Jack tugged down her green hat and shoved her hands into her black peacoat's pockets, trying to stay warm while walking down a grubby looking back alley near the harbour of Storybrooke. She glanced down at the dirty looking roll of currency called American bills in her right pocket. Jack quite disliked this parchment value system; it did not make logical sense to her. How could paper hold value, especially when their new world's country claims to be in debt? Paper based on a kingdom who is owned by another kingdom called China, could not possibly hold value, could it? The former Giant Slayer shook her head in confusion, giving up on understanding it.
Jack breezed past the fishing hut next to the docks, looking behind her to make sure no one saw her illegal dealings. She grew a lot less wary, however, after the town had regained their memories. They had become fixated with the evil queen and the saviour and all that crap that she really never seemed to care about. Ever since her last giant slaying incident, she had lost her taste for hunting them. The problem with this was that Jack had always wanted to hunt giants, ever since she was a child, that was her dream, then it became who she was. Now without it, she didn't know who she was. So weather she be in the enchanted forest or in Storybrooke, she was lost and alone.
The young woman wandered past the girl who waitressed at the diner, wearing some bazar looking red outfit. The girl was with The Dark One's lover, or something. Jack never really paid heed to who people were in the town. The scantily dressed waitress turned her head to Jack, sniffing in her direction, like she smelled something.
"Damn it," jack muttered to herself, remembering that she was a werewolf. She could probably smell her merchandise. The former Giant Slayer picked up her gate, and hurriedly pasted by them. Jack then looked out to the wharf which had a few various people wandering it. Normally the sight of people made Jack turn tale and bugger off in the opposite direction, but for some reason she felt drawn to the area. As she approached the large dock, he eye caught on a figure lying on the ground, she walked with curiosity towards it; recognising it as a person lying on their back. What confused her was the sight of numerous townspeople walking by them, not even giving them attention, like they didn't even see the person.
As she got nearer she saw that the person was a woman. Her dark hair was spread out in a mess surrounding her head, as her feet clapped together. She looked as if she were just hanging out in the middle of the wharf like one would normally do on a sofa.
"Hey!" Jack called out to her from about five metres away. But the girl did not respond, "Hey, Hello?" she called out again, stilling herself right beside her, now looking down upon her.
The girl then moved her head, and gazed up at her, "Who the hellbots are you talking…" The girl shot up in her seat "to? You! Jack!"
Jack shook her head in shock, "Desdemona?"
"Wait, you can see me?" The woman sprung to her feet, in front of her.
Jack scrunched her face, "Yes, of course I can see you. You're right there."
"Oh my Straw-Spinning-into-Gold-Wheel!" The star-fairy squeaked, "You can see me! No one can see me, but you can see me!"
"What do you mean, no one can see you?"
The girl whipped her head about, seeing Dr. Hopper coming up the wharf, walking Pongo. She then grinned with sparkling eyes towards Jack as she said, "You look like a crazy person right now, 'cause you're talking to yourself."
"What?" Jack then looked to the Doctor who was, indeed, looking at her curiously. He then asked her as he approached, "are you feeling alright, Miss?"
"Nope!" The fairy blurted out, "She is a crazy person who loves minced meat pie, just a little bit too much. Seriously it's a problem, Doc. Is there anything that you can do for her?" Desdemona giggled towards the psychiatrist, "Oh, and also, she see's ghosts, and they talk to her."
Jack blankly looked to her cheeky friend, then to the doctor, who clearly did not hear her or see the star-fairy. "I-ah- no, I mean, yeah, I'm alright."
The doctor squint his eyes at her, "I don't think that I know you?"
"Probably not," Jack shrugged awkwardly, before turning around; speedily walking back off the wharf, towards her house.
"Oh- Okay then, have a nice day!" She heard the man call to her, where she only raised a hand in farewell.
"You are smooth," Desdemona sarcastically remarked as she trotted alongside her. "And fast," she added, when she was forced to jog a bit to keep up with Jack's speedy gait.
"I do not love minced meat pies like a crazy person!" She whipped her head to the side to scowl at her, but as soon as her gaze fell onto the fairy with sparkling jeweled eyes that lit up with her beautiful smile, she could not help but bite her lip to conceal her own grin. "Actually, it's kind of creepy that you know that I enjoy meat pie."
"It's not creepy!" The girl gawked, "I am a fairy, that is freakn stuck up in the sky, that can only look down… or up, like at the Sun, but if you look at the sun too long, it makes everything yellow for like a century."
"What?" This time Jack couldn't help but laugh. "How does that even work? Do stars have retinas?"
"I don't know!" The girl giggled along. Jack then turned down a small back-alley that ran along behind a bunch of small houses, where the fairy followed. "So, where are we going?"
Jack responded, "well, I am going home. Where are you going?"
"I'm going home too."
Jack looked to her side, at the woman, "And you happen to be going home the same way as I am?"
"Yes," the girl nodded plainly.
"Well, where do you live?"
"In some strange phase that allows me to see this universe around me, but not actually interact with it."
"You are very difficult, you know that?"
"Am I?" the girl smiled, "this is fun, I like talking with people. I'm putting this on my list of things that I thought that I would like, and definitely do!"
"Wait, are you saying that you have never talked with anyone ever, or just here, in Storybrooke?"
"Yeeees," the girl nodded. "So where is our house?"
"Our house?" Jack spat.
"Yes, our house. I decided that I'm living with you because I like chatting with people, like I said earlier."
Jack smiled in amusement, "you know, you can't just decide things in your head and then act them out, especially if they affect other people."
"Really?" the girl asked in genuine confusion, "but you used to do that all the time, back home."
Jack didn't quite know how to take that. She knew the girl didn't mean any harm by it, yet still, it dug in quite deep, probably because she had a very valid point. Jack had taken people's lives, or rather, giant's lives, for her own thrill.
The star-fairy must have realised that she struck a chord with her, because she then added, "I saw you steal your little cousin's piece of minced meat pie….like, all the time." Jack smiled a little sad smile. "Hey, remember when you were stabbed, and then you were un-stabbed, because I fixed you?" The girl asked in good humour as she raised her white, tunic style, shirt, showing the knife wound, flashing her side. "That was sure nice of me to fix you like that. So nice, that you should open your home to me."
"Oh my God," Jack stopped in her tracks as she studied the injury. The cut was still open, as if the knife had just been removed from it, yet, it did not bleed. "What hap- are you-"Jack looked up to see Desdemona's face. "Are you dead? I- I mean, you are a ghost with a wound that doesn't bleed." The ex-slayer looked back to the wound; reaching her hand out to it, but her fingers fell through her body; proving that she really was some sort of phantom. "You're cold," Jack muttered as her hand past through the other woman.
"Oh, neat," Desdemona smirked, "what does cold feel like?"
Jack straightened her body and cocked her head at the strange question. Right before she was about to respond, she caught glimpse of an elderly lady staring at her from her backyard. "Let's keep moving," she muttered under her breath. Jack took them only about a half a block further before she turned into a backyard, "well, this is it."
Desdemona smiled as she physically walking through the backdoor before Jack could unlock and open it. The ex-slayer chuckled under her breath as she let herself in.
"Jiminy-crickets!" The star-fairy said as she studied the dining-room that was completely buried in marijuana plants. "You're a bong-sling'n, ash-rascal, green-thumb that you can suck high," she grinned like she was impressed. The fairy stood in the middle of the plants and squatted, "I'm a zebra in the jungle!"
"Zebras are in the prairies," Jack corrected her as she rolled her eyes.
"I thought those were groundhogs in the prairies?"
"I think they are too… I don't know, this world is strange."
"I like it!" Desdemona grinned.
"You're just saying that because you are actually on the ground in this world."
"If the glass coffin fits."
"It's 'if the glass shoe fits'," She looked to the star in the plants and swatted the air in front of her, "you know what? Never mind. 'glass coffin' works too."
Jack observed the odd girl who was studying her illegal plants like they were as mystical as an enchanted rose.
She still did not understand all that was happening, but what she did know was that she had not smiled since she had been stabbed, that day up the beanstalk.
"So why are you a ghost, Des?" Jack asked almost more to herself, than to the fairy.
"Hey, you called me 'Des'," the star-fairy smiled. "I like the sound of that. Des," she repeated, "Yes, that's a good one." But her smile soon fell as she looked to Jack. The ex-slayer's heart stopped in that look. That was the look that she remembered, it was the one Desdemona wore when she healed Jack. "I don't know why I'm like this, in this state. I tried to ask the Blue Fairy, but she couldn't see or hear me."
"Well then, let's go," Jack smiled at her.
"To see the Blue Fairy?" Desdemona asked in hope.
"Yep, come on," Jack threw her wad of cash into a cookie jar, before walking to the front door; opening it and locking it up behind her. It wasn't until she was halfway to the sidewalk in front of her house, that the fairy ran through the house wall to catch up.
"Mother superior is literally just up the road here," Jack told her.
"Wait, but, what are you going to say?" Her voice changed into a panic, "Oh rats-nests, she's going to kill me!"
"Kill you?" Jack whipped her head to her in shock.
"Well, no, not kill, kill me, but still! I broke the rules when I saved you. Oh no, wait stop!"
Jack halted right before they reached the lawn at the church, "what?"
"What if she kills you… or I mean, takes your life, because you're supposed to be dead. Maybe, me, staying in this state, is keeping you alive. You can't go talk with her."
Jack thought about what she had said, and was surprised when she realised that she didn't care if she were to die for her star-fairy. Her fairy was truly the only thing that gave her joy. When she was lost and sad, back in their land, she did indeed go outside to look up to her star, and when she listened, she felt alright. Although, it wasn't just alright that she felt, it was love. She needed her because she was her heart.
Wordlessly, Jack walked up to the building, only to find mother superior, along with a few other nuns, gardening outside. Before Jack called out to the woman, she had turned and caught sight of her. She cocked her head to the side before speaking calmly, as she always had, "Jacqueline the giant-slayer."
"Ah, so you know me?"
"Yes, well, you haven't exactly lived your life in terrible discreteness. And you are also the one that, somehow, managed to corrupt one of my own, and have her break the highest magical rule."
"…yeah, that's sort of what I wanted to talk to you about."
"If you're wondering if Desdemona is alive, I am afraid that I do not know. She returned to us in the sky, only to be cast out."
"Yeah, that was so not cool." Desdemona muttered.
"I have lost my magical connection with her as I do with all my other fallen-stars," the Blue Fairy finished.
"Obviously," The ghost-girl made a face at her as she waved her hands through the older woman's body.
"Stop that!" Jack carked under her breath at her friend.
"Excuse me?" The Blue Fairy shook her head at Jack's comment.
"Oh, not you-"
"Don't say it, Jack!" the star-fairy warned her, "just walk away. Bad things are going to happen. Bad, bad things"
"Oh, would you just shhhh?" Jack snapped at her.
"Um" Mother Superior cleared her throat, "Are you—"
"Talking to the most annoying fallen-star ever, the one that only I seem to have the personal pleasure of wanting to rip my own hair out, because I'm the only one who can see and hear her?" Jack had to keep herself from yelling in aggravation, "Yes!"
"Pft, you don't mean any of that," Desdemona muttered.
"Oh, dear," the wise fairy looked to her in both joy and concern. "She is here now?" Jack nodded her head with a tight smile. The Blue Fairy was silent for a moment as she pondered upon it. "Was she a phantom when she fell in our land too?"
Jack looked to Desdemona; raising her eyebrows. "No," the younger fair answered, "I wasn't an anything… I don't think that I was alive. All I remember is waking up here, in Storybrooke."
Jack relayed what she heard to the other fairy. "Hmm," The Blue Fairy thought, "I believe that this is her punishment. She saved you, an unworthy soul, and was to fall and die in our land, but the Queen's curse must have interfered and brought her here, in this state."
"Okay… but why am I the only one who can see her?" Jack asked.
"Well, that's simple. Desdemona didn't simply give up her life for yours, but she physically gave her life to you. You have her soul inside of you."
The three women were all quiet for a while, each doing their own mental processing. Jack finally broke the silence when asking, "If I die, will she get her life back?"
"What?" both fairies asked in unison.
"If I take my blade to my belly, and kill myself like how I was supposed to die. Would it bring Des back?"
"It doesn't matter if it would! You're not doing that!" The young fairy yelled. Jack just ignored her hollers, waiting for an answer.
The Blue Fairy studied her as if she were both shocked and proud of the ex-slayer for the question. "Probably," she said, "However, there may be another way."
"Other way?" Desdemona asked in hope, "Other ways are good! We like other ways that don't involve stupid ideas such as STABBING YOURSELF!" the girl yelled the last part in Jack's ear; where the ex-slayed cringed.
The Blue Fairy continued, "Perhaps, Jacqueline, if you were to prove yourself worthy, you would rewrite Desdemona's wrong; making her decision to save you, an admirable one."
"Would that really work?" Jack needed to hear an absolute from the wise fairy.
"I cannot say for certain, but it should work. As long as you become brave, truthful, and unselfish, you will make your gift-of-life legal in the code of good-magical."
Jack nodded her full head, "Okay."
"Desdemona, guide her. I have faith in you, even though you are the most stubborn fairy-child to ever shine in the night sky." The Blue fairy looked through where the young fair was standing.
The rebel-fairy didn't speak, she only nodded timidly.
"I guess we should go," Jack muttered awkwardly. She had used to be such a charmer with people, but it was odd talking with a woman that knew all her bad traits, a woman who had only just called her 'unworthy.'
The woman nodded, "good luck, ladies," before they turned and wandered off.
"What exactly does a brave, truthful, and unselfish person do?" Jack wondered out loud. "Do I have to start living a boring life like Snow White? Become a teacher and listen to dumb whiny kids all day long?" She raised her top lip in disgust.
"No, that's not being 'truthful'; teachers lie all the time. They tell their children that they're good at everything they attempt, like drawing or singing and stuff."
"Huh," Jack cocked her head in contemplation, "I never thought of that. That's a good point."
"Yeah," the fairy nodded, "Maybe you should just give away your plants to people to cheer them up."
"What? I can't do that! Are you—" Jack stopped when hearing the other girl giggling, "Oh, you're kidding. Ha-ha, you're so funny" she rolled her eyes.
"I know I am," the girl laughed whilst running through the door, into their newly shared house.
That girl was going to drive her up the wall, Jack just knew it, but she never ever wanted her star-fairy to leave her. Jack smiled as she dug out her keys to get back into the house, thinking upon how she was to save her literal soul-mate.