A/N: Okay, so I just finished writing 3x11, "Going Home," and if you have any memory of that episode at all, it won't surprise you that I am pretty shaken. Like, as bad as when I first saw it. Tried to sit back and watch clips with a detached, professional attitude, even trying to make fun of a thing here and there ("Regina's flippy hair!"), but getting into character got in the way and now I'm a mess. So. You are getting an update so when I start writing tomorrow, it'll feel like a brand new start and I can enjoy myself a little more.
Rumpelstiltskin lingers while Regina struts out toward them. Lurking back in the shadows with his leathery attire, so many crocodile images stir in his head, still brimming with hate for the man, but even he can't deny this is fortunate. Weaponry, their party has no shortage of, but magic? Who more experienced than the Evil Queen and the Dark One?
"Well, if this is your version of a rescue party, you got here just in time," Regina says.
"What are you two doing here?" Snow asks, her bow lowered.
"Same as you, except we actually have a chance." She gestures at Rumpelstiltskin as he finally approaches, his eyes zeroed in on his son. In his hands, he carries a small cube. "Pandora's Box. It can trap Pan for eternity simply by opening the lid."
"You didn't tell me my father was with her," Neal whispers over at Swan before he can even begin to wonder how they came upon such an object.
"I didn't know," she answers.
"Wait, your father is the Dark One?" Gods, catch up, Tink, he'd fancy snorting at her for her prying earlier, but Neal is too quick.
"Yeah, and he's not getting anywhere near Henry."
"Bae..."
"Why? What are you talking about?" Swan asks, looking every bit as thrown as he must. Last he had even given Rumpelstiltskin a thought, he'd been berating her and bragging about how he would rescue Henry from Neverland's clutches all on his own.
"There's a prophesy that says Henry will be his undoing. He didn't come here to protect him. He came here to kill him."
The words sting. He should be drawing his sword. They all should. But he stands frozen just waiting for elaboration from anyone, Neal to explain it further, Rumpelstiltskin to refute it...or, more likely, confess it. Even Regina gazes stricken at her partner.
"That's why you didn't want to find Neal before we got Henry back? Because you knew he'd spill your secret?" The first statement is a question, the second not nearly as much.
"Everything I did was to protect Henry," he argues, turning to the rest of them. "To rescue him from Pan."
"It makes sense." Swan has drawn her cutlass, so he does the same. "You left before we even made shore!"
Snow follows suit, they all do, weapons at the ready without actually knowing what to do. It doesn't matter. The Dark One just stands there, making a move to strike entirely beneath him.
"You're making a mistake," he says in a hushed voice, his pulse probably not even rising. "I don't care if the boy is destined to be my undoing. I won't hurt him."
"Because that sounds just like you," Regina growls.
"Without me, you will fail. I'm the most powerful amongst us." It is the best argument he can make, the one none of them can truly counter.
"Which is why we can't trust you," Neal says.
"If I could give you my dagger I would, but I can't." Killian raises an eyebrow. Offering up the dagger, even the idea of offering up the dagger, wouldn't be an offer to propose lightly, Regina or Neal or maybe even Tink clever and informed enough to work around its missing status and actually produce it. His grip on the sword tightens, jaw setting at trying to place himself in the man's position, to read any genuine feeling in him. Centuries of believing one person to be the most ruthless monster of all does not simply wither away in a matter of days, but the man loves Belle. She loves him. He loathes that the thought only grows clearer in his mind, but it's possible the man's ability to love extends to his grandson.
"But you can give me Pandora's Box," Neal says. "I don't have to trust you if I can stop you."
Well done, lad, he thinks, and judging by the way Rumpelstiltskin jostles the box like its weight is continually changing, he'll hand it over.
"Son..." A resigned, no, compliant expression comes over him and with a sigh, he surrenders the box to Neal.
"Look at me," he orders. "If you so much as lift a finger to perform magic, you're going to spend eternity in this box." A solemn, silent exchange.
"Let's go!" Swan says, ready to be the first to complete the last leg to the compound.
He's hung back when she hangs back, slowly working her way to the end of their group, stealing a glance over at him enough times to make it clear it's where she wants him. For Henry's health, he doesn't dwell on it, and he knows her well enough to know reenacting what happened the last time she wanted him to hang back with her is as far from her mind as they are from Storybrooke.
"We need to talk," she says, taking hold of his arm. Apparently just being distanced from her parents is enough for discussion since Regina, Neal, and Rumpelstiltskin tarry behind them.
"I find when a woman says that I'm rarely in for a pleasant conversation."
"There has to be way for David to leave the island," she says, and he would love nothing more than to tell her of some magical item in some hidden corner of the island made to do exactly what she wants. Not having a happy ending is bad enough, but giving someone unrealistic hope is worse.
"Well there isn't."
"He told me about your brother, what happened...I know it can't be easy to talk about, but-"
"Then let's not, shall we?" So apparently Snow is not the only one in the family who struggles to keep her mouth shut. That's a fine thing, David spouting off to anyone who will listen about private, soul-crushing...did he mention private...personal information... But it's Emma that is asking and she's not quite prone to saying more at a time than she should. "The water that cured David from dreamshade is connected to the island. If he leaves, the connection is broken and the poison will kill him."
"What if we take some of the water us? That way he stays connected. He can stay alive in Storybrooke." She's talking it out, her gestures larger than usual. It's piteous, he thinks, shaking his head. She normally does so well for someone not at all acquainted with magic being real until recently. Sadly he knows just what leaving Neverland will do to her father.
"For how long?" he asks, stopping to face her, hoping reason, even if it's cold, will keep her from trying it. "Once the water runs out, the dreamshade will take his life." She starts to exhale, closing her eyes for a brief second and he wishes like nothing else he knew of something, anything, even if it's relocating the entire waterfall and spring to Storybrooke.
"Unless there was another cure."
They look over at the same time at Rumpelstiltskin, a great deal closer to his usual self than he was before. He holds his breath, ready to hear it firsthand—the Dark One spinning a tale that ends with just the solution a desperate soul needs for a price no one should be willing to pay. He has half a mind to hoist her up onto his shoulder and run out of earshot with her, but all it takes is one word from her lips that no one hears that often, "yes," to strike the deal, and he can't prevent that.
"You're suddenly interested in what I have to say?" He smirks as he nears them. "I thought I wasn't to be trusted."
"You're not," she snaps back. "But I'll take my chances." Circles her like a shark.
"Well, if you'll remember, I too was poisoned with dreamshade by a cowardly pirate, and yet-"
"Yes, and we know how you cured yourself," she interrupts, gesturing a cutting motion with her hand to end his spiel. "The candle that takes another person's life—David is not that selfish."
"How noble. The point is after my near-death experience, I discovered much about the poison." No, no, don't listen, love, he cringes, watching surprise wash over her stoic expression. "I believe I could create an elixir back in my shop."
"What's your price?" she demands.
"Well, this is quite the favor. I'd expect one of equal weight when we return." Bloody hell, he'll take it, he'll do whatever dirty work the Dark One will have conjured for the Savior to do, but he keeps his eyes on her, willing her, silently begging her to dismiss the idea altogether. Her mouth does not even open. Rumpelstiltskin moves to catch up with the others. Good. Good, they can be alone and she'll hear him out.
"No," Neal says, breaking the silence. "When we get back to Storybrooke, you're going to save David because it's the right thing to do. No deals, no favors. Understand?"
She looks at him and Killian looks back, answering what he knows to be her question still finding its wording, knows it as surely as he knows the hypothetical price will result in her hating herself. Yes, he will listen to his son.
"Fine," Rumpelstiltskin whispers. "I'll do as you ask."
Well done again, he thinks, stifling the temptation to smile with the Dark One so close. Here was the boy, dormant underneath all the hurt and hard times that created such a jaded grown man.
"I'll go tell David," she says, stunned with fragile hope, dazed, even. It's how she would sound upon just waking up, and the slightest pangs of jealousy flick at him for Neal being the one who caused it. She starts off only for Tink and David to run up from the front of the group.
"We're here," Tink says. "Pan's perimeter."
"It's time. Tink will sneak us in the back like we planned." She waits a second for her mother and Regina to join in this little haphazard huddle. "We'll grab Henry. In and out. Simple. You good with Pan patrol?"
"Locked and loaded," Neal says, an unfamiliar phrase. However, the motion of tapping the satchel with the coconut in it explains it.
"You mind if I, uh..." There had to be some magic involved in Rumpelstiltskin unsheathing his own sword and drawing it out like it was his own, Killian thinks, teeth clenching. He takes a step only for the man to hold out his hand. "..borrow this? You said no magic and I agreed, but I'm not walking in there with nothing but my good looks."
"Now I, on the other hand..." he begins. Ass! He could use all the magic in the world and be trapped in the damn box for all he cared after that. Stealing a man's sword, his only sword—bad form.
"Here, in case your good looks fail you," David says, tossing him a sword.
"Thanks, mate." Still unfamiliar, others coming through for him, namely princes...
"Let's get Henry," Swan says.
"They've been here a long while," he says, stepping around the horde of unconscious Lost Boys, Snow and David doing the same, the former with an arrow still prepared in her bow. "This might have been where they'd been keeping Henry the majority of the time."
"Is anyone not here? Other than Henry and Pan?" Snow asks him, her head angling when she peers down at the children, her face wrinkling into one of distress.
"No," he says after doing a quick scan. "No wherever they are, they're alone."
"And that can't be good," Tink breathes.
The others return after answering the mysterious cries for help, Neal with a small girl in his arms, almost carrying her. About twelve or thirteen years old, by the look of her, in just a nightdress and red-rimmed eyes. He'd heard stories after he and Bae parted ways, stories of the Wendy Lady that Pan kept as a maid of sorts. However, these last several weeks have taught him much is often lost in translation when passing stories onward, and he'd heard just as many stories that the Wendy was nothing more than a bird.
"Here now," Neal says, taking one of the blankets off the clothesline and wrapping it around her. Other than the wizened look in her eyes that betrays what her true age should be, the girl looks to be in decent condition, obviously one of Pan's toys he felt had been worth preserving. "Okay, Wendy." Ah, he'd been right. The Wendy Lady. "Now since you've been here, have you seen my son? His name's Henry." He's knelt down next to her, speaking softly and with the patience a father would indeed have towards a child.
"You have a son?" she asks after a moment's hesitation.
"Yeah, and Pan needs his heart."
"Has he said anything about 'the heart of the truest believer?'" Swan tries. There is a beat before Wendy starts shaking her head.
"No. I'm sorry. He never mentioned anything about a heart."
"She's lying," Rumpelstiltskin hisses, pointing at the girl with the tip of a sword that doesn't belong to him. "Where is he?"
"Whoa!" David reaches him first, restraining him. Neal also moves in for reinforcement, for it does bloody well look like the Dark One is about to unleash all his wrath on no one more than a frightened child. "What the hell are you doing?"
"I've carried enough lies in my life to recognize that burden. She knows where Henry is!"
He believes him, and if he didn't, the way she drums her upside-down cup with her fingers gives her away. Yet this girl is no Lost Boy, no loyalty to Pan at all. Even the little ones still attempt to play with Pan at times, trying to win him over with their friendship so he'll stop tormenting them. Neal, fortunately, knows enough of all that to ask the right questions, asking her for the truth with a gentleness she most likely hasn't heard in a long while.
"You don't understand," she begins.
"You're helping Pan?" Snow blurts out.
"He's keeping John and Michael alive...only if I do what he says."
"Trust me, whatever he's promised, he will go back on his word," Rumpelstiltskin warns her with a knowing tone.
"And why should I trust a man who abandoned his own son?" she counters, and again, Killian finds himself pleasantly surprised by newly-discovered spirit.
"Because your brothers did," Regina says. Striking how, when she wants, she seems perfectly capable of relating to children. "They trusted a woman named Belle. They helped her get this box so we can defeat Pan."
"They're okay?" she asks at the same time he wonders how the two of them, three, counting Belle, transferred an item from one world to another. He can ask, later, Regina probably the one most willing to gloat and show off her knowledge for him. Last he knew, one needed a bean or some such magical item to reach into another land, not merely send objects back and forth.
"For now and only if we succeed," Regina answers. Neal has knelt next to her again, his hand on her arm.
"Wendy, we'll save John and Michael, I swear to God, but right now I really need your help. Please."
"Pan told Henry that he needs his heart to save magic, but it's a lie. He needs it to save himself."
"What do you mean?" he finally asks. An immortal does not need saving, but too many attempts on the hellion's life, too many lost tempers and bouts of roughhousing-turned-deadly, proved over the years mortal instruments do not work on Peter Pan.
"Pan's dying," she explains. "He needs the heart of the truest believer to absorb all the magic in Neverland, and once he does, he will be immortal, all-powerful."
Such resignation in her voice. All these years, he thinks, there were ways. There were ways to bring about this spawn of evil's destruction that would have resulted in Henry never even being brought here in the first place.
"And what happens to Henry?" Snow asks, inching towards Swan, whiter than a fresh sail but holding it together still.
"Well it's a trade. When Pan lives Henry will die."
It jolts Swan out of her sitting position and she crosses over to the far end of the group, isolating herself as she always does when preparing for the next mission.
"How do we stop Pan?" David asks.
"Pan took Henry to Skull Rock, but you haven't much time."
"Then we'll stay behind," David offers, nodding his head. "Someone needs to guard the Lost Boys when they wake up."
"You don't need to stay behind," Swan says, finding her voice firm and strong once again.
"David's right. Get him home. Tell him we love him." Snow stands up next to him. Ah, that explains the extra sense of urgency, he thinks, clenching his fist. They were both going to leave her, again. It forces him into the grossly hypothetical situation of staying with her and leaving any future, potential, as-stated-hypothetical children they would have to fend for themselves...stop this train of thought now, he orders himself, wiping it clear from his mind with only the original, gut-wrenching thought remaining—Emma Swan was going to be left alone again.
"Tell him yourself. When you get back from Dead Man's Peak. Gold can cure you back in Storybrooke. We just need to bring some of the water back with us," she says.
It's all Snow has to hear to rush for her daughter and throw her arms around her, the heights working out just right so each one can rest their chin on the other's shoulder. He suppresses a small smile at David standing there, dumbstruck, before rushing forward himself and just clutching Emma's hand.
"You never give up," Snow whispers to her before turning her head in Rumpelstiltskin's direction. "Thank you."
"Apparently that's the only thanks I need these days," he mutters.
"Tink and I will take care of things here," he says, not bothering to ask the fairy how that suits her, nor acknowledging her reaction, whatever it may be. "Meet you back at the Jolly Roger when you find Henry."
"Promise me if your father and I don't make it back, you get him home," he hears Snow plea, the split second of fear on Emma's face quickly latching onto the strength she'd found before.
"We're all going home together."
David nods to this, cupping her cheek for a moment before kissing it and heading out into the jungle.
He disassembles their clothesline before he'll use up any of his own rope on them, still sprawled out over the jungle floor like casualties of some night of drunken debauchery.
"Here," he calls to Tink. "Untie that one over there and we can use these." Half-expecting a question as to them really needing to restrain them, he reminds himself she lived in Neverland long after he left. Shaking his head at himself, he longs for her to start up some subject for them to discuss, to take his mind off of what all could be happening over at Skull Rock. He wasn't worried...per se...seeing as how Emma seemed to manifest magic on her own with more and more ease and had the support of the Evil Queen and the Dark One. He wasn't worried. He just wondered.
"Tempted to slit Felix's throat right here and now," Tink says, coming over to him and slicing the clothesline in half with her knife. She hands him one half and slides the other more than an arm's length from the Lost Boys should they wake.
"After you help me here..." he gestures at the rope he's wrapped around the boys' hands. "If you lose your temper, I won't hold you back." She kneels down and ties a secure knot. Used to be an everyday chore for him and now he's reduced to merely supervising others' work.
"Not in front of the little ones. Let's get these two over here." She's in front of him, but lingers and spins around, walking backwards. Her mouth hangs open for a minute before she clamps it shut.
"Out with it."
"I'm a little confused. Regina didn't kidnap Henry from Emma and Bae a long time ago, did she?"
"She adopted him. I'm not privy to all the details." The very first conversation with Cora, when she herself couldn't wrap her head around a child being raised by others when his parents couldn't do so. It would make sense for Tink to be unable to understand it, or at least be a foreign concept to her. Fairies never seemed all that in touch with the more gritty side of life, and in Neverland, the children raised themselves with no adult volunteers to be found. Recalling Cora, all this talk of hearts...he might not ever live it down if he asks her, but no one else is around and perhaps only a fairy would know.
"Have you ever heard of a person not being able to take out another's heart?" The Lost Boy he's nearest stirs, rubbing his eyes. A shame there's not enough material around here to gag them all as well.
"Why?"
"Curiosity." It's a haze, of course, since someone had issued him quite the blow back at Lake Nostos lifetimes, weeks, ago, but he didn't dream it. He'd seen the look of utter shock on Cora's face, following it with unfocused eyes to where it stayed planted on Swan, equally shocked her heart wasn't being ripped out and crushed into dust right then and there. And then that white blast that shook up the whole place and applied enough pressure to him to keep him down and dazed...
"There are spells that can be done, good magic, usually," she says, clapping her hands together at seeing their task finished, her face with a definite "and now we wait" look about it.
"And a Savior's? One destined to break a curse?"
"A Savior would have an untold amount of power, all depending on the person and just where he or she draws that power from." She looks at him and now it's time for the taunting, this unrelenting compulsion she has to pair everyone up and push, push, push. "You're worried."
"Don't tell me I ought not to be," he warns.
"Oh no, I'm worried, too." Well, that isn't the most reassuring thing she could have said. "But there's hope in the air, too, and hope hasn't been around for a long, long time."
