Singing the Rights
DIsclaimer: I do not: own OUAT, any of the characters or relationships; Fall Out Boy or their songs (I wish), sanity.
I do own a small library though, and this plot.
Hello All! I have been off a while, so here is a little bit of entertainment. Soul has taken on an existence of its own, but I am about 8k in, so it is plodding along. This is a little bit of fun for you all to enjoy.
NOTE: I AM TAKING PROMPTS. PM me and I will try to write something for you.
It was 3 weeks before Christmas, and the men of Storybooke had decided to all go out together for a meal. Ruby had diplomatically suggested that it was most likely because the women were all going to be going out later that week to the Rabbit Hole and wanted time to do a similar event, but Emma privately suspected that they were going to be mostly taking pleasure in confusing the resident pirate about the various Christmas traditions.
As a result, it was not surprising that at a little past eleven in the evening Ruby called the Sheriff's office.
"Em?"
The blonde sighed. "Considering the only other person who has keys to this place is probably in the room with you, yes, this is Emma. What's up?"
The waitress sounded apologetic. "I know it's late, but could you come down to the Diner? I think the intervention of the law may be necessary."
Emma pinched her nose. "Sure. Why not. What else do I have to do anyway, at eleven at night? What's going on there anyway?" But her friend had already hung up.
Emma did realise that there really was a problem when she could hear the Diner all the way down Main Street. Pulling up, she realised something else – the level of noise suggested that the men had not actually managed to LEAVE to get to the bar yet.
Chuckling, she stepped inside.
At first glance, it didn't appear that anything was damaged, save a single overturned bar stool. Thankful for the fact that it would be unlikely that she would be processing charges for property damage, she steered around the loud crowd and made a beeline for the back room, intent on finding Ruby.
"Rubs? Why are you sitting on a bucket?"
The redhead was hiding in the kitchen, sat on an upturned bucket. She looked relieved to find the Sheriff made it. "Emma! Hiding Granny's crossbow. She threatened to shoot them." She gestured back into the room. "She's not around, is she?"
Emma shook her head. "Not that I have seen. What's going on, then?"
Ruby grimaced from her perch. "I blame Charming. He and the others took offence to Jones drinking them all under the floorboards every Friday, so they decided to ply him with drink." So far, this was standard. David was known for trying to get Killian drunk and instead finding himself shouted at by Snow, nursing a hangover. "But this time, they found a secret weapon." The redhead leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially. "Eggnog."
Emma blinked in surprise. She had learned early on that even mixing alcohol was unlikely to make the pirate any more than slightly tipsy, so hearing he had a weakness was irresistible. She pulled out a crate and sat down on it. "Tell me more."
Ruby was becoming more animated. "Jones took a real liking to the stuff, he's obviously never had it. Had a full pitcher of it. And in this instance, he got really drunk."
Emma was about to ask how drunk when the question was answered for her. A very familiar and drunk voice broke into a rendition of what sounded suspiciously like "on the Good Ship Venus." The usually unflappable Ruby turned red and buried her head in her lap and Emma grew uncomfortable as she recognised one of the other voices joining in as David's. Thankfully Henry was not with them.
There was a quiet "Please get them out of here before Granny kills them." from Ruby and Emma steeled herself, stepping back out into the Diner.
She was greeted with an astonishing sight.
Killian Jones, 300 year old pirate, was being hoisted up in the air by the various menfolk of the town, singing all the while and holding on to what looked like an almost empty pitcher of eggnog as though his life depended on it, while Gold sat in a booth and laughed at them. Emma moved to the imp first.
"Please tell me you didn't tamper with the drinks."
The man, who usually was surly at any accusation, laughed uncharacteristically. "Sheriff Swan, I see you have come to join the merry party. And no, I did not, though I may be tempted to ply the pirate with eggnog in the future." Seeing Emma's unconvinced stare, he shrugged. "I may have suggested eggnog as a way to test his tolerance. But I have too much respect in the man's drinking ability to tamper with his actual drink. I would look to my son and your father as the main culprits in this matter. I believe Ba... Neil had brought a substantial music collection with him, and Prince kept refilling his glass." The man grinned impishly. "I do hope you are not here to stop my entertainment, are you? I have not had this much fun since that magician hypnotised the dwarfs and Tiny to believe they were morning larks."
Realising that the wizard was not going to be any help from this quarter, Emma looked around the room. The only other person who appeared to be still in normal and sober was a very grumpy Leroy, so Emma chose to delay the inevitable. "How long have they been like this?"
Grumpy looked angry. "Since they finished eating, which was well over three hours ago. Wasn't much of a problem till people started trying to sleep."
"Any chance I can talk you into rounding this band of merry men up? I am sure Snow will appreciate her husband being brought home in one piece."
Leroy sighed and nodded, despite the fact that they both knew he was being manipulated. "Sure sister. Just give me a few to get the others and we can start herding these sheep home."
The dwarfs assembled less than 5 minutes later and Emma decided that she may as well get on with her civic duties.
"You are all under arrest! Put your hands behind your backs and let me cuff you." Emma held her breath for a moment – normally this was the point where her opponents became rowdy or violent or ran. However, Storybrooke being what it was, the men mostly threw up their arms and, strangely, lined up to be detained. Emma idly thought that there was no way all 17 of them were going to fit in a single vehicle, but decided that frog marching them to lock up would have a sobering effect on them instead.
She finally got to Hook and, rather than cuff him, pulled out a plastic bind to attach his elbows together, so he could not escape the restraints. She recited his rights almost automatically.
"You are arrested on the charge of being a public nuisance, on a verbal complaint. Anything you say can and will be held against you in a court of law. You are entitled to representation – if you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be appointed for you by the state. Do you understand your rights?"
What happened next surprised everyone.
"Emma Swan."
Emma rolled her eyes. "Yes, Hook, that is indeed my name."
"Emma Swan."
"Why are you saying my name?"
The pirate stuttered. "Y-y-you saaaaid that aaanything I say wo-wou-would be held against meee. I said y-your name!"
And it suddenly occurred to Emma that it was possible that in his intoxicated state the pirate had forgotten the basic meaning of some English words.
As if on cue, Neil started to sing and Emma realised that she had underestimated the captain of the ship. For Neil was singing the chorus from "Just One Yesterday". She normally liked Fall Out Boy, but in that moment she cursed the fact that they liked to play around with words so much, as the song really left no doubt as to which meaning Jones was angling at.
The rest of the men had either joined the signing or were chanting Emma's name, while Killian Jones stood there, still drunk, leering at her suggestively. "So, lass, what will it be?"
This time, he definitely didn't see the right hook coming.
To Emma's relief, Killian woke up next morning, in lock up, with the remaining 13 men who had not yet been retrieved by their families, cuddling David and with almost no memory of the previous night. Deciding to give him a break for the day, since the whole event was no entirely his fault and he had already been decked, she took him home and let him recover from his headache with aspirin and buried in blankets – he could not be fully to blame for Neil's music taste or David's inability to be outdone in anything. He would get enough grief for loosening his inhibition, so that punishment was enough.
Her father was being taken care of, of that she had no doubt. Snow had been beyond livid and insisted on speaking extremely loudly when she had collected her husband. She would doubtlessly find other ways to make the Charming Prince miserable.
That left Neil. He had gone home early in the morning, when Rumplestiltskin had poofed in, asked (Emma suspected this was something Belle had insisted on) if Granny or any of the neighbours were pressing charges or if it was just time served, and upon receiving the all clear, poofed back out, the still unconscious Bae in tow.
She knocked on the door.
After a moment, she heard stumbling and the door opened to reveal the father of her child, dressed in a blanket. "Go away."
She pushed past him into the room. The small apartment he was staying at was nice, central and had the usual basic amenities. This, apparently, included a CD tower.
Emma stopped in front of the aforementioned piece of furniture and perused the selection. Then, with no hesitation, she started to pull CDs off the shelves and out of their cases, throwing them into a pile on the floor.
"Emma, what are you doing?" Neil sounded more awake now.
Emma simply continued her work. FOB was joined by the Sex Pistols and many more artists, whose songs could be misconstrued as even vaguely suggestive.
Her ex was panicking.
"Em, look, yesterday was a bit of harmless fun. It won't happen again. Just. Just put down the CDs and we can talk about it like civilised adults." Seeing that this tactic was not working, he charged tune. "Look, it wasn't just me. Everyone else was as complicit. David.."
Emma spun around. "Oh, don't you doubt that they will all suffer. My mother has an idea on how to handle him. I am pretty sure that Sean was probably too quiet to do anything but go along with whatever you loggerheads suggested and Jefferson was wise enough to duck out as soon as you suggested karaoke. Hook will be sitting on the roof, in snowfall, re-roofing the Station, so he is getting what he deserves. But you. You introduced them to these." She pointed to the pile at her feet as though it was some dead animal. "And you must pay."
This was certainly a good time to test her magic.
Ruby could not stop laughing. Hook, finding out that the whole thing had been filmed, had avoided the whole town for a week, before he turned up on their doorstep and had been put to work repairing some of the tables with his crew as penance by the still disgruntled Granny.
The waitress was also exchanging amused glances with Regina, who, in all her superiority, was attempting to explain to a forlorn Neil that no, there was no way to reverse the damage his collection had suffered, and he really should have been grateful that Emma had not attempted to turn him into the pile of sludge with the aid of a magical fire.
AN: Dedicated to Mr Miran, who has spent hours trying to calm me down, as I panic over work and not writing and the fact that 8 months in, we are still not unpacked, and putting up with me listening to FOB on repeat about 11 times a week.