THIS STORY IS FROM THE ONCE UPON A ROUND ROBIN EVENT ON 7/3/14
PROMPT: Regina walked into Granny's diner for lunch. Several other people were also in the diner, like Archie, Belle, and Rumple. She sat down at her usual table and was about to place her order with Ruby when Snow burst into the diner, looking frantic. "Help! Somebody's kidnapped my baby!"
KIDNAPPED
BY
FAIRIETALES4EVER, SNAPEGIRLKMF, FANFICADDICTTION
NARNIANGRIFF23, & CJ MOLIERE
FAIRIETALES4EVER:
Snow was distraught. She'd only been gone for about 15 minutes, having discovered they were out of ingredients to make s'mores. Which had been Henry's dessert of choice that night. She'd left baby Neal in Charming and her grandson's capable hands, but when she returned to the apartment, the boys were nowhere to be found and the living room was a disaster zone.
FANFICADDICTTION:
Snow couldn't understand what happened but she knew it was something terrible so she had gone to Granny's to get a search party together." Has anyone seen him or the boys they were supposed to watch him while I was out and they have gone missing too," said Snow. Grumpy then stepped up. "A missing royal family member-looks like you need dwarves. Come on fellas we got work to do," said Grumpy to the others.
SNAPEGIRLKMF:
Belle was horrified. "Rumple, you need to do something!" she cried. Rumple stood up. "Snow, do you have something of Neal's I can hold, dearie? I need it for my locator spell."
NARNIANGRIFF23:
"Yes, I have his blanket." she stated hurriedly bringing it out of the bag she had dangling from her arm. In her haste, her eyes filled with worry even as she did her best to put on a brave face.
CJ MOLIERE:
Belle took the blanket and handed it to her husband. He waved his hand over it and it started glowing. It hovered in the air before him then it floated out the door with him and his wife walking a few feet behind it. He motioned for the others to follow.
FAIRIETALES4EVER:
Grumpy raised a beer stein toward the blanket, looking surprisingly coherent, despite the fact that this was his 4th glass since 10 this morning- and it was only noon now. "Come on brothers, we have a job to do!" He rallied the dwarves together and followed the Gold's down Main Street in a determined march. "Snow, half of us will follow this trail. The rest of you," he gestured to the crowd that had paraded out of the diner behind them. "Follow her back to the apartment. There might be a clue there as to who took the prince."
FANFICADDICTTION:
The group split up and went their separate ways. Ruby went with Snow. She knew with her wolf sense and hearing she might catch something the others would miss. On the way to the apartment she neither smelled nor heard anything unusual but when she actually stepped in...
SNAPEGIRLKMF:
the living room, she smelled a scent she didn't recognize. It was a man's scent, strong and strangely cold. "Snow, someone I don't recognize has been in here." She cast about trying to find where it led. She went down the hall way and found it led to an open window. "This way!" Meanwhile, Regina called Emma on her cell. "Sheriff, your baby brother, Henry, and your dad have gone missing!"
NARNIANGRIFF23:
Snow and the others followed quickly on Ruby's heels all vying for a spot around and behind the former princess. As Snow followed her best friend onto the fire escape, Emma in the office uttered her go to catch phase. "What the hell happened?" She quickly grabbed her gun and its holster strapping on her gun belt as she balanced the phone on her shoulder. Then she started seeing red. No one messed with their family and got away with it. Not if she had anything to say about it.
CJ MOLIERE:
The blanket led the first search party into the woods. Rumple felt for Snow...this was every parent's worst nightmare...your child being missing. It was something he always feared with Bae, even after becoming the Dark One. And this child had been named in his son's honor making him all the more determined to find the prince. Then it floated toward the wishing well...
FAIRIETALES4EVER:
Meanwhile back at the apartment, Ruby cried, "The trail goes this way!" and led the group down the street and to the woods towards the well. "Oh no!" Snow gasped, sprinting toward the Well. This was the hub for all of Storybrooke's magic...and the only place anyone could always make a portal...She hopped and prayed that whoever had taken Neal hadn't used his slowly blossoming magic and whisked him away to another land.
FANFICADDICTTION:
"We have to get him back!" yelled Snow. She looked at Rumple in panic."How do we get him back?!" she screamed.
"I am sorry, but I'm not sure we can at least not without knowing who took him and why. Have you met anyone new?" asked Gold.
SNAPEGIRLKMF:
"Not that I can think of," she half-sobbed.
"Please, find my baby, Rumple!"
Rumple patted her shoulder. "I'll try my best, dearie." He concentrated hard, willing the events of the past to unfold to his Seer's Eye. He saw . . . a tall spare man in a black cloak and a red robe holding the baby in one hand, and dragging a bound Charming and Henry behind him in chains. The man glanced behind him and laughed evilly before opening a portal to Fairy Tale Land.
Rumple stiffened and snapped out of his trance. He knew who the other man was. A rival sorcerer called, "Rasputin! He has Neal and the others!" he spat. "I can open up a portal to there, but we have to be careful. He's a powerful necromancer." He waved a hand and cast several protection spells over the group.
He handed Snow a wand. "This is a wand of summoning, Snow. If you spot Neal or Henry or David, use it to summon them to you. He won't be expecting you to use magic." He opened the portal.
NARNIANGRIFF23:
Snow nodded determinedly, just as Emma pulled up in the patrol car and was striding toward the group loaded for bear, Snow's bow and quiver in hand. "You're gonna need these and you're not going without me too." she declared, her tone as sure and unmovable as stone.
CJ MOLIERE:
"Or me," added Regina. Rumple nodded in approval. The more mages that could go through the portal with them, the better. Rasputin was the most vicious sorcerer that ever lived and defeating him was not going to be easy. Rumple suspected he had taken up residence in the Dark Castle where he would have access to volumes he could study to strengthen his power or learn how to siphon the powers from others. The protection spells he cast over the group would keep them safe...for now. But if the dark necromancer siphoned the magic from the child he would be unstoppable...
SNAPEGIRLKMF
Rumple stepped through the portal first, followed by Snow. They emerged outside the Dark Castle and he held up a hand as the others came through. "He's in there, all right. But we don't want to go in the front door. He'll have warded it. We need to go around the back." He led them around the side, through a secret tunnel into the castle dungeons.
Meanwhile, Rasputin had placed the crying baby in a basket beside his desk in the Dark One's study. "Shut up, brat!" he snapped irritably. Then he continued perusing the text on how to draw power from a True Love baby.
FAIRIETALES4EVER:
The group burst in the back door, swords unsheathed, bows and weapons at the ready.
The sorcerer simply glanced upward, hardly phased by their dramatic entry, "Well well, what have we here? Long time no see Stiltskin," he laughed, his lips curling upward in a satisfied smirk.
SNAPEGIRLKMF
"Get out of my castle, you ingrate!" Rumple snarled. He began to conjure a sticky web to entrap Rasputin.
"Give me my baby!" Snow yelled, and tried to summon Neal to her, but the spell failed as Rasputin blocked it.
"Not so fast, princess!" he laughed.
Emma shot at him, but the bullet passed through him. "My, that tickles!" he smirked, and slammed her against the wall with a magic bolt.
Then he threw a glittering ball down and several winged creatures emerged from it. They swarmed over Regina and the dwarves.
Meanwhile, Belle crept unnoticed around Snow and grabbed Neal from the basket.
Rumple flung the web at Rasputin. "Catch, dearie!" he yelled. The web's sticky strands entangled the other mage.
NARNIANGRIFF23:
Emma shook her head trying to clear it and played opossum till she saw an opening since the bullet didn't work. She doubted her taser would work so the sensible choice seemed to be magic.
Regina was throwing fireballs as the dwarves swung their pickaxes at the creatures. Rumple strode forward steel in his gaze. While Charming tried hopelessly to pick the lock to get to his wife's and the others sides.
SNAPEGIRLKMF
Emma crept up and picked the locks on Henry and Charming's chains, freeing them. Regina burned the winged black imps to ash and the dwarves chopped up the rest of them into bits and pieces. Belle ran with baby Neal to safety behind Rumple, who used his magic to haul a trapped Rasputin up into the air.
His eyes glittering, the Dark One snarled, "You've overstayed your welcome, you rotten baby snatcher! Now-GET OUT OF MY CASTLE!" he roared, and he flung Rasputin, still wrapped up in the web, out the door of the castle, and watched him bounce and roll all the way back to his home in the frozen North.
Snow hugged her baby and then her husband. Emma hugged Henry and so did Regina. Belle hugged Rumple.
"All's well that ends well, dearie," he said to her, kissing her.
Then they all trooped back through the portal to Storybrooke and celebrated the baby prince and the rest of the Charming's return at Granny's with burgers and lasagna, beer and iced tea.