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Where Belle Solves Everything

Rumplestiltskin smiled as he released Ella holding in the laughter that often bubbled under his skin. Before he could slowly disappear before anyone noticed he was even here among many familiar faces a hand grabbed his and pulled him into another dance. His already wide eyes widened as he took in the beaming beauty before him. His beauty. Belle. His magic responded instantly checking to see if this image before him was real.

"Rumple," her voice soft and filled with warmth. "I've longed to see you again."

"Belle, you can't be real. She said you died."

She shook her head and pulled him after her leaving the dance floor. "Regina kept trying to capture me. I had an adventure. I saved a prince from a curse. Then I tried to turn back to return to the dark castle. Regina was there. Thankfully Prince Phillip and Mulan were both nearby and saved me. I went with them to save Phillip's true love, Aurora. As long as I didn't head back to you or my father she left me alone."

"How do I know this isn't some sort of trick?" Rumple demanded as they stepped into the royal garden.

Belle smiled, biting her bottom lip lightly, "Well I could always check to see if I'm still your true love." She leaned forward as if to kiss him.

Jumping back quickly, Rumplestiltskin did a little side step. His hands going instinctively to the familiar gestures, his fingertips gently pressed against each other as he looked at the woman before him. His magic slipping out softly and touching her smiling form. "It is you," he said in wonder.

"Yes, it is."

"Regina tried to capture you?"

Belle hummed a soft affirmative as she nodded. "I realized as long as I remained with my friends I would be able to avoid her. For some reason she wouldn't come near if I was near Prince Phillip or Mulan. I suspect she has some sort of hands off agreement with Maleficent since she's who we up against."

He walked up closer to her, his eyes scanning to confirm what his magic already had, that she was unharmed. Belle's beaming smile diminished slightly as old fears returned. Taking a deep breath she took a step forward, causing the distance between them to vanish, and wrapped her arms around him.

"I thought I might never see you again, Rumple."

Stiffening for a moment in shock Rumplestiltskin slowly wrapped his arms around her as smoke appeared around them transporting them back to the Dark Castle. Back home.

"Tell me what happened," he demanded without letting her go.

"After breaking the curse on Prince Phillip I went with him and Mulan to save Princess Aurora. In doing so I met a child seer, saved her, and she told me some interesting things. I then got her to summon the shadows from Neverland for me so I could meet your father. But-"

Rumplestiltskin jerked his head back to stare at her.

"First I met up with the shadows to make them a deal. I do thank you for teaching me about deals, it comes in quite useful. They didn't want him anymore either. They took me to Tinkerbelle, the Green Fairy, I promised to do my best to help her get her wings back and if nothing else she could have a home with me. With her help I sent my shadow back here to collect a few things for me. I then approached Peter Pan, it was very easy to get close to him, all I had to do was tell him I was your true love and distract him by talking about you. Then I sealed him in Pandora's Box. I do hope you don't mind my borrowing it. I decided to just keep him trapped in it for now since he is your father."

"You trapped my father inside Pandora's Box, which you stole from me?" his large eyes blinking at her.

"Borrowed!" Belle said insistently. "I was always planning to return it. Though he kept a doll that he said had been yours if you want that as well. After that I had the shadows take me to Wonderland. They can travel almost anywhere. In Wonderland I tracked down the Queen of Hearts, better known as Cora. I made a deal with her. I could give her almost everything she ever wanted, as long as she put her heart back in."

"You also 'borrowed' her heart I take it?"

Belle nodded. "Yes. She was… different once she had her heart back. From there I had the rabbits of Wonderland make a portal to Oz. Then the four of us went to Oz."

"Four?" Rumplestiltskin had reached a point were he wasn't really trying to make sense of what his love was telling him.

"Cora, Tinkerbelle, Hook and I. Oh! Captain Hook had apparently been sent by Regina to kill her mother. Anyway, from there we tracked down Zelina. It was easy enough to make a deal with her. After all, one of the things she wanted most was her mother. I then had my shadows take Zelina and Hook to Neverland. Since my deal with the Shadows was to provide a family for the children they would bring to visit Neverland. I'm pretty sure Hook and Zelina are going to find love together. It's very sweet, sort of. Bonding over their… anger with you."

Belle smiled up at him, before resting her head in the crook of his neck and continued retelling her adventure, "Cora, Tinkerbelle and I then went to visit Regina. A lot of Regina's darkness comes from an unhappy relationship with her mother, made worse by the fact Cora didn't have her heart and so was forcing Regina to follow in her footsteps. There was crying all about. Some apologizing to Prince Henry as well. Tinkerbelle is going to stay with Regina and help her heal from all the pain in her life. Once Regina's well enough Tinkerbelle will take her to meet her true love that she was too scared to meet after the pain of loosing her first love. Oh! You'll never guess who her true love is! It's Robin Hood! The guy who stole from you to save his wife and unborn son. Of course his wife has since died or their meeting would be very awkward. Regina approaching a married man would not work out if she's going to try to only do light magic now."

Rumplestiltskin felt an anger build within him. He needed Regina to cast the dark curse. Admittedly he now had his true love and could cast it himself but he already knew how much he'd hurt when he thought her dead and the thought of loosing her by his own hand... His true love had ruined all his plans to find his son.

"Then I took Cora back to Neverland with these pretty shoes I got from Zelina after she turned all her winged monkeys back into people."

"Shoes?" Rumplestiltskin finally released Belle to take a step back and stare at her feet.

Belle lifted her dress slightly so he could see her feet in a familiar pair of silver shoes that could transport people anywhere, including the land of no magic where Baelfire was. Rumplestiltskin grinned and he lifted his love up and spun her around, hope burning deep within him for the first time in a long time.

"All we have to do before we can go find your son is rescue my friend Princess Anna from her evil aunt and help her sister, Queen Elsa of Arendelle. And don't think I don't know how mean you were to Anna when you met!"

"Why have you summoned me?" Rumplestiltskin demanded of a very pregnant Princess Ella.

"I want to renegotiate our deal," Ella said bravely as he appeared before her. She would do whatever she could to protect her child.

"Ah yes," his golden body making elaborate movements. "The baby! You can keep her. Don't want it anymore. I'm too busy to deal with that."

Ella's mouth dropped open before stammering out, "What?"

"I don't have time to take care of the child and find it a new family now."

"Huh?"

"What did you think I did with babies? I trade them to families who desperately want them for something I want. You'd be surprised what I can get in a series of trades starting with a baby."

"I can keep my baby?" Ella asked in shock.

"Yes yes. I already said that. Weren't you listening? Nevermind that. I'm off to travel for awhile so for my favor just let Snow White know that Regina and the curse won't be an issue. I'm going to be out of reach for an unknown amount of time. I'm going to a royal wedding in another kingdom with my wife tomorrow and then we're off to travel the realms." A quick smoke cloud appeared and then Rumplestiltskin was gone.

"Wife…?"

"And then Rumplestiltskin disappeared and was never seen again," Snow White said retelling the full story of her romance with her husband, Charming, to their two children, Emma and Neal. Although both children were teenagers now they enjoyed hearing the story of their parents love and hoped to find just a strong a love for themselves someday.

A soft clapping was heard from above them. "What a sweet tale. A tale as old as time."

Snow White jumped to her feet. "Rumplestiltskin!"

The form left the tree easily landing on the ground near them. Snow gasped as she took in his form. His skin was no longer golden, or scaly, although she still thought he appeared creepy, overall he appeared human just not normal.

"What happened to you? You look… different."

"Love, dearie. True love's kiss can break any curse, even that of the dark one. But magic can't just vanish. Until a new dark one comes the power is mine to use." He didn't mention the unlikelihood of this since the dagger was very well hidden, Belle's ability to cross realms very useful. He rather enjoyed his current life and rather thought most people would appreciate the absence of a dark one anyway. "My wife wanted me to see if you wanted to arrange a playdate with our offspring. My son is only a few years older than your children and my daughter only a little younger. Both are human I assure you."

After a brief pause where Snow was too slow to respond before her children who were both excited by this turn of events had both agreed.

"Next week the same time then?"

Another chorus of agreement met him as he smiled and disappeared in soft swirl of silver smoke. He didn't know why his ability as a seer was assuring him it was very important that Princess Emma and his Baelfire met but he saw nothing but good things for them.

End

REVIEWS INSPIRE ME!

Once Upon a Time is my new obsession! Belle is my favorite character. I kept Emma's little brother's name Neal, it would be too confusing to change it, let's go with it was fate. I've got another story in my mind too but I need to finish some of my other on-going stories before I can start it. As it is this story ended up being much longer than expected.I kept wanting to add more parts.