FURTHER DISCLAIMER FOR CHAPTER: The cloud is evil, so take what some of its incarnations say with a grain of salt.
In the Evil Queen's Basement
August kept his head down as he made his way to the police station, and he slipped inside and, with only a little assistance from an officer milling about with a coffee, found his way to the Sheriff's office. Through the doorway, he spotted Emma and a blonde girl talking. The blonde girl mentioned the victims, Jefferson and Belle, and Augst leaned against the door. "Talkin' about the kidnapping?" he asked.
Both women snapped their heads toward him, and Emma shot back as much as the chair allowed. She blanched, whereas the other conversant was only mildly surprised. "What...August...but...I don't...you...in your room...I was there...save...puppet..." Emma babbled.
"Short version, the only one I'm really sure of the details on, is that the Blue Fairy used the magic Rumpelstiltskin brought back to bring me back to life."
"Oh, yeah," the other girl said, gesturing to him. "I heard your story."
"You have? Oh, so you must be from the future or something."
"How come you two act like this is the most normal thing in the world?" Emma asked.
"Because this place is pretty much cursed," August said. "Anyway, that's not why I'm here. I'm here because I want to add my bit to the kidnapping investigation."
OUAT
Bae and Morraine walked down Main Street as casually as they could manage, both trying to remember the exact way to Regina's castle. At one point, when several citizens looked at them strangely, Morraine laced her fingers through Bae's. "They'll ask fewer questions," she explained in a low voice, but Bae suspected that she had an ulterior motive.
A large, black-clad man glared at them, and Bae squeezed Morraine's hand almost instinctively. He watched him, and once they finally passed him, he turned his gaze to their path.
They turned one final corner, and the mansion loomed before them. Morraine released Bae's hand, and he fell in behind her. "Alright, how do we get to the basement?" he asked.
"We go in the way we did before, if we can," she replied, "and then make our way down."
"Alright."
They walked around to the back and spotted the window to the boy's bedroom, just as it had been for their first break-in. "He must know we're working for the same side," Bae whispered.
"Fantastic," she replied, moving toward the wall and scaling it. Bae followed more closely than he had the first time he climbed this wall, and they slipped into the room almost at the same time. Morraine walked over to the door, opened it, and peered out down both directions of the hallway. When she pulled back, she turned to Bae and asked, "Do you feel anything?"
Bae closed his eyes and breathed slowly. "No, but there might be others here who don't use magic."
"Can we get past them?"
"If we're quiet."
"Then let's move."
"Carefully."
"Of course."
Morraine slipped out through the doorway, and Bae followed.
They padded to the ground level and exchanged a look. She walked around the stairs to the living room, in the back corner of which was another door. They crept toward it, and Morraine gingerly worked it open, waiting for it to creak. It didn't.
Morraine glanced at the contents of the closet and shook her head before closing it as gently as she opened it. They slipped back into the foyer and around the stairwell, toward the glass door. Bae placed a hand on her shoulder and gestured to another door, this one right under the stairwell. She nodded, and he opened it as gingerly as she had opened the first door. The chamber beyond was pitch black save the square of light from the other side of the doorway. When Bae took a step forward, he found himself standing on a cold stone platform. He looked over to Morraine and nodded to her. She stepped onto the platform and closed the door completely.
"Sorry," she whispered to him. Judging by the feel of her breath on his skin, she was within inches of him. He blushed and took her hand. He felt around with his toe and then stepped down.
"It's safe," he whispered, reaching out to the wall.
Morraine touched her side of the wall, and they moved slowly down a series of stairs. "Bae, how are we to identify our hostages? This place is black as pitch?"
"By voice."
"What are you, nuts?"
"If there's no other light source, no."
They continued on in silence. The lower the stairwell went, the damper the air and stone became, and the more it seemed as if the darkness would last forever and the stairwell would lead to nowhere.
Finally, when they moved to go down another step, they found themselves standing on another platform. "Did we make it?" Morraine asked in a low voice.
"I hope so," Bae replied. "I have no way of knowing where we are."
"Look." Her eyes drifted to a small, barred rectangle of light straight ahead, several feet above them.
"Sweet light," they whispered at the same time.
"How far under are we?" he asked.
"Not too far, apparently."
Bae took a deep breath. "Hello?" he asked at a normal volume. Something shuffled in the corner. "Anyone there?" The soft shuffling came again. It reminded Bae of something like fabric. "Left," he whispered to his companion. At his previous volume, he said, "It's alright. We're here to help you, bring you to safety." The rustling continued, getting louder. "Are you unhurt?"
"We can help get you out of here," Morraine said, inching toward the corner the sounds indicated. Bae followed closely so as not to lose her silhouette in the terrible light. "Will you give some sign that you can hear us?" The rustling gave one final burst, as if the fabric were collapsing in on itself. Morraine almost backed into Bae. "We should go now. I don't like this."
Bae looked over his shoulder at what he could now see of the stairwell. He lay a hand on her shoulder and guided her toward it, keeping his sensitivity tuned toward what was behind him.
Something drifted over the floor. The hair on Bae's neck stood up. "Do you still have that knife?" Bae asked. She brandished it, and it flashed in what little light there was. The reflection floated across a dark cloud for its brief existence. "We're not alone." She held the knife to the light again, carefully directing the light toward the cloud.
"Another wraith?" she asked.
"I don't know."
"Let's get out of here before we can find out."
Together, the kids inched toward the stairwell, Morraine guiding their movements so as to best track the cloud. It still rolled in front of them and maybe slightly to the side, but Bae felt something behind him and lay a hand on Morraine's shoulder to stop her from moving. "It's behind us, too," he breathed. "We're surrounded."
"I've got a feeling we need more than my knife to save us."
"From a sensitive's perspective, yes."
The smoke cloud suddenly swept upward, obscuring the rectangle of light and plunging Bae and Morraine into total darkness. "M? M?" Bae asked.
"I'll try not to leave you if I can help it," Morraine replied.
"What was it using to trick us?"
"What are you talking about?"
"It's just a thought. If we can unravel its trick, it might let us live."
"Or kill us outright."
"It's worth a shot. Come left with me."
She took his hand, and he moved in what he hoped was the right direction. "You'd better know what you're doing," she said harshly. "If you get killed, I have to explain to Rumpelstiltskin that it's not my fault, and you have no idea how much I don't want that."
"I can feel it, M. I'm keeping track of it." Bae held his free hand in front of him, feeling for the wall, and once he reached it, he felt for the corner and knelt slowly. His hand drifted to the floor and...satin. "I knew it," he breathed.
"Great. Now let's find our way out of this mess before we're killed."
"Alright, alright." Bae and Morraine stood and pressed their backs to the wall, inching their way to the stairwell.
Pain shot through Bae's arm, and he let out a cry and sank to his knees, his arm pressed to his chest. He thought he heard Morraine call his name, but the sound was muffled, or he was hallucinating. He couldn't be sure. Wherever the smoke touched him, his skin stung. It forced him back against the wall, just for want of avoiding contact with it.
Fear settled heavily into his gut. Whatever this thing was, it didn't want him to leave.
"Well, well, well," a cold, chilling voice said. Bae felt a presence drifting through the smoke, and the picture of the beggar that arrived before his father became the Dark One popped into his mind. "It's little Hobblefoot's son."
"What do you want with me?" Bae asked.
The presence chuckled. "You still sound so naive, so childish. You sound like you're going to be the hero and your father will love you."
"What do you know?"
"All he cares about is the power. All he cares about is being important and influential. You should've figured that out by now, with him letting you go through that hell called Sherwood alone."
"And he's all the better for it. He wasn't trapped in a terrible hallucination with no hope of getting out until he was free of the Ring. You know nothing of Sherwood."
"This one is fiery, still very youthfull. Perhaps he needs to be reminded." Out of the mist, an image formed: his father keeping hold of his hand as he dangled over a green vortex. Then, in one moment, the equilibrium, that one moment when he hoped his father would agree to follow, was destroyed. He was released. "He chose his power over you, kid. He let you go so you could fend for yourself. How do you feel about that?" Bae fell silent, and the beggar's presence laughed. "See that, kid? He doesn't deserve you."
"Shut up and get back," Bae yelled, shooting to his feet and bursting forward. The cloud seemed to shrink away from him. "It doesn't matter whether my father let me go or not. None of that matters now, and don't you dare think you can say any different. No matter how hard you try, I will never listen to you."
"Then you honestly believe that he would follow you."
"If he had the means, yes."
"If there was another magic bean, you mean?"
"Yes."
"Not like the Blue Fairy would give it to him. Not like he'd take it." The presence's last sentence was said quickly, and Bae found an opportunity.
"Why wouldn't the Blue Fairy give him a magic bean? I thought she said his magic didn't belong in that world."
"You stupid, snot-nozed, pint-sized little brat," a female voice snapped. Bae turned to his right, where a copy of the Blue Fairy hovered. "Your pathetic excuse for a father was the key to my getting every other magic user in one place and without powers. My only mistake was getting caught up in it, but hey." She shrugged. "Live and learn, and besides, with the magic back, all I have to do now is wait for them to kill each other, and I'll be the only one left standing, and the most powerful. The world will come to me for its magic."
"And what of the lands beyond the Enchanted Forest? Do you have any influence there, or do you simply not care?"
"They already feel my influence, the fey beyond the Black Forest."
"So you don't care."
"Exactly."
"Except, the only way to kill the Dark One is with his dagger, thus acquiring his powers, and the cycle continues. I'm absolutely certain that if what you say is true, you don't want to put up with that." Bae couldn't help but let out a laugh, and he turned in the general direction of the beggar presence, who had yet to show himself. "I take it you're the Dark One before my father. What did he say your name was? I know it was an easy one to remember." He felt the presence flinch. "Ah, yes. I've got it now. You're Zoso. This whole thing is made the spirits of Dark Ones past, trapping me in an evil queen's basement, possibly to die. I've got a question for you, then. What does she have over you?"
The presence, the entire smoke cloud, shifted position. Bae noticed that the copy of the Blue Fairy had disappeared. Bae turned his full attention to Zoso, patiently awaiting the former Dark One's answer. Finally, Zoso sighed and said. "Listen, kid. I've been dead for centuries, and the rest of us, the gods know how long, but because of that goddamn knife-sorry-"
"It's fine."
"Because of that goddamn knife, I've been conscious for every second of it. Regina promised us that we would finally find some peace if I helped her make sure the hostages never get found."
Bae closed his eyes and waited. "I feel your magic, even as a ghost, but I do not feel a deal," he said. "She lied to you."
"Wait...you're a sensitive?"
"You're figuring this out now? I thought all magical beings could feel one another."
"Sometimes it's hard to tell."
"That aside, we haven't found anyone, and you are not officially bound by contract. What sense is there in keeping me here?"
The cloud pulled away from him, for a brief moment revealing the rectangle of light and a crumpled satin dress in the corner of the room, the very dress that had tricked him and Morraine. "The kid's got a point," Zoso said, suggesting that he was talking to someone else, but Bae didn't want to ask about it. "We're not bound the way we used to be. There is no contract this time. We were just ordered, and the promise was an afterthought. Maybe we can make a real, formal deal with the kid. He breaks the knife some kind of ways, in exchange for...whatever he asks for, I guess."
"That makes it sound like breaking the knife isn't as easy as driving it into the trunk of a tree and ripping the hilt off," Bae said to the cloud. "It also sounds pretty dangerous, what with the return of magic and all."
"Oh, it's dangerous, alright," Zoso said, addressing Bae directly. "You break that thing, your father drops dead."
Unless he's dead already, Bae thought, quashing the notion before he sensed that Zoso or any other presence in the cloud could hear it. "I have a feeling there may be a way," he said. "I can't be sure if this is so or if it can be done, but I have a feeling."
"Don't you dare think you're going to drag us all through hell and back on the word of a sensitive," the Blue Fairy copy's voice snapped.
"I suspect possibly that you are all the Dark Ones that were ever slain. But why the Blue Fairy?"
"Wish I knew," Zoso said. "She's not talkin'."
"Alright, I won't ask."
"Anyway, back to business." Bae felt a chill in the air. "You said you can feel a way to break the knife."
"I have a vague notion."
"And you already know that if you break that knife, we can finally get some peace."
"Yes."
Zoso's form, still that of the beggar that Bae was familiar with, stepped out of the cloud, which had shifted again to reveal the rectangle of light. "I say we make a deal, for real. The terms are, you break the knife, however you intend to go about it, in exchange for...well, what do you want?"
Think this through, Bae, he told himself. This is a serious matter, and you don't have a lot of dealing experience. "How do I know you won't go back on me?" he asked.
"We're all former Dark Ones; you said it yourself. We can't break deals. Well, except maybe her."
"The fairy?" The answer was in Zoso's eyes, and Bae accepted it, though he wasn't sure what to do with this little bit of knowledge. If anything, he could ask August about it later. He returned his attention to the deal at hand.
So the ghosts of Dark Ones past can't break deals, Bae thought. But this was still very serious. He bit his lip and eyed Zoso. He probably would've agreed to break the knife, anyway, but someone had proposed a deal, and judging by the chill that had raced up his spine, this was something he couldn't walk away from. He had to seal the deal, but he had to do it just so.
Something flashed through his mind, a fact that was the basis of an idea. He said, "I'll break the knife, in exchange for one favor, to be called in at a time of my choosing. Anything at all."
"Deal," Zoso said, holding his hand in the space between them.
Bae waited a moment more, checking to make sure the surrounding magic accepted the terms, before shaking the ghost's hand. "Deal," he said.
"Well, you get on out of here. Can't do us any good stuck in a basement."
"Thank you."
The cloud pulled back, leaving Bae a clear path to the stairwell. When he reached the foot of the steps, he looked back at the cloud, but Zoso's spirit had rejoined it. He turned back to the stairs and made his way up, mentally preparing himself for the inevitable onslaught of light that awaited him on the surface.
No sooner had Bae reached the top landing than the door burst open with such force that it almost slammed into the opposite wall. He jumped back, almost falling back down the steps. "What are you trying to do, kill me?" he asked, recovering himself and taking a tentative step toward the man standing in the doorway.
"Are you hurt?" the man asked. "Are you unwell? Did anything happen to you?"
"I'm perfectly fine." Bae stepped past the man into the light of the hallway, wincing and waiting until his eyes adjusted. He walked down the hall to the foyer, and another man tried to guide him through the front door, but he shrugged the hand off. His mind was heavy with everything that had just happened, and there were only two people he wanted to see right now.
The sun was much harsher than the artificial light of the castle, but again, he adjusted. A crowd had gathered on the street behind yellow ribbon. He noticed that Morraine's face relaxed upon seeing him, as if she'd been staring at the front door, worried, the entire time he was gone. Rumpelstiltskin and a well-covered August stood side by side a short distance away from her.
Rumpelstiltskin held up the ribbon, allowing Bae to pass underneath, and as soon as he was able, Bae threw his arms around his father's shoulders and buried his face in his neck. Rumpelstiltskin held his son tightly. August's mouth curled into a smile, though neither seemed to notice.
"Can I go home?" Bae whispered.
"Yes, Bae," Rumpelstiltskin replied. "You can come home."
