Cora keeps herself to herself with squared shoulders, her cape even rustling in an elegant, regal way. The sound of rushing water roars as she brings Lake Nostos back to life. It settles into a round little pool, enough water for what they need, no longer dried up.

"Dried up, dead, useless, much like you."

She'd physically sunk, Swan, not just her face but her entire being when he told her he wouldn't have left her. Cora produces the ashes out of her cloaks and holds the vial out to him.

"And now the ashes. Would you care to do the honors?"

A peace offering, he gathers, as much a display of trust as someone like Cora can make. With a smile, he takes it, pops the top, and scatters the ashes into the lake. They disappear into the water, sinking, reuniting in a swirling, maddening frenzy until they weave themselves into a whirlpool with just enough of a purple hue to it for anyone to spot its magic. Storybrooke. Where her son is, who needs her, she'd said... Cora utters something about looking forward to seeing her daughter without any hints to her plans once she finds Regina. And just what are your plans once you find Rumpelstiltskin, he asks himself, swallowing just a little. Nothing, his mind answers for him. Just...done.

"Just as I'm done with you."

Gods, there had been no need for all the anger to burst out as it had. She and her mother and her companions languish in an inescapable cell, all but impregnable to anyone who didn't know to look for it, rendering rescue a distant dream. Fitting punishment for her betrayal...perhaps too fitting. He knows how it feels to be left with nothing to do but wait, wait for something you only hope will happen with no evidence it ever will. Her face had gone hard, unreadable, frozen in a cold scowl upon listening to his words, too proud to plead with him more than she already had. He considers leaving the bean, just throwing it out of his pocket at the last second, sporting chance and all that.

"I told you I'd deliver you Rumpelstiltskin," Cora says, holding out the compass. It forces a near double-take out of him, how placing his hand on that compass will bring his destiny right to him. "Now don't let go, unless you want to end up someplace that isn't Storybrooke."

Even though his body goes nowhere, he feels like he lunged. In his mind's eye, he could see himself plunging into the portal...if not for an arrow knocking the compass right out of his hand. Straight across from them, Swan, Mulan, and Snow, the latter just lowering her bow, stare them down.

"You're not going anywhere! This portal's taking us home!" she yells to them. His eyes dart along the sand in search of the compass. Looks like there's still a chance they'll all be going to Storybrooke together, except Aurora. For a ridiculous moment, he wonders what they did to her.

"Find it first," Cora orders. "I'll take care of them."

He spots it, but if he reaches for it now, he'll give away its location. The corner of his eye warns him to draw his sword because somewhere along the line Swan has picked one up and she's running straight for him. With both arms swinging the sword around, she hacks away at the air in front of him, forcing him to block. He blocks again when she attempts to swing with one arm, growing used to its weight, but that's all that can be spoken of favorably in regards to her form. So she resorts to kicking...

With fireballs and arrows slinging around, he rather has the easy end of things, already disarming her. He stands there, wondering if she knows where the compass is and if she'll make a run for it. Grunting, she throws herself into him. It takes nothing to side-step and help her find her way to the ground. She rolls over onto her stomach in a split second, her hand inches from her weapon.

The puerile part of him wins out, choosing to toy with her. After all, Cora will make short work of Snow and Mulan; neither of them can rival her with magic. Bending over, he takes hold of Swan's leg and drags her back. She's even lighter than he thought she'd be.

A flash of something in the air diverts his attention, though. Cora's vanished in a puff of smoke, sending the sack with Aurora's heart flying right above the portal. He has to bend backward to reach it, stretching out his arm as far as it will go, the strap just barely looping over the tip of his hook. Releasing Swan, he tosses it over the portal back to Mulan. Well don't just stand there, he thinks. Get going. Mulan out of the fight, his evil deed undone...well, remedied, anyway, he grins at Mulan's stumped expression, Swan finding time to collect her sword.

"I may be a pirate, but I bristle at the thought of a woman losing her heart—unless it's over me," he tries, hoping that will finally satisfy Mulan. Swan nods at her at the same time Snow sprints over to her shouting, "Go!"

"No! But you need the compass!" Mulan cries.

"And Aurora needs her heart!" He sees her hand over her sword to Snow. Well, a fine time of bonding for everyone then, watching Mulan run off.

"I had no idea you had such a soft side," Swan scoffs, this time walking with the sword instead of charging. She learns, is calculating how she wants to move.

"I don't. Just like a fair fight." He'll take the offensive this time, banging her sword softly at first, only to spring at her. Blocked. He lowers. Blocked. Indeed she does learn. They bring the swords up at the same time, hardly uncrossing during the entire movement.

"Good form," he says. Perhaps in another life, under different circumstances, they could have sparred. Her leg slides out, her footwork the only thing worse than her clunkiness with the weapon. Hooking it up onto his thigh, he grins. "But not good enough." Again, he sends her to the ground. Oh, she'll get through the portal even if he has to knock her in there himself, but in what capacity, still breathing heavily, hair all over the place—he slides his hook down her sword, bracing it with his own, just to see how she'll react.

"Normally, I would prefer to do other, more enjoyable, activities with a woman on her back." There's no way this is lost on her, he thinks, watching how she grits her teeth, how her lip curls up into a sneer. "With my life on the line you've left me no choice. A bit of advice? When I jab you with my sword, you'll feel it." Her eyebrows shoot straight up. No, not lost on her at all. Let her think whatever she wants. "You might want to quit."

They're close enough to the portal, all it would take is a good clenching of her shoulders and a brisk roll to send them both tumbling into it. Anyone else who wants to follow may do so as long as it's with haste.

"Why would I do that when I'm winning?" she murmurs, her inflections uneven and breathless as she holds up the compass. How...he stumbles backward when she kicks him, heaving him off of her. Sword drawn, he blocks a harder attack. Then another. No, she will not cost him Storybrooke. The bean tucked away in his pocket makes no difference, not now that she's growing dangerously closer and closer to besting him yet again. No. Emma Swan is not going through that portal first on her own terms. It takes both his arms and some of his weight to keep her from lifting her sword above her shoulders.

"Thanks!" Before he can wonder for what, everything goes dark.


The wind scatters some sand across his face and into his hair. Blinking a few times, he springs into a crawling position, fetching his sword laying at his side. He bends his wrist down so his hook arm can investigate why the side of his face throbs the way it does, his jaw locked. Opening and closing his mouth a few times, he stretches his jaw as far as it will go. The pain lessens, therefore so does his attention to it, taking in instead the sudden quiet. No whirring of a portal, no feet shuffling around in the sand, nothing.

Cora stands gazing vacantly at the lake. It doesn't take a genius to deduce what happened, everyone else gone. So it will require the bean, he thinks, nodding a little to himself. Why does that not surprise him?

"We failed," she says.

"Really, Cora, after all this time, why do you still doubt me?" Holding up the bean, he wonders just how difficult it would be for the woman to muster a smile, a bit of sincere gratitude once in a while. It wouldn't kill her, after all, to be genuinely pleased, pleased, not satisfied, as there is a difference.

"That bean's petrified. It's useless."

"But these waters have regenerative properties." No change in her face whatsoever. Oh well, he can smile for the both of them. "Perhaps it's time to do some gardening." He'll not risk tossing it in, so he dips it into the water, still holding onto its chain. With no glow or poofing sound, there is no outward sign the bean is any different from other ones. It just takes being able to look at it a certain way, to know, really know, how it will stand out.

"Take it out. Let's see it," Cora says. Only when he brings it out of the water and cups it in his palm does he see it's taken on a white, nigh-transparent quality, luminous. "That should work," she breathes.

"Then it's off to the ship. I hope you don't get seasick."

"Something tells me we won't be out on the water very long." She lifts her arm, contorting it with some flourish, preparing to draw upon some magic.

"Wait."

"I'm sorry," she huffs. "Did you want to take one last look at the scenery?"

"The giant. At the top of the beanstalk," he says through his teeth. He will ignore her snark for now. "What say you to conjuring him up and accompanying us?"

"Why?"

"Just what is it you plan to do after you find Regina?" he asks, choosing his words with care as her eyes burning at him is the clearest sign she will leave without him if he needlessly holds up her time.

"Very well. I would have you guess, but to save time, I plan to find Rumpelstiltskin's dagger and steal his powers." Her arms straighten and position themselves in front of her body, hands clasped together, nonplussed and matter-of-fact. It matches what he supposed from the start, from the moment in Wonderland she decided to spare him. But he must ask just the same.

"You'd overthrow your own daughter?"

"Certainly not," she laughs, reeling her head back. "She'll rule the little town she's created for as long as she wants, but she needs someone to advise her and to prepare the boy for greatness."

"Henry."

"Besides, if she makes a mistake or two, which she will, she can fall back on someone with limitless abilities. What does any of this have to do with the giant at the top of the beanstalk?"

"Surely you don't assume finding that dagger and controlling the Dark One a task everyone in town will be blissfully unaware of? A diversion, namely a giant one, might come in handy, another weapon in your arsenal, as it were." Waiting, he licks his lips and inhales. "Bloodthirsty barbarian, insatiable." He tilts his head, flexing his jaw one last time, wondering just how she'll manage the feat of retrieving Anton, nothing so simple as knocking at his front door.

"With me handling his leash, why not? This bean was his?" He nods as she places her fingertips on it. Closing her eyes, she mouths something indecipherable, then looks up and smiles. "He's secure. Shall we?"

With a sudden cloud of purple smoke obscuring everything around them, it fades away to reveal the pier where the Jolly Roger is docked, waiting for him. Hello, old girl, he thinks, inspecting it for any signs of wear and tear that had not been there when he'd left it. Trim still fresh, sails without tatters or frays, no fallen leaves curled up on the deck—not a bit of wear and tear.

"I'll take it from here," he says, climbing aboard, used to loosening all the lines himself by now. Cora makes her way up the gangplank and smooths a hair back in place, but then he never expected any compliments to his ship from her. Taking the helm, he spins it out of its docked position, the wind just right to send them out towards open sea at a high speed.

"Might want to hold onto something!" he calls to her, hurling the bean out with all his strength. The whirlpool it creates when it hits the water isn't as large as some of the maelstroms he's come across in his travels, and yet it feels just as boundless. He's steered the ship and now the current will do the rest, sending them faster, faster, faster into the oblivion. It's impossible to keep one's eyes open the entire jump from world to world. All one can do is squint through tight eyes at the swirling array of pale colors vaguely resembling water. With a nauseating lurch, the portal launches the ship into the air as if it is spitting it out. In a split second, after feeling his bones will go one direction and his organs another, the Jolly Roger coasts on smooth gray waters.

It looks serene, bland, but serene. A lighthouse near some craggy rocks, white boxy buildings a bit taller than he's seen before. Hard to believe a sleepy-looking village like this is where the crocodile has been hiding all these years. He imagines the horizon as a veil, waiting for him to hold out his hand and brush it to the side.

"There it is."

"Storybrooke."


A/N: Coming up? Adventures in Storybrooke!