entrance, with Merlin telling Jaden to summon the watering can. "Use the watering can on the mushrooms in the meadow near the entrance to the Glade of Trust." He instructed her, pointing out the mushrooms that needed the attention.
Jaden did as she was told, using the watering can on the mushrooms beside Merlin, causing them to disappear within the blink of an eye.
Merlin clapped his hands together in glee like a small child. "Huzzah! The enchantment removed those pesky mushrooms! Now, I'll work on making it a permanent addition to your watering can. It will soon be an even more useful tool."
Jaden nodded her thanks, beginning to turn away from the wizard when she was stopped by the sound of her name calling her back.
"Jaden, what exactly did you put in that sandwich?" Merlin asked her suspiciously, narrowing his eyes in speculation.
"Uh…" Jaden stumbled over her mental words, desperately searching for an excuse to offer the elderly wizard that showed her nothing but kindness since her arrival to the valley. "I have no idea what you're talking about, old man. Now if you don't mind, I'm going to check up on Scrooge and see if he has any work for me!"
Jaden hurriedly waved her goodbyes and raced across the meadow in the direction of Scrooge's shop, where Merlin watched her until she was a small speck in the distance.
He had no doubt in his mind that Jaden had tampered with his sandwich, but couldn't find it in his heart to be mad at her. He had a funny feeling the sandwich wasn't originally meant for him in the first place anyway, it was just a matter of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
He would have to do something about her mischievous behaviour before she got herself into some trouble she couldn't get out of.
He wouldn't be surprised if it hadn't happened already.
