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Mal’s back had hurt for days. At first, she had assumed she slept wrong and it’d fade, but as the days passed, it became clear that the pain wasn’t a result of a lifetime of activity. Life on the Isle had been hard and had certainly left scars, but this was out of the norm.
She was lying atop her bed, attempting to sketch out a new idea, when a sudden wave of pain struck. Mal bit her tongue, years of learned behavior telling her to hide her pain, her weakness. There was no need to alarm her crew about her discomfort.
Mal skipped dinner that night, claiming she wasn’t hungry, missing the concern on Evie’s face. She spent the night tossing and turning, desperately trying to ignore the increasing pain.
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Evie awoke to a scream. She shot straight up in her bed, anxiety brewing as she scanned for danger; instead, her eyes fell upon Mal writhing in her bed. She felt her stomach drop; she knew something had been off about Mal in the past week, but this was far worse than she would have ever assumed. Mal never screamed; her mother had beaten it into her from a young age that pain was weakness, and Mal was not allowed to be weak.
Seeing Mal like this sent chills through her body. Something was wrong.
In a daze, she found herself running to the boys' room; there was no time to text or call them. Mal needed them now.
“Jay, Carlos, wake up now! Somethings wrong with Mal!” Evie called, banging erratically on the door. Each second that passed felt like hours waiting at the door until it flew open, revealing Carlos and Jay.
There was no need for words; the urgency in Evie’s eyes told them all they needed to know. As they dashed back to the room, another scream pierced the chill night air, sending new waves of urgency throughout them.
They returned to the room to see Mal writhing desperately and scratching at her back. The boys were quick to restrain the purpled-haired girl as Evie called out to her.
“Mal! Mal! Can you hear me? What’s wrong?” She repeated her words a few more times before Mal responded with a distorted “Evie?”
“Yes, yes, it’s me. Do you know what's wrong?!” Evie exclaimed.
Mal went to speak before another wave of pain crashed through her, her nails digging into the comforter as she grit her teeth.
“M-my back,” Mal forced out. Evie was quick to peel off Mal’s shirt, revealing red scratches and deep bruising in what looked to be two long gashes near her shoulder blades.
“Holy shit! What happened!” Jay exclaimed, only to be met with Mal’s response that she didn’t know.
Another wave of pain crashed through Mal, this one worse. Evie's heart clenched at the whimpers and muffled screams coming from her best friend. Sometime during the pain, Evie’s hand had found its way into Mal’s and was gently rubbing her thumb along it.
Evie's thumb paused as she saw something on Mal's back move. Evie nausea crawl up her throat she saw something fluttering under the gash-like bruises along Mal’s back; it looked like something wanted to escape.
Mal had just calmed down a little when another wave of pain struck, and Mal screamed. They were forced to watch and hold their friend down as something dark and purple ripped its way through Mal’s back. Blood started dripping through the newly formed gash as Mal gasped and whimpered. Evie ran to grab a wet towel from the bathroom. As she ran, she heard another muffled scream and the sickening sound of the tearing of flesh as the other gash opened.
When she returned to wipe the areas, there was so much blood, and beneath it were… feathers? “They're wings,” Evie's voice came out breathless. Jay and Carlos stood stunned where they were holding Mal down.
One of the wings twitched, trying to further escape, tearing more of Mal's back. As Mal whimpered, Evie blurted out her realization, “We need to pull them out.”
“WHAT!” exclaimed Carlos and Jay in unison. “We can't,” Carlos stuttered out.
“We have to,” Evie replied, starting to gently pull out the feathered appendages. Mal let out a few whimpers but seemed in less pain as she gently pulled the wings out. The wings were covered in a layer of blood, crimson spilling over Mal's back as they finally managed to free the appendages.
Mal laid on the bed panting as Evie turned to look at her. Mal looked straight at Evie as she began to talk, “Evie?” she said, her voice higher pitched and slurred. “Yes, baby?” Evie replied, a pit of horror growing at the thought of Mal slipping during the ordeal.
“Back hurts,” the little stated, frowning.
“I know sweetheart. Can I get an age check real quick?" Evie replied sadly.
“Uhhmm,” the little mumbled, holding up her fingers to decide how she felt; she held up five, then four, then three before settling on four.
“Wow! You're such a big girl right now! Come on, let's go get you cleaned up huh?” Evie exclaimed.
“Mkay,” said Mal as Evie helped her to the bathroom. Evie turned to the boys, “I'm gonna give her a bath real quick. Will you guys clean up the mess?” Carlos and Jay nodded as Evie closed the bathroom door.
“Bubbles? An' Ducks?!” Mal asked, tilting her head to the side.
Evie turned on the tap before replying, “Of course honey, you were very brave today.”
“yay! yay!” Mal said, jumping in excitement before wincing at the pain her new wings caused, “Owie,” she whimpered as tears welled up in her eyes.
“I know sweetie; let's get you in the bath now. You'll feel better without all that grime on you,” Evie said, booping Mal's nose, eliciting a giggle from the girl.
Once Mal was undressed, she was placed into the bubble bath, newly formed wings floating at the surface.
“Wahs on my back?” asked Mal, looking back at her wings with scrunched eyebrows.
“Those are your new wings baby. Let's get them cleaned up, okay?” Evie replied to Mal's awe.
“cool!!” the little screeched, earning a soft reminder to use inside voices.
Evie started by running her fingers gently through the tips of Mal’s wings, gingerly removing the crusted blood that adorned them. As the wings were cleaned, the black and purple colors of her feathers started to appear.
Evie decided it would be best to not use any products on the wings until they had more information. Instead, she gave the little some body wash while she worked on washing Mal's hair and cleaning the gashes on her back.
Although Evie did notice something strange about them, they seemed to be smaller than before. She wondered if maybe the wings came with other abilities like accelerated healing.
“Alright honey, time to get out,” Evie said, pulling herself out of her musings. Mal pouted at her, starting to whine a bit before Evie told her, “We can play with more toys after you're dry honey.”
After Evie had patted Mal's wings as dry as she could, she raked her fingers through to straighten them. She then put Mal in her softest pants and an old T-shirt, which holes were cut into. Evie then gently guided Mal out into the main room, finally getting a good view of the entirety of Mal's wings. They seemed to have around a five-foot wingspan with feathers that started out as black and faded to a similar purple to her hair at the tips.
Evie was broken out of her thoughts as Mal exclaimed, “Carlos! Jay!” excitedly running over to the boys. “Hey, sweet cheeks,” Jay said as Evie observed the room. The boys had cleaned the blood off of Mal’s bed and walls and replaced the bedding with the spare sheets and comforter they were provided, a fact that Evie and the rest of them still couldn’t get over. I mean, they were lucky if they even got a blanket on the island, let alone one as soft as they were in Auradon.
Evie was broken from her thoughts as Mal ran back up to her, “Evie! Evie! You said we could play!” Evie replied with, “Of course honey, what do you want to do?” as she glanced at the clock; it read 8:34. First period started at 8:00, but gods knew that Mal needed a break, especially after the night she’d had, besides remedial goodness didn't even start until 10:15. They should have about two hours before Fairy Godmother came looking for them with that condescending tone of hers. Gods, Evie was not looking forward to the lecture on right and wrong they were sure to receive for skipping classes that day.
“Uhhhm, can we color! An’ an’ watch ‘toons!” Mal asked, slurring her speech.
“Sure,” Evie replied, reaching for the crayons and coloring book they had claimed through most definitely legal means as Carlos turned on a simple kids show. The channels switched a few times before they landed on a cute, colorful cartoon of a bipedal dog family. Luckily, Carlos had lost much of his fear of dogs after meeting Dude and reading up on them in the library.
As Mal quickly became enamored with coloring in her book, Evie turned to the boys with a determined look on her face. “So, Fairy Godmother’s sure to come to check on us when we don’t show up to her class, and while we could go and say Mal’s sick, that's only going to work so long,” Evie stated in a hushed whisper. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Mal chewing on her thumb as she drew and was quick to gently remind the girl to use her paci instead.
Once that was handled, Evie turned back to the boys, “Right, so obviously her wings are going to be kind of hard to hide, and It’s not looking like she's going to age back up anytime soon, so we need a plan for when Fairy Godmother comes barging in here to make sure we aren't up to some kind of evil scheme,” Evie stated a hint of annoyance in her voice at the mention of the fae.
“We could still go with that being sick thing for now, I guess. We could hide Mali out of sight in the bathroom and say something about the wings later?” Jay stated. “But what if she asks to see Mal? She might get all care-y or something?” Carlos asked, resulting in a slight bristling from Jay.
“Yeah, well, do we got a better plan?” Jay responded with a hint of irritation before backing down; “Sorry Carlos, it's the stress,” he corrected himself, ruffling Carlos’ curls.
“Sooo what I'm hearing is that we're going to play a game of hide and seek when Fairy Godmother comes around,” Evie interjected, trying to calm the tension in the room. The boys agreed before Jay spoke, “Well with that settled, I think we’ve got a little girl over there to play with. The other two nodded in agreement before turning to Mal, whose newly formed wings fluttered happily as she scribbled across the pages.
Where the little had started out with coloring in more realistic tones and fairly inside the lines, her pages had turned from an orange and white fox to a kaleidoscope of scribbles atop a rabbit. Looking at the page, Evie said, “Hey sweetheart, are you feeling a bit younger now?”
“Uh huh,” Mal replied, still coloring.
“Can I get an age check then, little one?” Evie asked. Mal responded by holding up two fingers, resulting in a coo from Evie.
“Want to play a different game?” Evie asked, sitting on the floor beside Mal and reaching for her small box of little gear. Mal nodded in response before Evie pulled out four foam cars, once again gained perfectly legally, handing the white one to Carlos, the red to Jay, the purple to Mal, and keeping the blue for herself. Mal's wings fluttered in excitement as she made a “vroooom noise” and rolled her car on the ground.
Throughout the next hour, the room was filled with races and obstacle courses as the excited little and her caregivers ran around the room making exaggerated car noises.
Evie took a breath before sitting down. She hated to ruin Mal's fun, but Fairy Godmother was sure to arrive soon, and she knew Mal would hate to be seen like this. She exclaimed, “Hey Mali, want to play another game now?” resulting in an excited, “Uh huh!” from the little.
“We're going to play hide and seek okay?” Evie said, resulting in Mal nodding. “Buuut, this game of hide and seek will be a bit different, okay?” she continued, looking into Mal's eyes. “In this one, I'm going to need you to hide in the bathroom when Fairy Godmother gets here and not come out until one of us says so, does that sound okay?”
Mal looked at her with confusion before asking, “Why?” in a small voice. “We want to keep you safe, little one, and I'm sure big you doesn’t want her seeing you like this,” Evie replied gently, resulting in a nod from Mal.
Just as their conversation was finished, a knock was heard at the door, “Girls? Are you in here? I went to the boys' dorm, but I didn’t hear them. You know you're not supposed to skip class!” Fairy Godmother said sternly. Evie quickly whispered to Mal to hide, only opening the door when she was sure Mal was hidden.
Gods, Evie did not want to speak to that pretentious fairy, yet she knew keeping quiet would only make things worse. She opened the door, “Yes, Fairy Godmother?” she asked in a sickly sweet voice.
“I was coming to see why you guys hadn’t shown up to class,” Fairy Godmother stated as Evie opened the door, further revealing Jay and Carlos. Her eyes scanned the room before she asked, “Where's Mal?” in a stern tone.
“Oh, that's actually why we're not in class, Mal wasn’t feeling very well this morning, so we're taking care of her,” Jay said.
“All three of you?” Fairy Godmother responded, raising her eyebrow.
“Well, Mal can be quite a handful sometimes, we thought it was for the best, you know?” Evie said, trying to hide her nerves. She was normally so good at this; why was it so hard right now?
Fairy Godmother still looked skeptical, “Well, I'm still going to need to see her, especially if she's as sick as you guys claim she is,” she said, causing the three of them to bristle defensively.
“Well, she's in the bathroom right now, sorry,” Jay said, not feeling an ounce of remorse; gods, he hoped this worked. Fairy Godmother was still unconvinced, though. Jay could feel the sweat on the back of his neck, and in his peripherals, he could see Carlos and Evie starting to take their normal positions behind him in defense.
“I can wait,” Fairy Godmother responded calmly, pulling them out of their thoughts. Evie was the first to react, “I- I’ll go check on her then,” she said, voice slightly panicked as she slipped into the bathroom, leaving an awkward tension in the air.
“Hey Mali,” Evie said in a hushed tone. Mal turned to her excitedly, only to be quickly hushed. “So Mali, Fairy Godmother is refusing to leave until she sees you're well. is there any chance you think you can be big for a little bit?” Evie said, trying to keep the panic out of her voice. Mal just blinked at her in response, confusion coating her face. “Right, so that's a no,” Evie pondered to herself; gods, how were they going to get out of this one.
“Honey, if you can’t age up, we're going to be forced to tell Fairy Godmother about this, and we both know that isn’t what big you wants,” Evie said gently, desperation starting to set in. Mal let out a small whimper in response, tears beginning to gather in her eyes. “Hey hey sweetie, it's going to be okay, well protect you,” Evie replied, trying to comfort the distressed little.
“Don’ wanna go back,” Mal said quietly, startling Evie out of her panicked thoughts. “Oh honey, no, you never have to go back there again, I promise. We'll do everything we can to make sure of that, and even in the very unlikely possibility telling her about your regression causes problems, we can always enact our plans to run away.”
Mal still seemed unconvinced but was further reassured when Evie whispered to her, “You're safe here Mali, you have no need to hide.” Evie wasn’t sure if she believed it herself, but she needed Mal to be calm for this. “I’ll be right back honey, I'm just going to talk to her real quick.” Mal nodded, still hesitant, as Evie slipped back into the main room.
She returned to the awkward tension of the room; Jay and Carlos were sitting on the bed, tapping their foot restlessly and picking at their cuticles, respectively. Fairy Godmother, on the other hand, just looked a bit impatient. She shook her head at the boys to signal that Mal was still little as she turned to Fairy Godmother. She knew their stomachs dropped a bit at the confirmation, just as hers had when Mal had confirmed it herself, but they had to continue.
“Well?” Fairy Godmother asked in that sickly sweet tone of hers. Gods, Evie wanted to punch her; she could even see Jay reaching instinctually for the dagger in his coat. Instead, she swallowed her anger and spoke, “So, there are two things that you’ll need to know before we let you see her,” she said, resulting in wrinkled brows and an unsure nod from Fairy Godmother as she thought of what secrets could they be hiding this time.
“We don’t really know what to do with the first one, but I'm going to make it very clear with the second one that it is to stay secret. If we find out that you told anyone or even hinted at it, we won’t hesitate to take action,” Evie said, barely concealed malice in her tone.
“Are you threatening me?” Fairy Godmother asked, appalled as she looked at the glint of danger and possibly fear in Evie's eyes. “Are you planning on telling anyone?” Jay asked, not even bothering to hide the threat in his voice.
Fairy Godmother sighed, “As long as whatever you're hiding is not hurting anyone, I will not tell anyone what I learn,” she said cautiously. The three of them nodded as Evie replied with, “Deal,” showing her teeth, slightly too sharp to be human.
“So, the first thing is that last night, I was woken by Mal being in a lot of pain, and I rushed to get the boys. She said that her back hurt really bad, and not long after, wings broke through the skin,” Evie said.
Fairy Godmother looked at them dumbstruck before replying, astounded, “Why didn’t you tell anyone or get help!?”
Carlos responded this time with a shrug and a quiet, “Adults don’t help,” It struck Fairy Godmother that that was the first she’d heard him really speak all day.
“Right, so the second one, this is the one that you can’t tell anyone about,” Evie continued, staying silent until Fairy Godmother nodded in confirmation that she got the message.
“So, have you heard of age regression?” Evie asked.
Fairy Godmother nodded, a bit confused, before saying, “I mean, I’ve heard of it before, but I don’t know too much about it. It's when someone is mentally younger for a bit right?”
Evie relaxed a little, at least she didn’t have to explain the concept, that could've gone so wrong. “Well, it's typically a response to some sort of childhood trauma, and villains don't tend to make good parents, to say the least,” Evie said with a far-off look on her face.
There was a moment of silence before she broke herself out of her memories. “Right, so Mal regresses, and the pain of her wings growing in caused her to slip, so she's currently like two right now?” Evie said, slightly unsure.
There was a period of awkward silence before Fairy Godmother replied with a dumbstruck, “Well, that's unexpected”.
Evie nodded before saying, “Well, I'm going to go get her now, just make sure you move slowly and speak calmly to her. She hasn’t really met a lot of people like this.” as she opened the bathroom door. “Hey Mali, it's time to come meet Fairy Godmother,” Evie said in a softer tone.
Mal shook her head slightly from inside the bathroom, a look of fear in her eyes. “Hey, hey, it's okay, she won't hurt you, she's a good guy remember,” Evie said, trying to console her.
Mal hesitantly stepped out, and wow, Fairy Godmother would’ve never imagined Mal so unsure of herself, honestly, the girl was a bit cute like this. “Hi little one, it's nice to meet you,” Fairy Godmother said, keeping her voice soft as she looked at Mal.
Mal tried to hide behind Evie, unsuccessfully, of course; Fairy Godmother couldn’t help but smile a little at the purple-haired girl's actions. “It’s okay sweetie, I just needed to make sure you’re okay. I'm not going to hurt you, although we will have to talk about those wings…” She said, trailing off in thought.
Mal suddenly backed away in fear, “Don’ take 'em!” she exclaimed in panic as tears pooled in her eyes. Evie was quick to wrap the little in a hug, looking defensively at the perceived threat. Fairy Godmother had a look of horror on her face before she managed to speak, “Honey, I would never take away your wings; they're part of you, I just need to talk to you about caring for them.”
Mal relaxed a bit in Evie's arms, still looking unsure but mustering out a nervous, “'Kay.”
Fairy Godmother nodded before making a move to leave the room, “Well, now that I’ve made sure you're all okay, I'll take my leave, and don’t worry you’ll be excused from your classes today, but I expect to see you all tomorrow!” she said, voice returning to its normal tone.
As Fairy Godmother left the room, she heard Evie faintly telling Mal that it was time to eat and for a nap, only to be met with a small whine from Mal. She couldn’t help but think as she walked away that maybe she’d misjudged these kids more than she originally thought.