"WOD" - Chapter Two
Chapter Two
Waking up the next ‘morning’ in Eventide, Rania was
amazed by how refreshed she felt. She slept sitting down the entire night; her
posture locked in crossed arms and a drooping head. There were moments when the
young, healthy body she inherited in her fifth regeneration would surprise her
in strength, speed, and endurance. Being ‘Rania’ was truly a gift for the centuries-old
Tinkerer of Gallifrey.
After a good long stretch in both her arms and legs, she
looked towards the bed where Craig had slept…but Craig wasn’t in it.
“Craig?!” She jolted in alarm, remembering the Eventide
plague. “Oh, no!”
Immediately, she jumped out of the chair and rushed out
of the room. She hurried downstairs, hoping Seamus and Belinda would help in
some way. They knew about the plague, being from this world; any details – no
matter how miniscule – could be useful.
Passing through the inn’s cozy little dining area, she
heard a familiar voice say to her, “Good morning, Rania.”
“Good morning, Craig,” she responded instinctively. She
was nearly on her way towards the front desk when she stopped, double backed,
and looked into the dining room. There Craig was, sitting at the table and
eating breakfast. “Oh, Craig…there you are,” she huffed with relief.
Seeing how flustered she was, Craig asked with his mouth
full, “Mou O.K.?”
Rania didn’t want to outright admit that she allowed
herself to be spooked by the local superstition, so she merely told Craig,
“Yeah, I’m fine.” She walked up and rubbed his head. “Did ya sleep well?”
“Mmm-hmm,” Craig said, swallowing his bite. “It helps
that it’s really quiet here.”
“Yeah…too quiet.” Rania eyed the area
suspiciously. “Did you see Mr. Seamus and Mrs. Belinda?”
Craig shook his head. “Nope. I figured they were still
sleeping.”
“Along with every other guest in the inn?” Rania
reflected in realization. She returned to her initial objective of reaching the
front desk; neither Seamus nor Belinda was there. Out of curiosity, Rania
glimpsed behind the desk at the pegboard for the room keys; out of the twenty-three
rooms in the inn, just two keys still hung on the pegboard – all the others
were allotted to their guests.
So, how is it that we’re the only ones taking
in all the amenities?!
She didn’t want to disturb Craig in the middle of his
breakfast, but she also didn’t want to leave him alone in the inn under such
wary circumstances. So, together, they left the inn and headed out onto the
streets, which were just as eerily still. Not a soul was walking around and not
a single car was moving.
“Where is everybody?” Craig inquired, starting to notice
the bizarre occurrence himself. Then he remembered, “The plague!”
“It’s not…” Rania started to say before she conceded,
“Oh, who am I kidding! Yes, it is the plague. And I stupidly brought us
right in the thick of it.” She slapped her own forehead in self-punishment.
“Hey, it’s okay, remember what you told me?” Craig said.
“The nuage energy keeps us immune, right?”
“But I made that up to help you sleep, remember?”
“Yeah, but…you’ve never been wrong before.”
Rania smiled at him. His unrelenting faith in her touched
both her hearts. You don’t deserve this kid, Aznavorian.
Suddenly, they heard the sound of garbage cans clashing
in a nearby alley.
It was the first noise they heard after they came out of
the inn.
Drawn by curiosity, they headed for the alley to see what
caused the noise.
What they found was a mouse – but not a small, ordinary
mouse. This one wore familiar red shorts and bright yellow shoes, along with a
blue coat that had yellow trimming (and tail fabric that enclosed the actual
tail) and a wide-brimmed blue wizard hat that overlapped and crinkled a bit
over his big round ears. From one of his white-gloved hands, he magically
projected a small flame to help illuminate the dark alley.
“Mickey Mouse?!” Rania recognized the Disney mascot.
“Who?!” Craig frowned.
Mickey was startled to see them there in the alley. “Oh,
gosh! Ya scared me! Didn’t think anyone was still ‘round here.” He giggled in
that iconic way Rania knew from the cartoons she used to watch with Kristin and
Candace.
“I didn’t think Eventide had its own variant of you,”
Rania observed in amusement.
“Variant?” the confused Mickey parroted the term. “Oh,
no. I’m not from this world. And I take it neither of you are either.”
Rania shook her head, smiling. “I guess we’re the lucky
ones to be spared from the Eventide plague.”
“What plague is that?” Mickey queried.
“The one that’s making everyone disappear,” Craig told
the mouse.
“The disappearances?” Mickey sounded very
perturbed. “Oh, gosh…that’s no plague. This entire world is dying.”
“Dying?!” Rania and Craig exclaimed, shocked.
“Uh-huh,” Mickey nodded. “The one person who protected
this world and many others just like it – the Guardian of the Disneyverse – has
vanished, leaving the worlds unprotected. That’s why Yen Sid, my master, sent
me to find the Guardian – whose real name is Joanie Navarro-Thomas – but I
haven’t had much luck in the 7,000 worlds I’ve visited so far.”
Craig was taken aback by that number. “You’ve visited 7,000
worlds?!” He glimpsed at the equally impressed Rania. “You’ve been to way
more than that, haven’t you?”
Rania gave a bashful shrug. “Well, I don’t wanna brag,
but I think I may have Mr. Mouse beaten by 300,000…but I digress, since I did
lose count after a while.”
“Gosh!” Mickey’s eyes enlarged. “You’ve got quite some
experience!” Hearing this, it suddenly dawned on him, “Maybe you and your lil’
friend can help me out!”
Rania couldn’t believe that the Mickey Mouse was
enlisting in her help. “S-Sure!” she stammered in immense gratitude.
“What do you need from us?”
“Scour the Disneyverse, look through every world, and
find a young woman with bright pink hair – that’s Joanie, our Guardian,” Mickey
instructed. “I’ll stay in touch with ya telepathically. All ya have to do is call
out my name.”
Rania smirked. “That’s all? Sure you wouldn’t want us to
yell out, ‘Oh, Toodles!’?” She playfully tittered over her reference.
Unfortunately, it went over Mickey’s head. “I don’t get
it.”
“Neither do I,” Craig cringed.
Embarrassed, Rania cleared her throat and shamefully muttered,
“Never mind.”
Moving past the moment, Craig looked up and saw how the
majestic bluish-orange hue of the night sky was turning pitch-black, each and
every one of the stars fizzing out. “Hey, is it just me or is everything
getting darker?” he consulted with Rania and Mickey.
The sight of it all distressed Mickey. “It’s Eventide’s
finale! We gotta get out of here! Is there a ship or somethin’ ya came here
in?”
“My TARDIS,” Rania told him. “It can get us out!”
“Get to it quickly!” The mouse urged. “You don’t have
much time!”
On that, Mickey vanished with the wave of his hand,
inadvertently trapping Rania and Craig in the darkness of the alleyway. This
prompted Rania to take out her sonic screwdriver, using its glowing green tip
to illuminate the way back to her Type-X TARDIS. All of Eventide was engulfed
in pitch blackness as Rania and Craig returned to the safety of the Gallifreyan
ship.
As Rania went to work on the controls, Craig indicated a
rather daunting situation with his Time Lord friend, “Rania…you still look like
a princess!”
Hearing him amid her piloting, Rania gazed at her hands
and body.
For reasons unknown to her, she still maintained her animated
form inside her TARDIS. Under normal circumstances, the spatial quality of the
world she visited would shift back to her ‘real world’ physiology once inside
her ship. But this was something new…something horrifying…something exciting.
She then tested a theory.
While intensely piloting her ship, she sang…
She steps into the night
Stars are shining bright
A path of glowing light
Leading to a sight
Mountains touching skies
Dreams in her eyes
Wings made to fly
No more goodbyes
In this world of magic
Anything can be
Every dream’s elastic
From a tiny seed
Waterfalls that sing
Fairy tales bring
Echoes of the king
Freedom in the spring
Creatures big and small
Answering her call
Through the castle hall
Heart begins to fall
In this world of magic
Anything can be
Every dream’s elastic
From a tiny seed
Craig recognized the song – it was the same one that
Rania sang the day before, only it didn’t sound as enchanting or whimsical as
it did the first time. He got a haunting vibe from this version, which matched
with how Rania appeared near the control console. Craig had seen her like this
before when she was driven by pure adrenaline. Mickey Mouse had given her a
very important mission – one that could save an entire universe…or one of many
within another multiverse…the ‘Disneyverse,’ as Mickey called it.
Suddenly, they hit massive turbulence, rocking the ship
violently.
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