Author's notes: Dear showrunners, if I wanted to watch "Skin Deep" again, I would just watch "Skin Deep" again. Also, I miss Maleficent. Why couldn't this season be about Maleficent and her daughter instead of Emma and Hook?

I told myself that I wasn't going to let season 6 get to me, but apparently I lied. Especially after Morpheus really did have a f***ing hourglass! Ha ha. I swear I wrote that bit in my previous story without having seen any spoiler pictures or anything, so it was a complete coincidence.

"It's similar in effect to Zelena's time travel spell, but creates alternatives, remakes, sequels, and sidesteps. Slightly safer to use, but in the hands of the irresponsible... well, if we're lucky, the god of dreams isn't a fool." — Rumplestiltskin, talking about the Hourglass of Chronos

The last thing Belle expected to see upon her return to Storybrooke was herself. It was dark, and she only caught a glimpse of the familiar figure before it turned away, but she was ninety percent sure of what she'd seen. That was herself, coming out of the pawn shop. Belle started forward, but Rumplestiltskin seized her elbow.

"Wait!" he whispered into her ear. The urgency in his voice quelled her impulse to call out to this... imposter? The two of them watched silently as the other walked down the street, until her shape was lost in the night. Then with a wave of his hand, Rumplestiltskin enveloped them in the maroon smoke of his transportation spell and took them elsewhere.

Belle immediately recognized the cluttered back room of the shop. Rumple let go of her arm and turned on the light. They stared at each other in a moment of confusion. Belle cleared her throat, then found her voice. "What's going on? Who was that?"

"Someone with your appearance, certainly." It went without saying that appearances could be deceptive, especially when magic was a possibility. He cast a protection spell around the room, then told Belle, "I need to take a closer look."

He rummaged in one of the cabinets and found a circular vanity mirror, the type that was set in a metal frame and stand. He placed it on a tabletop. Belle caught a glimpse of a painted eye surrounded by elvish glyphs before he rotated the mirror around until the reflective surface was facing them. He waved a hand across the mirror. The image changed to show... Belle.

Watching over Rumple's shoulder, Belle caught her breath at the confirmation of what she had seen before: there was no mistaking her own face.

"It's not a glamour or a shapeshift," murmured Rumplestiltskin. He waggled a finger, and the image zoomed out to show that the other Belle was not alone. She was speaking to someone... it was her father! A moment later, the scene faded, and she was looking at her real self again, staring anxiously from behind Rumple. His eyes met hers in the mirror. "It is you. Or at least, Belle, in some sense."

"How is that possible?" Belle mentally shuffled through everything she had read about magic, remembering obscure stories about dopplegangers and fetches. Then a more recent example occurred to her. "Night root? That creates a physical double." She thought back over their last few meals and whether someone could have slipped in a dose of the magical extract.

"No," replied Rumplestiltskin. He put his hands on her shoulders, turning her to face him. "I wouldn't allow that to happen. I have defensive wards set up."

Belle nodded. Although she had argued with him over dark magic, it had never been these kind of spells that she was worried about, and she had been a target of Rumplestiltskin's enemies enough times to appreciate the protection.

"Besides, the manifestation created by night root always attacks its progenitor," said Rumplestiltskin. "While this version of you showed no awareness of your existence."

"Time travel, then? Maybe it's a future me."

"That would show up in its aura." He tapped the rim of the mirror.

Time to hit the books, then. Belle knew the drill. By now almost as familiar with the contents of his library as he was, she started pulling out the magical reference books. She had just begun scanning the index of the first when Rumple interrupted her.

"We're missing the obvious." He glared at her from across a cabinet.

"What?" She blinked and refocused on his face. She hoped he wasn't about to fly off into one of his rages.

"Morpheus." He bit the name off with contempt and annoyance, but calmly enough. "Morpheus has the Hourglass of Chronos."

"You think he's in Storybrooke?" asked Belle in alarm.

"Let's find out, shall we?" Rumplestiltskin returned to his enchanted vanity mirror, dropping a handful of other items next to it. He picked up one of his golden threads and ran it from the mirror frame to a small black box. "This time I'll set it up for audio, too."

Oh, right, that's a speaker, thought Belle, drawing on Lacey's knowledge of the Land Without Magic. She hadn't known that technology could be mixed with magic that way. So why couldn't he use one of those big flat screens instead of a tiny mirror? Something to ask when they weren't as busy.

Meanwhile, Rumplestiltskin had one of his chests of potions out. He selected a vial and poured the contents onto the mirror. The liquid transmuted itself into a sheen of blue light which seemed to be absorbed into the reflection. "I should be able to track him from our last point of contact, back at the shrine."

It didn't take long for the image of Morpheus to appear, much as she remembered: a pale, gaunt man in ragged night-black robes standing outside the rustic shrine where they had met him. As they watched, the light flickered, swirling into a cloud of mist, then dissipated again. The rough stone and timber shrine had grown into a massive domed edifice on a mountain peak, arched windows admitting sunlight into a multi-tiered interior with torches and oversized statues.

"That's a little more imposing than the hovel," said Belle, moving next to her husband to peer into the mirror.

"This is his temple as it appears in the realm of dreams," said Rumplestiltskin, shifting to one side to allow Belle a better view. "He seems to have delusions of grandeur. A common affliction among the divine pantheon."

"And Dark Ones, too. I haven't forgotten your castle."

Rumplestiltskin scoffed. "I built that when I thought Bae might want a castle."

"And to keep all your precious things in," muttered Belle, but she leaned against him and hugged him fondly to take the sting out of her words.

"It turned out to be convenient," he agreed, putting an arm around her waist. They watched together as Morpheus walked up to the altar in the center of the temple. Another cloud of mist swirled around him, and when it cleared again, he wore the appearance of a young man with short brown hair, his robe no longer shaded an unearthly black. "Huh."

The young man held up his right hand. An hourglass appeared in his palm.

"It looks different," said Belle.

"In the dream realm, perceptions are more fluid than they would be elsewhere."

Morpheus tipped the hourglass over and waved a hand around it. Sparkling red sand sprayed out, then drifted down and solidified into a human shape.

Belle gasped. "It's you!"

"Indeed." Rumplestiltskin frowned at his double in the mirror, who was frozen in place, as if under a paralysis spell. Morpheus circled his creation once, twice, three times. Then, presumably satisfied with his work, the god of dreams vanished from view. The copied Rumplestiltskin unfroze and took out a small box. He lifted it, and a few passes of his hand sent Belle — a Belle who was still deep in sleep — onto the bed-like altar. Then he picked up the urn from the stand next to the altar and sprinkled what looked like more sand over both himself and the sleeper. The sand ballooned into another cloud of mist which filled the whole mirror.

"What is that?" whispered Belle. "Why did he do that?"

"I don't know. At a guess, Morpheus has tampered with his memories. If he really is a copy of me, he'll be trying to wake you, or what he thinks is you."

The mist cleared to show Rumplestiltskin standing alone in a wood. He was soon joined by Morpheus, still in his guise as a young man. Belle was surprised to hear him introduce himself as Morpheus. "What's the point of the disguise, then?"

"I don't know." They listened to the conversation as it was transmitted through the speaker. The scenery shifted again. "Ah, the Dark Castle."

As they followed Rumplestiltskin's double into the interior, Belle noted, "Darker than I remember."

"Hmm. Look, there you are." They watched the copy of Belle turn towards the opened door, her voice anxious as she greeted Rumplestiltskin, who wavered in the mirror between his current human shape and his former appearance as the demonic imp. "A dream within a dream."

Dream-Belle vanished deeper into the castle. Morpheus and dream-Rumplestiltskin spoke, and Belle could hear the edge of desperation in the familiar voice. Her arm tightened around the Rumple standing next to her. "I did have some nightmares at first..."

"I know. I'm sorry," said Rumplestiltskin. "Captivity isn't easy, even when you've volunteered for it."

"Do you... do you ever have bad dreams?" Belle asked hesitantly, remembering the horror of finding him in Zelena's cage, unable to leave even when the door was open. She remembered his despair at his utter helplessness under the dagger's control.

"Sometimes," Rumplestiltskin whispered, a shudder running through his body. Then he steadied himself and drew her closer. "But listen, we're free now."

"Not like her, poor thing," said Belle, gazing into the mirror at the version of herself trapped in the dream. "And look at you. You were never that nice when I really was in your castle. Rudest man I ever met."

"You led a sheltered life before you met me," Rumplestiltskin pointed out. "And you cried incessantly the whole first week."

"You locked me in the dungeon!"

"Well, I couldn't have you wandering around the castle all night, breaking things."

"I wouldn't have," said Belle, offended at the suggestion.

"How was I supposed to know that? You weren't exactly a trained housekeeper when I hired you." Rumplestiltskin sighed. "I remember thinking at the time that you got the better end of our deal."

"You made me a servant!"

"And I saved your family and your town from an army of ogres. Plenty of people have entered a lifetime of servitude for far less," said Rumplestiltskin. "How much did your father pay the maids at his castle?"

"At least he never threatened to turn them into toads," muttered Belle. Dancing. Dream-Belle and dream-Rumple were dancing. She had never had that chance when living in the Dark Castle.

"Hush. I think she's beginning to remember," said Rumplestiltskin. "Aha."

Belle frowned as the scene in the mirror unfolded, her heart sinking as dream-Belle pushed dream-Rumple away. "Not again!" She wanted to reach through the mirror and shake some sense into her counterpart, but she knew it was too late. These events had already happened.

Then Morpheus "revealed" his identity to the two in the dream and Belle gasped. "No... our son? They believe him?"

"It's clearly impossible. Our child is still a barely-formed embryo, with no thoughts or feelings, much less recognition of a father it's never met," said Rumple, sounding irritated at their dream counterparts' gullibility. "Besides, two sleepers can't wake each other up with True Love's Kiss. Snow White tried that once with Prince Charming. What the hell is Morpheus playing at?"

Real or not, Belle couldn't help feeling sorry for the pair in the mirror. Dream-Belle vanished through the portal, leaving dream-Rumple standing alone in the temple with nothing but a forlorn expression on his face.

The image faded and the mirror was a simple mirror once more. Rumple broke free of Belle and paced the confined space of the back room. "He's manipulating events. Why does he want them separated? Is he trying to incarnate himself into a mortal form so that he can have substance in the waking realms?"

"We need to warn the others," said Belle. She started for the exit, but even as her fingers closed on the curtain separating them from the front of the shop, Rumple drew her back.

"Stop. We can't go out there," he said. "It's all I can do to keep our reality intact in a shielded room."

"Wait, what? What are you talking about?" Belle stared at her husband. Was he hiding things from her again?

Rumplestiltskin gripped her hand as if afraid to lose her... to what, she wasn't sure. He met her eyes with apparent sincerity. "It's the hourglass. It's powerful, Belle. I was going to use all the magic in Storybrooke, added to my own, to wake you — and that might not have been enough. So you can imagine what that hourglass is capable of..."

"Creating copies of us, yes," said Belle. "But they're not real, are they?"

"Oh, they're very real. And they're not exactly copies. If we go out there, soon we'll become the fakes. We'll become nothing but forgotten dreams. As far as reality is concerned, we've been replaced."

Belle stared at him, aghast. He wasn't lying. "We have to fix this. There must be some counter-spell..."

Rumplestiltskin shook his head slowly, and now she could see the strain on his face. "I don't know of any. To create one myself would take time."

Time they might not have. Belle nodded in understanding. "But what if we had help? You're not the only sorcerer in Storybrooke. What about Regina, or Emma? And the fairies... if Morpheus is planning some evil, even Blue would help us, wouldn't she?"

"All right. I'll try to contact them." Rumple released her hand reluctantly and returned to his enchanted mirror. "Let's see what they've been up to while we were away."

Belle followed him, curious despite her new fears. Images appeared in the mirror again, and snatches of conversation. Some of them Rumple dismissed quickly — no need to watch Emma and Hook rolling around on a couch — and others he lingered over. "What did I say? They dealt with Mr. Hyde quickly enough! But it seems he brought over a whole airship filled with his friends. Hmm. What's afflicting Miss Swan? She seems... distracted."

They watched her visit Hyde in the prison cell, then her encounter with an oracle.

"Keeping secrets again? Haven't we played this game before?" muttered Rumple. "And it's a tricky business, foretelling the future."

"Do you think the oracle was telling the truth?" wondered Belle.

"I don't know," said Rumple. The images shifted again. "Zelena." They watched as relations between Zelena and her half-sister deteriorated.

"What did Zelena mean about Regina removing the part of herself that was most like her?"

Rumple thought about it for a few moments before he answered, "There was a potion Hyde was working on, that would separate him from his alter ego, Dr. Jekyll. Perhaps he finally succeeded. If Regina used it..."

A few scenes later, in Zelena's farmhouse, they had their answer. There was the Evil Queen in all her regalia, sharing a drink with her sister.

"Regina, Regina, Regina," said Rumple, shaking his head. "You still haven't learned, have you?"

"Do you think it's part of Morpheus's plan?" Belle didn't know which answer would be worse. Either things were already in a mess and the addition of the god of dreams could be the tipping point to total catastrophe, or it was all part of a plot so insane that her head hurt just trying to unravel it.

Rumple gestured over the mirror, bringing back Regina's visage. "I don't know yet. Come on, Regina, answer your calls." There was no response from the mirror. After a full minute had gone by, he let the image fade. "Nothing. She's the best at this kind of magic. If even she can't hear me..."

His attempts to contact the other denizens of Storybrooke met with no more success. He even tried Zelena and the Evil Queen, despite his obvious distaste. Finally, he sent his mirror crashing into a wall with a furious sweep of his arm. "Damn it!"

He leaned with his hands flat on the table, head bowed, trembling slightly and breathing hard.

"Rumple..." Belle touched his arm, led him to sit down on the bed. "It's all right. We'll think of something else."

"It's not all right," he whispered. "Our reality is degrading every moment we stay here. Even if we met them face to face now, I'm not sure they would be able to see us. We have to go."

"Go where?"

"Not even the hourglass should be able to affect us across realms. We'll go back to the Enchanted Forest." He hesitated, then added, "I still have some things... in the vault at my castle."

"No. You can't!" Belle protested automatically. He had told her before that he stored only the most dangerous of dark magic in his vault.

"We may not have a choice." He stood up shakily and took the Apprentice's wand from his jacket. With a sure, practiced motion, he drew a door in the air. "And we're certainly out of time." He looked back, holding out a hand for Belle.

She took his hand and stepped with him through the portal. Her next step came down on...

...nothing. A furious wind blasted around and between them. Belle lost her grip on her husband's hand. She had to shut her eyes against the storm. For the space of a dozen heartbeats, she felt herself spun in the maelstrom between worlds. Then she was spit out into a sudden calm. She opened her eyes to find herself in the air. Falling!

It was daytime, with the sun shining down out of a cloudless blue sky. As they fell, Belle caught a glimpse of an unfamiliar landscape around them. The Dark Castle was nowhere in sight. It didn't even look like the Enchanted Forest. Then she looked down to see a strange man staring up at them with a surprised expression. At which point she collided with the stranger, sending both of them crashing into the ground. She heard Rumplestiltskin's voice calling out, "Belle!"

As she lay there, breathless and stunned, she could only hope that they had not leaped from the frying pan into the fire.

Notes: Next chapter, should I actually write it, starts a crossover with a show that had the sense to quit after three seasons and a godawful reboot attempt. Perhaps thinking about this story will help inspire me for NaNoWriMo. As for Morpheus and whatever he's up to...I'll wait and see what happens in canon first.