I'm Not a Soldier; I'm a Dragon Fighter
Disclaimer: I do not own either of these characters, though I wish I could own the TV show rights! That would be so amazing! All lines in bold are from Once Upon a Time in Wonderland or Once Upon a Time.
Will Scarlet's heart has recently been taken out by Cora, the latter known better as the Queen of Hearts. He doesn't think much about it, until he gets a strange impulse to walk all across the vast kingdom of Wonderland to get to the queen's castle.
"Maybe letting her have control of my heart wasn't the best idea after all," Will whispers to himself as he reaches the palace gate.
Who knows why the queen wants him all of the sudden at her castle? She could easily want to kill him, or torture him; the list really does go on and on. A guard opens the gate, and Will hesitantly steps inside to meet the queen.
"Ah, Will, you're right on time. Please, take a seat," Cora tells the handsome young man as he enters the throne room.
Will instantly obeys, because he really has no choice in the matter. At first, he remains quiet, not wanting to say something stupid in front of the Queen of Hearts that might make her crush his heart. Will eventually clears the lump in his throat and begins to make conversation.
"So, Your Majesty, what is it that you wanted from me?" he politely asks.
"My dear Will, there's no need to be nervous. I'm not going to crush your heart," Cora says with a grin.
"You're not?" Will questions as he breathes a sigh of relief.
"No, my dear boy. You still have plenty of good years left to live. I simply called you here for a mission. Only the bravest men have gone," Cora says with a mischievous smile.
"What mission am I going on, Your Majesty?" Will inquires as he stands up.
"Have you ever fought a dragon, Will?" she questions as she grabs a sword off of the table.
"I can't say that I have. Why do you ask?" he replies.
"I am in need of a great swordsman to take care of a little dragon problem I have on the Eastern border. Does that catch your interest?" The Queen of Hearts remarks.
"If I slay the dragon, I'll be the most famed hero in the realm," Will realizes as he straps the sword to his hip.
"That's right. Now, off to training camp you go," Cora bids him farewell as two guards escort him out to the camp.
Two hours later, Will reaches the queen's training camp for her prestigious army. Many of the men send hostile glances at Will, as if they are already coming up with ways to make his existence miserable. Will simply goes over to the general and introduces himself.
"Greetings, General. My name is Will Scarlet. The Queen of Hearts requested that I joined your men in the fight against the dragon," Will speaks up as he holds out his hand to the renowned general.
"You're a lot smaller than most of my men, but maybe you'll be twice as brave and daring. It wouldn't be a bad thing if you were good with a sword either," the general says with a straight face as he sizes Will up.
Will nervously looks around at the rest of the men at the army camp. What the general said is true. All of the other men have twice as much muscle as he does, and they also have about three inches on him.
"All of that's just because they're older than you are. Don't stress yourself out over nonsense on the first day," Will tells himself as he walks around the training camp.
He unsheathes his sword and begins attacking the wooden dummy that is set up in the center of the camp. Will exerts his full energy on the training dummy, and the head pops off as he does so. Will gasps and tries his hardest to put it back on without anyone noticing what he's done. He then gets back to attacking the inanimate opponent, putting all of his energy into his attacks, timing them almost perfectly. If only he was fighting a real opponent, then everyone could see just how diverse his skills are.
"He certainly is a strange lad, that's for sure," one of the men remarks as he watches Will train from a distance.
"Strange doesn't even begin to cover it. He's wasting all of his energy fighting a wooden dummy. What's he gonna do when the general has us practice on each other?" another interjects.
"He'll fail, miserably. And when he does, he'll find out just how bad of a soldier he is. That's when the real fun begins," the leftenant remarks.
Sure enough, the general calls all of his men around the fire to tell them their new training partner.
"Leftenant Smith, you will be paired with Will Scarlet since he is the youngest and the least experienced. I want you to teach him the ropes. Do explain to him that I have high standards for each new recruit," the general barks at his second-in-command.
"Yes, sir. I will teach him what it means to be in the Queen of Hearts' army," the leftenant salutes with a smirk.
Will starts to head for one side of the training grounds, away from everyone else.
"And where do you think you're going?" the leftenant yells at Will.
"I was trying to give the others room to train. Common courtesy and all," Will answers as his commander nears him.
"Do you think that enemies in battle care about common courtesy?! No, they bloody don't, boy! I don't know where you were raised, but is sure wasn't in Wonderland," the commander yells, spitting a little in Will's face as he does so.
"I was raised in the Enchanted Forest, actually. I was never taught to fight in battles, sir," Will remarks as he looks down at his boots in defeat.
"Who gave you the right to speak, soldier?!"
"No one did, sir, but I thought you wanted me to answer your question," he answers quietly.
"Boys, we need to teach the new recruit some manners. Get the fire arrows ready."
Will swallows uneasily as he thinks about what the fire arrows might be. He doesn't have to wait long, for all of the men shoot arrows tipped with fire towards him. Will instantly begins running towards the woods to find some sort of cover. An arrow whizzes directly beside Will's head, and it almost sets his left ear on fire. In panic, Will grabs a tent, some blankets, and some provisions and makes a run for the Eastern border. Something tackles him, and hard.
"What in the bloody world are you?!" Will screams as a masked figure puts his boot against his chest.
"I'm a soldier. My name's Ryan. You better take the fire arrows, mate. There are things much worse that they can inflict on you," the young soldier tells Will.
"Thank you very much. I'll keep that in mind? I take it they did these worse punishments on you?" Will returns as Ryan helps him up.
"I ran away from the fire arrows, but one still singed my ear. After the leftenant found that out, he tied me to a tree and had the men throw their knives at me for target practice. They chopped off the top layer of my hair and left me with this," Ryan uneasily swallows as he takes off his mask and helmet to show Will a nasty scar on the top of his head.
"I'm sorry about that, mate. That just doesn't seem fair to me," Will regretfully says as he heads towards the others.
"I didn't catch your name, by the way," Ryan speaks up.
"I'm Will. Will Scarlet of the Enchanted Forest, at your service, or rather, in the Queen's service," he smirks in response.
As he returns to camp, the general calls him over.
"Scarlet, get over here!" the general roars across the camp.
Will walks towards the general with his head down, hoping that he doesn't get severely punished for not taking the fire arrows like a man.
"Yes, sir?" Will softly speaks up, hoping the commanding officer is nothing like the leftenant.
"My men move out at dawn. Make yourself useful and come along, or else I'll have to let the leftenant take care of you. You wouldn't want that, would you?" he mocks.
"No, sir. I'll be ready to go then." Will answers.
Dawn approaches rather quickly. Will instantly grabs his sword and pulls on his boots before stepping out of the tent and walking over to Ryan.
"Morning, Will," Ryan greets as the younger man walks up.
Will simply nods in response. The general exits his tent with the leftenant not too far behind.
"We're going to split up into two groups. Will, you're with me. The rest of you know your commander. Let's move out!" the general yells.
Ryan follows the leftenant and Will follows behind the general, wondering who will reach the dragon first. After many hours of walking, Will's feet start to hurt, so he starts to make conversation with the men in his group to take his mind off of the pain. Unfortunately for him, no one answers.
"Well, this is just lovely, isn't it? Tromping through the cold with you lads. Anyone know a good marching song?" Will sarcastically says to the other soldiers.
No one responds to this, so he figures they don't.
"No? I don't know what I enjoy more- the frostbite or the conversation," Will says out loud as the cold December air chills his face and begins to travel from his head down to his toes.
"Stop talking," the general commands in an annoyed tone.
"Well, I'd like to stop walking, but the Queen of Hearts ordered me to, so-" Will starts to reply until the general wraps a fist around Will's neck.
The general's grip on Will's neck increases, and the young soldier begins to choke.
"Listen, Will. We're hunting the most dangerous creature in Wonderland- Killed plenty of men, women, children. Been evading my men for weeks- trained soldiers. So tell me, how are you going to help us?" the general icily says, his grip on Will's neck remaining.
"By paying attention," Will instantly replies.
"To what?" the general presses, tightening the hold he has on the newest recruit's neck.
"All of the trees are burned," Will observes as he surveys the area.
The general looks around, and notices that what Will said is correct. He shoves Will backward, releasing his hard grip off of the young man's neck. Will inhales a big gulp of oxygen to make up for what he lacked when the general was almost choking him.
"We're close. Spread out. And show no mercy. Because you'll get none from this monster," the general announces to his troop.
A shrieking noise gets the attention of all of the men. No sooner than this noise echoes through the trees does a tremendous black shadow start to make its way down to Earth.
"There! Split up! Scarlet, with me!" the general yells.
Will runs behind the general, and keeps up pace with the more experienced man.
"The dragon's lair is through there. You stay here," the general instructs with a bit of venom in his voice.
Some more men come up behind Will as they hear screams coming from the cave where their general is, and where the other group has allegedly gone. Will starts to run towards the entrance to the cave.
"They need our help!" Will yells to the other men above the chaos.
"We stay here. Our orders are clear," the leftenant tersely replies.
"People are DYING!" Will shouts as he hears Ryan call out in pain.
Our hero runs into the cave alone, frantically searching for Ryan, his only friend in the entire army. The dragon begins to fly outside of the cave with Ryan in his mighty jaws. The other soldiers stand there like lumps on a log, so Will sprints after the shadow of the dragon as it heads for the open woods. The dragon changes direction many times, causing Will to have to jump over many bushes and small trees as he continues running at full speed. He then quickly turns a corner as the dragon descends, and Will hides behind a tree as he draws his sword. The sword glimmers in the sun, and a ray of sunlight casts its way towards the dragon, almost as if it is beaconing Will to get closer. Will slowly makes his way towards the winged beast, hoping to get to Ryan before it is too late. However, since he has his sight set on the dragon and his new friend, Will does not see where the hill is standing on drops off sharply. His feet get caught in the roots of a plant, causing him to trip and fall headfirst down the hill. Will starts rolling down the hill, his vision starting to get blurry as the he sees the sky and then sees the ground. His body continues rolling over many small trees, acorns, rocks, you name it. Will groans in pain as he continues rolling down the hill, his head starting to pound in the process. When he finally reaches the bottom of the hill, he lands on his back a mere inch away from the dragon. The dragon roars as Will starts to slowly stand up. He starts to panic a little, but upon seeing that the dragon has set Ryan down, he knows what he must do.
"Will, what are you doing?!" Ryan weakly shouts as Will nears the dragon.
"I'm ridding the kingdom of this foul beast, that's what I'm doing!" Will yells as he hops on the dragon's back.
He stabs the sword in the back of the dragon's neck before getting thrown to the ground.
"What to do? What to do?" Will thinks to himself as the dragon comes running towards him.
At this thought, he pulls his dagger out of his boot and waits until the dragon is charging at him. Will then slices the dagger through the dragon's heart. The great beast falls to the ground, so Will grabs his sword and stabs it in the beast's neck. The dragon lets out a fierce shriek as it dies beside Will. Will lets out a sigh as sweat rolls down his forehead. Ryan moans from the ground, and Will rushes to his side.
"Are you okay?" Will asks in concern.
"I'll be alright. Are you okay? You're the one who fought the dragon, not me," Ryan chuckles.
"I've never been better. That was quite exciting," Will admits as he helps Ryan up.
The other soldiers, minus the general run towards the youngest members of the army.
"Where's the general?" Ryan questions.
"He's dead," the leftenant reveals.
The two young men hold their heads down. Another soldier points to the dead dragon body behind Will.
"He killed the dragon single-handedly," the man says in awe.
"Well, Will, I guess you are a soldier," the leftenant remarks as he pats Will on the back.
"I'm not a soldier; I'm a dragon fighter," Will smiles as they start to head back to camp.
Author's Note: I inspired this story off of what Will told Alice in Season 1 Episode 12 of Once Upon a Time in Wonderland. He told her that he wasn't a soldier, yet he was in the Queen of Hearts' army. I thought I would make him a dragon fighter. Please review, and thank you for reading my one-shot!