Into Tangled
Dawn came out of the portal and was no longer a mink, but a human girl was once again. This time, though, she still did not quite fit in because she was dressed a little too clean and in clothes a little to new to fit in where she had come out. It was an orphanage.
Dawn could only feel her shoulders slump and could only roll her eyes in exasperation. Her portals had an odd sense of humor.
“Children! Lunch is ready! If you don’t come in an’ eat, you won’t get nothing!” yelled out a high-pitched voice that sounded sharp and severe. It came from an older woman wearing an old blue dress with a dirty grey apron that Dawn suspected used to be white. The woman had grey hair pinched into a bun high on her head which pulled on her face giving it a further angular angry look than it already had with the woman’s pinched lips and squinting eyes.
Dawn hid in the shadows of the building across the street from the orphanage as dozens of children, all thin and wearing threadbare clothes with no shoes, came running at the woman’s call.
It was one child though, that caught Dawn’s attention. He did not stand out from the rest, there was nothing eye or attention grabbing about him. However, Dawn could tell he was a budding thief. He was not particularly good yet and Dawn could tell, having lived on the streets of Agrabah for a year with the street kid Aladdin.
With nothing else to do currently, Dawn left the little orphanage behind and roamed the rest of the city. It was a city, but it was not an exceptionally large one. The city had approximately 50,000 people living within its meager walls. Not the biggest city, but Dawn felt it was appropriately large for having the diversity of people living here from rich to poor.
Dawn a grown a little since she had first fallen through that very first portal. It appears the time in the world she landed in did not matter, it was the number of portals she jumped through. She no longer looked like a five-year-old, but instead she looked to be around eight or nine. It was not obvious at first, that she was aging, but Dawn was simply grateful that she would not be forever young.
With a lick of her pointed incisor, Dawn nabbed a fruit from a vendor and continued on her way seeing the sights of the city. It was nice, just exploring such a place without worry for anything. Dawn took a bite out of the fruit and was happy at the sweet juices that burst across her tongue.
“Hey! I saw you take that! How did you do that?” asked a young boy, that same young boy Dawn had seen from the orphanage.
Dawn raised an eyebrow and continued munching on the fruit. Once she was done, she threw away the pit and the stem to the gutter and turned around to walk away, intent on ignoring the young boy who now followed her.
“Don’t ignore me! Teach me how you did that!” the boy exclaimed.
“Why should I do anything?” Dawn asked as she licked her fingers clean of the juices that had dripped from the fruit.
“I dun kno’. I just wanna learn!” the boy looked discomforted by having to ask for help, “Can you please, please, Please help me?”
“Fine,” Dawn sighed, finally taking pity on the boy who seemed to normally be confident and boisterous in everything he does. “Come here and watch me carefully.”
Dawn watched the crowd carefully before picking out her target and making a quick plan. Her target was an overweight man who carried a fat coin purse. Dawn was not after the coin purse; she was after his jewelry. There was a thick bracelet fastened around his fat wrist over top his clothes, and Dawn knew it would be far easier than taking candy from a baby. Dawn made her way forward and simply unclasped it as she walked by. She was dressed nicely enough and looked clean enough that the rich man did not give her a second glance. She looked like some well-off family’s child and so he felt no caution from her in comparison to if she had been wearing threadbare clothes.
She walked back with the spoils hidden in her pocket. “Did you see what I did?”
The young boy just looked wide eyed and confused, “I barely even saw you do anything! That was amazing! Can you teach me how you did that?”
Dawn snorted and raised an eyebrow. “Well, first, you need to look like something other than a child from the orphanage. Everyone keeps an awfully close eye on you because you look poor and so they think you might resort to stealing. You need to blend in.”
The boy pouted remarkably, it looked marvelously cute on his little face. “I can’t steal well enough to get the amount of money to afford good clothes.”
“Well, my name is Dawn, what’s yours?”
“Eugene Fitzherbert.”
Dawn gave a warm smile to the boy, “Well, Eugene, this is now yours.” Dawn handed over the gold bracelet and plopped the jewelry into his hands. “Do you know how to sell it?”
Eugene’s hazel eyes lit up in awe as he clutched the bracelet close to him. Then he realized what exactly he had in his hands and quickly shook his head, “I don’t know how I could sell it; this seems pretty important.”
Dawn let out a scoff, “That blubbering idiot probably won’t notice its missing until the end of the day. He only wore it to look more impressive than he is. So, were going to go to a traveling merchant, they aren’t super hard to find. They’re normally set up around a shopping district or near the entrances to the city. We just need to set up some sort of sob story and get them to buy it. They wont be familiar with the piece we’re selling and soon they’ll be gone anyways so no one will be able to trace the theft back to us.”
Eugene nodded and Dawn witnessed the spark of mischief in his eyes as he clutched the bracelet close. “What else?”
“Well, since you’re not dressed properly to be a rich kid’s son, what’s your sob story going to be?”
Eugene had to think about it for a moment before replying, “I would tell the merchant that my mom is sickly and my dad left us.”
Dawn shook her head, “No, that’s too much. He’s probably heard such stories a million times. Try again.”
Eugene pouted, pursing his lips in a frankly adorable manner. “Fine, what about my dad is dead and my mother is wasting the family money. I need this to secure my own future before its completely gone.”
Dawn nodded, “Not bad, not bad. If you can pull it off, you’ll be golden. Though, I would recommend you wearing something just a little better to pull off such a con.” Dawn looked around and noticed a shop selling some fine vests. “Watch me.”
With a quick jog, Dawn entered the establishment and smiled brightly at the store owner. “Hello dearie, how can I help you today?”
“I’m just looking for a new vest for my younger brother, he’s outgrown his already and I wanted something new and special for him.” Dawn smiled a perfect innocent smile, hiding her teeth behind closed lips. “Can I look around?”
“Sure dearie, just call me if you need anything.”
Dawn looked around the shop and grabbed a light blue vest that would button shut at the front of Eugene’s chest. Then, Dawn simply dropped a gold coin from her neither space on the countertop in payment. There was no need to steal from an innocent shop keeper who was just trying to make a living and support their family.
“You paid for that.” Eugene stated in confusion when Dawn came out with the little vest.
“Yep.” Dawn gave a shrug. “There are people you steal from because they need to be stolen from. That fatso we stole the bracelet from was a person who won’t go hungry because I stole it. This shop keeper is a person who depends on the clothes they sell to put food on the table. It would be like stealing form the orphanage. You would be stealing from people who already have few belongings. Stealing from them just makes you a horrible person.”
Eugene nodded with a serious look on his face. “Alright, I don’t want to steal from people who are poor either.”
Dawn smiled. “That’s the spirit. Now, put this on and let’s go cry to a merchant.”
~~~
Over the next few weeks, Dawn taught everything she had learned from Aladdin to Eugene. The young boy was smart as a whip and did not let anything get in his way. Though, they still had fun and played around especially when Eugene invited Arnwaldo Shnitz. The other boy was big and slightly on the chubbier side and Dawn loved to freak the bigger boy out by baring her teeth at him in a growl.
“So, what do you guys want to be when you grow up?” Dawn asked the two boys as she lay on her back staring at the stars. The three of them were currently laying on the roof of the orphanage and were simply relaxing after a full day of thievery and play.
“I wanna change my name to something cool! I want to be famous and a master thief!” Arnwaldo stated with a huge grin upon his face. Eugene punched his shoulder and gave a grin back in support of Arnwaldo’s dream.
“What do you want to change it to?” Eugene asked.
Arnwaldo shrugged, “Something cool like Lance Strongbow! That would be cool!”
Dawn could not help but giggle. “You do know that you could eventually leave this town and just simply change your name. It’s not like everyone in the world knows your actual name.”
Arnwaldo laughed along before turning to Eugene, “What about you, what do you want to be when you grow up?”
“I am going to be Flynn Rider. I will be rich and live in a castle!” Eugene exclaimed, pumping his fist into the air with vigor and determination. “What about you Dawn, what’ll you be?”
Dawn smiled brightly, “I want to have fun adventures and make new friends everywhere I go. Then, someday I want to have a family that will love me forever.”
Eugene smiled warmly at Dawn’s dreams and then smiled warmly towards Arnwaldo. “Well, I say we can make our dreams possible, no matter what!”
~~~
Dawn was with the two boys for only a few months more and they shot up like weeds in comparison to her due to better food quality. The better food quality entirely due to thievery.
“Well, Flynn, Lance,” Dawn smiled brightly at the two boys before turning to the gate out of the city. “It’s time for me to head on out of here to explore the world.”
“What!” Flynn looked at Dawn in shock.
Dawn could do nothing but shrug. “The both of you knew I wasn’t going to stick around forever, right?”
Lance’s lower lip trembled as he felt his eyes begin to water, “But I thought you were going to stay longer.”
Dawn gave Lance a hug and quickly pulled Flynn into the hug as well. “You two are my friends and will forever be my friends. I just have more places to go and things to do. I want to explore more places than being stuck here. It honestly is what it is. Plus, I helped you learn everything that I learned from my friend Aladdin.”
Lance hugged Dawn harder, “Promise you’ll visit us again someday.”
Dawn smiled at Lance, “I promise. I’ll visit the both of you again someday. Though I don’t know if I’ll be able to recognize you guys when you’re all master thieves.”
“I’m going to keep wearing my blue vests and my name will be known across the kingdoms as Flynn Rider.”
“I’ll be in a red vest and I’ll be the best thief in the world.”
“Deal. I’ll find you both again someday. Then, you can tell me about all of your adventures!” Dawn swore to her two friends.
Then, with a final hug to the two of them, Dawn exited the gates of the city and made her way out of sight. Once no one could actually see her, Dawn opened up her next portal and stepped through.